Hindu Notes from General Studies-01

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Dravidian language family is 4,500 years old: study

News

• The Dravidian language family, consisting of 80 varieties spoken by nearly 220 million people across southern and central India, originated about 4,500 years ago, a study has found.
• This estimate is based on new linguistic analyses by an international team.

Why its Important?

• The study of the Dravidian languages is crucial for understanding prehistory in Eurasia, as they played a significant role in influencing other language groups.

Findings in the Study

• The researchers used data collected first-hand from native speakers representing all previously reported Dravidian subgroups.
• The findings, match with earlier linguistic and archaeological studies.
• South Asia, reaching from Afghanistan in the west and Bangladesh in the east, is home to at least six hundred languages belonging to six large language families, including Dravidian, Indo-European and Sino-Tibetan.
• The Dravidian language family, consisting of about 80 language varieties (both languages and dialects) is today spoken by about 220 million people, mostly in southern and central India, and surrounding countries.
• The Dravidian language family’s four largest languages Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil and Telugu have literary traditions spanning centuries, of which Tamil reaches back the furthest.
• Along with Sanskrit, Tamil is one of the world’s classical languages, but unlike Sanskrit, there is continuity between its classical and modern forms documented in inscriptions, poems, and secular and religious texts and songs.
• Neither the geographical origin of the Dravidian language nor its exact dispersal through time is known with certainty.
• The consensus of the research community is that the Dravidians are natives of the Indian subcontinent and were present prior to the arrival of the Indo-Aryans (Indo-European speakers) in India around 3,500 years ago.
• Study author ,collected contemporary first-hand data from native speakers of a diverse sample of Dravidian languages, representing all the previously reported subgroups of Dravidian.
• The researchers used advanced statistical methods to infer the age and sub-grouping of the Dravidian language family at about 4,000-4,500 years old.
• This estimate, while in line with suggestions from previous linguistic studies, is a more robust result because it was found consistently in the majority of the different statistical models of evolution tested in this study.
• This age also matches well with inferences from archaeology, which have previously placed the diversification of Dravidian into North, Central, and South branches at exactly this age, coinciding with the beginnings of cultural developments evident in the archaeological record.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-02

Parliament passes Payment of Gratuity Bill

News:

• Parliament passed a key bill that will empower the government to fix the amount of tax-free gratuity and the period of maternity leave with an executive order.

Beyond News:

• The Rajya Sabha, which failed to transact any significant business over the last fortnight due to protests by various parties, passed the Payment of Gratuity (Amendment) Bill without discussion.
• The Bill, moved by Labour Minister, was passed by a voice vote.
• The Lok Sabha gave its approval to the important bill last week.
• The legislation will enable the government to enhance the ceiling of tax-free gratuity to Rs. 20 lakh from the existing Rs. 10 lakh for employees falling under the Payment of Gratuity Act.
• After the implementation of the 7th Pay Commission, the ceiling of gratuity amount for Central government employees was doubled to Rs. 20 lakh.
• It also allows the government to fix the period of maternity leave for female employees as deemed to be in continuous service in place of the existing 12 weeks.
• The amendment to the payment of gratuity law comes in the backdrop of Maternity Benefit (Amendment) Act, 2017 enhancing the maximum maternity leave period to 26 weeks.

Jackfruit is now Kerala’s official fruit

News

• Kerala elevated jackfruit as the State’s official fruit.

Beyond News

• Agriculture Minister announced the ennoblement of the ubiquitous fruit in the Assembly during a discussion on demand for grants in the Budget for farming.
• He said Kerala produced 30 to 60 crore jackfruits annually. Their produce was entirely organic and pesticide-free.
• Kerala hoped to market jackfruit and its value-added products as its signature agricultural export. The State also would market its banana and pineapple crop in foreign markets.
• Coconut production in Kerala was on the decline. Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, and Karnataka had overtaken Kerala in coconut production.
• Kerala remained the largest coconut producer because of the vast area under cultivation.
• The government planned to extend coconut cultivation from the current 8 lakh hectares to 9.5 lakh hectares. It would introduce more high-yielding varieties to boost coconut harvests.

Hindu Notes from General Studies-03

Indigenous technology tested on BrahMos supersonic missile

News

• Supersonic cruise missile BrahMos was successfully flight-tested for the first time with an indigenous seeker.

Beyond News

• The seeker, a critical technology in missiles, had come from Russia.
• The precision strike weapon with Indian-made seeker flew in its designated trajectory and hit the target with pin-point accuracy.
• The seeker was developed by Research Centre Imarat (RCI), Hyderabad, in collaboration with other DRDO labs.
• The seeker technology, which determines the accuracy of a missile, is a closely guarded secret.
• Mastering it is a significant milestone in missile technology and would reduce import dependence.
• BrahMos is a joint collaboration between India and Russia and the missile is capable of being launched from land, sea, sub-sea and air against surface and sea-based targets.
• Its range was initially capped at 290 km as per obligations of the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR).
• Since India’s entry into the club, the range has been extended to 450 km and the plan is to increase it to 600km.

Pakistan gets powerful missile tracking system from China

News

• The state-run Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) said that,in an unprecedented deal, China has sold Pakistan a powerful tracking system which could speed up the development of multi-warhead missiles by its all-weather ally.

Beyond News

• Zheng Mengwei, a researcher with the CAS Institute of Optics and Electronics in Chengdu, confirmed to the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Postthat Pakistan had bought a highly sophisticated, large-scale optical tracking and measurement system from China.
• Zheng said he could not elaborate on the technology nor where in Pakistan it was being used as it involved the country’s  defense interests.
• Pakistani military recently deployed the Chinese-made system “at a firing range” for use in testing and developing new missiles.
• China was the first country to export such sensitive equipment to Pakistan.
• The system’s performance surpassed the user’s expectations and it was considerably more complex than Pakistan’s home-made systems.

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