IAS Mains General Studies

Paper	Name	Description	Marks
Paper-I		Essay	250
Paper-II	General Studies-I	Indian Heritage and Culture, History of India and world, Geography of India and world and Society	250
Paper- III	General Studies-II	Governance, Constitution, Polity, Social Justice and International relations etc.	250
Paper- IV	General Studies-III	Science and Technology, Economic Development, Bio-diversity, Security and Disaster Management	250
Paper V	General Studies-IV	Ethics, Integrity, Attitude, Aptitude and case studies	250
G.S. Total			1000
Paper-VI	Optional Subject	Paper-I	250
Paper-VII	Optional Subject	Paper-I	250
Sub Total mains			1750
Personality Test			275
Grand Total			2075

Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 30 September 2016

:: National ::

Indian commandos conducted surgical strikes on PoK terror launch pads

• The Indian Army announced that it had carried out strikes on eight terror launch pads, in a night long operation across the Line of Control in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, which, officials claimed, exacted casualties in the “double digits.”
• The operation to hit terrorist bases in a “pre-emptive counterstrike” were given the go-ahead a week ago, days after the attack on the Uri army base in which 19 Indian soldiers were killed.
• The strikes were in locations spread over 200 kilometres, and were carried out by Para Special Forces and 'Ghatak' platoons of the local units.
• Local commanders were given a free hand to select the targets that had been mapped in advance. The teams had already been moved to forward positions by helicopters, but no Indian Army chopper crossed the LoC.
• Army started with artillery fire at a few locations including along the LoC at Uri. As the Pakistani troops focussed on retaliating, Indian commandos crawled across to the predetermined spots across the LoC.
• The Union government had kept the Army strike across the Line of Control under the wraps, but had put the forces guarding the border on maximum alert two days ago.
• The Army strike is a testimony that the LoC is back to being the preferred route by Pakistan’s Inter-Service Intelligence and the Army to push militants into Indian territory.
• In the past three years, officials recorded most of the infiltration attempts and ceasefire violations along the 197-km International Border, which runs along Jammu district.
• In 2013, there was massive displacement of Jammu’s villagers along the border. From November 2015, however, the focus shifted back to the LoC and this year alone, the Army has thwarted more than 20 attempts.
• The Border Security Force (BSF) guards the 2,308-km border with Pakistan, running from Gujarat to Jammu.
• In Jammu, 192 km of the border, which is referred to as a working boundary by Pakistan, is manned by the BSF, while the remaining 8 km is secured by the Army. The LoC is entirely secured by the Army.

:: India and World ::

China says its trying to decrease the tension between India and Pak

• China signalled that it was actively engaged in defusing tensions between India and Pakistan, using multiple channels, to prevent a spillover of friction between New Delhi and Islamabad in the region.
• China said: Beijing maintains contacts at different levels with both India and Pakistan. China is friendly neighbour to India and Pakistan. China hopes that both the countries could properly deal with their differences through dialogue.
• China’s Deputy Foreign Minister Liu Zhenmin told Pakistan’s special envoy to China for Kashmir that “Beijing hopes that Pakistan and India will strengthen channels for dialogue, appropriately handle any differences, improve bilateral relations.”

:: Science and Technology ::

3D-printed material helps bones regrow

• A cheap and easy method to make synthetic bone material has been shown to stimulate new bone growth when implanted in the spines of rats and a monkey’s skull, researchers said.
• Human trials using the biomaterial, called Hyper-Elastic Bone [HB], could begin in the next five years, according to the research team from Northwestern University.
• “Its biological effects in the outcomes we observed directly were quite astounding.”
• The material is “made mostly of a ceramic, which contains mineral found in teeth and bones, and polymer, both of which are used in the clinic,” said the study in Science Translational Medicine.

Rosetta spacecraft to switch off after 12 years (Register and Login to read Full News..)

:: Business and Economy ::

Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways will invite bids from foreign funds

• Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways will invite bids from foreign pension funds for recycling of brownfield projects to raise funds, a senior official said.
• The Cabinet has approved the proposal last month. There is a need for model concessional agreement after which the Request For Proposal (RFP) will be finalised.
• The process involves handing over of 75-odd brownfield road projects across the country to these foreign funds for a concession period of 30 years, he told reporters.
• During this period, the foreign funds would collect toll as per law and maintain them while ownership would not be transferred.
• The government was expected to garner Rs.50,000 crore which would be given upfront by the fund managers and would be then ploughed back in creating other new road assets.

Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 29 September 2016

:: National ::

Sikkim and Himachal Pradesh best performers in Swachh Bharat Mission

• Sikkim and Himachal Pradesh have the maximum percentage of villages that are ‘Open Defecation Free’ according to the criteria of the Swachh Bharat Mission.
• While the northeastern State scores a hundred per cent, as per the current tally, Himachal Pradesh scores 55.95 per cent.
• Other better performing States with village-level achievements are Haryana and Meghalaya with just over 41 per cent each, Gujarat (37.58 per cent), Maharashtra (28.33 per cent), Chhattisgarh (24.91 per cent) and Rajasthan (23.83 per cent).
• Kerala, which leads in overall household toilet coverage as per Swachh Bharat surveys, is in the list with only 19.92 per cent, indicating that declarations play a role in the overall assessment.
• Besides these, the other States identified by the Mission trail the rest with lower coverage. The total number of districts declared ODF in the country stand at 23.
• For purposes of assessing performance, the Swachh Bharat Mission considers both individual household latrine coverage and ODF.
• Three cities in Karnataka — coastal Mangaluru, Udupi and Mysuru — have been declared “open defecation free” this week in the survey conducted among 75 cities across the country under different population categories.
• Mysuru scored again, after it topped the list of “clean cities” for two consecutive years. A recent survey of 476 cities had also declared Mangaluru the third cleanest in India.

After India’s snub to SAARC summit, it is likely to be cancelled

• The SAARC summit of 2016 will be cancelled. The confirmation from Nepal, the current SAARC Chair, came hours after Bangladesh, Bhutan and Afghanistan decided, like India, to stay away from the summit scheduled for November in Islamabad.
• Nepal had not taken any decision as it is the SAARC Chair and will have to follow proper official procedure before announcing the cancellation.
• The leaders of India, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Afghanistan do not want to share the dais with Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
• India argued that the SAARC rules are clear that the summit meeting cannot be held if one member withdraws.
• Like India that cited “cross-border terrorist attacks in the region” as a reason for boycotting the summit, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Afghanistan too expressed similar concerns in their official notes to Kathmandu.
• The cancellation will be unprecedented as four members have cited “terrorism” , “interference” and “imposed violence” while withdrawing from the summit.
• In the past, summits were postponed after quiet consultation but this time, major members of the regional grouping openly cited terrorism emanating from Pakistan as the reason for non-participation.

:: International ::

Jeffrey DeLaurentis to become first US Ambassador to Cuba in 50 years

• The United States has tapped Jeffrey DeLaurentis, America’s top diplomat in Havana, to become the first official Ambassador to Cuba in five decades.
• Mr. Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro announced a thaw in relations in December 2014. The two countries restored full diplomatic relations in July 2015.\
• Since then, Washington and Havana have taken once-unthinkable steps to mend ties after more than half a century of enmity.
• Mr. Obama has visited Cuba and relaxed portions of the U.S. embargo imposed since 1962. Mr. DeLaurentis is already in Havana and previously worked in Bogota and at the United Nations.
• But his nomination, which requires Senate confirmation, is likely to face stiff opposition in Congress, where Cuban-American lawmakers have sought to garner local support by opposing Mr. Obama’s policies.

:: Business and Economy ::

Pakistan suffers heavily due to problems with India

• Pakistan suffered a loss of about $7 billion in 2014 by importing items from other countries at a higher cost instead of sourcing them from India, according to a study by Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS).
• The think-tank in the study, to be released this week, found out that the loss was substantial considering Pakistan’s GDP (nominal, 2015) was only about $270 billion.
• Prime Minister Narendra Modi is slated to chair a meeting to review trade ties between India and Pakistan on Thursday.
• Significantly, the RIS study’s findings are in line with the theme of Modi’s recent speech at Kozhikode (Kerala), where he called upon the people of Pakistan to fight a war on unemployment, poverty and illiteracy.
• Many products that Pakistan imported from third countries were at least three times more costly than the price of the same item from India in export markets, it added.
• Pakistan is a net-importing nation with a trade deficit of $22 billion in 2015. In 2015, it imported around $44 billion, while it exported only items worth $22 billion. India-Pakistan trade is far below potential and negligible.
• Trade between both the nations in 2015-16 was just $2.6 billion, while according to various estimates the annual bilateral trade has the potential to surpass $20 billion if both countries cooperate and remove barriers and restrictions.
• Currently, most of the trade happens indirectly through Dubai, Singapore, port of Bandar Abbas (Iran).

Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 28 September 2016

:: National ::

India to boycott Islamabad SAARC meet

• Stepping up diplomacy pressure on Pakistan, India said, “In the prevailing circumstances”, the government is unable to participate in the November SAARC summit in Islamabad.
• The decision on cancelling Indian participation was taken even as discussions continued about steps such as reviewing the MFN status for Pakistan following the Uri attack.
• Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Bhutan are also likely to stay away from the Islamabad summit.
• The decision is unprecedented as this is the first time that India has cancelled participation in the regional group’s summit meeting because of actions that it blames on Pakistan-based elements.
• The tough step had been under consideration since the Uri attack, the second such cross border strike in nine months after the January 2 Pathankot airbase strike.
• India had earlier accepted Pakistan’s invitation for the summit in March during a ministerial meeting held in Kathmandu.
• Earlier in the day, India summoned Pakistan High Commissioner to “firm up” its case on the Uri attack. The envoy was summoned for the second time since the September 18 attack.
• Mr. Awan also identified one of the slain attackers as one Hafiz Ahmed from Dharbang, Muzaffarabad and disclosed that two handlers for the raid were Mohammed Kabir Awan and Basharat.
• Security forces also apprehended on September 23, opposite Pakistan’s Sialkot sector, one Pakistani national named Abdul Qayoom who confessed that he underwent three weeks of training with the Lashkar-e-Taiba.
• The Prime Minister’s Office has called for a meeting on Thursday on Most Favoured Nation status-related issues.
• The meeting, which is part of the diplomatic measures to target Pakistan for its alleged role in Uri, will be attended by officials from the Ministries of External Affairs and Commerce.
• India had granted the MFN status to Pakistan in 1996 as part of its commitments on joining the World Trade Organisation.

:: International ::

India and Sri Lanka keen to sign Economic and Technological Cooperation Agreement

• India will invest $2 billion in Sri Lanka in the next three-four years, Commerce and Industry Minister NirmalaSitharaman said on Tuesday.
• Ms. Sitharaman, who was here for talks on the Economic and Technological Cooperation Agreement (ETCA), called on Prime Minister RanilWickremesinghe and later met senior Ministers to discuss the terms of the agreement.
• The ETCA initiative follows unfruitful negotiations, spanning nearly a decade, on a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) between the neighbours. India and Sri Lanka already have a Free Trade Agreement since 1998.
• Both New Delhi and Colombo are keen on signing the ETCA, though there is considerable opposition to it within Sri Lanka, coming both from a section of medical and IT professionals, and from trade unions.
• The second round of negotiations on the ETCA is scheduled to take place in New Delhi on September 29 and 30.

:: Science and Technology ::

Green house gases have to come down for planet to cool down

• Our planet may grow intolerably hot even if greenhouse gases in the atmosphere remain at current levels, according to the first two-million-year reconstruction of surface temperatures.
• “Stabilisation at today’s greenhouse gas levels may already commit Earth to an eventual total warming of five degrees Celsius over the next few millennia," said a study in the journal Nature .
• This was the middle of a predicted warming range of 3 C (5.4 F) to 7 C (12.6). Even 3 C would, in the long-run, unleash a maelstrom of climate change impacts, it said.
• The U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said current atmospheric concentrations of the main greenhouse gas CO2 — over 400 parts per million (ppm) — would, over the next century, push average global temperatures 2 to 2.4 C above the pre-industrial era benchmark.

:: Business and Economy ::

India has risen rapidly among all countries in the global competitive stakes

• India has risen rapidly among all countries in the global competitive stakes by climbing 16 notches to the 39th position during the past year in the WEF’s Global Competitiveness Index.
• According to the World Economic Forum’s latest Global Competitiveness Report this marks the biggest scale of improvement in competitiveness among all countries and is the second year in a row India has gone up 16 ranks in the WEF index.
• It suggests that improvements in institutions and infrastructure have increased overall competitiveness along with recent reforms such as opening the economy to foreign investors and increasing transparency in the financial system.
• India’s competitiveness has improved, particularly in goods market efficiency, business sophistication and innovation, while lower oil prices and improved monetary and fiscal policies have made the economy not only stable,
• According to executives polled for the report, India’s tax regulations, corruption, tax rates and poor public health are the most problematic factors for doing business.
• The report added that the labour market rigidities and the presence of large, public enterprises especially in the utilities and financial sector make the economy less efficient.
• While India is the only South Asian economy in the top half of the rankings, Sri Lanka surprisingly ranks ahead of it in ‘technological readiness’ — one of twelve pillars on which countries are rated.

Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 27 September 2016

Govt mulls over Indus water treaty

• Declaring that “blood and water cannot flow together,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a meeting of officials from the Water Resources and EAM to discuss the government’s options on the India-Pakistan Indus Waters Treaty.
• While the meeting decided to suspend further water talks and increase the utilisation of rivers flowing through Jammu and Kashmir to maximise India’s share, there was no decision on either reviewing or abrogating the 1960 treaty.
• The government decided to suspend talks on the Permanent Indus Commission, the dispute redressal mechanism that has met 112 times, until “terror comes to an end.”
• According to Article VIII of the Indus Waters Treaty, the Commission must meet once a year, alternately in India and Pakistan. The last meeting was held in July 2016.
• According to the sources, the Prime Minister held the meeting as “things have been difficult with Pakistan,” adding that, hence, “this was the appropriate time to review arrangements under the Indus Waters Treaty again.”

Ankit Kawatra gets UN acclaim

• Troubled to see the amount of food being wasted in the big, fat Indian weddings, management graduate Ankit Kawatra came up with the solution to redistribute it among the hungry.
• Mr. Kawatra, who left his corporate job to start ‘Feeding India’, is among the 17 people selected for the inaugural class of U.N. Young Leaders for Sustainable Development Goals for his initiative.
• The young leaders were selected by the U.N. from more than 18,000 nominations from 186 countries.
• He established his own NGO, Feeding India, which now claims to have fed 1 million meals with a network of 2,000 volunteers across 28 cities in the country.
• They work towards solving hunger and malnutrition in India by redistributing excess food from weddings, corporate, canteens, banquets and households.

ISRO puts satellites in two diff orbits

• Pushing forward the scope of its workhorse rocket PSLV, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) launched a total of eight satellites in two different orbits.
• Besides the weather satellite SCATSAT-1, two satellites PRATAM and PISAT from Indian institutions, from Algeria (ALSAT1N, 1B and 2B), from Canada (NLS-19) and the United States (Pathfinder-1) were launched in the longest PSLV mission.
• Earlier, ISRO was using separate rockets to launch satellites in different orbits and for the first time ISRO launched satellites in two different orbits in a single mission.
• About 17 minutes after it took off from the First Launch Pad of the Satish Dhawan Space Centre here at 9.12 a.m., the rocket placed SCATSAT-1 (371 kg) in the polar sun synchronous orbit at an altitude of 725 km.

:: India and World ::

Sushma Swaraj addresses United Nations General assembly

• India took its campaign to diplomatically isolate Pakistan to the United Nations, with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj asking the world community to hold to account countries that “nurture, peddle and export” terrorism.
• A unified global strategy can defeat terrorism, “and if any nation refuses to join this global strategy, then we must isolate it,” she said, speaking in Hindi.
• Countering Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who accused India of human rights violations while speaking at the U.N. last week, Ms. Swaraj sought to turn the tables on Islamabad.
• “The brutality against the Baloch people represents the worst form of state oppression,” she said, referring to the ethnic minority in Pakistan.
• The Minister elaborated on how India’s positions converged with the global concerns on three issues — terrorism, climate change and the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals.
• Her narrative also explains — at least partly — India’s decision to ratify the Paris climate pact, in an abrupt turnaround from its recent position that the national process for ratification was still in progress.
• Ms. Swaraj reiterated PM Narendra Modi’s announcement on Sunday that India will ratify the pact on October 2, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.
• External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj mentioned the name of alleged Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorist Bahadur Ali arrested in Kashmir two months ago, as a living proof of cross-border terrorism from Pakistan.

:: International ::

Japan warned China against expanding its military activity

• Japan’s top government spokesman warned China against expanding its military activity to the skies over disputed East China Sea islands after eight Chinese war-planes flew near the area over the weekend.
• Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said that Japan scrambled at least one fighter jet after the planes passed over the Miyako Strait on Sunday, east of the Senkaku islands.
• Mr. Suga acknowledged that the flights might be part of an exercise, but said that Japan would respond firmly to any violation of Japanese airspace.