Indian Current Affairs: 27.05.208

I chanced upon this lecture session from Joseph Stiglitz on The Hindu site. It is very rare for most of us to access lectures from Nobel Laureates. As usual Stiglitz is at his best talking about globalization; what else?

Phoenix plunged into the Martian atmosphere at more than 19,300 kmph after a 10-month, 711 million-km voyage through space.
It is the first successful soft landing on Mars since the twin Viking landers touched down in 1976. NASA’s twin rovers, which successfully landed on Mars four years ago, used a combination of parachutes and cushioned air bags to bounce to the surface.
Phoenix’s target landing site was 48-km-wide shallow valley in the high northern latitudes similar in location to the earth’s Greenland or northern Alaska. The site was chosen because images from space spied evidence of a reservoir of frozen water close to the surface.
Pheonix will talk with ground controllers through two Mars orbiters, which will relay data and images.
It is equipped with a 2.4 meter-long arm capable of digging trenches in the soil to get to ice that is believed to be buried up to 30 cm deep.
Get a glimpse of one of the very first pictures sent by Phoenix here.
This graphic describes the Phoenix craft very well.

The Gujjars, estimated to number 1.6 crore nationwide, are already included in the other backward classes (OBC) category. They have, however, been gunning for ST status ever since the Jats were declared OBCs, thereby increasing the competition for government jobs and seats in colleges. The other source of contention for the Gujjars is the perception that the Meenas — a community that had comparable socio-economic status — have forged ahead by virtue of being declared STs.
The Gujjar agitation once again highlights the perils of caste-based reservations which is bound to lead to more groups clamouring for quota benefits. It is time that the Indian state takes a more nuanced approach to affirmative action. A points-based system — which has been proposed by some sociologists — where factors like income and gender are considered, in addition to caste, might deliver social justice better. If a rethink of the quota system is not done urgently, we could see a repeat of the situation in Rajasthan in other parts of the country.

The Nanavati murder case rocked Mumbai in the late 1950s. The dramatis personae were the debonair naval officer, Commander Nanavati, his English wife, Sylvia, and her wealthy playboy lover, Prem Ahuja. Nanavati was away at sea when Ahuja seduced Sylvia and the cuckolded husband found out on his return. He picked up a naval pistol from his ship and drove to Ahuja’s flat, where he shot Ahuja. Afterwards, he went straight to the police and gave himself up.
The trial was a landmark in Indian judicial history. It was the last one to employ the jury system, which was abolished shortly after, because this trial demonstrated just how vulnerable Indian juries were to media pressure and public passions. But the case lived on through two Hindi movies, a lengthy story in the New Yorker, a mention in Midnight’s Children, and Indra Sinha’s 2002 novel, The Death of Mr Love.
Nanavati was sentenced for life, released early and quietly migrated with his family to Canada, where he died.
BTW noticed the word “cuckolded?” A cuckold is a married man whose wife has sex with other men. In current usage it sometimes refers to non-married couples in committed relationships as well, although the traditional meaning is a man whose wife is adulterous.

Scientists have identified a protein that restricts the release of HIV-1 virus from human cells — a major breakthrough in AIDS research which they claim could lead to finding new treatments. A joint team from Vanderbilt University, Emory University and Mayo Medical School has identified calcium modulating cyclophilin ligand or CAML as the cellular protein that inhibits the release of HIV particles. They identified CAML as an innate defense mechanism against HIV. CAML works by inhibiting a very late step in the virus lifecycle, leading to the retention of HIV particles on the membrane of the cell.

The full complement of an organism’s DNA is called its genome. In animals and people, it is made up of nearly 3 billion building blocks. The sequence of those blocks spells out the hereditary information, just as strings of letters spell out sentences. Decoding a genome, which is called sequencing, means identifying the order of the building blocks.
The first sequencing of a composite human genome was announced in 2001. Four individual male genomes have so far been sequenced. Male sequencing data has been unravelled from Jim Watson, co-discoverer of the double helix structure of DNA, from researcher Craig Venter and from two Africans.
Now researchers at Leiden University Medical Center say they have sequenced the entire genome of one of their female researchers.

A UK based think-tank viz., the Commission on Growth and Development, which has Montek Singh Ahluwalia (Dy. Chairman of our Planning Commission) has said so. The think-tank is chaired by Nobel laureate Michael Spence.
In addition to India, Vietnam will also be joining the club of these fast-growing economies, which among others include Japan.
The other members of the Miracle Economies include Botswana, Brazil, China, Hong Kong (China), Indonesia, Malaysia, Malta, Oman, Taiwan (China) and Thailand

Now that many results are pouring in, it is pictures like these that should give you the inspiration to get on with your preparation, competition and life:

That is Serbia’s Jelena Jankovic who fell on the court after missing a return against Romania’s Monica Niculescu in the first round of the French Open at Roland Garros on Monday. Jankovic won 7-6 6-2.

A government-commissioned report says there is no real threat to neighbourhood kirana stores from modern retail chains. Organised retail will only benefit farmers in terms of getting better prices for their produce and the negative impact on kiranas would be short-lived.
The ICRIER study has recommended a nationwide uniform licensing policy to facilitate modern retailing, which will help take India’s total retail sector to $590 billion in 2011-12.
At present, only 12% of unorganised retailers have access to institutional credit.
One of its other major recommendations is to facilitate cash & carry outlets, which can procure from farmers and sell to unorganised retail.

So says a Grant Thornton report. The other two countries are China and Russia. The report also pointed out that India would catch up with the US by 2050 and the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) markets as a group will surpass the G7 by 2032. As per the report, emerging economies are likely to witness an average growth of 6.3% in 2008 and 6.4% in 2009 in comparison to advanced economies which are likely to grow by 1.3% in the next two years. It added China’s economy will move ahead of the US by 2027.

Indian Current Affairs