Daily Current Affairs : 15th April

Daily Current Affairs for UPSC CSE

Topics Covered

1. Elnino
2. Great Backyard Bird Count
3. UPI &E-Wallet
4. Oil Consuming Bacteria
5. Khalistan Movement
6. Facts for Prelims – Wannacry and Notpetya, Scaled Composite Strato Launch, Steel, Know your client, Lipstick seeds

1 . Elnino

Context : The forecast of a below average monsoon in 2019 on the back of a prospective El Nino that is often associated with less rainfall has come from a private agency, Skymet.

Background and History

• El Nino was observed as far back as in the late 1800s when South American fishermen noticed the warming up of coastal waters around Christmas. They referred to it as “El Nino” (Spanish for the boy child), since it appeared around Christmas.
• Sir Gilbert Walker, a British mathematician, discovered the Southern Oscillation (SO), or large-scale changes in sea level pressure across Indonesia and the tropical Pacific. However, he did not recognise that it was linked to changes in the Pacific Ocean or El Nino.
• It wasn’t until the late 1960s that Norwegian-American meteorologist Jacob Bjerknes and others realised that the changes in the ocean and the atmosphere were connected. This was how the coinage ‘ENSO’ came into existence.
• As already mentioned, El Nino has been found to impact almost half the world triggering droughts in Australia, India, southern Africa and floods in Peru, Ecuador, the United States, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Colorado River basin.

About Elnino

• El Nino is a phenomenon in the equatorial Pacific, in which sea-surface temperatures rise over a threshold of +0.5 degree Celsius (and when it cools by the same margin it is La Nina).
• These are averaged over five, three-month sessions on a trot across a stretch of water designated as the Nino 3.4 region to arrive at the Oceanic Nino Index (ONI).

Terms related to Elnino

• Southern Oscillation Index, or SOI – gives an indication of the development and intensity of El Nino or La Nina. The SOI is calculated on the basis of the atmospheric pressure differences between Tahiti (South Pacific Ocean) and Darwin (Australia), separated by 8,569 km. Sustained positive SOI values are indicative of La Nina conditions while negative values suggest El Nino conditions.
• ENSO (El Nino Southern Oscillation) – refers to the oscillation between the El Nino and the La Nina. ENSO shifts irregularly back and forth between El Nino and La Niña every two to seven years. Each phase triggers predictable disruptions of temperature, precipitation, and winds disrupting large-scale air movements in the tropics, triggering a cascade of global side effects.
• Under ‘normal’ conditions, though, the west tropical Pacific is warmer than its eastern basin. The warmer area of the ocean is also a source for convection and is associated with cloudiness and rainfall. During El Nino years, the warmth shifts to Central and East Tropical Pacific (Nino 3.4 region), and along with it, cloudiness and rainfall.

Effects of Elnino

• El Nino has been generally known to suppress monsoon rainfall in India while La Nina increases it.
• El Niño years tend to be drier than average, but one of the strongest El Nino of the century (1997-98) produced a monsoon season with above-average rainfall for India (see table).
• Researchers also believe that even the location of the warming in the Pacific may possibly have an influence on the monsoon.
• Anomalous warming in the Central and East Pacific (Nino 3.4 region) could have a more profound adverse impact on the monsoon than when the warming shifts to the adjoining far east Pacific (Nino 3. region).
• Current conditions (March, 2019) suggest that the warming is pronounced (+0.98 degree Celsius) in the Nino 3.4 region than the far east Pacific (+0.74 degree Celsius), which could suggest a weaker monsoon this year.
• Scientists claim there may be other factors that combine with the prevailing Pacific conditions to decide the fate of the monsoon.
• Progressive heating of the land during April-May-June is one.
• The extent of the Himalayan/Eurasian snow cover is another. Less snow cover means a warmer subcontinent, which can help to intensify the monsoon circulation and bring more rain.
• The Indian summer monsoon rainfall is influenced by a system of oscillating sea surface temperatures known as the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) in which the western Indian Ocean becomes alternately warmer and then colder than the eastern part of the ocean. A positive IOD occurs when the sea surface temperatures are greater than normal in the Arabian Sea and less than normal in the tropical eastern Indian Ocean. When the reverse is the case, a negative IOD is said to have developed. A positive IOD leads to greater monsoon rainfall and more active (above normal rainfall) monsoon days while negative IOD leads to less rainfall and more monsoon break days (no rainfall).

2 . Great Backyard Bird Count

Context : This year, it was Tamil Nadu’s Salem district that submitted the largest number of checklists, at 8,420, among all participating districts (or counties) in the world in the Great Backyard Bird Count

About Great Backyard Bird Count

• Launched in 1998 by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and National Audubon Society, the Great Backyard Bird Count was the first online citizen-science project to collect data on wild birds and to display results in near real-time.
• Scientists use information from the Great Backyard Bird Count, along with observations from other citizen-science projects, such as the Christmas Bird Count, Project Feeder Watch, and eBird, to get the “big picture” about what is happening to bird populations. The longer these data are collected, the more meaningful they become in helping scientists investigate far-reaching questions, like these:

1. How will the weather and climate change influence bird populations?
2. Some birds, such as winter finches, appear in large numbers during some years but not others. Where are these species from year to year, and what can we learn from these patterns?
3. How will the timing of birds’ migrations compare with past years?
4. How are bird diseases, such as West Nile virus, affecting birds in different regions?
5. What kinds of differences in bird diversity are apparent in cities versus suburban, rural, and natural areas?

India and the GBBC

• In India GBBC is undertaken by Bird Count India
• Some of the interesting finds were the migratory eastern Orphean warbler, green-winged teal (a small duck), and the nocturnal Jerdon’s nightjar.
• India saw a staggering response to the GBBC this year: 1,786 birdwatchers spent a whopping 10,764 person-hours documenting birds not just in their backyards, but in wild spaces too.
• Participants from 31 States and Union Territories spotted 852 species, making India the country to record the third highest number of species worldwide. India contributed 22,273 lists, the second highest after the U.S.
• This year also saw the largest number of Indian districts taking part, at 291. More than 80% of districts in Delhi, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Himachal Pradesh and Goa contributed to the GBBC.

3 . UPI and E wallet

Context : An analysis by The Hindu of data from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) and some industry players from April 2018 to March 2019 shows that not only is the UPI platform outperforming e-wallets in terms of the value of transactions done, but it is also eating away at e-wallets’ market share in specific areas such as person-to-merchant (P2M) transactions.

What is UPI?

• Launched in 2016, United Payments Interface (UPI) is a payment system that facilitates transfers between bank accounts via smartphone. Without the hassle of entering credit card details or banking passwords, customers can transfer funds directly from their own accounts to peers and merchants.
• A product of the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), UPI’s goal is to move India toward a cashless economy. By allowing smartphones to double as debit cards, UPI is poised for astronomical growth. India is currently home to 780 million feature phones and only 120 million smartphones. As this percentage shifts in the coming years, cashless systems like UPI will increase market share.

How Does UPI Work?

• Hailed by many as one of the most sophisticated public payments infrastructures in the world, UPI provides merchants with virtual addresses free of sensitive personal information. Similar to an email address, consumers can use this unique ID to transfer money or make payments to any merchant, person or bank.
• Most payment systems require an account number, account type and bank name, but with UPI, no account details are required. Payments also happen in real time, 24-hours a day, so users no longer have to wait hours for payments to go through.

What is e-wallet

• E-wallet is a type of pre-paid account in which a user can store his/her money for any future online transaction. An E-wallet is protected with a password. With the help of an E-wallet, one can make payments for groceries, online purchases, and flight tickets, among others.
• E-wallet has mainly two components, software and information. The software component stores personal information and provides security and encryption of the data. The information component is a database of details provided by the user which includes their name, shipping address, payment method, amount to be paid, credit or debit card details, etc. 

Main Difference

• UPI is basically direct bank to bank money transfer but in case of wallets it acts as an intermediary between two bank accounts
• UPI is inter-operable ie you can send money from different accounts in different banks and receive it in different accounts in different banks

4 . Oil Consuming Bacteria

Context : An international team of scientists has identified a species of bacteria that can eat away oil spills from ocean water.

About the News

• Scientists have discovered a unique oil eating bacteria in the Mariana Trench, the deepest part of the earth’s oceans, a finding that may pave way for sustainable ways to clean up oils spills.
• The new group of bacteria that can consume hydrocarbon.
• Hydrocarbons are organic compounds made through a combination of hydrogen and carbon. While they are commonly found in natural gas and petroleum, they are also included in the production of other industrial byproducts such as chemicals, explosives, fibers, plastics, rubbers, and solvents.
• To prove that the microbes are capable of degrading hydrocarbons, the researchers isolated some samples and simulated their natural environment in the trench in a laboratory. Samples of seawater were also collected from the ocean’s surface as well as from the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

Facts for Prelims : The Mariana Trench or Marianas Trench is located in the western Pacific Ocean approximately 200 kilometres east of the Mariana Islands, and has the deepest natural trench in the world

5 . Khalistan Movement

Context : The Canadian government has bowed to domestic political compulsions and completely scrubbed all references to Sikh and Khalistani extremism in its 2018 report on terrorist threats, much to the chagrin of India

What was the Khalistan Movement?

• The Khalistan movement is a Sikh separatist movement, which seeks to create a separate country called Khalistān in the Punjab region to serve as a homeland for Sikhs
• The fight for a separate Sikh state owes its origins to the Punjabi Suba Movement. The Akali Dal – a Sikh-dominated political party – sought to create a separate Sikh Suba or Province.
• When the States Reorganization Commission, constituted to assess the demand for separate states by linguistic groups, made its recommendations, it rejected the Akali Dal’s demand.
• But after a series of violent protests, the Indira Gandhi government relented in 1966.
• The state was trifurcated into Punjabi-majority Punjab, Hindi-majority Haryana and the Union Territory of Chandigarh. Some hilly regions of the state were merged into Himachal Pradesh.

Anandpur Resolution

• The Punjabi movement galvanised considerable political support for the Akali Dal and after a brief split, the party came together under Parkash Singh Badal’s leadership, giving the Congress a tough fight in the 1967 and 1969 assembly elections.
• The 1972 election, however, proved to be blip in the Akalis’ rising political graph. The Congress swept to power, prompting the Shiromani Akali Dal to introspect.
• The venue for this introspection was the Anandpur Sahib Gurudwara, where the party adopted a resolution that would serve as a blueprint for the party’s future agenda. The resolution demanded autonomy for the state of Punjab, identified regions that would be part of a separate state, and sought the right to frame its own internal constitution.
• This was the Anandpur Sahib Resolution
• With the Anandpur Sahib resolution, the Akalis tried to create the perception that Sikh religion could not be separated from Sikh politics. Positioning itself as the sole guardian of the faith served a politically expedient narrative for a party looking to unseat the Congress in Punjab.

About Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale

• While Akalis may have abandoned its stated aims, the Anandpur Sahib resolution found an admirer in Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale – a religious scholar who’d been travelling across Punjab advocating a return to the Khalsa or a more orthodox form of Sikhism. He targeted Hindus and ‘modernised’ Sikhs, who cut their hair and consumed alcohol in equal measure.
• If the Akalis were a moderate faction espousing Sikh pride and politics, Bhindranwale represented the extremist view that among other things called for a separate state.
• But there were times when the lines blurred, like in August 1982 when Bhindranwale and Harcharan Singh Longowal, then President of the Akali Dal, launched the Dharam Yudh Morcha or a civil disobedience movement.
• Both took up residence inside the Golden temple, directing demonstrations and police clashes.

About Operation Bluestar

• Between 1-3 June, 1984, rail road and air services in Punjab were suspended. Water and electricity supply to the Golden Temple was also cut off. A complete curfew was imposed in Amritsar, with the CRPF patrolling the streets. All entry and exit points to and from the Golden Temple were also completely sealed.
• At 10:30 PM on 5 June 1984, the first phase of the operation was launched. A frontal attack was launched on the buildings inside the Golden Temple complex. Trained fighters offered heavy resistance to the indian army. The army was unable to move towards the sanctum sanctorum where Bhindranwale was believed to be lodged.
• In other parts of Punjab, the Army had launched a simultaneous operation to round up suspects from villages and Gurudwaras.
• Mindful of the trust deficit in the Sikh community, Indira Gandhi recalled her Sikh bodyguards – Satwant Singh and Beant Singh. They are regarded by some as martyrs. (Photo Courtesy: Sikh Siyasat News)
• A day later, General KS Brar called for tank support to tackle the situation.
• On 6 June, tanks rolled down the staircase right up to the parikrama – the perimeter that encloses the lake on which the sanctum sanctorum is built. Tanks shelled the exterior of the Akal Takth and while it suffered exterior damage, the structure remained standing.
• The bodies of Bhindranwale and his commanders were recovered and by 7 June, the Indian army gained control of the complex.
• But it was another two days before four terrorists holed up in a basement were eliminated. Operation Bluestar finally ended in the afternoon on 10 June 1984

Aftermath of the Operation

• Four months later, on 31 October 1984, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her two Sikh bodyguards.
• More than 8,000 Sikhs were killed in the ensuing anti-Sikh riots in 1984.
• A year later, on 23 June 1985, Sikh nationalists based in Canada blew up an Air India flight killing 329 people. They said the attack was to “avenge Bhindranwale’s killing”.
• On 10 August 1986, former Army Chief General AS Vaidya, who led Operation Bluestar, was assassinated by two bike-borne militants in Pune. Later that day, an unsigned note on behalf of the so-called ‘Khalistan Commando Force’ claimed responsibility for the killing.
• On 31 August 1995, a suicide bomber took out Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh inside the Punjab civil secretariat in Chandigarh. Singh was credited with wiping out terrorism, which had spiked in the aftermath of Operation Bluestar.

6 . Facts for Prelims

Wannacry and Notpetya

• WannaCry and Notpetya are ransomwares
• Ransom malware, or ransomware, is a type of malware that prevents users from accessing their system or personal files and demands ransom payment in order to regain access

Scaled Composite Strato Launch

• The Stratolaunch aircraft is designed to act as a flying launch pad for satellites and put payloads in orbit. With 117 meters wingspan and 73 meters nose-to-tail length, the company describes its aircraft as the “world’s largest plane”. While it does have the largest wingspan, it does not have the longest nose-to-tail length.

Steel

• India was a net importer of steel during the 2018-19 fiscal year, the first time in three years, as the country lost market share among its traditional steel buyers and imports jumped on demand for higher quality steel domestically.
• India’s exports during the fiscal year declined after rival steelmakers in China, Japan, South Korea and Indonesia, blocked from markets in the United States and Europe by tariffs and other protectionist measures, ate away at the country’s markets in the Middle East and Africa, according to an Indian government official with close knowledge of the matter.
• Imports from the four Asian countries also climbed as they diverted supply into India

Know your Customer

• KYC or Know Your Customer is the mechanism through which banks and other investment destinations verify the identity of the customer to ensure that no fraud, theft, or duplication takes place.
• The documents needed are for ID proof (any one of PAN card, driving licence, passport copy, voter ID, Aadhaar card or bank photo passbook) and proof of address (recent land line or mobile bill, electricity bill, passport copy, recent demat account statement, latest bank passbook, ration card, voter ID, rental agreement, driving license or Aadhaar card).

Lipstick seeds (Annatto)

• They are natural colour agents and are considered to be non-carcinogenic. Besides lipstick, the plant’s seed extract is used as a natural colouring agent in cheese, food preparations, bakery products and sweets across the world.
• The seeds reportedly have healing properties and used in treating digestive disorders, weak bones, headache, neural tube defects, eye ailments and respiratory problems.