IASTODAY DAILY CAPSULES -General Studies-01

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Study of one lakh individuals finds why India’s children are anaemic

News

• A paper published in Scientific Reports points out that about 58.5% of children below five years of age in India are anaemic.

Factors at play

• The team analysed over one lakh children using the National Fertility and Health Survey (2015-16) data. They write that socio-demographic factors including wealth of the family, maternal education, maternal age, type of residence are the main reasons behind the incidence of childhood anaemia.
• Maternal education plays a very important role in reducing the incidence of childhood anaemia in any society and indeed in India. It increases the chances of mothers appreciating the issues involved and taking the correct and appropriate steps towards preventing it.
• Study revealed an inverse relationship between the mother’s education and incidence of childhood anaemia, in India.
• The report notes that even the richest households had anaemic children. While 52.9% of children in the rich households were marked anaemic, the number was 63.2% in the poorest households. Overall, vitamin A and iron intake was also lower than the recommended level.
• Nutritional and iron deficiencies top the list of factors that predispose children to anaemia in India and these should be prioritised in any intervention.
• Previous studies from across the globe have shown that severe anaemia in mothers and premature delivery can also lead to childhood anaemia and so the mother’s health needs to be addressed as well.
• The study showed that children of younger mothers are more anaemic.
• The paper notes that though India has an anaemia control programme which recommends iron intake and folic acid supplements, the results show that the programme has not been a success.

Bengaluru may top Indian cities Inclusive Prosperity Cities Index, but has long way to go

News

• Bengaluru may have ranked better than Delhi and Mumbai on the Prosperity & Inclusion City Seal and Awards Index, but it still has a long way to when compared with other cities across the world.
• It ranked only 83 of 113, indicating that a lot more work has to be done to achieve real inclusivity.

Long way to go

• The rankings are dependent on the criteria of evaluation for inclusive cities: per capita income, level of education, access to health care, environmental quality, personal safety, affordable housing and quality of life.
• In fact, the Index categorises cities into developed and emerging. The best ranking for an ‘emerging city’ on the Index is 50 for St. Petersburg in Europe. All cities from the 79th rank are ‘emerging cities’.
• But what the city is found lacking in is inclusion of the urban poor in decision making, argue activists.

Egypt unveils animal mummies of lion cubs, crocodiles, birds

News

• Egypt’s Ministry of Antiquities is revealing details on recently discovered animal mummies, saying they contain two lion cubs as well as several crocodiles, birds and cats.

Animal mummies

• Announcement came during an exhibition at the famed Step Pyramid in Saqqara, south of Cairo. That’s near where the mummies and other objects were found in a vast necropolis.
• Archaeologists frequently find mummified cats, but the recovery of a lion is rare. The ministry says the animal mummies are all from the Late Period (664-332 B.C.).
• The ministry had announced last week it was running scans to determine that the mummies were indeed lions.
• Egypt has stepped up promotion of its archaeological treasures in hopes of reviving a tourism sector slow to recover from the 2011 uprising that toppled long-time autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

IASTODAY DAILY CAPSULES -General Studies-02

Centre invokes special power to revoke President’s Rule without prior Cabinet nod

News

• The Centre invoked Rule 12 of the Transaction of Business Rules, 1961 that empowered it to revoke the proclamation of President’s rule in Maharashtra without the prior approval of the Union Cabinet.
• Rule 12 pertaining to “Departure from Rules” says the Prime Minister may, in any case or classes of cases permit or condone a departure from these rules, to the extent he deems necessary.

Notification

• The Cabinet did not meet to revoke the proclamation as the government used its power under the Rule.
• President Ram Nath Kovind revoked the proclamation through a notification issued that was signed by Union Home Secretary Ajay Kumar Bhalla.
• The notification was digitally signed by the official concerned before being uploaded on the official gazette portal nic.in.
• An official said a notification can only be digitally signed once the physical copy has been signed by the President.

Centre, Punjab at odds over stubble burning

News

• The Centre’s data come from the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), which monitors stubble burning in Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh using satellite data and counts the number of incidents from the beginning of October.
• According to the ICAR’s latest daily bulletin, Punjab saw 49,787 incidents between October 1 and November 21.

Stubble burning

• The PCB routinely counts stubble burning incidents from September 24, given that paddy harvesting begins in early to mid-September. It recorded 52,154 incidents between September 24 and November 21, compared with 50,970 in the year-earlier period.
• With paddy harvesting at its fag end in the key grain producing State of Punjab, both the Central and State governments released data on stubble burning on Friday, but with starkly different narratives.
• Union Agriculture Minister told the Rajya Sabha that the events had declined 19% this year, including a 16.8% reduction in Punjab.
• However, Punjab’s Pollution Control Board (PCB) data show an increase of 2.3% in the number of incidents.
• Even over a comparable period, however, the data differ slightly: in November 2019, the Centre’s data show 27,366 incidents, while the State has recorded 30,017 incidents.
• The Punjab government acknowledged that the increase in incidents showed that some farmers continued to defy the ban on burning crop residue and said it was optimistic that the “burnt area” figure would show improvement.
• Last year, an area of 17.8 lakh hectares was burnt, down from 19.78 lakh hectares in 2017.
• The burning of crop residue is regulated under the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981.
• This year, Sangrur district saw the highest number of farm fire incidents at 6,661, while Bathinda, with 5,774 such cases, was in the second spot. Firozpur district recorded 4,943 cases.
• Punjab’s incidents of stubble fire declined from 84,000 in 2016 to 46,000 in 2017, government data show.

IASTODAY DAILY CAPSULES -General Studies-03

GDP slump will hit $5-trillion economy target, warns NITI Aayog

News

• The road to a $5 trillion economy by 2025 is beset with many speed breakers, the NITI Aayog has warned the government.

Economy target

• • The nominal GDP growth a measure of growth without accounting for inflation has to be at least 12.4% on an average if that target has to be reached. The current rate was a mere 8% in the first quarter of the current financial year.
  • Experts estimate that growth will dip in Q2 compared to Q1 in both real and nominal terms.
  • Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on July 5, presenting her first Budget, had said her government would work to make India a $5 trillion economy by 2025. The claim has often been ridiculed by opposition parties.
  • According to data he provided, gross fixed capital formation in the sub-sector of ‘dwellings, other buildings and structures’ fell from 12.8% of GDP in 2011-12 to 6.9% in 2017-18.

365 terrorist incidents so far in J&K this year

News

• In the past 30 years, the least number of terrorist violence incidents in Jammu and Kashmir were recorded in 2013 and 2015, show government data.

Terrorist violence

• According to data for the current year collated by the J&K administration, 365 incidents of terrorist violence were reported till September 4.
• According to the J&K administration, there are 59,76,359 mobile phone connections in the Kashmir Valley, of which 20,05,293 postpaid connections were working. The population of Valley is around 70 lakhs as per the 2011 census.
• Government has said 280 e-terminals were set up across 10 districts of the Valley and till November 18 as many as 23,0418 people had accessed the Internet on these machines.
• In 1990, when terrorism started in Kashmir Valley, 4,158 incidents were reported where 461 civilians, 155 security forces and 550 terrorists were killed. It peaked to 5,938 incidents in 1995 leading to the killing of 1,031 civilians, 237 security personnel and 1,332 terrorists.
• There was sharp decline in number of such incidents in 2008 when it dropped for the first time to 708 when 91 civilians and 75 security personnel were killed along with 339 terrorists.
• In the year 2013, the incidents of terrorist violence stood at 170 where 15 civilians and 53 security personnel were killed. The same year 67 terrorists were also killed. As per the status report, 41,866 persons lost their lives in 71,038 incidents of terrorist violence which includes 22,536 terrorists.

Spike in 2016

• In 2016, after the unprecedented violence in Kashmir Valley following the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani by security forces, 322 incidents of terrorist violence were reported where 15 civilians, 82 security personnel and 150 terrorists were killed.
• Till September 4 this year, in 365 incidents, 23 civilians, 78 security personnel and 136 terrorists were killed.
• Last year, in 614 incidents, 23 civilians, 78 security personnel and 136 terrorists were killed.

Forex reserves rise to new lifetime high

News

• India’s forex reserves rose by $441 million to a fresh lifetime high of $448.249 billion in the week to November 15, on an increase in core currency assets, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data showed.

Forex reserves rise

• The overall foreign exchange reserves, which have been on an upward trend for many weeks now, had swelled by $1.71 billion to $447.808 billion in the previous reporting week.
• The foreign currency assets, a major component of the reserves, increased by $643 million to $416.472 billion in the week ended November 15, as per the Reserve Bank data.
• Expressed in US dollar terms, the foreign currency assets include the effect of appreciation or depreciation of non-US units like the euro, pound and the yen held in the foreign exchange reserves.
• During the week, gold reserves decreased by $200 million to $26.709 billion, it said.
• The special drawing rights with the International Monetary Fund was down by $5 million to $1.435 billion.

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