PERSONS AND PLACES IN NEWS - SEPTEMBER 2012

1. Aseem Trivedi: Political cartoonist and anti-corruption and Internet freedom crusader Aseem Trivedi was arrested by police on grounds of sedition and insulting the national flag and constitution in one of his cartoons.
2. Justice Altamas Kabir: The senior most Supreme Court Judge, Justice Altamas Kabir, was on appointed the next Chief Justice of India.
3. Kaushik Basu: The World Bank has appointed Kaushik Basu as its Chief Economist and Senior Vice President. 
4. Syed Mustafa Siraj : Veteran Bengali writer Syed Mustafa Siraj passed away recently after a brief illness in Kolkata
5. Vrandavan:  A town in Uttar Pradesh was in news as large number of widows from eastern states like West Bengal are living here in sub standard living conditions.
6. New Delhi: The Sixth Mekong Ganga Cooperation (MGC) Ministerial Meeting was held in New Delhi on September 4, 2012.
7. Verghese Kurien: The father of “White Revolution” and founder of the cooperative dairy movement in the country, died  at the age of 90
8. Brajesh Mishra: Brajesh Mishra, India’s first National Security Adviser during NDA regime, died recently
9. Haqqani Network: The Haqqani network is one of the most dangerous terror groups in Afghanistan. It is mainly fighting U.S.-led forces. It has a long record of carrying out high-profile attacks in Kabul. US has recently included it in the list of terrorist group
10. Lakhdar Brahimi: He is an Algerian veteran United Nations envoy and advisor is apointed as new envoy of U.N and Arab League to Syria
11. Bagram Airfield:  Also referred to as Bagram Air Base, is one of the largest U.S. military bases in Afghanistan. It is located next to the ancient city of Bagram in Parwan province of Afghanistan was in news recently because of  fate of inmates who were arrested by US.
12. Benghazi, Libya: The US Ambassador to Libya, Christopher Evans was killed on September 11, 2012 with three others in a rocket attack on their car in Benghazi, Libya.
13.  Mustafa Abu Shagour: Libya’s national congress has picked Mustafa Abu Shagour, the current Deputy Prime Minister, as the country’s Next Prime Minister
14. Haile Mariam: He is the new Prime Minister elect of Ethiopia.
15. Leng Thirith:  Ex-social affairs minister in the murderous Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia was accused of war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity.
16. Aung San Suu Kyi: U.S. Congress has presented Myanmar democracy leader Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi with the Congress’ highest civilian honour
17. Ebrahim Alkazi:  He has been conferred France’s highest cultural award for his contribution in nurturing and presenting modern theatre in India and preserving the treasures of photography and other art forms for posterit
18. Varanasi: The Second International Buddhist Conclave was held in Varanasi on September 29, 2012.
19. Tehran:  Capital of Iran hosted the 116 Non Align Movement Summit, with its focus on Syrian Crisis
20. Hadia Tajik: The Pakistani origin Norwegian lawyer was appointed as Minister of Culture in Norway
21. Johannesburg: The 9th World Hindi Conference was organized in Johannesburg, South Africa from 22-24 September, 2012.
22. Dr. Sima Samar: A well known human rights and women’s right advocate and activist of Afghanistan has jointly won prestigious Swedish Right Livelihood Award.
23. Ernakulam:  It will be declared as the first district in the country having ‘meaningful financial inclusion’ on November 22

National

1. A Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C21) blasted off from Sriharikota on September 9 and placed two foreign satellites in orbit, accomplishing the Indian Space Research Organisation’s 100th mission, a milestone in the country’s space journey
2. The Government of India is going to put a cap on the maximum price at which essential drugs can be sold in the country. These include commonly used AIDS and cancer drugs, painkillers, TB drugs, sedatives, lipid lowering agents and steroids.
3. The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs, which met on September 14, 2012 under the leadership of Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh, decided to allow 49 per cent FDI in aviation sector
4. Air India gets the nod by the cabinet to come up with two subsidaries i.e. Air India Engineering Services Ltd. (AIESL) and Air India Transport Services Ltd. (AITSL).
5. The National Stock Exchange has launched operations of its new trading platform for small and medium enterprises (SMEs), with the first listing in this segment and said some more companies would follow. The new platform is called Emerge.
6. India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, in its twenty second flight (PSLV-C21), was launched on September 9, 2012 from the First Launch Pad of Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC SHAR), Sriharikota.
7. The Union Environment Ministry recently rejected the proposal to set up a radar surveillance system in Narcondam Island in the Andamans by the Indian Coast Guards. The Ministry took this step in an effort to conserve Narcondam hornbills.
8. India on September 19, 2012, test-fired its nuclear-capable strategic missile Agni-IV.
9. The Government has moved towards limiting the oil subsidy bill by increasing diesel prices by Rs 5 a litre and limiting the number of subsidized LPG cylinders to 6 per year per connection.
10. A committee headed by former Chairman of the Finance Commission Vijay Kelkar has proposed a new roadmap for fiscal consolidation
11. This missile has a strike range of about 4000 km. The test fire was done from a test range in Wheeler Island off Odisha coast.
12. Big Bang Reforms: The Government has notified the rules for allowing foreign retailers to set up stores in India. The Government also notified conditions for 49% investment by foreign airlines in Indian carriers and permitting greater foreign investment in some sections of the broadcasting sector.
13. Delivery of the Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov, to be renamed INS Vikramaditya, to the Indian Navy has been further delayed by several months because of technical troubles with its engines detected during the ongoing sea trials
14. The  Union Cabinet  recently approved the sale of minority stakes in five PSEs — Hindustan Copper (9.59%), Oil India (10%), RITES (10%), MMTC (9.33%) and Nalco (12.15%) —with a target revenue collection of Rs. 15,000 crore
15. The Delhi government recently announced a ban on all gutka products in the capital. Delhi is the 9th state to do so
16. The central Government is about to make the national level minimum wage rate of Rs 115 per day mandatory in all states. This move is expected to benefit approximately 400 million unskilled workers across the country.
17. The Government recently introduced the 117th Constitution Amendment Bill in the Rajya Sabha. The Bill upon becoming an Act would amend the Constitution to provide reservation to members of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in government job promotions
18. Supreme Court has ruled that auctions are not the only permissible method for disposal of natural resources across sectors. It held that the 2G verdict was confined to allocation of spectrum and is not applicable to other resources
19. Sri Lankan President Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa is on a three-day visit to India, to inaugurate a Buddhist University in Sanchi, Madhya Pradesh at the invitation of the State Government

International

1. China’s Communist Party has expelled disgraced leader Bo Xilai from the organization. He was also removed from the membership of the National People’s Congress, bringing an end to his political career. 
2. The border forces of Bangladesh and India have completed their five-day meet on border issues, and Bangladesh has made a commitment to expedite fencing by resolving disputes around the zero line. The porous Indo-Bangladesh border will soon see greater pace and rigour in fencing.
3. India and other G4 countries have reiterated their demand for reform of the UN Security Council (UNSC).
4. Top officials from India and the US organized meetings to strengthen collaboration in the energy sector with special focus on mobilising clean and affordable sources for their requirements
5. Sudan and South Sudan failed to reach a final agreement on ending hostilities and resuming oil production even as a September 22 deadline set by the UN Security Council expired.
6. Russia has ordered the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to halt its operations in the country
7. Nepal’s major political forces have agreed to go in for fresh elections for a Constituent Assembly (CA). The four major political forces — Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), Nepali Congress (NC), Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist Leninist) and United Democratic Madhesi Front (UDMF) agreed on this issue of elections.
8. Protests against Japan for its control over the disputed Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea have spread across over a dozen cities of China and turned violent.
9. A state of emergency was forced in the western Rakhine state of Burma, after deadly communal clashes
10. Germany’s highest court has approved the creation of the Euro zone’s permanent bailout facility, but said that Germany must retain its effective veto on all of the vehicle’s decisions
11. Japan has announced plans to end its reliance on nuclear power within 30 years. It is a historic policy shift prompted by the triple meltdown at the Fukushima power plan
12. Canada has closed its Tehran embassy and ordered Iranian diplomats be expelled. It has also accused the Islamic Republic of being the biggest threat to world peace
13. An early general election was held in the Netherlands on 12 September 2012 after Prime Minister Mark Rutte handed in his government’s resignation to Queen Beatrix on 23 April.
14. President of Palestine, Mr. Mahmoud Abbas visited India on 11th September 2012.
15. China to complete Qinghai–Tibet Rail Link
16. China recently commissioned its  first  aircraft  carrier – Liaoning.  The  300 metre- long  Liaoning is a  refurbished  and  upgraded  version of  the  Soviet  carrier  Varyag which  China  purchased  from Ukraine. It came  after  years  of sea  trials  and  tests  to  fit  the carrier  with  weapons  and engines.

MONTH WISE CURRENT AFFAIRS-INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

Tentative deal in Iraq keeps Maliki in power
Iraq’s political leaders reached a tentative deal on November 10, 2010, to form a new government by giving a second term to Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, thus breaking the eight-month political stalemate that had plagued the country. The unexpected compromise, after a more than seven-hour meeting, came after the largely Sunni-backed bloc of Iraqiya, which won the most votes in March polls, begrudgingly agreed to back Maliki.

But even as the deal was announced, some Sunni leaders expressed dissatisfaction, a potentially troubling sign for the US as it moves toward the planned withdrawal of all of its forces by the end of 2011. A feeling of exclusion among Sunnis could prompt them to abandon the political process and renew an insurgency that has quieted significantly in recent years, although steady levels of violence continue.

US officials had been pushing a power-sharing agreement between Iraqiya leader Ayad Allawi, a secular Shiite, and Maliki, whom they tacitly backed for PM, as a way to break the Shiite leader’s monopoly on government authority and give the Sunni Arab minority a powerful role in Iraq’s next government.

Under the new agreement, it was agreed to appoint a speaker from Iraqiya, then name the current Kurdish President, Jalal Talabani, as President of Iraq. He, in turn, named Maliki as Prime Minister.

Junta’s proxy seeps Myanmar poll
Myanmar’s military-backed party captured 77 per cent of the Parliamentary seats contested in the November 7, 2010 elections, following polling widely decried as manipulated and unfair.

The results point to an overwhelming victory, but there has never been much doubt about the outcome because the junta-proxy, the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), fielded candidates in nearly every district, whereas the largest opposition party was able to contest only 164 of the 1,159 parliamentary seats.

The government said the elections, the country’s first in two decades, were a major step towards democracy, but critics, including US President Barack Obama, said they were neither free nor fair.

The polling also sparked violence and some fears of an outright civil war among Myanmar’s ethnic minorities, who make up about 40 per cent of the population. Some have been fighting the central government since Myanmar gained independence from Britain in 1948.

The West denounced army-ruled Myanmar’s first election in 20 years while State media in China, a key ally of the regime, struck a discordant note by hailing the polls as a sign of progress.

Led by US President Barack Obama, numerous countries decried the vote as neither free nor fair and called for the release of political prisoners, including democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi, who was sidelined in the polls.

China has long helped economically dysfunctional Myanmar to keep afloat through trade ties, arms sales, and by shielding it from UN sanctions over rights abuses as a veto-wielding member of the UN Security Council.

Backgrounder: Elections are very rare events in Myanmar. In the last half a century there was only one—in 1990, followed by the latest held on November 7). A devout Buddhist politician, U Nu, set up an unstable administration on the withdrawal of the British, survived the first two elections, but voluntarily retired after the second. His successor asked the army, soon after, to stand in for some time in the capacity of a caretaker. Nu returned for a second try at governing the multiple insurgency-ridden country, by decisively winning the 1960 election. Yet, in less than two years, the army dethroned the elected government in a coup.

The first military dictator, General Ne Win, was toppled by a students-led agitation in 1988, but another General took power and the military has since then showed no intention of loosening its grip on the country. Currently, Senior General Than Shwe is the top boss and nearing 80 in age.

The Generals did try to create a democratic façade for their rule at one stage by organizing a general election in 1990, but did not know how to tailor it to their desired narrow self-interest and watched their own make-believe civilian political party crushed by the voters. That largely fair election, witnessed by foreign journalists, gave only 10 of 492 seats to the army’s party and 392 to Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD).

The junta responded with iron fist. The result of the election was annulled. Suu Kyi and her NLD were turned into targets for unceasing persecution. Suu Kyi has been under house arrest for 15 of the 20 years since then. She could not collect the Nobel Peace Prize she was awarded. Nor could she participate in the November 7 election because the military junta’s electoral laws were largely directed against her and her party.

Twenty years after that failed election, the army has staged another. This is an attempt no doubt at easing the growing pressure of adverse world opinion. As could be expected, the Generals were careful this time not to make the mistakes of 1990. A new constitution was framed and adopted by a referendum in which 99 per cent of the voters participated and over 92 per cent of them cast “yes” votes. The constitution reserves for the army one-fourth of the seats in each of the two Houses of Parliament and the more important ministries. Also, no constitutional change will be possible without a majority of more than three-fourths. A political party has been created with leading roles in it for about a score of men who were military officers till sometime back.

Prime Minister General Thein Sein resigned from the army to lead the civilian-looking outfit named the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP).

The electoral laws ruled out Aung San Suu Kyi’s participation. Neither convicted persons nor individuals opposing the State organizations could stand for any seat. Roughly 300,000 Buddhist monks representing the religious order were disenfranchised. So were the people in some rebellious ethnic minority areas. No one whose spouse or children are foreign citizens can become the head of the Myanmarese State. Suu Kyi’s British husband is now dead and her two sons are also British living in the UK.

Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy found the dice so heavily loaded against them that they only had one choice—boycotting the sham election. Yet the junta wanted to be doubly sure; it ordered the dissolution of NLD and a few other parties on the ground that they failed to apply for permission to continue political activities.

There were no election observers from abroad and unlike in 1990, when 60 foreign journalists were granted visas a few days before the polling, no news-person from outside was let in.

Democrats lose control of US House of Representatives
A disenchanted American electorate, in a snub to President Barack Obama, handed a bruising defeat to his Democratic Party and put the Republican Party back in control of the US House of Representatives in mid-term elections on November 4, 2010.

The loss of Democratic control of the House will be an obstacle to Obama’s ability to push through his agenda over the next two years. However, it is by no means an indicator of the President’s own fate. In 1994, the Republicans took control of Congress under Bill Clinton’s Presidency. Clinton, a Democrat, went on to serve for a second term. Besides Clinton, Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower both lost control of at least one house of Congress in the mid-terms. No President in the past century has lost his bid for a second term in office after losing the majority in the mid-term elections.

However, Republicans are in no mood to work with the Democrats and the party’s leaders have vowed to do everything possible to ensure that Obama is only a one-term President.

Ireland becomes second Euro nation to seek aid
On November 22, 2010, Ireland became the second euro country to seek a rescue as the cost of saving its banks threatened by a re-run of the Greek debt crisis that destabilized the currency.

The aid, which Irish officials said as recently as November 15 they didn’t need, marked the latest blow to an economy that more than doubled in the decade ending in 2006. The bursting of the real-estate bubble in 2008 plunged the country into a recession and brought its banks close to collapse. With Irish bond yields near a record high, policy makers are trying to keep the crisis from spreading.

The package for Ireland will total as much as 60 percent of gross domestic product, compared with 47 percent for Greece.

The bailout follows two years of budget cuts that failed to restore market confidence as the cost of shoring up the financial industry soared.

UNDP Human Development Report
India is ranked 119 out of 169 countries on the Human Development Index (HDI) of the UNDP’s 2010 Human Development Report.

This marks an improvement of just one rank between 2005 and 2010 though the report, a special 20th anniversary edition, places India among top 10 performers globally in terms of HDI measured on income growth. The category is led by China. India comes 10th after Botswana, South Korea, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Mauritius.

China has improved eight notches (from 2005 to 2010) to secure the 89th position. In South Asia, Nepal has gained five places to reach the 138th rank. Maldives has risen four places to 107; Sri Lanka at 91 too has beaten India in the rankings, though Pakistan has lost two ranks to fall to 125, while Bangladesh is up one at 129.

Though high on GDP growth, India reports severe inequalities (the report for the first time measures inequalities, gender gaps and multidimensional poverty as markers of human development) while several low-income nations have posted huge profits by investing in education and health. Nepal is the only South Asian country, which despite low income, stands as the third best performer in the top 10 movers the report highlights.

These movers are the 10 nations (out of 135 studied for development indicators) that made the largest HDI improvements over the past 40 years. Oman leads the pack having invested its energy earnings in health and education. Except China, which is second on this list thanks to income gains (recording 21 fold jump in per capita income since 1980), all other nine countries are top movers due to health and education benefits. These are Nepal, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Lao PDR, Tunisia, South Korea, Algeria and Morocco. India is 16th in the category.

While India’s HDI value has increased from 0.320 in 1980 to 0.519 in 2010, higher than South Asia’s average of 0.516, India still lags behind among medium HD nations. South Asia, particularly India, post shocking percentage losses in HDI values if inequalities are counted.

The best HDI ranker in the world, Norway, loses just 6.6 per cent to inequality while China loses 23 per cent and Bangladesh 29.4 per cent.

Global giants join hands to save climate
On November 29, 2010, the first day of the Cancun Climate Summit, the global consumer goods industry announced two major initiatives on climate protection: to halt deforestation practices and phase out climate damaging refrigerants that have high global warming potential.

In a statement issued from Paris, this was announced by the Consumer Goods Forum, a CEO-level organisation of 400 global consumer goods manufacturers and retailers with combined revenue in excess of $ 2.8 trillion. The initiatives were announced by the board of directors, comprising 50 CEOs and co-chaired by Muhtar Kent, CEO, The Coca-Cola Company and Lars Olofsson, CEO of Carrefour.

On deforestation, the Consumer Goods Forum decided to mobilise their collective resources to help achieve zero net deforestation by 2020.

On refrigeration, the Forum agreed to begin phasing out hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) refrigerants as of 2015 and replace them with non-HFC refrigerants.

Deforestation is one of the principal drivers of climate change, accounting for 17 per cent of greenhouse gases today. The consumer goods industry, through its growing use of soya, palm oil, paper and board, creates many of the economic incentives which drive deforestation.

Refrigeration plays a vital role in the retail and consumer goods industry but is also a significant and growing source of greenhouse gases. HFCs are powerful greenhouse gases that are thousands of times as potent as carbon dioxide. While they currently have a relatively small aggregate impact on global warming, HFC emissions are projected to represent 9-19 per cent of projected greenhouse gas emissions in 2050. The US government has targeted HFC reduction as a priority climate action under the Montreal Protocol, and garnered support from 91 nations at 2010 Montreal Protocol conference in Bangkok.

World mayors sign climate change pact
Mayors from around the world have signed a voluntary pact in Mexico City to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The pact was signed at a meeting meant as a precursor to the UN-sponsored talks in Cancun.
Participants from some 135 cities and urban areas signed the pact committing them to adopt a number of measures to stem climate change.

Meanwhile, a new study has found that fossil-fuel gases edged back less than hoped in 2009, as falls in advanced economies were largely outweighed by rises in China and India.

Annual emissions of carbon dioxide from the burning of oil, gas and coal were 30.8 billion tonne, a retreat of only 1.3 per cent in 2009, compared with 2008, a record year.

USA, Australia ink space surveillance pact
On November 8, 2010, Australia and the US signed a pact to increase space surveillance over the Asia-Pacific region by expanding the reach of US military satellites.

The two countries signed a ‘space situational awareness’ partnership at the conclusion of the annual US-Australia security and military dialogue, under which Washington would place more satellite tracking sensors in Western Australia.

The network would give Americans a strategic surveillance capacity over the southern hemisphere to track space and missile launches from China as well as Korea.

The signing of a space pact comes as US and its allies in the Pacific region have accused China of trying to militarise space by investing heavily in space technology.

A space situational awareness partnership statement issued at the conclusion of the security meet said that the US and Australia shared a deep concern about the “congested and contested nature of outer space”.

G-20 Summit
The Seoul Action Plan, agreed at the end of the two-day Summit of the G-20 leaders, called for moving towards more market-determined exchange rates. An undervalued Yuan or a weak Dollar also has ramifications for India and several other countries in terms of their exports becoming uncompetitive. The G-20 group includes India, the US, China, Germany, France, Brazil, Russia and Japan.

In the face of a currency war between the US and China, global leaders, including Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, agreed to refrain from ‘competitive devaluation’ and bring in exchange rate flexibility to ensure that no country gets undue advantage.

These measures, the leaders said, would help mitigate the risk of excessive volatility in capital flows facing some emerging market economies.

Cablegate Crisis in USA
The United States was catapulted into a worldwide diplomatic crisis on November 29, 2010, with the leaking to various international media of more than 250,000 classified cables from its embassies, many sent as recently as February 2010. At the start of a series of daily extracts from the US embassy cables Arab leaders are privately urging an air strike on Iran and that US officials have been instructed to spy on the UN leadership.

The cables include comments on a shift in relations between China and North Korea, high-level concerns over Pakistan’s growing instability, and details of clandestine US efforts to combat al Qaeda in Yemen. The cables also contain specific allegations of corruption, as well as harsh criticism by US embassy staff of their host governments, from Caribbean islands to China and Russia.

The State department’s legal adviser wrote to the founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, warning that the cables were obtained illegally and that the publication would place at risk “the lives of countless innocent individuals … ongoing military operations … and co-operation between countries”.

The electronic archive of embassy dispatches from around the world was allegedly downloaded by a US soldier and passed to WikiLeaks.

The US embassy cables are marked “Sipdis”—secret internet protocol distribution. They were compiled as part of a programme under which selected dispatches, considered moderately secret but suitable for sharing with other agencies, were automatically loaded on to secure embassy websites, and linked with the military’s Siprnet internet system.

More than 11,000 are marked secret, while around 9,000 of the cables are marked noforn (no foreigners).

North Korea shells South Korean island
On November 23, 2010, North Korea fired scores of artillery shells at a South Korean island, killing two soldiers, in one of the heaviest attacks on its neighbour since the Korean War ended in 1953. South Korea was conducting military drills in the area at the time but said it had not been firing at the North.

The attack came as the reclusive North, and its ally China, were pressing regional powers to return to negotiations on its nuclear weapons programme and revelations that Pyongyang is fast developing another source of material to make atomic bombs.

It also followed moves by leader Kim Jong-il to make his youngest, but unproven, son his heir apparent, leading some analysts to question whether the bombardment might in part have been an attempt to burnish the ruling family’s image with the military.

At least 200 North Korean shells hit Yeonpyeong, which lies off the west coast of the divided peninsula near a disputed maritime border. Most landed on a military base there. Photographs from Yeongyeong island, just 120 west of Seoul, showed columns of smoke rising from buildings.

South Korean President Lee Myung-bak, who has pursued a hard line with the North since taking office nearly three years ago, said a response had to be firm following the attack. But he made no suggestion the South would retaliate further, suggesting Seoul was taking a measured response to prevent things getting out of hand.

The two Koreas are still technically at war—the Korean War ended only with a truce—and tension rose sharply early 2010 after Seoul accused the North of torpedoing one of its navy vessels, killing 46 sailors.
The US strongly condemned the attack and called on North Korea to “halt its belligerent action,” and urged nuclear-armed North Korea to “fully abide by the terms of the Armistice Agreement” that ended the Korean War.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov condemned the shelling, warning of ‘colossal danger’ from Korean tensions and calling for an end to any hostilities.

The third summit on Global Agenda was held in Dubai in November 2010. The summit gave an opportunity to social, political and business leaders across the world to benchmark key developmental issues against global realities.

The 16th United Nations Climate Change Conference took place in Cancun, Mexico, from November 29, 2010. India was among the 190 UN members who took part in the 12-day event.

The UN Education, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) has included French food in its list of world’s “intangible cultural heritage”. Peking opera and Spanish flamenco dancing have also been included in the list.

Chinese President Hu Jintao has been named the most powerful person in the world by Forbes magazine, ahead of US President Barack Obama who takes number two spot. Mrs Sonia Gandhi has been ranked 9th, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh 18th. Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani, Tata Chairman Ratan Tata and head of ArcelorMittal Lakshmi Mittal are also part of the list of 68 people.

India was ranked 119 in terms of human development, according to UNDP’s Human Development Report 2010.

Barack Obama was the fourth US President to address Indian MPs in the historic central hall of Parliament. Three of his predecessors—Dwight Eisenhower in 1959, Jimmy Carter in 1978 and Bill Clinton in 2000—were given the rare honour of addressing the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha MPs. Before Obama, former Russian President Vladimir Putin and former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe addressed Indian MPs in 2007.

UN World Day of Remembrance for Road Accident Victims is observed on November 21.

MONTHWISE CURRENT AFFAIRS-NOVEMBER 2010

Business & ECONOMY News

Institute of Microbial Technology (IMTECH), a Chandigarh based biotechnology laboratory, has signed a $150-million licensing agreement with Nostrum Pharmaceuticals, a US company, for new-generation clot busters developed by it.

According to a scheme approved by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), the union government will provide financial incentive for each electric vehicle sold in India during the remaining part of the 11th Plan—2010-11 and 2011-12. The scheme envisages incentives of up to 20 per cent on ex-factory prices of the vehicles, subject to a cap of Rs 4000 for low-speed electric two-wheelers, Rs 5000 for high-speed electric two-wheelers, Rs 60,000 for seven-seater three-wheeler and Rs one lakh for an electric car.

Axis Bank has acquired investment banking arm of Enam securities for Rs 2,067 crore. Asset Management Company and insurance broking arm of Enam are not part of the deal.

State-owned Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) has surpassed Reliance Industries to regain its position as India’s biggest refiner. This was achieved after completion of expansion of its Panipat refinery.

Tatas have launched first indigenously manufactured helicopter cabin from the aero-space special economic zone near Hyderabad. The TAS project for the cabin was conceived in collaboration with US-based Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation, a subsidiary of United Technologies Corp., USA.

On November 1, 2010, the Reserve Bank of India raised the repo and reverse repo rates by 25 basis points (100 basis points equals one per cent), reflecting the continued government and RBI concerns over inflationary pressures. Repo rate is the rate at which RBI lends to banks and that now stands at 6.25%. Reverse repo is the rate at which RBI borrows from banks and that now stands at 5.25%.

Paris-based BNP Paribas has become the world’s biggest bank, with assets rising 34 per cent in last three years, reaching $3.23 trillion.

Oil & Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), SAIL and NTPC have been given the Maharatna status by the government. This status empowers these companies to form financial joint ventures and wholly-owned subsidiaries and undertake mergers and acquisitions without government approval for up to Rs 5,000 crore in one project or 15 per cent of their net worth.

MONTH WISE CURRENT AFFAIRS-NOVEMBER 2010

NATIONAL AFFAIRS

Nitish wave sweeps Bihar
Voters in Bihar delivered a memorable and truly massive mandate to the NDA, led by Nitish Kumar of the Janata Dal (United). The NDA together cornered as many as 206 (JDU 115 and BJP 91) of the 243 seats in the Assembly, a landslide that had eluded even Lalu Yadav at his peak.

Even more spectacular was the strike rate of the BJP, which contested 102 seats and won 91 of them, winning virtually 9 of the 10 seats the party contested. The BJP appears to have done equally well in urban as well as rural constituencies, riding piggyback on the public image of Nitish Kumar.

The share of votes polled by different parties, however, tell a slightly different story. While the NDA got 40 per cent of the votes polled, up 2 per cent from the 38 per cent of the votes polled in the general election in 2009 and from 36 per cent polled by them in the last Assembly election in 2005.

Drastic improvement in Law and Order situation, speedy trials to convict 50,000 criminals, some from his own party, empowered women, reservation of half of the seats in local bodies and primary school teachers category for women were some of the major reasons for Nitish Kumar retaining power in Bihar.

Absence of local leaders and lack of ground work, and sudden decision to contest all 243 seats dissipated the focus and let to the dismal performance of Congress party.

On November 26, 2010, Nitish Kumar was sworn in as the Bihar Chief Minister for the second consecutive term and the third time at a simple ceremony at the sprawling Gandhi Maidan, Patna. Senior BJP leader Sushil Kumar Modi was sworn in as a Cabinet Minister and designated as Deputy Chief Minister.

NRIs to get voting rights
It’s celebration time for nearly 11 million Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) across the globe. They will now be able to exercise their franchise in the elections in the country of their origin. Both Houses of Parliament had passed the Representation of People (Amendment) Bill in the Winter Session of Parliament to grant voting rights to NRIs.

Citizens of India who have not acquired the citizenship of any other country and were living abroad owing to employment, education, or otherwise, are now eligible to register their names in the electoral rolls in the constituency of the address shown in their passport and to vote when and if they are physically present when polls are held.

Until now, an NRI’s name got deleted from the voters’ list if he or she stayed outside the country for more than six months at a stretch.

India’s first eco-sensitive zone on a major river
The Union government has decided to declare the natural course of the Ganga in 135 km stretch from Gaumukh to Uttarkashi in Uttarakhand as India’s first “eco-sensitive” zone on a major river. This means that part of the river cannot be disturbed for any projects. Following this decision, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh approved a proposal of scrapping three big hydel projects— Loharinag Pala, Bhairon Ghati and Pala- Maneri—and providing 2,000 MW of free power to Uttarakhand as compensation for the same.

The decision is direct fallout of Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh’s assurance to religious gurus, including senior BJP leaders, and environment experts that river Ganga will be allowed to run its natural flow in the 135-km stretch. The minister had support of non-official members of the authority, who had been advocating that no dams—small or big—be allowed on the river.

Mahadayi Water Disputes Tribunal
The Union government has constituted the Mahadayi Water Disputes Tribunal with a sitting Supreme Court judge, Justice J.M. Panchal as its Chairman. Justice Viney Mittal of the Punjab and Haryana High Court and a former judge of Andhra Pradesh High Court, Justice P.S. Narayana, have been appointed as members.

The Tribunal has been constituted on a request sent by Goa in July 2002, for adjudication of the water disputes with Karnataka relating to Mahadayi River. Maharashtra also stands to benefit from its adjudication. The need for setting up the three-member tribunal was being felt since the Union Ministry of Water Resources had tried to resolve the dispute, but was not successful.

Visit of President Patil to Abu Dhabi
Indian President Pratibha Patil made a goodwill visit to Abu Bhabi and Dubai in November 2010.

India’s economic aspirations and strong growth make it an ideal destination for foreign investment, President Pratibha Patil told members of the Abu Dhabi Chamber of Commerce.

All religions of the world unite was the President’s second message in Abu Dhabi.

At an interaction with students of Indian schools from the UAE at the Abu Dhabi Indian School, the President advised them to build friendships and develop the ability to work constructively as a team. She opined that education was not merely necessary to secure a job but an investment into the future and a way to imbibe the concepts of peace, harmony and tolerance.

Inaugurating the Indian Islamic Centre, the President said that it was a tribute to the collective efforts of the Indian Diaspora and would serve as a cultural bridge between India and the UAE.

The President arrived in Dubai to a grand reception given by the Indian community. She also launched a long-awaited 24-hour helpline for distressed Indian workers facing problems with their employers or contracts.

President Patil’s visit to Syria
Indian President Pratibha Devisingh Patil arrived on November 26, 2001, on a four-day state visit to the Syrian Arab Republic. Her visit assumed special significance since this was the first ever visit of by an Indian President to Syria.

Several Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs), including those on cultural exchange, were signed during the visit. Her talks with President al-Assad gave a new momentum to the bilateral relations in all fields, particularly on expanding economic and commercial cooperation. The President’s visit was aimed to bolster a political dialogue between the two countries and discussions were held on bilateral, regional and international issues, including West Asia peace process.

President Patil will also meet Syrian businessmen and industrialists to find new prospects for bolstering and developing economic and commercial relations between the two countries. Syria is an important country for India’s energy security needs.

Syria has already backed India’s demand for a permanent membership of the United Nations Security Council and has always tried to act as a moderator for toning down Pakistani rhetoric in the meetings of Organisation of Islamic Countries.

Visit of President Obama of USA
US President Barack Obama reached India for a three-day official visit on November 6, 2010. He arrived in Mumbai where he paid homage to the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack victims. Later, addressing the Indian and American entrepreneurs he said several landmark deals worth US $ 10 billion have been signed between Indian and American companies shortly before his arrival. These deals, he said, will help in creating more than 50,000 jobs back home in USA.

Among the biggest deals announced included Reliance Power’s purchase of 2,400 MW plants from GE and Spicejet’s deal to buy thirty three Boeing 737 aircraft.

President Obama landed in Delhi on November 7, 2010.

On November 8, President Obama addressed the Indian Parliament. The US President’s speech, which was interspersed with several India-specific references and continuously underlined the fast-improving partnership between New Delhi and Washington, was attended by a packed House, which included Vice-President Hamid Ansari, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, Cabinet ministers and members of the two Houses of Parliament.

If Obama’s support to India for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council was aimed to please the hosts, the visiting President was equally forthright when he reminded India that this membership also comes with greater responsibilities which require it to spell out its position on issues like human rights violations.

Obama, who was given a standing ovation at the end of his mesmerising speech, also pleased his hosts with a specific mention to the terrorist organisations being harboured by Pakistan.

While speaking on Iran’s nuclear programme, he said the US and India “can pursue” the goal of securing the world’s vulnerable nuclear material. “We can make it clear that even as every nation has the right to peaceful nuclear energy, every nation must also meet its international obligation, and that includes the Islamic Republic of Iran,” he said.

India and the United States pledged to defeat all terrorist networks, including the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), and strengthen international cooperative activities that will reduce the risk of terrorists acquiring nuclear weapons or material.

Condemning terrorism in all its forms, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and US President Barack Obama, in a joint statement, issued at the end of the American leader’s official engagements in India, called on Pakistan to bring to justice the perpetrators of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks.

They reiterated that success in Afghanistan and regional and global security required elimination of safe havens and infrastructure for terrorism and violent extremism in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The two leaders also emphasised the importance of close cooperation in combating terrorist financing and in protecting the international financial system.

Deciding to strengthen and expand the Indo-US global strategic partnership, the Indian PM and Obama called for an efficient, credible and legitimate United Nations to ensure a just and sustainable international order. Singh welcomed President Obama’s affirmation that in the years ahead, Washington looked forward to a reformed UN Security Council that included India as a permanent member.

Singh and Obama also expressed a commitment to strengthen international cooperative activities that would reduce the risk of terrorists acquiring nuclear weapons or material without reducing the rights of nations that played by the rules to harness the power of nuclear energy to advance their energy security. This sentence in the joint statement is obviously aimed at justifying the Indo-US civil nuclear deal under which India will develop nuclear energy with the assistance of major world powers to meet its growing electricity needs. Both sides expressed deep concern about the threat of biological terrorism and pledged to promote international efforts to ensure the safety and security of biological agents and toxins.

On the civil nuclear deal, they reiterated their commitment to build strong bilateral cooperation through the participation of American energy companies in India on the basis of mutually acceptable technical and commercial terms and conditions that enabled a viable tariff regime for the electricity generated.

The two leaders also decided to take mutual steps to expand US-India cooperation in civil space, defence and other high-technology sectors commensurate with India’s non-proliferation record and commitment to abide by multilateral export control standards.

Key health and Education pacts singed: A promise to help India battle old and emerging infections and another of forging collaborations in higher education were the high points of US President Barack Obama’s India visit, which saw two key pacts being inked in the sectors.

On the health front, President Obama and Prime Minsiter Manmohan Singh announced the setting up of the Global Disease Detection India Centre to come up under the MoU between the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), Delhi, and the Centre for Disease Control (CDC), Atlanta.

On the education front, the two sides committed themselves to a higher education summit in New Delhi in 2011 to develop “collaborations” in the area.

Building lab capacity at home for diagnoses of emerging infectious diseases using well characterised reference materials and advanced technology transfer that meets CDC and global standards will be the other major takeaways from health MoU.

India and the US also launched a joint initiative for an ‘Evergreen Revolution’ in agriculture to promote food security across the world. As part of the food security initiative, India’s expertise in agriculture sector will be shared with farmers in Africa. An agreement was also reached between the two nations for cooperation on forecast of monsoon, the most crucial weather feature for a good crop.

Obama said, “like the earlier collaboration between two countries in agriculture that ushered in ‘Green Revolution’ in India, he expected the ‘Evergreen Revolution’ to enhance food security for the world”.

Loan scam
On November 24, 2010, the CBI arrested R.R. Nair, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of LIC Housing Finance, and four other senior officers of public sector banks and financial institutions, including the LIC, the Bank of India, the Central Bank of India and Punjab National Bank, on bribery charges to facilitate corporate loans.

The arrests and the subsequent talk of a housing scam spooked stock markets that fell in the last hour of trading by 232 points with financials and real estate stocks, which were directly related to CBI’s action, bearing the maximum brunt.

The CBI said it had busted a racket wherein the private financial services company, its CMD and other associates were allegedly bribing senior officials of public sector banks and financial institutions for facilitating large-scale corporate loans. They were also gathering confidential business information from financial institutions.

Officials of various public sector banks and financial institutions, namely the Bank of India, the Central Bank of India, Punjab National Bank, LIC and LIC Housing Finance Limited were receiving illegal gratification from the private financial services company that acted as mediator for corporate loans and other facilities from financial institutions.

Post independence, India lost $462 bn in illicit financial flows
Post independence, India lost a staggering $462 billion in illicit financial flows due to tax evasion, crime and corruption, a research and advocacy group has said in a report. The report, released by Washington-based Global Financial Integrity (GFI), found that the faster rates of economic growth since economic reform started in 1991 led to a deterioration of income distribution which led to more illicit flows from India.

According to the primary findings of the report titled “The Drivers and Dynamics of Illicit Financial Flows from India: 1948-2008”, India lost a total of $213 billion in illicit financial flows (or illegal capital flight).
These illicit financial flows were generally the product of: tax evasion, corruption, bribery and kickbacks, and criminal activities.

From 1948 through 2008 the Indian private sector shifted away from deposits into developed country banks and moved more of its money into offshore financial centres (OFCs). The share of OFC deposits increased from 36.4 per cent in 1995 to 54.2 per cent in 2009, the report said.

The total present value of India’s illicit assets held abroad accounts for approximately 72 per cent of India’s underground economy. This means that almost three-quarters of the illicit assets comprising India’s underground economy—which has been estimated to account for 50 per cent of India’s GDP (approximately $640 billion at the end of 2008)—ends up outside of the country.

Telecom spectrum scam
On November 16, 2010, the CAG indicted former telecom minister A. Raja for ignoring the advice of Prime Minister, Finance and Law ministries to allocate 2G spectrum to new players in 2008 causing a whopping revenue loss of over Rs 1.76 lakh crore.

In the report, tabled in both houses of Parliament, the CAG noted that the ministry of communication and IT “decided to go ahead with arbitrarily deciding that the cut-off date for issuance of Letters of Intent would be advanced to September 25, 2007, and applications received would be decided on FCFS (first-come-first-served) basis.”

In November 2007, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had written to the telecom ministry suggesting introduction of “transparent methodology” of auction, “revision of entry fee” in the “backdrop of inadequate spectrum and large number of applications received for fresh licences.”

The CAG highlighted that the Law Ministry had suggested setting up of an Empowered Group of Ministers to discuss the large number of applications and spectrum pricing, but the telecom ministry rejected it saying “the need for forming and EGoM arises when a new policy is being framed and on this particular issue no new policy for grant of UASL (unified access service licences) was being framed.”

The auditor, however, said the “contention of the DoT is untenable as the rejection of the advice” of the Law Minister to have detailed deliberations on the issues in the EGoM on the ground that changes in policy might lead to litigation “goes against the well-established and time-tested procedures of functioning of the government and the collective responsibility of the Union Cabinet.”

The report said the presumptive loss caused to the exchequer through spectrum allocation to 122 licencees and 35 dual technology licences in 2007-08 was Rs 1,76,645 crore. It pegged the figures on the basis of 3G auction held earlier this year in which the government mopped up over Rs 67,000 crore.

In the 77-page report, the CAG said the figure of the presumptive loss has been determined on the basis of various indicators like 3G auction and a price offered by an operator in 2007, besides scarcity value, nature of competition, business plans envisaged, number of operators and growth of sector.

The auditor pointed out that spectrum was allotted by DoT to the existing operators beyond the contracted limits (6.2 Mhz) without imposing any upfront charge for such allotment.

On the values determined through various indicators, the presumptive value of 2G spectrum on account of grant of 157 licences in different circles during 2007-08 would be in the range of approximately Rs 58,000 crore to Rs 1,52,038 crore.

The value of spectrum held by 13 operators for 51 circles based on the 2001 rates works out to be Rs 2,561 crore, while its value based on above indicators like 3G auction would be Rs 12,000 to Rs 37,000 crore.

The CAG said that 85 out of 122 new licences issued to 13 companies in 2008 were granted to ineligible companies as all of them (85) did not have stipulated paid-up capital at the time of application. Further 45 out of 85 licencees were issued to companies which failed to satisfy conditions of main object clause in the memorandum of Association (MoA), the government auditor said.

The CAG said the process of giving dual technology licences to leading telecom firms including Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices “lacked transparency and fairness”, and equal opportunity was denied to other similarly placed operators who could apply for use of dual technology only after formal announcement of the policy.

Noting that this approval (dual technology use) had violated Cabinet decision of 2003 to allow additional spectrum at 2001 prices, the auditor said, “Deviation from a Cabinet decision should normally be with the approval of Cabinet.

April 11, 1954 has been declared as the most boring day of the 20th century. Every day something significant happens, but nothing remarkable is known to have happened on this day, according to experts who inserted over 300 million important events of the century in a computer search programme to calculate.

From January 2011, all telemarketers’ mobile numbers will start with the same three digits: 700. This move is part of the ‘Customer Call Preference Regulation’ on curbing unsolicited marketing calls and SMS messages.

The Bimal Jalan committee was set-up to review the ownership and working of capital markets infrastructure institutions (MIIs). One major recommendation of the report is that only banks, insurance companies and domestic financial institutes with a net worth of Rs 1,000 crore be roped in as anchor investors.

Rajiv Gandhi Scheme for Empowerment of Adolescent Girls, called SABLA, aims to empower adolescent girls between ages 11 to 18 years by providing them nutrition, Iron and Folic Acid (IFA) supplementation, health check-up, nutrition and health education, counselling/guidance on family welfare, vocational training etc.

Former Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi (ranked 9th) and Mother Teresa (ranked 22nd) are among Time magazine’s “25 Most Powerful Women of the Past Century”. The list is topped by Jane Addams, an outspoken advocate for women suffrage, who was the first American woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize.

Oil & Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), SAIL and NTPC have been given the Maharatna status by the government. This status empowers these companies to form financial joint ventures and wholly-owned subsidiaries and undertake mergers and acquisitions without government approval for up to Rs 5,000 crore in one project or 15 per cent of their net worth.

Sachin Tendulkar has been named as the official ambassador of Cricket World Cup, 2011.

Ace shooter Gagan Narang was India’s flag-bearer during the opening ceremony of the 16th Asian Games held at Guanghzhou, China.

The Central government has renamed the Amritsar airport as Sri Guru Ram Dass Jee International Airport.

India was ranked 119 in terms of human development, according to UNDP’s Human Development Report 2010.

Taj Falaknuma Palace in Hyderabad is India’s most expensive hotel. The palace was once the exclusive preserve of the rulers of Hyderabad. The grand presidential suite at the hotel costs Rs 5 lakh per night.

Uttarkhand based NGO Himalayan Chipko Foundation has been awarded the Green Apple award at the House of Commons, London, for exposing the Hak Hakook scam in which timber meant for villagers in the State was sold to the timber mafia.

National Cancer Awareness day is observed on November 7.

National Legal Services Day is observed on November 9.

World Diabetes Day is observed on November 14.

OCTOBER CURRENT AFFAIRS

India's per capita income grew by 10.5 per cent to Rs 44,345 in 2009-10 against Rs 40,141 in the year-ago period, according to government data. The World Bank, however, pegs India's per capita income at a much higher $1,180 per year. India ranks a poor 161st in the world in terms of per capita incomes. The per capita income was slightly higher than Rs 43,749 as calculated by the Central Statistical Organisation in its advance estimates for FY10. However, per capita income grew by 5.6 per cent last fiscal if it is calculated on the basis of 2004-05 prices, which is a better way of comparison and broadly factors inflation. Per capita income (at 2004-05 prices) stood at Rs 33,588 in FY10 against Rs 31,821 in the previous year, according to estimates of national income. Per capital income means income of each Indian if national income is evenly divided among the country's population of 117 crore (Rs 1.17 billion).

The size of the Indian economy rose to Rs 62,31,171 crore (Rs 62.3 trillion) in the 2009-10, up 11.8 per cent over Rs 55,74,449 crore (Rs 55.7 trillion) in FY09.

According to the World Bank categories, nations with per capita income (PCI) less than $935 are 'low income;' nations with PCI from $936 to $3,705 are 'lower middle income;' those with PCI from $3,706 to $11,455 are 'upper middle income;' and those with PCI from $11,456 or more are 'high income.'

From January 1, 2011, India will extend “visa on arrival” facility to nationals of Cambodia, Vietnam, Philippines and Laos.

Volkswagen’s Bugatti, costing upwards of Rs 16 crore, is India’s most expensive car.

The Union government has okayed two new naval bases on the eastern coast of India, at Paradip (Oddisa) and Tuticorin (Tamil Nadu).

India has slipped to 87th spot in Transparency International’s latest ranking of nations, based on level of corruption. The “Corruption Perception Index” ranks Denmark, New Zealand and Singapore as the top three in the list with lowest level of corruption.

The International Cricket Council (ICC) and Castrol, the world’s leading lubricant company, have announced an agreement that makes Castrol the official performance partner of ICC with a unique presence at all ICC cricket events for the next five years.

The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has raised the application limit for retail investors to Rs 2 lakh, from Rs one lakh.

The International Renewable Energy Conference was held in New Delhi in October 2010.

India became a sectoral dialogue partner with ASEAN in 1992. It became a full dialogue partner in 1995. India and ASEAN have been holding annual summits since 2002. The 8th India-ASEAN Summit was held in Hanoi, Vietnam on October 29, 2010.

India will celebrate 2013 as the centenary milestone year to showcase the heritage of the Indian film industry.

Bharat Diamond Bourse in Mumbai is said to be the world’s largest bourse, with all the essential facilities—cutting, polishing, trading, banking and customs—under single roof.

World Standards Day and World Sight Day are observed on October 14.

The Rail Coach factory, Kapurthala, has rolled out India’s first AC double-decker rake from its premises. The first AC double-decker train has been introduced between Howrah (West Bengal) and Dhanbad (Jharkhand).

The UN General Assembly has elected India, Germany, South Africa and Columbia to two-year seats on UN Security Council. The term will begin in January 2011. The four countries will be the non-veto-holding members of the 15-nation body.

“Conversations with Myself” has been written by former South African President Nelson Mandela.

Krishna Poonia won India’s first Commonwealth Games athletics gold, in 2010 Games, after Milkha Singh in 1958.

Finance Minister of India, Pranab Mukherjee has won 2010 Finance Minister of the Year for Asia award, conferred by Emerging Markets, part of Euromoney Institutional Investor Plc.

World Mental Health Day is observed on October 10.

Three Indian women—all from the corporate sector—find a spot on the Forbes list of 100 most powerful women in the world, topped by US First Lady Michelle Obama. Chennai-born PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi came in at No 6, while Axis Bank CEO Shikha Sharma and ICICI Bank Managing Director & CEO Chanda Kochhar were ranked 89th and 92nd, respectively. Surprisingly missing from 2010 list is Congress President Sonia Gandhi. She came in at No 13 in 2009.

Beijing Olympic gold medallist Abhinav Bindra led the 619-strong Indian contingent in the opening ceremony of the Commonwealth Games, 2010.

Current Affairs October 2010

NATIONAL AFFAIRS India trails in Global Hunger Index The IFPRI’s Global Hunger index ranks India in the “alarming” group (the categories: moderate, serious, alarming and extremely alarming), below many failed States ruled by tyrants and despots. The ranking considers the number of children under five who are underweight, malnourished or wind up dead, particularly girls. In Asia, everyone, except Bangladesh, which is just one rank below India, is doing better. China is at number nine, Pakistan at 59, Nepal at 56. India is bested by a host of tottering States, including Guinea-Bissau, Togo, Burkina Faso, Sudan, Rwanda and Zimbabwe. India’s approach to hunger has been to throw a programme at every failing. There is the world’s largest programme for nutritional, health and school needs of children under six, the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS), which runs 1.4 million centres nationwide with a budget of Rs 7,806 crore for 2020-11. Then, there is the world’s biggest cooked-meal programme, covering 119 million children in government schools up to class VIII with a budget of Rs 9,440 crore. India also has the world’s largest public distribution system (PDS) for subsidised food, with a budget of Rs 55,578 crore, and the world’s biggest cash-for-work programme, the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), with a budget of Rs 40,100 crore. Hunger in India is definitely not a problem of resources. However, hunger persists despite spectacular economic expansion, and it is disproportionate to rising incomes. Behind every story of hunger and malnutrition is a collective national apathy towards the poor, an unreformed, struggling agriculture sector, the low status of women and collapsing administration. In addressing hunger, the biggest question remains: who’s in charge? Evidence abounds in leaky multi-billion dollar, anti-hunger programmes: a quarter of the money spent on mid-day meals never reaches the poor, a third in the NREGA and more than half on the PDS. The failures of the PDS are especially acute. Only 36 per cent of its poor have below-poverty-line (BPL) cards to access cheap food. Nearly 60 per cent of these cards are with people who are not officially poor. National Green Tribunal Notified The National Green Tribunal (NGT) was officially notified on October 19, 2010 with its Chairperson, Justice Lokeshwar Singh Panta taking charge of his office. The tribunal is exclusively dedicated to environmental issues. Established by an Act of Parliament (the National Green Tribunal Act of 2010), it will have circuit benches across the country to try all matters related to and arising out of environmental issues. The tribunal, which shall also consist of other members, who are experts in the field of environmental and related sciences, has been empowered to issue directions for the compensation and restitution of damage caused from actions of environmental negligence. This is the first body of its kind that is required by its parent statute to apply the “polluter pays” principle and the principle of sustainable development. The erstwhile National Environment Appellate Authority had ceased to exist with the launch of the NGT. Tobacco India Report Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS) for India, 2009-10, conducted on 99.9 per cent of India’s population in 29 States, UTs of Chandigarh and Puducherry has submitted its report. According to it, India’s obsession with tobacco continues despite laws to tell the users of its lethal consequences. Though 64 per cent of all adults believe tobacco leads to heart attacks, 35 per cent (one-third) continue to consume tobacco in some form or the other. Highlights of the report are: —52 percent adults exposed to second hand smoke at home, highest in J&K (68%), lowest in Chandigarh (15%); 29 percent exposed in public places. —Cigarette smokers’ monthly expense is Rs 400, as against Rs 94 for bidi smokers. —Monthly cigarette expenditure is highest in Arunachal (Rs 1,265), lowest in Jharkhand (Rs 181.70). —Mizoram has highest tobacco use (67%), while Goa (9%), Punjab (12%), and Chandigarh (14%) have lowest. —Mizo women are most addicted (62% use tobacco) as against least addicted in Punjab (under 1%), Chandigarh, Himachal and Goa (under 5%). —Most tobacco use is in East (45%), Northeast (44%), and lowest use is in North (19%). India signs Convention on Supplementary Compensation at IAEA On October 27, 2010, India signed the Convention on Supplementary Compensation (CSC) at the IAEA in Vienna that will enable the country to undertake nuclear commerce. The convention sets parameters on a nuclear operator’s financial liability in the event of a nuclear accident. The convention was adopted in September 1997 and opened for signature at Vienna a few days later at the 41st General Conference of the IAEA. The convention provides for compensation in case of transnational implications of a nuclear accident and has been signed by 14 countries. However, only four countries—USA, Argentina, Morocco and Romania—have ratified it so far. Upon entry into force, the convention would establish a uniform global regime for compensation to victims in the event of a nuclear accident. The CSC provides for the establishment of an international fund to increase the amount available to compensate victims and allows for compensating civil damage occurring within a State’s exclusive economic zone, including the loss of tourism and fisheries-related income. It also sets parameters on a nuclear operator’s financial liability, time limits governing possible legal action, requires that nuclear operators maintain insurance or other financial security measures and provides for a single competent court to hear claims. All States are free to participate in the convention regardless of their involvement in existing nuclear liability conventions or the presence of nuclear installations on their territories. Notably, India is the only country to have such a provision, which was added after wide political pressure. ASEAN-India Summit The 8th ASEAN-India Summit was held at Hanoi, Vietnam on October 30, 2010. Addressing the heads of the state of ASEAN countries, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said the conclusion of a “services and investment agreement” between India and ASEAN would be an important step in “our goal of comprehensive economic cooperation”. With an aim to play a more significant role in the growing economies of the region, India has been pushing its case for having a bilateral pact in services and investment at the earliest. Through this pact, India wants to get a foothold in all ASEAN countries for its growing pharmaceutical industry, besides allowing ease in visa regimes for its IT professionals, healthcare workers and teachers in Brunei, Cambodia, Laos, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand (ASEAN nations). With an agreement in place for free trade in services and investment, India can offer a bigger share of the pie to these countries in its infrastructure sector that is poised for a major growth. Addressing the other leaders at the summit, which came out with a five-year ‘Plan of Action’ outlining a roadmap for enhanced multi-faceted cooperation, Manmohan Singh said: “India’s economy is expected to witness a sustained growth rate of 9-10 per cent in the coming years, which would offer many opportunities for trade and investment. Our experience of implementation shows that we need to work very hard at all levels if we have to accelerate the pace of engagement as outlined in the plan of action”. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s Japan visit Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited Japan on October 25, 2010. The visit ended with the successful conclusion of negotiations for the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA). As a first step in realising CEPA, both countries agreed to a “sweeping” liberalisation of their bilateral visa regime. The successful conclusion of CEPA is expected to elevate trade and economic relations between the two countries to the next level. Though the trade between the two nations remained almost stagnant for decades, it has been growing rapidly since past three years. The agreement will foster new business opportunities, enhance competitiveness of private sectors, and encourage closer partnership between the private sectors in India’s teeming SMEs and Japan’s infrastructure and hi-technology enterprises. India is hoping that the CEPA coming into place will also balance out the trade imbalance between the two countries. As of now, trade between the two countries is strongly in favour of Japan. India is also hoping that its generic pharmaceutical and IT sectors will benefit largely as this agreement opens up the Japanese market for India. While Japan exports marine products, iron ore and petroleum products to India, electrical and electronic goods, iron and steel products, chemicals and auto components are exported by India. Since India-Japan CEPA is truly comprehensive for trade in goods, investment and services, besides allowing movement of natural persons, it will improve the India-Japan partnership and enhance their global partnership. This will also mean that goods being traded will become cheaper, with the lifting of trade barriers. Visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Malaysia Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited Kaula Lumpur on October 27, 2010. The highlight of the visit was agreement between India and Malaysia to forge new ties on two of the most important issues for their economies—sealing the Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement (CECA) and contain the threat of terrorism through establishment of a Joint Working Group on Counter Terrorism, besides collaboration in defence. The two leaders said that the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) will be signed by January 31, 2011 and this will be implemented by July 1, 2011. Taking into account the India-ASEAN trade in goods agreement, that came into effect from January 1, 2010, both sides have offered ASEAN plus market access in goods. India and Malaysia have also agreed to provide access of each others’ services market across all modes and various sectors. The two countries will now finalize areas of economic cooperation in infrastructure development, creative industries, tourism, SMEs, business facilitation, science and technology and human resource development. Malaysia is the second largest trading partner for India within ASEAN, and India is the largest trading partner for Malaysia in South Asia, excluding China. Bilateral trade between the two countries is now estimated at $ 10.5 billion, and this has doubled in the past five years. The two leaders, while condemning terrorism in all its forms and manifestations, agreed to enhance cooperation in counter terrorism, through information sharing and setting up a Joint Working Group on counter-terrorism. This is of great importance for India as Malaysia is understood to be emerging as a logistics, regrouping and fund raising hub for three militant groups—militants from Punjab, Tamil Tigers and Al-Qaeda. Jamia Islamia, based in Indonesia, is an Al Qaeda affiliate, and is helping the latter in logistics and fund raising there. India and Malaysia have also agreed to enhance defence exchanges and cooperation through regular exchanges between the defence ministers and senior defence officials, chiefs of armed forces and regular service to service staff talks and regular ship visits. The two sides also signed as many as five agreements. These include MoU on cooperation in field of traditional systems of medicine; MoU on Cooperation in Terrorism; MoU for Cooperation in IT sector; Agreement between CSIR and UNIK of Malaysia on Research and Development Collaboration; and, Cultural Exchange Programme. India-Russia to jointly develop advance stealth jet India and its old military partner Russia will soon ink a deal to jointly develop an advance stealth fighter. Defence Minister A.K. Antony said during the visit of his Russian counter-part A.E. Serdyukov on October 7, 2010, that he has sorted out all issues regarding the joint development of the fifth generation of fighter aircraft (FGFA). Apart from this, the joint development of the multi-role transport aircraft (MTA) will be the other major military programme between the two nations over the next ten years. Notably, the announcement balances out the “perceived” tilt in India’s decision to buy a series of aircrafts from the US. This includes medium haul transporters, the C-130-J, long-range maritime reconnaissance aircraft, the P8-I, and some VVIP jets from Boeing. The FGFA will be the IAF’s frontline fighter from 2016-2017 onwards and will cost the nation $25 billion, dwarfing the much-hyped $11-billion deal for the purchase of another 126 fighters. With stealth technology, super manoeuvrability and supersonic speed, it will match the F-22 raptor produced by the US. In case of the MTA, the two nations formed a $600 million joint enterprise in September 2010, for designing and producing it. The planes will be designed at carrying load of around 20 tonne, with speeds in the region of 900 km, and will be an asset on shorter runways in Ladakh and the North East. Design specialists from Ilyushin, maker of best-selling transport plane, IL-76, will be on board. N-deal with South Korea India and South Korea have struck a deal to finalise an agreement on civil uses of nuclear energy. This was a major success for India during the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s Asia tour. The issue came up for discussion during the bilateral meeting of the Prime Minister with the President of the Republic of Korea, Lee Myung-bak, at Hanoi, on the sidelines of the 17th ASEAN Summit. The Korean President has invited the Prime Minister to Korea in 2011 and the deal is likely to be signed then. With this, Korea becomes the ninth country with which India will be signing the nuclear agreement. Ever since the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) ended India’s isolation from global nuclear commerce mainstream in 2008, India has signed civil nuclear pacts with U.S.A, France, Russia, Canada, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Argentina and Namibia. India strengthens ties with Vietnam India has enlarged its scope of cooperation and relations with Vietnam—another “not-so-happy” neighbour of China. Defence Minister A.K. Antony, during his visit to Vietnam, announced a slew of measures to expand cooperation as part of the nation’s “look east policy” aimed at engaging key countries situated east of India. Under an arrangement, New Delhi will provide support to Vietnam to enhance and upgrade the capabilities of its services in general and Navy in particular. Apart from capacity building for repair and maintenance of its equipment, most of which are of Russian origin, the armies of the two countries will also cooperate in areas like IT and English training of Vietnamese Army personnel. In return, Hanoi has offered maintenance and repair facilities at Vietnamese ports and called for more ships of the Indian Navy to visit them. The navies of the two nations often exercise together. To take their ties to the next level, both the armies will also have joint training in mountain and jungle warfare in India in 2011 and will also work towards developing cooperation among defence institutes. CWG Corruption probe Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has appointed a high-level committee headed by a former Comptroller and Auditor General, V.K. Shunglu, to go into allegations of corruption related to the Commonwealth Games held in New Delhi in October 2010. The developments came as opposition parties, which had held their fire during the 12-day event, stepped up their demand for thorough probe into corruption charges so that those guilty can be brought to book.

INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS EU bows to German call for debt mechanism German Chancellor Angela Merkel has won European Union backing for a rewrite of EU treaties to create a permanent debt-crisis mechanism by 2013, to prevent a repeat of the Greece-led shock that jolted the Euro. As the biggest contributor to Euro 860 billion ($1.2 trillion) in loans and pledges to stem 2010-s debt crisis, Germany wants to spare taxpayers the costs of any future operations to rescue financially distressed States. Bonds in Greece, saved from the brink of default by EU and International Monetary Fund loans in May, led a decline by so- called peripheral European securities as Germany’s triumph spurred concern that the EU mechanism will force bond holders to bear the costs of future bailouts. The extra yield investors demand to hold Greek 10-year debt over German equivalents rose to 813 basis points. German bonds advanced as investors sought safer assets, paring their weekly drop. G-20 raises developing nations’ quota in IMF The Group of 20 Finance leaders struck a landmark deal on October 22, 2010, to boost developing countries’ power in the International Monetary Fund, even as they failed to set targets for a wide-ranging global economic rebalancing. The IMF deal was hailed by fund MD Dominique Strauss-Kahn as a ‘historical’ moment that will see Europeans give up two seats on its 24-strong board to powerful developing countries and transfer 6 percent of votes to them. India is world’s third largest carbon emitter India is now world’s third biggest carbon dioxide emitting nation after China and the US. The new emission data from the United Nations was a cause of worry for India’s climate negotiators at the next round of talks in Tianjin in China, held in October 2010. China, in 2009, moved to the top position while contributing 23 per cent of the total global emissions and India, in 2010, surpassed Russia to take the third position with five percent. The saving grace is that the difference in total carbon emissions between the US (22 per cent) and India is still huge. Russia's emissions have been falling because of economic slowdown. India's per-capita carbon emission is still lowest in the world (about 4.5 tonnes) but the demand for energy is rising, especially among the middle-class. The pressure on India and China to reduce emissions is rising. US chief climate negotiator Todd Stern told a meeting of major economies forum that a legally binding climate treaty was not possible until India and China take “obligation” to reduce emissions. ASEAN Summit The 17th ASEAN Summit was held in Hanoi, Vietnam, on October 28-30, 2010. The meeting was considered a success, with all members agreeing to cooperate with one another in solving the region’s economic downturn. The 17th ASEAN Summit focused on the contents of building the community and implementing the ASEAN Charter, external relations and key role of the body, sustainable development and coping with global challenges. Business News After three decades and more than 220 million units, Sony has stopped selling its Walkman cassette player in Japan, admitting the gadget could not keep up in the digital age. Cherished by a generation of joggers, school children and music fans since its launch in 1979, the Walkman evolutionised the way people listened to music but has since been overtaken by another icon of the modern era—the iPod. The July 1, 1979, roll-out of the portable cassette player helped transform Sony into a global electronics powerhouse. The Japanese giant sold 30,000 Walkmans in the first two months after its launch, and 50 million within a decade. Eurocopter, a company owned by European consortium, European Aeronautic Defence & Space Co. NV (EADS), has become the first global chopper company to open an office in India. Pfizer Inc has decided to acquire King Pharmaceuticals, a move that will bolster the pharma major’s presence in the pain treatment segment. Hewlett-Packard has appointed former SAP AG CEO Leo Apotheker as its CEO and President. Bharti Airtel will partner telecom equipment suppliers Ericsson and Huawei to expand and manage its mobile network in Bangladesh.