Daily Current Affairs 21 July 2020 | UPSC Current Affairs 2020

Current Affairs Of Today Are

1) HIL (India) has supplied 20.60 MT of DDT to South Africa for Malaria control program

• HIL (India) Limited, a PSU under the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers has supplied 20.60 Metric tonnes of DDT 75 % WP to South Africa for their Malaria control program yesterday.
• HIL (India)  is the sole manufacturer of DDT globally. The company was incorporated in the year 1954 to manufacture and supply DDT to the Government of India’s Ministry of Health and Family Welfare for the malaria control program. I the year 2019-20, the product was supplied to 20 States in the country. The Company is also exporting the product to many African countries.
• The Department of Health, South Africa shall be utilizing DDT  in three provinces adjoining Mozambique. The region is highly affected by Malaria and it has reported maximum morbidity and mortality due to the disease in recent years.
• Malaria continues to be one of the major public health problems globally. In 2018, an estimated 228 million cases of malaria occurred worldwide and most malaria cases and deaths (93%) were reported from African Region. In the Southeast Asia Region, India accounts for majority of cases and death. Spraying of insecticides inside the human habitats i.e. Indoor Residual Spraying (IRS) has proven to be an effective mosquito control tool. World Health Organisation (WHO) recommends DDT as one of the efficient IRS chemicals to curb malaria mosquito menace and it is widely used by Southern African countries like South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Namibia, Mozambique, etc. and India.
•  The Company is further in the process of supplying DDT 75% WP to Zimbabwe (128 MT) and Zambia (113 MT) in the current FY 2020-21. 
• HIL (India) Limited has recently exported 25 MT of Malathion Technical 95% to Iran under Government-to-Government initiative for the Locust Control Programme and also exported Agrochemical-fungicide (32 MT) to Latin American region.

Source: PIB 

2) Oxford Covid-19 vaccine prompts protective immune response in early tests

• Scientists at Oxford University say their experimental coronavirus vaccine has been shown in an early trial to prompt a protective immune response in hundreds of people who got the shot. 
• British researchers first began testing the vaccine in April in about 1,000 people, half of whom got the experimental vaccine. Such early trials are usually designed only to evaluate safety, but in this case experts were also looking to see what kind of immune response was provoked. 
• In research published in the Lancet, scientists said they found that their experimental COVID­19 vaccine produced a dual immune response in people aged 18 to 55 that lasted atleast two months after they were immunised.
• What this vaccine does particularly well is trigger both arms of the immune system
• The experimental COVID­-19 vaccine caused minor side effects like fever, chills and muscle pain more often than in those who got a control meningitis vaccine. 
• There’s increasing evidence that having a T­-cell response as well as antibodies could be very important in controlling COVID­-19 the immune response might be boosted after a second dose; their trial tested two doses administered about four weeks apart.
• Even two billion doses may not be enough, underlining the importance of having multiple shots to combat the coronavirus. 
• Numerous countries including Germany, France, the Netherlands, Italy, U.S. and the U.K. have all signed deals to receive hundreds of millions of doses of the vaccine which has not yet been licensed with the first deliveries scheduled for the fall. British politicians have promised that if the shot proves effective, Britons will be the first to get it. 

Source: The Hindu

3) IAF to induct five Rafales

• Indian Air Force (IAF) is scheduled to induct the first batch of five Rafale fighter jets from France at the Air Force Station, Ambala, on July 29, subject to weather conditions. The final induction ceremony will take place in the second half of August
• The induction of Meteor Beyond Visual Range air­toair missile, widely recognised as a game changer for air combat, Scalp longrange stand­off attack air to ground missile, and MICA multi­mission air­to­air missiles into the IAF’s inventory will give the force an edge in the neighbourhood. According to its manufacturer, MBDA, Meteor has a no­escape zone many times greater than any other air­to­air missile.
• The Rafale induction and operationalisation will be on top of the agenda during the Air Force Commanders’ Conference (AFCC) to be held from July 22 to 24 with the theme “IAF in the Next Decade”. During the three-­day conference, the discussions would take stock of the current operational scenario and deployments. The plan of action for operational capability enhancement of the IAF in the next decade will also be discussed

Source: The Hindu

4) Sero-prevalence study conducted by National Center for Disease Control [NCDC]

• The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare [MoHFW] commissioned a sero-surveillance study in Delhi.
• This study has been done by the National Center for Disease Control [ NCDC] in collaboration with Govt of National Capital Territory of Delhi, following a rigorous multi-stage sampling study design.
• Study was conducted from 27th of June 2020 to 10th July 2020.
• For all the 11 districts of Delhi, survey teams were formed. Blood samples were collected from selected individualsafter taking written informed consent and then their sera were tested for IgG antibodies and infection using COVID KAVACH ELISA approved by Indian Council for Medical Research [ICMR]. It is one of the largest sero-prevalence studies conducted in the country using the ELISA testing.
• 21,387 samples were collected as per lab standardsand were tested. The tests done help in identification of presence of antibodies in the general population. These test performed is not a diagnostic test but only provides information about past infection due to SARSCoV-2 in individuals who test positive.
• Antibody testing repeatedly done over time i.e. sero-surveillance, generates important evidence for assessing the spread of the pandemic from time to time.
• The results of the sero-prevalence study show that on an average, across Delhi, the prevalence of IgG antibodies is 23.48 %.  The study also indicates that a large number of infected persons remain asymptomatic. This implies the following:
• Nearly six months into the epidemic, only 23.48% of the people are affectedin Delhi,which has several pockets of dense population. This can be attributed to the proactive efforts taken by the Government toprevent the spread of infection including prompt lockdown,effective containment and surveillance measures, including contact tracing and tracking, as well as citizen’s compliance to COVID Appropriate Behaviours.
• However, a significant proportion of the population is still vulnerable. Therefore, the containment measures need to continue with the same rigour. Non-pharmacological interventions such as physical distancing, use of face mask/cover, hand hygiene, cough etiquette and avoidance of crowded places etc., must be followed strictly.\

Source: PIB

5) Passage Exercise (PASSEX) 

• Indian Naval ships on Monday conducted a Passage Exercise (PASSEX) with the U.S. Navy’s  USS Nimitz carrier strike group near the Andaman and Nicobar islands as it is transiting the Indian Ocean. The exercise comes amid a high alert by the Navy in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) due to the stand­off with China along the border in Ladakh
• As part of this, four frontline naval ships, Shivalik, Sahyadri, Kamorta and Rana including a stealth
• corvette, teamed up with carrier USS Nimitz and three other U.S. ships in the eastern Indian Ocean near the islands. 
• With regular large-­scale exercises deferred due to the COVID-­19 pandemic, the Navy has recently undertaken several PASSEXs, which officials described as an opportunity to improve interoperability on the high seas. USS Nimitz, the U.S. Navy’s largest aircraft carrier, is returning from the South China Sea through the Malacca Straits
• There, it recently conducted integrated operations along with the USS Ronald Reagan carrier strike group to support, what the U.S. Navy’s 7th Fleet said
• A free and open Indo-­Pacific and promote an international rules­based order wherein each country can reach its potential without sacrificing national sovereignty
• The Nimitz Carrier Strike Group is transiting through IOR. During the passage, Indian Navy units undertook PASSEX with the U.S. Navy. The Indian Navy had conducted similar PASSEXs with the Japanese Navy and the French Navy in the recent past
• Last week, ships under the Eastern Naval Command had conducted exercises in the Bay of Bengal off the A&N islands.
• While operating together, the two Navies conducted “high­end exercises designed to maximise training and interoperability, including air defence,” a statement by the U.S. carrier strike group 11 said.
• On June 27,  JS Kashima and  JS Shimayuki from the Japanese Maritime Self Defence Force ( JMSDF) training squadron had conducted a PASSEX with INS Rana and INS Kulish in the Indian Ocean. 
• The Navy is keeping a close watch on the movement in the IOR of Chinese naval ships, whose presence has gone up considerably over the years in the name of anti­piracy patrols. In 2017, China opened its first overseas military base in Djibouti in the Horn of Africa.

Source: The Hindu

6) Consumer Protection Act, 2019 comes into force

• The Consumer Protection Act,2019 comes in to force from today i.e. 20th July 2020. While briefing the media about the Consumer Protection Act, 2019
• this new Act will empower consumers and help them in protecting their rights through its various notified Rules and provisions like Consumer Protection Councils, Consumer Disputes Redressal Commissions, Mediation, Product Liability and punishment for manufacture or sale of products containing adulterant / spurious goods.
• the Act includes establishment of the Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) to promote, protect and enforce the rights of consumers.  The CCPA will be empowered to conduct investigations into violations of consumer rights and institute complaints / prosecution, order recall of unsafe goods and services, order discontinuance of unfair trade practices and misleading advertisements, impose penalties on manufacturers/endorsers/publishers of misleading advertisements
•  the rules for prevention of unfair trade practice by e-commerce platforms will also be covered under this Act. The gazette notification for establishment of the Central Consumer Protection Authority and rules for prevention of unfair trade practice in e-commerce are under publication.
• under this act every e-commerce entity is required to provide information relating to return, refund, exchange, warranty and guarantee, delivery and shipment, modes of payment, grievance redressal mechanism, payment methods, security of payment methods, charge-back options, etc. including country of origin which are necessary for enabling the consumer to make an informed decision at the pre-purchase stage on its platform.
• that e-commerce platforms have to acknowledge the receipt of any consumer complaint within forty-eight hours and redress the complaint within one month from the date of receipt under this Act.
• the New Act introduces the concept of product liability and brings within its scope, the product manufacturer, product service provider and product seller, for any claim for compensation.
•  the new Act provides for simplifying the consumer dispute adjudication process in the consumer commissions, which include, among others,  empowerment of the State and District Commissions to review their own orders, enabling a consumer to file complaints electronically and file complaints in consumer Commissions that have jurisdiction over the place of his residence, videoconferencing for hearing and deemed admissibility of complaints if the question of admissibility is not decided within the specified period of 21 days.
• an Alternate Dispute Resolution mechanism of Mediation has been provided in the new Act.  This will simplify the adjudication process.  A complaint will be referred by a Consumer Commission for mediation, wherever scope for early settlement exists and parties agree for it. Mediation will be held in the Mediation Cells to be established under the aegis of the Consumer Commissions.  There will be no appeal against settlement through mediation.
• the New Act also introduces the concept of product liability and brings within its scope, the product manufacturer, product service provider and product seller, for any claim for compensation. The Act provides for punishment by a competent court for manufacture or sale of adulterant/spurious goods. The court may, in case of first conviction, suspend any licence issued to the person for a period of up to two years, and in case of second or subsequent conviction, cancel the licence.
• Under this new Act, besides general rules, there are Central Consumer Protection Council Rules, Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission Rules, Appointment of President & Members in State/District Commission Rules, Mediation Rules, Model Rules and E-Commerce Rules and Consumer Commission Procedure Regulations, Mediation Regulations and Administrative control over State Commission & District Commission Regulations.
•  the Central Consumer Protection Council Rulesare provided for constitution of the Central Consumer Protection Council, an advisory body on consumer issues, headed by the Union Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution with the Minister of State as Vice Chairperson and 34 other members from different fields. The Council, which has a three-year tenure, will have Minister-in-charge of consumer affairs from two States from each region- North, South, East, West, and NER. There is also provision for having working groups from amongst the members for specific tasks.
• in earlier Consumer Protection Act, 1986a single point access to justice was given, which is also time consuming. The new act has been introduced after many amendments to provide protection to buyers not only from traditional sellers but also from the new e-commerce retailers/platforms.

Source: PIB

7) India’s first of its kind public EV Charging Plaza inaugurated

• With a focus on enhancing energy efficiency and promoting e-mobility, Shri R.K Singh, the Minister for Power, New & Renewable Energy, inaugurated India’s first publicEV(Electric Vehicle) charging plaza at Chelmsford Club in New Delhi.
• EESL is spearheading the EV ecosystem development in India by undertaking demand aggregation for procuring EVs and identifying innovative business models for implementation of Public Charging Station (PCS). EESL in collaboration with NDMC has established India’s first of its kind public EV Charging Plaza in Central Delhi. This plaza will host 5 Electric Vehicle Chargers of different specifications.
• The charging plaza, with its compatibility with a wide range of electric vehicles will greatly spur e-mobility adoption. This would make EV charging hassle free and convenient for the consumers, thereby making e-mobility adoption an attractive proposition.
• Union Power Minister Shri R K Singh also launched “Retrofit of Air-conditioning to improve Indoor Air Quality for Safety and Efficiency” (RAISE) national programme.
• Poor air quality has been a concern in India for quite some time and has become more important in light of the COVID pandemic. As people return to their offices and public spaces, maintaining good indoor air quality is essential for occupant comfort, well-being, productivity and the overall public health.
• Poor air quality has been a concern in India for quite some time and has become more important in light of the COVID pandemic. As people return to their offices and public spaces, maintaining good indoor air quality is essential for occupant comfort, well-being, productivity and the overall public health.
• In that context, EESL has undertaken a retrofit of its office air-conditioning and ventilation system. This is a part of the larger initiative to “Retrofit of Air-conditioning to improve Indoor air quality for Safety and Efficiency” developed for healthy and energy efficient buildings, in partnership with U.S. Agency for International Development’s (USAID) MAITREE programme. EESL’s corporate office in Scope Complex has been taken up as a pilot for this initiative. The pilot focuses on improving indoor air quality (IAQ), thermal comfort, and energy efficiency (EE) in EESL office’s air conditioning system.
• As per EESL, pilot project has shown very impressive results – about 80% improvement in Air Quality parameters with almost no implementation hassles. Considering employee’s occupational health and safety is paramount in any workplace amidst the COVID-19 scenario, EESL is keen to provide such solutions across the country with standardisation and demand aggregation approach.
• Both the initiatives reaffirm the pledge for ecological preservation and building a resilient energy sector, undertaken by EESL and other key stakeholders during the “#iCommit” campaign held on World Environment Day.

Source: PIB

8) Body fluids can provide clue for early detection of colon cancer

• Colorectal cancer that affects the large intestine (colon) and rectum is the 5th leading cause of cancer death in India, mainly because late detection minimizes chances of recovery. In the last decade, the country has witnessed a rapid increase in the rate of colorectal cancer among younger people due to poor dietary habits, lack of physical activity, obesity, increased alcohol consumption, and chronic smoking. The current detection methods need invasive biopsies, and subsequent evaluation requires special expertise. The delay in the timely detection of the disease limits access to rapid and affordable treatment.
• Dr. Tatini Rakshit from S. N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences,a recipient of the INSPIRE Faculty Fellowship Award instituted by the Department of Science & Technology (DST), Govt. of India along with her research group has developed a sensitive tool that could be useful to identify colon cancer at a very early stage from body fluids like blood, urine, and feces (stool). The method that scores above currently existing methods like polymerase chain reaction (PCR), enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), electrophoresis, surface plasmon resonance (SPR), surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS), microcantilevers, colorimetric assay, electrochemical assay, and fluorescence methods in terms of accuracy, has been published recently in ‘Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters’.
• Dr. Tatini’s research group is working with Extracellular Vesicles (EV) at the single vesicle level to identify biomarkers non-invasively. Initially, these EVs were thought to be garbage bags for removal of unwanted materials by the cell. Her group teased out a potential colon cancer biomarker molecule, Hyaluronan (HA), that is present on the surface of lipid sacks secreted by cancer cells.
• Extracellular vesicles (EVs) embody molecular information about the parent malignant tissue and hold a huge potential for convenient cancer diagnostics. The team has established that the evaluation of cancer cell-secreted EVs from body fluid (for example, blood, urine, stooletc.) and capturing clinical information without biopsying the tumour could be an effective and non-invasive alternative method of cancer detection
• They used Atomic Force Microscope that utilizes a nanoscale finger to probe Hyaluronan on the EVs' surface from colon cancer cells. They have also performed spectroscopy experiments (FT-IR, CD, and RAMAN) to find the characteristic signatures of HA, and both the data sets highly correlate with each other.
• “We believe that our work strategy could be useful in identifying biomarkers from different body fluid derived EV samples, for example, blood, urine, and feces(stool) samples from patients to detect colon, ovarian, bladder and prostate cancer at the very early stages of the disease. The experimental tools we employed are easy to use, easily accessible, cost-effective, and the experiments could be performed in a few hours. We envision that this biophysical approach can be used effectively for clinical translation of EV cancer biomarkers from liquid biopsies.” said Dr. Tatini. She expressed sincere gratitude to her collaborators, Professor Samir Kumar Pal, S. N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences, Kolkata, and Professor Dulal Senapati, Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Kolkata for their constant support and DST for generous research funding and fellowship.
• Dr. Tatini plans to set up a collaboration with a hospital and start working with EVs derived from biofluid samples. Her group is also interested to perform mass spectrometry-based proteomics of these EVs to get a better correlation.

Source: PIB

9) Privatization of PSU

• India is looking to privatise more than half of its stateowned banks to reduce the number of government-owned lenders to just five as part of an overhaul of the banking industry
• The first part of the plan would be to sell majority stakes in Bank of India, Central Bank of India, Indian Overseas Bank, UCO Bank, Bank of Maharashtra and Punjab & Sind Bank, leading to an effective privatisation of these state­owned lenders
• The idea is to have 4­5 government owned banks
• At present, India has 12 state­owned banks.
• The Centre is working on a privatisation plan to help raise money by selling assets in non­core companies and sectors when the country is strapped for funds due to lack of economic growth caused by the COVID-­19 pandemic.
• Several government panels and the RBI have recommended a maximum of five state­owned banks.
• The government has already said that there will be no more mergers (between PSBs) so the only option for them is to divest stakes
• India expects bad loans at its banks could double after the crisis brought the economy to a standstill. 
• As a result, the Centre may need to pump in nearly $20 billion into the PSBs
• The govt has already announced under the  Aatma Nirbhar Bharat Package that it will privatize the PSUs and only few PSUs will remain under Govt. control (at least one and max four) in the Strategic Sectors. There will not be any PSU under Non-Strategic Sector. Govt will provide classification of STRATEGIC and NON-STRATEGIC Sectors. 
• Govt is on an aggressive privatization mode as it is falling short of revenues (this is just one of the reasons). the other reasons are to bring efficiency, accountability, innovation etc.
• The bad loans (NPAs) of the banks may double due to this corona crisis. And since, govt being the owner of the PSUs, it will have to pump money into the banks (recapitalization), if it will not privatize/sell the Public sector banks.  So, there is double advantage in selling its ownership (also called disinvestment or divestment as such no difference). First, it will not be required to recapitalize the banks as a result of increase in NPAs. And the second, it Govt. of India will get money if it will disinvest its stakes in banks. Keep in mind that when Govt. of India sells its shares (ownership) in PSBs then it is the Govt. of India who gets money rather than the PSBs.

Source: Mint