Hindu Notes from General Studies-02

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Former ministers can’t overstay in official bungalows-Supreme Court 

News:

• SC held that Former ministers have no business overstaying in official bungalows.

Beyond News:

•  A minister who has demitted office cannot cling on to public largesse, amicus curiaeGopal Subramanium submitted in the Supreme Court .
• The apex court is examining a provision in a Uttar Pradesh law that allows ex-ministers to stay on in official bungalows.
• Uttar Pradesh-based NGO Lok Prahari has sought action against the authorities for acting in contempt of a Supreme Court verdict in August 2016, directing them to ensure that the former chief ministers vacate the bungalows.

Article 14

• Appearing before a Bench of Justices asked whether Article 14 (fundamental right to equality) of the Constitution allows ex-ministers to retain their official bungalows indefinitely.
• In August 2016, the court held that former chief ministers should hand over possession of the bungalows occupied by them.
• Except former Presidents, Vice-Presidents and Prime Ministers in the “evening of their lives,” no dignitary, even former Chief Ministers, can be provided government bungalows for their lifetime unless backed by a specific statutory provision, the Supreme Court had held.

The court had observed that the public bungalows were maintained at a great cost to the exchequer and not meant to be “frittered away.” Allowing former chief ministers and their families to stay on indefinitely in public properties was a “largesse.”

Dalits stage protests in Belagavi against violence in Bhima-Koregaon

News:

• Several Dalit organisations staged protests in Belagavi  in Karnataka , against the violence in Maharashtra after the observation of the Bhima-Koregaon battle bicentenary.

Why its important?

It makes koregaon event of 1818 significant.

Beyond News:

• They were shouting slogans against the Maharashtra government for failing to control violence.
•  They claimed that Brahminical forces had tried to wipe away memories of the victory of the Mahar regiment against the Peshwa forces in 1818 in Bhima-Koregaon.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-03

 

It’s dust particles, not alien spacecraft, that cause dimming of Tabby’s star

News

• A press release from Louisiana State University says that the mysterious dimming of Tabby’s star is caused by dust particles and not (as some believed) by alien spacecraft orbiting it.

Tabby’s star

• Tabby’s star or Boyajian’s star is the “most mysterious star in the universe” as it kept dimming and brightening irregularly, following no pattern.
• Officially called KIC 8462852, the star is 1,000 light years away from the Earth and 1,000 degrees hotter than the Sun.

Finding:

• The recent report compiled by 133 scientists, shows that the dimming is caused by ordinary dust particles, the majority of them at a size less than one micrometre.
• The new data shows that different colors of light are being blocked at different intensities.

Cookstoves in India more polluting than thought: study

News

A study has found that traditional cookstoves, widely used in the rural parts of India, may be producing much higher levels of particulate emissions than previously estimated, causing a detrimental impact on the country’s environment and health of residents.

Beyond News

The research, published in the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, was the c ulmination of field studies conducted in India.
In December 2015, the researchers spent 20 days running a series of tests in Raipur, a city in central India where more than three-quarters of the families use cookstoves to prepare their meals.
The scientists burned a wide variety of biofuels (fuel wood, agricultural residue, and dung) acquired from different parts of India, cooked different meals in a number of varying ventilation situations and recorded the resulting emission levels using high- tech particle measurement devices.
The scientists say that the newly developed low-cost pollution sensor can allow to eventually determine the regions of hot spots and locations that would have high concentrations of emissions.

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