Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 15 September 2022

::NATIONAL::

Union Home Minister Amit Shah inaugurated the National Automated Fingerprint Identification System (NAFIS) on August 17, at the two-day National Securities Strategies (NSS) Conference 2022 held in New Delhi.

About:

NAFIS is a country-wide searchable database of crime- and criminal-related fingerprints project.
It is developed by National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) and would help in quick and easy disposal of cases.
It assigns a unique 10-digit National Fingerprint Number (NFN) to each person arrested for a crime.
This unique ID will be used for person’s lifetime, and different crimes registered under different FIRs will be linked to same NFN.
Earlier, Madhya Pradesh became first state to identify a deceased person through NAFIS.

Department of Biotechnology (DBT) and Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC) has given 75 Amrit Grants for Biotech Initiatives.

About:

These are interdisciplinary, multi-institutional grants involving Start-Ups, industry, academia and research bodies.

Key objectives:

Support high-risk, ambitious research ideas, milestones-driven collaborative research in all domain specific areas of biotech sector in Public-Private Partnership (PPP) mode.

Thematic Areas:

Health, agribiotech, climate change, synthetic biology and sustainablebioresource management.

Tensions between India and China since May 2020 is worrying Indian astrophysicists involved in an ambitious project to install an Indian-made spectroscope aboard the developing Chinese space station Tiangong.

About:

Scientists at the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bengaluru, were among nine groups selected from 42 applicants in 2019 as part of a UN-led initiative that invites research teams from all over the world to compete for an opportunity to design payloads that will be shuttled to Tiangong aboard rockets of the Chinese Manned Space Agency.
The project, called Spectrographic Investigation of Nebular Gas (SING), also involves collaboration with the Institute of Astronomy, Russian Academy of Sciences, and has been designed and developed by research students at the IIA. The plan is to have it ready by the year-end so that it can be launched in the summer of 2023.
Though the plan is on schedule, scientists at the IIA are now consulting with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the External Affairs Ministry whether they are in the clear to go ahead with the project.

The Finance Ministry released the Foreign Exchange Management (Overseas Investment) Rules, 2022 subsuming extant regulations for Overseas Investments and Acquisition and Transfer of Immovable Property Outside India Regulations, 2015.

About:

With an eye on wilful defaulters, the new rules stipulate that any Indian resident who has an account appearing as a non-performing asset; or is classified as a wilful defaulter by any bank; or is under investigation by a financial service regulator or by investigative agencies in India, will have to seek an no objection certificate before making any overseas financial commitment.

Union Minister for Commerce and Industry released the Booklets and Documents on Future Ready Commerce at a function in New Delhi.

About:

It comprised of fourteen volume Restructuring Dossier of ‘Department of Commerce which has been created to facilitate transition.
The restructuring programme for Department of Commerce has been undertaken with the key objective to equip the ecosystem to achieve two trillion-dollar export target by 2030.
Under it a dedicated Trade Promotion Body will also be set up to drive overall promotion strategy.
The 14 volumes defines the role of each section within the department and lays down the expected outcomes and key performance indicators.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi greeted all engineers on the occasion of Engineers Day.

About:

Every year India celebrates National Engineer’s Day on September 15 to recognise and honour the achievements of the great engineer Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya.
Along with India, Visvesvaraya’s great works are also celebrated in Sri Lanka and Tanzania on September 15 as Engineer’s Day.
Popularly known as Sir MV, he undertook several complex projects and delivered remarkable infrastructural results during his engineering career.
He patented and installed an irrigation system with water floodgates at the Khadakvasla reservoir near Pune to raise the food supply level and storage to the highest levels known as ‘block system’ in 1903.