Hindu Notes from General Studies-02

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Cabinet okays changes in laws to optionally share Aadhaar to get mobile phone connections, banking

News

• The Union Cabinet approved amending the existing laws to provide legal backing for seeding of biometric ID Aadhaar with mobile numbers and bank accounts as an optional KYC after the Supreme Court barred mandatory use of 12-digit unique identifier by private firms.

Beyond News

• The Cabinet approved amendments to the Telegraph Act and the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) after the Supreme Court in September imposed restrictions on the use of Aadhaar by private companies.
• Two Acts will be amended to provide for voluntary sharing of the 12-digit identification number for obtaining new mobile phone connections and for the opening of bank accounts.
• The changes in the relevant sections of the Telegraph Act and PMLA will be effected through the original Aadhaar Act. A bill in this regard could be moved in the ongoing Winter Session of Parliament and would clarify that the changes in the two Acts are being made through the principal Aadhaar law.
• Under the amendments, an Aadhaar holder can opt for offline verification through QR code and will not require to share his or her actual Aadhaar number.
• The Supreme Court had struck down Section 57 of the Aadhaar Act that made seeding of the biometric ID with SIMs and bank accounts mandatory, saying it had no legal backing.
• To overcome this lacuna, the Telegraph Act is being amended to provide legal backing for the issuance of mobile SIMs through Aadhaar.
• Similarly, the amendment to the PMLA will give individuals option to link their bank accounts to Aadhaar in the KYC option.
• Under the amendments, the government has proposed an imprisonment of up to 10 years for attempting to hack Aadhaar data. Currently, the punishment for this offence is 3 years.

Child who has been enrolled for Aadhaar through his/her parents will have an option to opt out of Aadhaar data base after attaining age of 18 years.

Japan to buy more stealth jets, radar to counter China, Russia

News

• Japan will accelerate spending on advanced stealth fighters, long-range missiles and other equipment over the next five years to support U.S. forces facing China’s military in the Western Pacific.

Beyond News

• The plans are the clearest indication yet of Japan’s ambition to become a regional power as a military build-up by China and a resurgent Russia puts pressure on its U.S. ally.
• The United States, followed by China, North Korea and Russia, are the countries that most influenced Japan’s latest military thinking.
• China, the world’s second biggest economy, is deploying more ships and aircraft to patrol waters near Japan, while North Korea has yet to fulfil a pledge to dismantle its nuclear and missile programmes.
• Japan plans to buy 45 Lockheed Martin Corp F-35 stealth fighters, worth about $4 billion, in addition to the 42 jets already on order.
• The new planes will include 18 short take off and vertical landing (STOVL) B variants of the F-35 that planners want to deploy on Japanese islands along the edge of the East China Sea.
• The islands are part of a chain stretching past Taiwan and down to the Philippines that has marked the limit of Chinese military dominance east of the disputed South China Sea.
• The new F-35 order may also help Japan avert a trade war with the United States.
• Japan plans to spend 25.5 trillion yen ($224.7 billion) on military equipment over the next five years, 6.4 percent higher than the previous five-year plan. Cost-cutting will free up another 2 trillion yen for purchases, the procurement paper said.
• Japan only spends about 1 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on defence, but the size of its economy means it already has one of the world’s largest militaries.
• The defence papers assessed non-traditional military threats as well. A new joint-forces cyber unit will bolster Japan’s defences against cyber attacks. More electronic warfare capabilities are planned.
• Japan’s air force will also get its first space unit to help keep tabs on potential adversaries high above the Earth’s atmosphere. ($1 = 113.4800 yen)

Hindu Notes from General Studies-03

Unusual star forming like a planet spotted

News

• Instead of finding a planet, astronomers have detected a star forming in the outer regions of the disc of dust and gas surrounding a massive star.

Findings

• The main object, referred to as MM 1a, is a young massive star surrounded by a rotating disc of gas and dust that was the focus of the scientists’ original investigation.
• When these clouds collapse under gravity, they begin to rotate faster, forming a disc around them. In low mass stars like our Sun, it is in these discs that planets can form.
• By measuring the amount of radiation emitted by the dust, and subtle shifts in the frequency of light emitted by the gas, the researchers were able to calculate the mass of MM 1a and MM 1b.
• They found that MM 1a weighs 40 times the mass of our Sun. The smaller orbiting star MM 1b was calculated to weigh less than half the mass of our Sun.
• Binary stars are often very equal in mass, and so likely formed together as siblings. Finding a young binary system with a mass ratio of 80:1 is very unusual, and suggests an entirely different formation process for both objects.
• The astronomers made this surprising discovery by using a new instrument situated high in the Chilean desert – the Atacama Large Millimetre/submillimetre Array (ALMA).

Nuclear-powered ‘tunnelbot’ to search for life on Europa

News

• Scientists are designing a nuclear-powered “tunnelbot” that can penetrate through the icy shell of Jupiter’s moon Europa and search for signs of life in its sub-surface ocean.
• Between 1995 and 2003, NASA’s Galileo spacecraft made several flybys of Jupiter’s moon, Europa.

Beyond News

• Several findings from observations of the moon pointed to evidence of a liquid ocean beneath Europa’s icy surface.
• Researchers believe that the ocean could harbour microbial life, or evidence of now-extinct microbial life.
• While scientists generally agree on where to look underneath the thick, planet-wide ice shell where water is in contact with a rocky core and where biochemical ingredients for life may exist how to get there to collect samples remains a major tactical problem.

IAF airlifts 463 tonnes of load to Ladakh region in a single wave

 News

• In a demonstration of the ‘rapid airlift capability’ of the Indian Air Force (IAF) for response during times of war and natural disasters, the Western Air Command (WAC) airlifted a record 463 tonnes of load from Chandigarh to airfields and drop zones in the Ladakh region in a single wave.

Beyond News

• This was accomplished with a fleet of 16 fixed wing transport aircraft comprising of C-17 Globemaster, the Il-76 and medium lift An-32 aircraft.
• All aircraft were loaded and took off from Chandigarh airbase early in the morning. The entire wave was accomplished in little less than six hours.
• The WAC is entrusted with the air maintenance of the entire northern region of the country and under normal operating circumstances airlifts close to 3,000 tonnes of load per month.
• Airlift of approximately 500 tonnes, in the achieved time frame, in a single wave, happens to be a record which enhances the assessment of the Commands’ capability towards rapid and heavy airlift.
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Over 100 hectares of invasive plants removed in Mudumalai tiger reserve

News

• Mudumalai Tiger Reserve (MTR) officials have removed over 100 hectares of invasive Lantana camara plants over the last year, ensuring that herbivores had more food available to them during the lean summer months.

Beyond News

• Though there is enough fodder in the core area of the tiger reserve currently, they are undertaking measures to ensure that conditions are suitable for regeneration of grasslands within the reserve.
• The removal of Lantana camara plants could potentially lead to an increase in carrying capacity within the reserve.
• They are also monitoring the availability of water in the core area and will step in and fill up artificial water troughs located in the core zone if the need arises, while salt licks have already been placed near watering holes.
• Forest department officials said they were monitoring whether there was regeneration of Lantana or Eupatorium in areas where they had been removed.

IAF plane takes to the air on blended bio-fuel

News

• For the first time, an An-32 transport aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) flew with blended bio-jet fuel produced from Jatropha oil, unlocking the possibility of gradually expanding it to the entire service at some point.
• This has the dual benefit of reducing the carbon footprint as well as usage of fossil fuels.

Beyond News

• India had thus joined a league of select nations to have “developed, tested and certified” a single step Hydro-processed Renewable Jet (HRJ) process to convert non-edible oil into biofuel for use on military aircraft.
• IAF carried out extensive engine tests on the ground. This is now followed by flight trials using 10% bio-jet blended Aviation Turbine Fuel (ATF).
• This bio-jet fuel technology was developed by the Indian Institute of Petroleum (IIP) under the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in 2009 and tested between 2011 and 2013.
• Following extensive evaluation, including performance ground runs on the aero-engine since 2018, the Centre for Military Airworthiness and Certification (CEMILAC) cleared the trial flight last week.

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