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Table of Contents
Islands apart
• Abdulla Yameen, President of the Maldives, have put Malé on a collision course with New Delhi.
• India criticised the government for its incarceration of former President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom and Chief Justice Abdulla Saeed, sentenced to 19 months in prison
for an alleged plot to unseat Mr. Yameen.
• India called the trial a sham, saying the sentencing put a question mark on the credibility of the presidential election process.
• March 2015: Prime Minister Narendra Modi cancelled a visit in a show of disapproval of the treatment of Mohamed Nasheed
• Bolstered by a newly strengthened relationship with China, Mr. Yameen showed no inclination to heed India’s advice.
• The Maldives has conveyed to India that it will not extend beyond June 30 the lease of Indian helicopters or the visas of personnel manning them.
• This signals a marked downturn in defence cooperation between the two countries, which normally coordinate maritime and EEZ (Exclusive Economic Zone) patrols
together.
• Meanwhile, hundreds of Indians offered employment in the Maldives at resorts, hospitals and colleges have been denied work visas for the past few months.
• Until a few years ago, the Maldives affirmed an “India First” policy.
• Mr. Gayoom also ran a near-autocracy for three decades from 1978, and India’s interventions always aimed at strengthening the government there, with any misgivings conveyed only through quiet diplomacy.
• India has been the first port of call in crisis for Maldivian leaders; when Mr. Nasheed was deposed in 2012, it was at the Indian embassy that he sought refuge.
• It’s time to restore the bilateral trust.
Decongesting our cities
• 5.4 million in 1981 to 210 million in 2015
• Public transport uses less road space, consumes less fuel and emits less pollutants on a per passenger basis.
• If public transport could offer conveniences, commuting choices might just shift.
• After all, no one likes to drive on crowded streets and struggle to find parking at crowded destinations.
• New app-based services are flexible, the kind personal motor vehicle users are looking for to shift to more sustainable modes of transport
• There is a common belief that app-based services wean people away from public transport, and not personal motor vehicles, and so should not be allowed.
• Last-mile connectivity
• The regulation must, therefore, consider embracing technology-based services for the larger benefit, rather than fighting them.
The changing nature of violence
• At present no one, the courts of judicature included, seems to understand the shifting taxonomy of violence.
• Thoothukudi is yet another incident in the expanding saga of industry versus the environment.
• This segment embraces pollution issues, from Sterlite’s copper smelters in Thoothukudi to the tanneries spewing effluents in Kanpur, to the iron mines in Goa
today.
• The mother of all environmental tragedies remains the Bhopal Gas Tragedy of 1984.
• Added to this list are the escalating violence resulting from
• caste conflicts — including the most recent Dalit uprising;
• farmers’ woes across the country; the rape of young women and children;
• issues revolving around tradition versus modernity;
• the outsider versus insider syndrome, especially in the Northeast —and we have an unfolding vista of incessant conflict and violence.
• The issues involved in each of them are highly complex and need careful attention.
• The number of deaths in the police firing were unusually high for a situation of this kind, but no one has definitively disputed that the firing did not take place according to prescribed law and order procedures.
• The widest gap separating the official version from that of the public is about the presence/absence of ‘agent provocateurs’ among the protesters.
• It is no secret that many of today’s large-scale protests across the country are prompted by militant elements from outside, who are pre-programmed to create chaos.
• The qualitative difference from the past is that protests today are beginning to embrace entire communities. Agitations also tend more and more to be ‘leaderless’.
• This is the age of ‘high voltage’ revolt, basically an expression of repressed anger.
• Much of this arises from an “embedded wisdom” that the system is being “manipulated” in favour of the rich, the powerful, and the big multinationals.
• This is something that is not confined to India alone.
• Organisations genuinely interested in the welfare of the locals initially launching the agitations, which gradually tend to be taken over by extreme right-wing and left-wing organisations.
• The result remains the same: widespread disr
• The police also do not seem to have taken into consideration the kind of impetus provided to agitational methodologies by the ‘digital wave’.
• Advice from old-timers in the police on how to manage today’s crowds, including the erection of barricades and promulgation of Section 144, have little relevance in the circumstances prevailing today.
• New ‘smart tactics’ have to be developed.
New Asian constellation
• The SCO was formed in 2001, with the intent of calming the Eurasian borders strained by the Sino-Soviet rivalry of the Cold War.
• Qingdao became the perfect venue for a summit of eight Eurasian nations.
• India and Pakistan were the talk of the town as they were making their maiden appearance as full members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO).
• But the organisation has since mutated from its core security orientation, seeking greater regional prosperity for the collective.
• Culture has become an important element of the SCO, attuned to the group’s search for an inclusive Eurasian identity.
• But perhaps more significantly, India is re-exploring a transit corridor to Central
Asia through Pakistan under the SCO’s multilateral connectivity initiative.
• If the Pakistan-Central Asia two-way route works, it can soften the ground for
improved ties between New Delhi and Islamabad, as a subset of the rise of
Eurasia
Suspense continues
• As a result of the split verdict by a two-member Bench of the Madras High Court on the disqualification of 18 legislators, Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami’s regime gets a further lease of life.
• The case relates to a memorandum given by Mr. Dhinakaran’s loyalists to the Governor in August 2017, expressing lack of confidence in the Chief Minister and requesting the Governor to set in motion a “constitutional process” against him.
• On a complaint from the party’s Chief Whip, the Speaker ruled the MLAs had incurred disqualification, as their action amounted to voluntarily giving up party membership, one of the grounds for disqualification under the anti-defection law.
• The third judge, to whom the matter will be referred now, has to choose between the limited view of the decision-making process taken by Justice Banerjee, and the more expansive view taken by Justice Sundar.
Important News
• President rejects Tamil Nadu’s plea to release Rajiv case convicts
• Senior editor Shujaat Bukhari killed by gunmen in Srinagar
• Murder of Gauri not impulsive: SIT
• India calls UN report on Kashmir fallacious
• India is facing its worst water crisis: NITI Aayog
• ‘N. Korea sanctions to remain until total denuclearisation’
• Federal Reserve lifts rates amid stronger inflation in U.S., drops crisis-era
guidance
Answers-
1. Which of the following countries/water bodies is/are contiguous to Vietnam
border/boundary?
1. Laos
2. Cambodia
3. South China Sea
4. Gulf of Thailand
5. China
Choose the correct option
A. Only 1,2 and 3
B. Only 1,3 and 5
C. Only 2,3 and 5
D. All of above
2. With reference to Borneo, consider the following statements:
1. Next to Greenland and New Guinea, it is the largest island in the world
2. Entire island is administered by Indonesia and is its largest province
3. Entire island is located in the Northern Hemisphere
Choose the correct option
A. Only 1
B. Only 1 and 2
C. Only 2 and 3
D. All of above
Questions
1. Neel Darpan, which gained great fame for vividly portraying the
oppression by the Indigo planters, is written by
A. Dinabandhu Mitra
B. Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay
C. Premendra Mitra
D. Michael Madhusudan Dutt
2. With reference to `Yellow fever’ consider the below given statement
1. Infected mosquitoes spreads it in humans
2. The name Yellow Fever is derived from the yellow skin colour
(jaundice) of patients affected by this disease.
Choose the correct option
A. Only 1
B. Only 2
C. Both 1 and 2
D. Neither 1 nor 2
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