1- President Pranab Mukherjee gives assent to re-promulgation of Land Ordinance

President Pranab Mukherjee

President Pranab Mukherjee on 3 April 2015 gave his assent to re-promulgate the Land Acquisition Ordinance as per Article 123 of Constitution.

Earlier, in this regard Union Cabinet had made a recommendation to President as present Land Acquisition Ordinance promulgated in December 2014 is going to lapse on 5 April.

The new ordinance includes 9 amendments that were part of Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (Amendment) Bill, 2015.

Lok Sabha had passed the bill in the budget session in March 2015. However, the bill is pending before the Rajya Sabha, where government is in minority.

Earlier, President had prorogued the 234th session of the Rajya Sabha in order to pave the way for re-issuing of the Ordinance as per provisions of Constitution.

Article 123 of Constitution

• It gives legislative power to President. He can issue ordinances when Parliament is in recess i.e. not in session if there is urgent need to have a law on some urgent public matter.
• The ordinance has similar effect to an act of parliament. However, every ordinance must be laid and approved by both houses of the parliament within 6 weeks from the reassembling.
• If not placed and approved by both houses of the parliament after reassembling it becomes invalid or lapses.

2- Minor planet named as 4538 Vishyanand after Indian Chess legend Viswanathan Anand

Viswanathan Anand

Minor planet was named after India’s chess legend and first grandmaster Vishwanathan Anand by the Minor Planet Center.

His name was given to the minor planet which was previously identified as planet 4538. Now the planet will be called as 4538 Vishyanand and is located somewhere between the Mars and Jupiter.

Minor planet 4538 Vishyanand was discovered on 10 October 1988 by Japanese astronormer Kenzo Suzuki. Initially, the planet was unnamed for almost 10 years.

With this, Vishwanathan Anand has joined the league of former world chess champions Alexander Alekhine and Anatoly Karpov who also have minor planets named after them.

What is Minor planet?

• A minor planet is a term used to describe an astronomical object that is neither a dominant planet nor a comet and thus includes the dwarf planets that orbit around the Sun.
• The orbital categories of these planets are the asteroids, Kuiper belt objects, trojans, centaurs and other trans-Neptunian objects.

The first minor planet discovered was Ceres in 1801.

Naming of Minor Planets

Traditionally, the practice of naming a minor planet is left to its discoverer. If the discovered minor planet remained unnamed for over 10 years, than International Astronomical Union (IAU) names the planet.

3- India ranks 119 on 2015 FM Global Resilience Index

In recently released 2015 FM Global Resilience Index, India has been ranked a low 119 out of 130 countries.

India despite having scope and global potential was ranked 119 compared to 112th rank in 2014 Global Resilience Index.

Top 10 Countries- Norway (1), Switzerland (2), Netherlands (3), Ireland (4), Luxembourg (5), Germany (6), Qatar (7), Canada (8), Finland (9) and United States (10).

Bottom 4 countries- Dominican Republic (126), Nicaragua (127) Kyrgyz Republic (129) and Venezuela (130).

Facts about India’s ranking

• India is ranked 115 position on the economic parameter that takes into account GDP, political risk and oil intensity. This rank is same as in year 2014.
• In the risk quality factor, India is ranked 109 for its quality of natural hazard and fire risk management. In this parameter, India has shown slight improvement from its 113th rank in 2014.
• In the supply chain category that looks at corruption control, local supplier quality and infrastructure, India is ranked 89th position. In this category, India has fallen 11 spots from the previous year 2014.

About FM Global Resilience Index

• The Index measures business resilience of 130 nations. It is based on economic, risk quality and supply chain factors.
• The higher ranking of country in this index indicates that it is best suited for companies seeking to avoid disruptions in their global supply chain operations.

4- Captain Anoop Kumar Sharma takes over as CEO of Essar Shipping

Essar Shipping

Captain Anoop Kumar Sharma has taken over as whole-time director and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Essar Shipping Ltd (ESL). He replaced Ramakrishnan A. R. who had retired from service on 31 March 2015. Sharma has been associated with ESL since August 2008. Previously he was associated with Shipping Corporation of India (SCI) for 16 years. In SCI he had served as the Senior Vice President of the Chartering division and was responsible for exploring global business opportunities for SCI. Sharma is an Alumni of Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies, Mumbai and was a fellow of Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers, London. He is also member of the Governing council of Narottam Morarjee Institute of Maritime studies and Services export promotion council. Earlier ESL also had appointed S. Gayathri as an Additional Director of the Company to fulfill the requirement of having at least one woman director on board. Essar Shipping Ltd operates a diversified fleet of 15 vessels. It includes very large crude carriers (VLCCs), Capesize, Mini-capesize, Supramaxes, tugs and mini-bulk carriers.

5- Kailash Vajpeyi, Renowned Hindi poet passes away

Kailash Vajpeyi

Kailash Vajpeyi, renowned Hindi poet passed away on 1 April 2015 in New Delhi due to cardiac arrest. He was one of the prominent poets in a group known as San saatth ke baad ki kavita (Post-1960 poetry) that had shaped Hindi literature.

About Kailash Vajpeyi

Kailash Vajpeyi was born at Hamirpur district of Uttar Pradesh in 1936. He had completed his PhD in Hindi at the age of 24. He began his career as a journalist and later taught at Delhi University. In his entire career, 28 books were published including 14 volumes of poetry. Some of his notable works includes Sankrant, Dehant Se Hatkar, Teesra Andhera and Sufinama.

Awards- He was conferred with Sahitya Akademi award (2009) for his work Hawa mein hastakshar (Signature in the air). Lucknow University had awarded him with Vachaspati title.

6- Union Government unveils new Foreign Trade Policy

Union Government has unveiled new Foreign Trade Policy (FTP) to make India an exporting powerhouse in the next five years. The new trade policy will incorporate government ambitious initiatives such as Make in India, Digital India mission, Skill India programme, ease of business in order to boost jobs and take India’s exports to 900 billion dollars by 2020. The goals of the new policy will be achieved by simplifying complex procedures, addressing infrastructural bottlenecks and eliminating manufacturing hurdles. Focus areas of the new FTP are Labour intensive sectors to generate more employment. Boosting to environment-friendly products. High tech value addition. Involving skill India programme to promote entrepreneurship. Moving towards branding of products. Incentives for units located in SEZs. Making the life of traders easier.

Key facts

FTP also takes into consideration e-commerce. Under the new policy, India’s nascent, e-commerce sector would also be extended sops. The new trade policy will be based on two new schemes- Merchandise Exports from India Scheme (MEIS) and Services Exports from India Scheme (SIES). Under these two schemes, government has merged all earlier export promotion schemes. MEIS is for export of specified goods in specified markets with the rate of rewards range from 2 to 5%. SIES is for increasing exports of notified services and the selected services will be rewarded at the rates of 3 to 5%. The new also move towards paperless working. In this regard, a facility has been created to upload documents in exporter/ importer profile in order to avoid need of repeatedly submitting documents.

7- Mariyam Asif Siddiqui, Muslim girl wins Bhagwad Gita contest

Mariyam Asif Siddiqui

Mariyam Asif Siddiqui, a 12-year-old Muslim girl from Mumbai has secured first place Shrimad Bhagwad Gita Champion League. She won the first prize in an inter-school competition for explaining the teachings of the holy book- Bhagwad Gita. The Shrimad Bhagwad Gita Champion League was organised by International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) in March. In this contest, around 4,500 students from 195 schools had participated. They were given the English version of Bhagwad Gita for a month for preparation purpose for explaining the teachings of the holy book. The competition included recitation of the Gita in English along with a written test.

Like this post? Comment here !! Or have something to share? Write to us: info@khichdionline.com

Read More

#Current Affairs  JANUARY , FEBRUARY ,  MARCH – Date-wise  |  2015

#Current Affairs May 2015