Current Affairs for IAS Exams – 24 February 2016

:: NATIONAL ::

JNU students accused of anti-national slogan’s surrendered

• Jawaharlal Nehru University students Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya, facing sedition charge, surrendered to the police late night after the Delhi High Court directed them to give themselves in earlier in the day.

• The students left the campus in a university vehicle escorted by guards around 11-45 p.m. and were taken into custody by a police team waiting outside one of the exit gates of the varsity.

• They were joined by a large number of students who went right up to the west gate of the university. Four teachers and a lawyer also accompanied the two.

• Five students -- Ashutosh Kumar, Anant Prakash, Rama Naga, besides Umar and Anirban – are wanted by the police in a sedition case.

Presidents asks for debate with out disruption

• Anticipating a stormy Budget session of Parliament, President Pranab Mukherjee on Tuesday exhorted all MPs to discharge their responsibility in a spirit of cooperation and mutual accommodation.

• Addressing the joint sitting of both Houses, President Mukherjee said, “Democratic temper calls for debate and discussion, and not disruption or obstruction.”

• He also said let noble thoughts come from all directions — should be the spirit behind debate in this temple of democracy.

• Being a member of this great institution bestows great honour as well as important responsibilities.

• The President also told the MPs that “we owe a great debt to our freedom fighters.It is time to repay that debt, by building the country that they envisioned and fought for.”

Amnesty International says civil liberties in India are not up to International standard

• Criticising the government for using archaic laws to suppress dissent, Amnesty International, in its report for 2015-16, has included India among countries that have failed to match up to the “international standard” of freedom of expression and civil liberties.

• The report especially noted that over the past year, crackdown on freedom of expression by majoritarian groups linked to the government had intensified.

• Report said, “Censorship and attacks on freedom of expression by hardline Hindu groups grew. Scores of artists, writers and scientists returned national honours in protest against what they said was a climate of growing intolerance”.

• It criticised India for a negative gender justice environment, and for violating international legal obligations for the recent modifications in the juvenile justice system which “allows children aged 16 to 18 to be treated as adults in cases of serious crimes”.

• The report also made a special mention of Tripura, which was the first State to withdraw the Armed Forces Special Powers Act.

President’s address to Joint sitting of Houses focuses on Fasal Beema Yojana (Register and Login to read Full News..) 

Defence minister directed armed forces for identification of contemporary relevance projects (Register and Login to read Full News..) 

:: INTERNATIONAL ::

The campaign to decide Britain’s future in began in U.K.

• The campaign on Brexit has begun in the U.K., with Prime Minister David Cameron receiving early backing for his call for the country to remain in the European Union from opposite ends of British society.
• Even as the pound, which had taken a plunge in response to the Brexit uncertainty, slowly recovered ground, nearly 200 business leaders employing over 1.2 million people, and U.K.’s Trade Union Congress representing six million workers came out in support of the ‘Stay’ campaign.
• Leave campaigners allege that the business bosses – some of them Conservative Party funders – who have signed up to the letter com- prise just a third of the FTSE 100 companies.
• Initiated by the Britain Stronger in Europecampaign and the Prime Minister’s office, it includes heads of business houses like Marks and Spencer, British Telecom, Vodafone, and ASDA, although equally big businesses have not signed.
• The political divide over Brexit could not have been more evident in the House of Common’s on Monday, when David Cameron presented hiscase for staying in a “reformed” Europe.
• It was an un- usual Commons debate not least because the two opposing groups did not face each other as occupants of Treasury and Opposition benches usually do.

Syria’s regime agreed to cease-fire deal (Register and Login to read Full News..) 

:: BUSINESS and ECONOMY ::

Policy on strategic sale of state-owned companies soon

• The government will soon come out with a policy on strategic sale of state-owned companies and the disinvestment will not be confined to loss-making enterprises.

• Broadly, the strategic sale is that government is selling the equity of the company along with the controlling management.

• How much stake will be sold, it will vary from place to place and company to company.

• The previous NDA Government led by Atal Bihari Vajpayee had from 1999 to 2004 privatised about a dozen state- —owned firms and hotels including VideshSanchar Nigam Ltd. (VSNL), Bharat Aluminium Company Ltd. (BALCO), CMC Ltd. and Hindustan Zinc (HZL).

• But the policy was buried after the UPA came to power and only minority stake sales was pursued since then.

WTO compliant National Intellectual Property Rights policy in fortnight

• The government is likely to announce its Nation- al Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Policy within a fortnight.

• The policy -- which will be entirely compliant with the World Trade Organisation’s agreement on Trade Related aspects of IPRs (TRIPS) -- will, as per Prime Minister Narendra Modi's suggestion, have a special thrust on awareness generation and effective enforcement of IPRs.

• However, the policy will not suggest any changes in the existing Indian IPR laws or other related policies on the patent-disabling Compulsory Licencing (CL) and the provision-preventing 'ever-greening' of drug patents (done through minor modifications of an existing drug).

• The move to retain the provisions on CLs (in the National Manufacturing Policy and Section 84 of India's Patents Act) as well as Section 3(d) of India's Patents Act (preventing ever-greening of drug patents) comes even as the European Union and the US have been pressing India to make changes in this regard to “boost innovation, researchand development (R&D) and foreign investment in India”.

• According to Section 3(d), besides novelty and inventive step, improvement in therapeutic efficacy is a must for grant of patents when it comes to incremental inventions.

• The EU and U.S. had objected to India's adoption of CL in industrial sectors (in the National Manufacturing Policy) saying it will discourage investment and innovation.

• The policy will also suggest incentives such as tax benefits and fee waivers to encourage R&D and IP creation to strengthen the Make In India/Start-up/Digital India initiatives.

• To protect 'small inventions' developed especially in the informal / unorganised sectors, the policy will pro- mote 'utility patents' (with lower compliance burden and shorter period of protection, when compared to the nor- mal patents) only for mechanical innovations.

• This 'utility patents' may not be extended to the pharmaceutical sector considering the sensitivities involved in ensuring the efficacy of the drugs.

FII investment in public sector banks may increase to 49 percent (Register and Login to read Full News..) 

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Sources: Various News Papers & PIB

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