Daily Current Affairs 10th and 11th October

Daily Current Affairs for UPSC CSE

Topics Covered

1. Chemistry Nobel Prize
2. Mahabalipuram’s China connection
3. Moons ofSaturn
4. Lawful interception of online messaging apps
5. Section 124-A – Sedition Law
6. Diary Sector and RCEP
7. Hind Kush Himalayan Region
8. Facts for Prelims : Inter connect usage charges, Nobel Literature Prize

1 . Chemistry Nobel Prize

Context : The 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry will be awarded to John D. Goodenough, M. Stanley Whittingham and Akira Yoshino for the development of lithium-ion batteries, the Nobel Committee.

About the Discovery

How batteries work

• Batteries convert chemical energy into electricity. A battery comprises two electrodes, a positive cathode and a negative anode, which are separated by a liquid chemical, called electrolyte, which is capable of carrying charged particles. The two electrodes are connected through an electrical circuit.
• When the circuit is on, electrons travel from the negative anode towards the positive cathode, thus generating electric current, while positively charged ions move through the electrolyte.
• Single-use batteries stop working once a balance is established between the electrical charges. In rechargeable batteries, an external power supply reverses the flow of electric charges, so that the battery can be used again.

STANLEY WHITTINGHAM

• When Whittingham began working on batteries in the 1970s, rechargeable batteries were already available, but were bulky and inefficient.
• Whittingham worked with newer materials to make his battery lighter and more efficient.
• The older rechargeable batteries used to have solid materials in the electrodes which used to react with the electrolyte and damage the battery.
• Whittingham’s innovation came from the fact that he used the atom-sized spaces within the cathode material, titanium disulphide, to store the positive lithium ions. The choice of lithium was dictated by the fact that it let go of its electron quite easily and was also very light.

JOHN B GOODENOUGH

• Whittingham’s battery worked at room temperature, making it practical, but was prone to short-circuits on repeated charging. An addition of aluminium, and a change of electrolyte, made it safer, but the big breakthrough was made by Goodenough who changed the cathode to a metal oxide instead of metal sulphide (titanium disulphide) that Whittingham had been using. Goodenough’s battery was almost twice as powerful as Whittingham’s.

AKIRA YOSHINO

• Yoshino started working on Goodenough’s battery and tried using various lighter carbon-based materials as the anode in order to bring down the weight further. He got excellent results with petroleum coke, a byproduct of the oil industry. This battery was stable, lightweight, and as powerful as Goodenough’s.

2 . Mahabalipuram’s China connection

Context : Mahabalipuram, or Mamallapuram, 56 km south of Chennai on the Tamil Nadu coast, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi will meet China’s President Xi Jinping on October 11 & 12 in an informal Wuhan-style summit, had ancient links with Buddhism and China through the maritime outreach of the Pallava dynasty.

Mamallapuram & Pallava Dynasty

• The name Mamallapuram derives from Mamallan, or “great warrior”, a title by which the Pallava King Narasimhavarman I (630-668 AD) was known. It was during his reign that Hiuen Tsang, the Chinese Buddhist monk-traveller, visited the Pallava capital at Kanchipuram.
• Narasimhavarman II (c.700-728 AD), also known as Rajasimhan, built on the work of earlier Pallava kings to consolidate maritime mercantile links with southeast Asia.

Ancient Period Relationship with China

• Most interestingly, as historian Tansen Sen recorded in his 2003 work Buddhism, Diplomacy and Trade: The Realignment of Sino-Indian Relations, 600-1400, Narasimhavarman II sent a mission to the Tang court in 720 with a request that would seem unusual in the context of India-China relations today.
• The emissaries of the Pallava king sought the permission of Emperor Xuangzong to fight back Arab and Tibetan intrusions in South Asia.
• And, “Pleased with the Indian king’s offer to form a coalition against the Arabs and Tibetans, the Chinese emperor bestowed the title of ‘huaide jun’ (the Army that Cherishes Virtue) to Narayansimha II’s troops”
• The offer of help by the Pallava ruler, may have had more to do with furthering trade and for the prestige of association with the Chinese emperor, rather than any real prospect of helping him to fight off enemies in the faraway north.
• The Descent of the Ganga/Arjuna’s Penance, a rock carving commissioned by Narasimhavarman I, with its depiction of the Bhagirathi flowing from the Himalayas, may serve as a reminder of the geography of India-China relations, and their shared resources.
• Tamil-Chinese links continued after the Pallavas, flourishing under the Cholas as the Coromandel coast became the entrepot between China and the Middle East. The links extended to a wider area beyond Mahabalipuram, through a layered history that has left a rich tapestry of society, culture, art and architecture, which is diverse and complex, and reaches up to modern times.

Trade during Medieval Period

• By the time Islam arrived on south India’s east coast in the 9th century, Muslims had already started trading with China by maritime routes
• The trading missions that the Cholas sent to the Song court included Muslims. A trader named Abu Qasim was second-in-command of a mission sent in 1015; the next mission, in 1033, included one Abu Adil. “It is possible that both Abu Qasim and Abu Adil were members of the Tamil-speaking Muslim community on the Coromandel coastknown as Ilappai,
• Today, the ancient port of Marakanam is a fishing village, known for its Muslim boatmakers.

Trade with China Under Colonial Rule

• In later centuries, the Coromandel coast retained its importance for trade between China and the west.
• In the 17th and 18th centuries, it was a staging post for the Dutch, French and British for control of the seas between South Asia and Southeast Asia, as the Europeans fought to protect their trade routes with China and other countries in the region.
• The ancient port city of Pondicherry, 80 km south of Mahabalipuram, was a French colony famous for its Chinese exports known as “Coromandel goods”, including crepe de chine.
• After establishing their writ on the Coromandel Coast, the British expanded eastward and established control over the Straits of Malacca, essentially to protect their trade routes to China and the rest of the region.
• Among the colonial outposts on this coast is Sathurangapattinam, or Sadras, right next to Kalpakkam, where the Dutch East India Company built a fort, their second one on the east coast after establishing a capital at Pulicat, north of Chennai.
• Sadras became a huge centre for the Dutch-controlled manufacture of cotton and muslin. The Dutch presence in the region grew rapidly after they established themselves in Java in 1603. They traded within Asia, buying textiles, metal, and porcelain, importing and exporting between India, China and Japan, to keep the spice trade going.

3 . Moons of Saturn

Context : On Monday, the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center confirmed 20 new moons orbiting Saturn, making it the planet with the most moons in our Solar System, at 82.

Current Status of Moons of different Planets

• The 20 had been discovered by Scott S Sheppard of the Carnegie Institution for Science. Until their confirmation, the planet with the most moons was Jupiter, at 79.
• A count of the moons listed on the NASA website shows that our Solar System’s planets together have 205 confirmed moons now. Saturn and Jupiter, with 161 between them, account for nearly 80% of these.
• Another 20% are orbiting Uranus (27) and Neptune (14). Of the remaining three moons, one is Earth’s own while the other two are with Mars.
• Mercury is so close to the Sun and its gravity that it wouldn’t be able to hold on to its own moon. Any moon would most likely crash into Mercury or maybe go into orbit around the Sun and eventually get pulled into it.
• It is not yet clear, however, why Venus does not have a moon.
  

4 . Lawful interception of online messaging apps

Context :  Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) is studying the possibility of bringing platforms such as WhatsApp under the ambit of “lawful interception”.

Need

• These services do not fall under the licensing regime prescribed by The Indian Telegraph Act, 1885, and effectively operated in a regulatory dark spot.
• While telecom players are subjected to lawful interception as per the telegraph law, over-the-top service providers (OTTs)platforms, by virtue of not being licensed, are currently not subject to interception by law-enforcement agencies.

Laws under which Lawful interception is made possible

• The Indian Telegraph Act, 1885 states that on the occurrence of any public emergency, or in the interest of public safety, the central government or a state government can take temporary possession — for as long as the public emergency exists or the interest of the public safety requires the taking of such action — of any telegraph established, maintained or worked by any person licensed under the Act.
• This mandates telecom companies to provide access to messages, calls, and logs of these in case a court order or a warrant is issued.
• However, the government, while clear on demanding access to message logs for law-enforcement purposes, is not relying on The Telegraph Act to meet this objective. Instead, it wants the platforms to come up with a solution to enable traceability.

Traceability Issue

• Apps such as WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, etc. claim to provide end-to-end encryption of their messages. This has caused some uncertainty among the authorities on how they can seek access to messages.
• End-to-end encryption means that messages are encrypted to protect against WhatsApp and third parties from reading them.”

5 . Section 124-A – Sedition Law

Context : FIR was registered in Bihar’s Muzzaffarpur district against 49 persons, including Ramachandra Guha, Mani Ratnam and Aparna Sen, who wrote an open letter to Modi raising concerns over the growing incidents of mob lynching.

What is sedition?

• Under Section 124A of the IPC, the offence of sedition is committed when any person by words or otherwise brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards, the government established by law.
• Three explanations added to the provision lay down that while “disaffection” shall include disloyalty and all feelings of enmity, comments without exciting or attempting to excite hatred, contempt or disaffection, will not constitute an offence.

Punishment for the offence of sedition

• Sedition is a cognisable, non-bailable and non-compoundable offence under the law, entailing life imprisonment as maximum punishment, with or without a fine.
• A person charged under this law is barred from a government job. They have to live without their passport and must produce themselves in the court at all times as and when required.
• Sedition was not a part of the original IPC that was enacted in 1860 — it was introduced in 1870, when it was said it had been dropped from the original IPC draft by mistake.

Origin of sedition law in modern India

• The law was originally drafted in 1837 by Thomas Macaulay, the British historian-politician, but was inexplicably omitted when the IPC was enacted in 1860.
• Section 124A was inserted in 1870 by an amendment introduced by Sir James Stephen when it felt the need for a specific section to deal with the offence. It was one of the many draconian laws enacted to stifle any voices of dissent at that time.

Famous Sedition Trials during Independence movement

• It came in handy to muzzle nationalist voices and demands for freedom — the long list of India’s national heroes who figured as accused in cases of sedition includes Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Mahatma Gandhi, Bhagat Singh and Jawaharlal Nehru.
• Tilak was sentenced to six years in jail after he was held guilty of sedition by the Privy Council for writing a piece in his newspaper, Kesari, under the heading “The misfortune of the country”.

Constitutional validity?

• The constitutionality of sedition was challenged in the Supreme Court in Kedar Nath Vs State of Bihar (1962).
• The Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court ruled in the Kedar Nath case that any act that had the “effect of subverting the Government” by violent means or create public disorder would come within the definition of sedition.
• The court ruled that disapproval of the measures of government with a view to their improvement or alteration by lawful means is not sedition. It held that “comments, however strongly worded, expressing disapprobation of actions of the Government, without exciting those feelings which generate the inclination to cause public disorder by acts of violence” would not attract the penal offence.
• Commenting in strong terms upon the measures or acts of Government, or its agencies, so as to ameliorate the condition of the people or to secure the cancellation or alteration of those acts or measures by lawful means, that is to say, without exciting those feelings of enmity and disloyalty which imply excitement to public disorder or the use of violence”, is not sedition.
• A citizen has a right to say or write whatever he likes about the Government, or its measures, by way of criticism or comment, so long as he does not incite people to violence against the Government established by law or with the intention of creating public disorder,

Arguments in support of Section 124 A

• Such acts are necessary to combat divisive tendencies, secessionist activities
• Sovereign countries, including the US, the UK, Canada, Australia and other democracies, have such provisions in their penal code.
• The freedom of speech in a country is not a license to spread disaffections hence Sedition law helps in curtailing it.
• Calls for violent revolutions seeking to overthrow the government, appeals for a separate Khalistan or Kashmir and other atrocity propaganda, which does not qualify as protected speech and has the ability to denude the legitimacy of a democratically elected government. 
• Supreme Court has repeatedly observed that the mere possibility of misuse of a provision does not per se invalidate the legislation. In such cases, the vulnerability extends only to the ‘action’ and not the ‘section’.

Arguments against Section 124A

• For decades, successive governments have used a colonial-era sedition law – the dreaded section 124a of the antiquated Indian Penal Code – against students, journalists, intellectuals, social activists, and those critical of the government.
• The law is purely used now to instil fear and intimidate people who protest against authority
• It is a constraint on the legitimate exercise of constitutionally guaranteed freedom of speech and expression.
• The British, who introduced sedition to oppress Indians, have themselves abolished the law in their country.
• The terms used under Section 124A like ‘disaffection’ are vague and subject to different interpretation to the whims and fancies of the investigating officers.
• IPC and Unlawful Activities Prevention Act have provisions that penalize “disrupting the public order” or “overthrowing the government with violence and illegal means”. These are sufficient for protecting the national integrity. There is no need for Section 124A.
• The sedition law is being misused as a tool to persecute political dissent.
• In 1979, India ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which sets forth internationally recognized standards for the protection of freedom of expression. However, misuse of sedition and arbitrary slapping of charges are inconsistent with India’s international commitments.

6 . Diary Sector and RCEP

Importance of Milk

• Milk is the country’s largest “crop”. Milk is, moreover, a source of liquidity for farmers, as it is sold daily and generates cash to take care of routine household expenses, unlike other crops that are marketed only once or twice a year.
• Milk matters equally to consumers in India, because it meets the animal protein/fat requirements of a significant portion of the population that is vegetarian.
• Milk, in the Indian context, is also a ‘superior’ food with income elasticity of demand greater than one. This means that as incomes rise, the demand for milk goes up even more. The moment families experience some upward mobility, they are likely to put desi ghee (butter fat) rather than vanaspati (vegetable fat) on their rotis.

Concerns regarding RCEP deal

• Global dairy trade takes place not in milk, but in the solids that derive from it — mainly milk powder, butter/butter oil, and cheese.
• If dairy products are covered under an RCEP deal, India may have to allow members of the bloc greater access to its market, whether through phased duty reductions or more liberal tariff rate quotas (TRQs).
• There is an already existing TRQ for milk powder, which enables import of up to 10,000 tonnes per year at 15% customs duty, and quantities beyond that at the regular rate of 60%.
• The Indian dairy industry is resisting any enhanced TRQs or other import concessions, even if extended only to RCEP countries, as opposed to the US or European Union.
• Country is the world’s biggest market for milk and milk products — which will only grow with rising incomes and high elasticity of demand. Access to this market will obviously benefit the predominantly export-oriented dairy industry of New Zealand and Australia.

7 . Hind Kush Himalayan Region

Context : To better gauge the impact of climate change on the Hindu Kush mountains, which includes the Himalayas, and spruce up data-gathering, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) will collaborate with meteorological agencies in China and Pakistan, among others, to provide climate forecast services to countries in the region.

About Hindu-Kush Himalayan Region

• The Hindu-Kush-Himalayan (HKH) region is considered the Third Pole [after the North and South Poles], and has significant implications for climate.
• This region is the source of the 10 major river systems that provide irrigation, power and drinking water for over 1.3 billion people in Asia – nearly 20% of the world’s population.
• The HKH region spans Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. It traverses about 5 million square kilometres and hosts a large and culturally diverse population.
• The HKH region includes mountain ranges of the Tien Shan, Kun Lun, Pamir, Hindu Kush, Karakoram, Himalayas, and Hengduan and the high-altitude Tibetan Plateau which produce one of the world’s largest renewable supplies of freshwater.
• It supports 120 million people directly through irrigation systems, and a total of 1.3 billion indirectly through river basins in India, China, Nepal, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.
• The Third Pole, which contains vast cryospheric zones, is also the world’s largest store of snow and ice outside the polar region.
• A report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change last month highlighted the threat to the HKH region from global warming. Floods would become more frequent and severe in the mountainous and downstream areas of the Indus, Ganges and Brahmaputra river basins, because of an increase in extreme precipitation events. The severity of floods was expected to more than double towards the end of the century, it said.
  

Key Issues

• The HKH region is geologically fragile, with young and rising mountains that are vulnerable to erosion and landslides, even without human interference.
• The region is undergoing rapid change, driven by forces such as climate change, disasters, economic growth, globalization, infrastructure development, land use change, migration, and urbanization.
• Changes in the area have had and will continue to have major consequences not only for people living in the region but globally.

8 . Facts for Prelims

Interconnect usage Charges

• IUC are the charges that a telecom service provider has to pay to other telecom operators whenever a user makes an off net call to another person. This helps the telecom operators cover the extra load that another operator’s call is putting on their network.

Nobel Literature Prize

• The Nobel Prize in Literature for 2019 is awarded to the Austrian author Peter Handke “for an influential work that with linguistic ingenuity has explored the periphery and the specificity of human experience.”
• The Nobel Prize in Literature for 2018 is awarded to the Polish author Olga Tokarczuk “for a narrative imagination that with encyclopedic passion represents the crossing of boundaries as a form of life.” She had also won the prestigious Man Booker International Prize last year.
• Two Nobel Prizes in literature were announced this year as the 2018 award was delayed by one year following sex abuse allegations that had rocked the Swedish Academy.