GS-III

Editor in Singapore charged with defamation The editor of a website in Singapore was charged with defamation late on Thursday for publishing a letter alleging corruption among the city-state’s leaders. Rights groups in Singapore denounced the “heavy-handed” response from the authorities. Source : https://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-international/singapore-editor-charged-with-defaming-government/article25737890.ece

Lakhs of migratory birds which have congregated at the Chilika lake are facing a threat to their lives following the detection of avian influenza virus barely a few kilometres away from the Nalabana Bird Sanctuary. Some crows and chickens were found dead inside poultry farms in Krushnaprasad block last week. …

Time limit for taking down content reduced from 72 to 36 hours The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has approached U.S.-based search engine Google for sharing its Application Programming Interface (API) for identifying child sexual abuse material on social media platforms. The MHA is also in talks with Microsoft to …

Apex court stays High Court order The Supreme Court on Thursday stayed a Meghalaya High Court order directing private airlines to commence operations immediately from the Umroi airport in the northeastern State. The order was passed by a Bench, headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and comprising Justices S.K. Kaul …

It is likely to make landfall between Masula and Odarevu The deep depression over the Bay of Bengal is likely to intensify and turn into a severe cyclone which is likely to cross south coastal Andhra Pradesh. With chances of the cyclone making a landfall between Machilipatnam and Odarevu in …

Take samples of a cavity in Soyuz Using knives and shears, a pair of Russian spacewalkers on Tuesday cut samples of material around a mysterious hole in a Soyuz spacecraft docked on the International Space Station that a Moscow official suggested could have been deliberate sabotage. Roscosmos space agency said …

Signature fossil of modern epoch may be their leftover bones It is one thing to eat chicken every day. It’s something else to have that on your permanent record, as in the geological record, the remnants of our time that archaeologists or aliens of the future will sift through to …

Addressing issues concerning the banking sector will be one of the immediate priorities of the newly-appointed Governor of the Reserve Bank of India, Shaktikanta Das, who has called for a meeting with the chief executives of Mumbai-based public sector banks on Thursday. “To begin with, I have convened a meeting …

Central bank’s sanctity should be preserved: former CEA Former Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian said it is important to protect the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) autonomy and there must be open technical discussions on issues in the present context. ‘No politicising’ “I want to convey that preserving the integrity, …

However, market volatility may continue ahead of RBI meet Benchmark equity indices rose sharply on Wednesday as investor confidence grew after the appointment of a new governor for the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the State election results fuelling hopes that the government would increase rural spending, among other …

New RBI Governor says he will interact with stakeholders to assess whether liquidity remains a constraint Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das said though inflation outlook seems benign, one should be watchful of the developments. After raising interest rates twice in the last six months and changing the monetary …

Group calls for clarification from govt. Anti-corruption campaigners have condemned the British Home Office’s decision to backtrack on plans to suspend a “golden visa” scheme for wealthy investors, just days after announcing the suspension. Last week, the Home Office had said it was planning to suspend the Tier-1 (investor) visa …

A Parliamentary panel has recommended that the Centre urgently take steps to ensure that the National Security Guard (NSG) — the country’s premier counter-terrorist and contingency force — is equipped with its own dedicated air wing. The committee headed by Congress leader P. Chidambaram observed with anguish that the two …

Priya Prakash Varrier is India’s ‘most searched’ personality Sport-related queries dethroned entertainment as India’s top ‘googling’ obsession in 2018, occupying the top three spots on the list of most searched for ‘items’ online. This is as per the annual trends data released by Google, which it does towards the end …

Deep Submergence Rescue Vehicle will help bring back crew members stranded under water The Indian Navy joined a select group of naval forces in the world on Wednesday when it inducted its first non-tethered Deep Submergence Rescue Vehicle (DSRV) system at the Naval Dockyard in Mumbai. The DSRV is used …

Global warming is heating the Arctic at a record pace, driving broad environmental changes across the planet, including extreme storms in the mid-latitudes, a major U.S. scientific report said on Tuesday. Persistent heat records have rattled the fragile Arctic in the past five years, a record-long warming streak, said the …

Blitzes are swift, vigorous attacks and usually part of military parlance. But there was nothing military about citizens as they looked up at trees across India on December 1 and 2: they were on a ‘bioblitz’, recording the flowering and fruiting of common trees. The Winter Tree Quest’s results now …

Dozens of top fashion industry firms have pledged at the UN climate talks to reduce their combined greenhouse gas emissions by 30% by 2030. “The fashion industry is always two steps ahead when it comes to defining world culture, so I am pleased to see it now also leading the …

A growing number of people are looking for ways to cut their personal emissions Some people count their calories. Dirk Gratzel counts his carbon emissions. The software entrepreneur from Germany is among a small but growing number of people looking for ways to cut their personal greenhouse gas emissions from …

The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed the Union Environment Ministry to declare 10 km area around 21 national parks and wildlife sanctuaries across the country as ‘eco-sensitive zones’. A Bench led by Justice Madan B. Lokur took the initiative after its amicus curiae informed the court that the State governments …