Current Affairs Questions & Answers - May 11, 2017

ANSWER: Ageing

Explanation:
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) called on Asian economies to learn from Japan’s experience and act early to cope with rapidly ageing populations, warning that parts of the region risk getting old before becoming rich.

Asia has enjoyed substantial demographic dividends in the past decades, but the growing number of elderly is set to create a demographic “tax” on growth, according to the IMF.

Adapting to ageing could be especially challenging for Asia, as populations living at relatively low per capita income levels in many parts of the region are rapidly becoming old.

Some countries in Asia are getting old before becoming rich.

The population growth rate is projected to fall to zero for Asia by 2050 and the share of working-age people, now at its peak, will decline over the coming decades, the report said.

The share of the population aged 65 and older will increase rapidly and reach close to two-and-a-half times the current level by 2050, it said.

That means demographics could subtract 0.1 percentage point from annual global growth over the next three decades, it said.

The challenges are particularly huge for Japan, which faces both an ageing and shrinking population. Its labour force shrank by more than 7 per cent in the past two decades.

The high percentage of its citizens living on pensions may be behind Japan’s excess savings and low investment, which are weighing on growth and blamed in part for keeping inflation below the Bank of Japan’s 2 per cent target.

Japan’s experience highlights how demographic headwinds can adversely impact growth, inflation dynamics and the effectiveness of monetary policy.

The IMF called on Asian nations to make changes like introducing credible fiscal consolidation plans, boosting female and elderly labour force participation, and revamping social safety nets.

ANSWER: Pooja Kapur

Explanation:
Pooja Kapur has been appointed as the next Ambassador of India to the Republic of Bulgaria.

Pooja Kapur, an Indian Foreign Service (IFS) officer – 1996 batch, presently serves as the Joint Secretary at the Ministry of External Affairs.

Venu Rajamony was appointed as the next Ambassador of India to the Kingdom of Netherlands.

Rajamony, President Pranab Mukherjee’s press secretary, was a student of Kochi’s Maharaja’s College.

He then pursued M.A. in International Relations at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU).

Rajamony topped the civil services examinations in 1986, after which he was inducted into the Indian Foreign Services (IFS)

ANSWER: Both of the above

Explanation:
The government has set up a task force headed by NITI Aayog vice-chairman Arvind Panagariya to come up with a methodology to generate timely and reliable employment data.

The Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself has initiated the process and has asked the task force to submit its recommendations at the earliest.

The other members of the task force are labour secretary M. Sathiyavathy, secretary of the statistics department T.C.A. Ananth, NITI Aayog’s Pulak Ghosh and Manish Sabharwal, chairman and co-founder of staffing firm Teamlease Services Ltd.

India lacks reliable data on jobs. The available data is currently outdated.

The data on jobs in the informal sector which employs country’s majority of the workforce is not easily available.

Also, the data released by the Labour Bureau is restricted to the organized sector. National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) data which is the most comprehensive data available on jobs is generated with a time lag.

Better data on jobs data will help policy planners assess the impact of policies on jobs and will shed light on the actual size of the informal economy

India’s Labour Market

• India’s labour market constitutes of over 470 million people.
• According to CRISIL, around 18 million people enter the workforce every year.
• As per the data with the NSSO, India had created around 59.9 million jobs between 1999-2000 and 2004-05 and created nearly two million jobs between 2004-05 and 2009-10.
• Between 2009-10 and 2011-12, 13.9 million jobs were created in the country.

ANSWER: Moon Jae-in

Explanation:
Moon Jae-in has been declared winner in South Korea’s presidential election by that country’s National Election Commission.

Moon, the Democratic Party’s candidate has won with 41.08% of votes. Moon will replace the ousted President Park Geun-hye, who was ejected from office in March after a corruption scandal for which she’s awaiting trial.

Moon narrowly lost to Park in 2012 election.

Park was South Korea’s first female president. She has been impeached in a corruption scandal.

Moon is a 64 year old former human rights lawyer and a liberal who favours a more open policy toward North Korea.

Unlike predecessors, Moon favours engagement with North Korea and has challenged the deployment of US missile defence system in South Korea.

Moon is a staunch proponent of the “Sunshine Policy”, which aimed to improve relations between the two Koreas from 1998 to 2008.

Moon Jae-in: Know More

• A son of refugees who fled North Korea during the 1950-53 Korean War, in 1975, Moon was jailed for staging anti-government protests.
• Later, he became a human rights lawyer and defended the rights of poor labourers and student activists. In 1972, Moon became a part of a pro-democracy movement to topple the dictatorship of Park Chung-hee.
• Park Chung-hee ruled South Korea for 18 years.
• He was the father of recently ousted President Park Geun-hye.

ANSWER: None of the above

Explanation:
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has inaugurated Supreme Court’s Integrated Case Management Information System (ICMIS).

This digital filing system will mark Supreme Court’s first towards becoming a paperless, digital court.

ICMIS is hailed as the biggest and most ambitious leap in judicial system.

Subsequently, all High Courts, District Courts, Sub-Division Courts will be integrated with the new system.

Later on, all the jails in the country will be Integrated by ICMIS software.

ICMIS will help litigants access data and obtain information about the filing, delays etc.

It would pave way for the integration of all courts in the country.

The appellants hereafter is not required to file the records as the records will be picked up electronically from trial courts and high courts.

The digital filing system will also help in ushering transparency as nothing can be manipulated with this paperless system.

Also, the litigants will be able to know the progress of the case on real time basis.

ANSWER: End of Train Telemetry

Explanation:
The Indian Railways is set to acquire the End of Train Telemetry (EoTT) equipments to run nearly 1,000 trains without guards in the current fiscal.

The EoTT system is designed to perform the guard’s job. EoTT system comprises two units, namely, ‘cab display unit’ (CDU) which is fitted on the locomotive and ‘sense and brake unit’ (SBU) which is fitted on the last coach of the train.

The units will be fitted with radio transmitter which can communicate with each other. The transmitter will send signals at regular intervals to the last coach to ensure that the train is running intact.

The Indian Railways will initially acquire 1,000 EoTT equipments for its container operations and later on more units will be procured to be fitted on all trains.

Accordingly, all goods trains on the proposed dedicated freight corridors will run with EoTT system.

Each set of EoTT device will cost approximately INR 10 lakh.

EoTT: Know More

• The EoTT system will help in establishing communication between the locomotive driver and the last wagon of the train.
• It ensures that the train is running as a complete unit.
• In case of parting of coaches from the rear side of the train, it will give indication to the loco driver so that the driver can apply brakes to the rear unit thereby averting collision of the rear portion with the front portion of the train.
• The transmitter at the last coach is connected to the brakes and the brake gets applied so that the broken away portion of wagons do not collide with the front portion.

ANSWER: 30,248

Explanation:
The 30-share BSE Sensex reached its record close of 30,248.

The index has surpassed its previous record closing of 30,133.35 reached on April 26. It also surpassed its intra-day peak of 30,184.22 recorded on April 27 to hit a fresh intra-day high of 30,271.60.

The NSE index Nifty has breached the 9,400-mark for the first time. The NSE index registered a record high of 9,415, surpassing its previous milestone of 9,377 reached on May 5.

The indices have settled at their respective closing highs after the IMD’s new monsoon forecast has predicted that India is likely to receive higher monsoon rainfall as the concern over the El Nino weather condition has eased.

What is a Share Market Index?

• A share market Index shows how a specified portfolio of share prices is moving in order to give an indication of market trends.
• It is a basket of securities and the average price movement of the basket of securities indicates the index movement, whether upwards or downwards.
• BSE Sensex is such an index.
• The BSE SENSEX is a free-float market capitalization-weighted stock market index of 30 well-established and financially sound companies listed on Bombay Stock Exchange.

ANSWER: Jharkhand

Explanation:
The Government of Jharkhand and Oracle on 8th May signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) intended to improve citizen services.

The agreement also works to make Jharkhand an attractive destination for start-ups.

Oracle will offer its support to the state through its vast portfolio of technology solutions, including Oracle Cloud - which are already powering a large number of governments globally.

These solutions cater to the growing requirements and expectations of citizens, businesses and government departments for smarter, transparent and efficient governance within the state of Jharkhand.

As part of the MoU, the Government of Jharkhand and Oracle will jointly explore and identify areas in which Oracle’s latest cloud-based technologies can be used to deliver improved citizen services and to address the state’s citizen and business requirements.

The state administration intends to use Oracle’s cloud-based solutions to build a platform to encourage innovation and entrepreneurship among its youth, helping establish Jharkhand as a preferred start-up destination in India.

Jharkhand also received investment support from the Centre for an internal venture capital fund to support start-ups in the State.

Under the MoU, Oracle and the Government of Jharkhand will collaborate to create proof of concepts and help new startups using Oracle Cloud-based platforms to operationalise citizen services and start-up centres aimed at increasing employment and alleviate poverty.

Oracle: Know More

• Headquarters: Redwood City, California, United States
• Subsidiaries: NetSuite, Dyn, Art Technology Group, Taleo, Endeca
• Founders: Larry Ellison, Ed Oates, Bob Miner

ANSWER: Justice Karnan

Explanation:
A seven-judge Constitution bench of the Supreme Court (SC), headed by Chief Justice J S Khehar, on 9 May 2017 sentenced Justice C S Karnan, the Calcutta High Court judge, to six months of imprisonment.

Justice Karnan has been sentenced for imprisonment for repeated incidents of contempt of court.

This marks the first time that the Supreme Court has sent a high court judge to jail on charges of contempt.

Additionally, the bench, comprising Justices Dipak Misra, J Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, M B Lokur, P C Ghose and Kurian Joseph, prohibited media, both print and electronic, from publishing any further orders if any passed by Justice Karnan.

The Supreme Court bench, headed by Chief Justice of India J S Khehar, in February 2017 issued a contempt notice to Justice C S Karnan.

Justice Karnan was accused of contempt after he named 20 “corrupt judges” of India earlier in 2017 and sought an investigation alleging corruption in the judiciary.

He also wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging an inquiry.

On 1 March 2017, the SC ordered the Calcutta government hospital to constitute a medical board to examine the medical condition of Justice Karnan and submit a report to the court.

However, Justice Karnan refused to undergo medical tests in compliance with courts’ orders.

He was then sentenced by the eight judges of the Supreme Court to five years of “rigorous imprisonment” and imposed a fine of INR 100000 each under the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act of 1989 and the amended Act of 2015.