The Hindu Current Affairs 21.05.

2019 1

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1.India cuts off UN panel after Jammu & Kashmir report

Mains Paper 3- International Relations

Why in News?
India has informed the United Nations that India will cut off any communication with the
HRC’s Special Rapporteurs with respect to a June 2018 report of the Office of the High
Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR) on alleged violations of Human Rights in Jammu
and Kashmir.
Highlights:
 Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) gave its first ever report
on Jammu & Kashmir in June, 2018 on the ‘Situation of Human Rights in Kashmir’.
 India slams the report & accused the then High Commissioner of Human Rights Zeid
Ra’ad Al Hussein of bias against India.
 In addition, the Special Rapporteurs had listed “13 cases of concern” from 2018
alone, in which “four children were among eight civilians killed by members of the
security forces.
 India... does not intend to engage further with these mandate-holders or any other
mandate-holders on the issue,” whom it accused of “individual prejudice”.
 India is already in contravention of several Conventions it has committed to,
including a “Standing Invitation” signed in 2011 to all special rapporteurs to visit
India.
 According to the UN records, more than 20 such visit requests, including to Jammu
and Kashmir, are pending at present. UN sources also said that between 2016-2018,
the OHCHR Special Rapporteurs had sent as many as 58 communications, and had
received no response other than the April 23 letter on Jammu and Kashmir.
 The report from the UN body came at the same time a report from two NGOs, J&K
based Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (APDP) and the J&K Coalition of
Civil Society (JKCCS), in the State on the alleged cases of torture was released in
Srinagar, which was endorsed by a former UN Special Rapporteur.
 The report claimed that nearly “70% of torture victims in Jammu and Kashmir were
civilians (not militants) and 11% died during or as a result of torture”. The cases
included incidents of electrocution, ‘water-boarding’ and sexual torture, which the
government has repeatedly denied.
About UN Special Rapporteur:
 A Special Rapporteur is an independent expert appointed by the Human Rights
Council to examine and report back on a country situation or a specific human
rights theme. This position is honorary and the expert is not United Nations staff
nor paid for his/her work.
 The Special Reporters submit a report of their visit to the Human Rights Council,
presenting their findings, conclusions and recommendations.

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2.Stubble burning incidents down in Punjab this harvest season

Mains Paper 3: Environment | Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation,
environmental impact assessment
Why in News?

Agriculture experts and officials believe that farmers in Punjab seem to have exercised
restraint in burning the wheat crop residue during the ongoing harvesting season.

What is stubble burning?

 Stubble burning is a common practice followed by farmers in the neighboring

states Haryana and Punjab to prepare fields for sowing of wheat in November as
there is little time left between the harvesting of paddy and sowing of wheat.
 Stubble burning results in emission of harmful gases such carbon diaoxide,
sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide along with particulate matter.

Why Punjab and Haryana contribute to stubble burning?

 In the 1960s, wheat-paddy crop rotation was encouraged in Punjab and Haryana
to make India self-sufficient in food grain production.
 Large public investments in irrigation and adoption of high yielding varieties
under the Green Revolution helped achieve the goal and make the nation food
secure.
 The share of paddy (rice) in the gross cropped area in Punjab has increased from
6.8% in 1966-67 to almost 36.4 % in recent years, while it has increased from
4.97% to 20% in Haryana.
 Besides, Punjab enacted a water conservation law in 2009 which mandates paddy
sowing within a notified period (sometime in June instead of the earlier practice
in May).
 A shorter period of sowing days prohibits transplantation before a notified date,
which in turn limits the window available for harvesting paddy to between 15 and
20 days.
 As a result, farmers who are pressed for time to sow wheat and maintain crop
yield find stubble burning to be an easy and low-cost solution.

Government steps taken and more needed

 Penalty: Crop residue burning was notified as an offence under the Air Act of 1981,
the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 and various appropriate Acts. In addition,
a penalty is being imposed on any offending farmer.

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 GRAP: EPCA has rolled out the Graded Response Action Plan which includes efforts
like banning construction activities, diesel generators, etc.
 Technology: Remote sensing technology, use of satellite imagery and a team
comprising local officials has been deployed to monitor incidences of crop burning in
the states of Punjab and Haryana.
 Procurement: Marketing and procurement of crop residue like husk is also being
carried out in these states. Government should collaborate with cement, packaging,
textiles, etc industries for husk/hull or stubble collection to use it proficiently.
MGNREGA workers can be allowed to weed out crop stubble from paddy fields
manually and mechanically.
 Awareness: Youth clubs, Kisan camps, radio and television campaigns have been
started to spread awareness on scientific crop residue management. Trained cadres
of agriculture scientists, assistants and workers can be deployed to create awareness
clarify doubts about machines and disseminate information on residue procurement.
 Subsidising machines: Government has been providing subsidies ranging from 50-
80% to farmers to buy crop residue disposal machines like happy seeders. Making
crop residue management more convenient than burning by giving out Happy seeder
machines on low rent to farmers.
3. Gujarat will supply treated waste water for industrial use

Mains Paper 2: Social issues | Urbanization , their problems & remedies

Why in News?

Every year, Gujrat faces water shortage, particularly for drinking water in far¬flung areas
in Saurashtra and north Gujarat, both drought¬prone regions in the State.

More than 750 villages are being supplied water through tankers due to non-availability
of local sources, as most of the dams and reservoirs have gone dry, due to deficit rainfall
in the last monsoon.

Key Facts:

 Gujrat has detailed plan for directing fresh water to address the water shortage
by limiting the supply of fresh water only for drinking and irrigation purposes
 “In the next 3-4 years, more than 80% of the water requirement of industries will
be met through the supply of treated waste water (TWW), which will be supplied
from Sewerage Treatment Plants (STPs),”.
 Treated wastewater (TWW, also referred to as reclaimed water or
recycled water) can be used for various non-potable purposes.

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 Sewage treatment generally involves three stages, called primary, secondary and
tertiary treatment. Primary treatment consists of temporarily holding the sewage
in a quiescent basin where heavy solids can settle to the bottom while oil, grease
and lighter solids float to the surface.
 Total sewage water generation is 4,000 MLD (million litres per day), while
treatment capacity is 3,500 MLD. In the next 2-3 years, new capacity of 1,500
MLD will be added, with the setting up of new STPs and expanding the existing
ones,”
 By treating waste water that’s generated in sewage and supplying it for industrial
consumption, will also resolve the issue of pollution in cities and towns.

4. State a step closer to opening up data

Mains Paper 3 – Governance
Why in News?

Maharashtra Government has transferred about 20% of its data onto the data
warehouses maintained by cloud service providers.

Highlights:

 Recently, the Maharashtra became first state in country to unveil Public Cloud
Policy that mandates state government departments to shift their data storage
onto cloud. Such a policy is in compliance with the Union Government's National
Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy,2012, which mandates facilitation of access
to government-owned shareable data in human readable and machine-readable
forms.
 As part of its Public Cloud policy, the Maharashtra Government has selected five
cloud service providers such as Amazon, Microsoft etc to store about 1.25 lakh
documents and files of the various state government departments.
 Such a public cloud policy would lead accelerate adoption of e-governance and
promote transparency and accountability of the government.

About Cloud Storage:

 Cloud Storage is a service provided by hosting vendors where data is remotely

maintained; backed up and managed.

 The cloud is now the main driver for delivering resources (such as storage) to
consumers on demand.

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 Cloud is not necessarily a new technology.

 Rather, it is emerging as a new vehicle for businesses enveloped around
innovative technologies such as server virtualization.
 It is bringing about advantages of economies in scale and multi-tenancy and
is greatly minimizing cost of consuming IT resources.
5. In a first, marriage between man, transwoman set to be registered
Mains Paper 3 – Social Issues
Why in News?

A marriage between a man and a transwoman is set to be registered in Tamil Nadu for
the first time

Highlights:

 After the Madras High Court’s judgment which allowed right to companionship
for LGBT community, a man and transwomen in Tamil Nadu who got married in
October, 2018 as per Hindu customs have approached the District Registrar
Office to get their marriage registered. The couple is likely to get their marriage
certificate very soon by the District Registrar Office.
 Prior to the judgment, the couple had faced legal and bureaucratic hurdles as
the Sub-registrar refused to issue a marriage certificate citing lack of provisions
in norms to formalise marriage of a trans-gender.
 The couple then approached the Madurai Bench of Madras High Court which
passed a significant judgment on 22nd April upholding their marriage.

The Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Bill, 2016.

 A transgender person is defined as one who are

(i) ‘neither wholly male nor female’, or
(ii) ‘a combination of male or female’, or
(iii) ‘neither male nor female’.
However, later cabinet modified the definition and has defined a transgender
as “whose gender does not match with the gender assigned at birth and
includes trans-men, trans-women, gender-queers, and other sociocultural
identities
 The Bill provides for ‘self-perceived gender identity’ i.e. persons can determine
their gender on their own

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6.Kilogram update to spur revision of textbooks

Mains Paper 4– Science & Technology
Why in News?

India, along with the rest of the world, on 20th May 2019 adopted new definitions of
four base units, the kilogram, kelvin, mole and ampere, which were released by
scientists at General Conference on Weights and Measures held in France on November
16, 2018.

New Defination

What has changed with 1 kg is its definition for the sake of accuracy. a mass measured
as 1 kg earlier would have meant 1 kg, plus or minus 15-20 micrograms. Using the new
definition, a mass measured as 1 kg will mean “1 kg, plus or minus 1 or 2 nanograms”

More:

Bureau international des poids et mesures (International Bureau of Weights and

Measures). BIPM is an organization that ensures and promotes the global definition and
adoption of measurements through the International System of Units (SI).

The global standards for measurement are set by the International Bureau of Weights
and Measures (BIPM), of which India became a member in 1957. At BIPM in Sèvres, near
Paris, stands a cylinder of platinum-iridium locked in a jar. Since 1889, the kilogram has
been defined as the mass of this cylinder, called Le Grand K, or International Prototype
Kilogram (IPK). In India, NPL maintains the National Prototype Kilogram (NPK-57), which
is calibrated with IPK. Using a machine called a Kibble balance, in which the weight of a
test mass is offset by an electromagnetic force, the value of the Planck constant was
fixed, the kilogram was redefined, and the date for the new definition was fixed for May
20, 2019.

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