16th Nov Daily current affairs for UPSC Civil Service Exam

Birsa Munda

• Birsa Munda Jayanthi was recently celebrated across the country.
• Birsa Munda is a tribal leader in chotanagpur region who fought against the land acquisition by British.
• He had forced the colonial officials to introduce laws protecting the land rights of the tribals.
• He started the faith of “Birsait” to challenge the British conversion activities through Christian missionaries.
• It attracted the members of Munda and Oraon tribal communities.
• He is popularly known as 'Dharti Abba' or the Earth Father, a folk hero inspiring other Adivasis in their struggle for forest rights in modern times.
• He started a movement called 'Ulgulan', or 'The Great Tumult, organising the Adivasis against the land settlement system imposed by the British.
• He fought against superstition, animal sacrifice and alcoholism and demanded tribal farmers to boycott ‘beth begari system’ (forced labour).
• The Chotanagpur Tenancy Act was passed in 1908, which restricted the passing on of land from the tribal people to non-tribals.

Geographical Indication (GI) tag

• A geographical indication is a sign used on products that have a specific geographical origin and possess qualities or a reputation that are due to that origin.
• It is managed by Cell for IPR promotion and Management (CIPAM) under the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP), Ministry of Commerce and Industry.
• West Bengal state has recently won the GI tag for Rasgulla.
• West Bengal and Odisha have been engaged in a legal battle over the origin of the syrupy Rasgulla since June 2015.
• Besides rasgulla, Banganapalle mangoes from Andhra Pradesh, Tulapanji rice from West Bengal will also get a GI tag this year by the Indian patent office.
• The ministry has started social media campaign #LetsTalkIP to promote Indian GIs.

Asia Pacific Cert (APCERT)

• First ever Asia APCERT Open Conference in India and the first in South Asia was recently held in New Delhi.
• Ministry of Electronics and IT hosted the event.
• CERT’s from 22 digital Asia Pacific economies participated along with participation from USA, Europe, Industry, Academia, Government and Media.
• Indian Compute Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) received the host country award from the APCERT, handed over by Japan CERT (JPCERT).
• India was selected to be part of the steering committee of APCERT along with 6 (Australia, China, Japan, Korea, Malaysia and Taiwan) other countries to shape the agenda for the next 2 years across the region.

Hunar Haat

• Hunar Haat (Skill Haat) is an exhibition of handicrafts, embroidery etc made by the artisans from the Minority Communities.
• It is organized by the Ministry of Minority Affairs.
• Artisans will be provided free of cost stall, the arrangements for their transport and their daily expenses.
• It was recently inaugurated at India International Trade Fair.

NGT

• The Southern Bench of National Green Tribunal (NGT) has recently given the permission to Kerala’s proposal to undertake development work in Periyar Tiger Reserve.
• Tamil Nadu has been opposing the project claiming that the development work falls under the leased area of Mullaperiyar dam and affects the ecology of the region under the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980.
• NGT has pointed out that National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) had already approved the project.
• NTCA is a statutory body headed by the Minister for Environment and Forests.
• The NGT bench has observed that the Chairperson of the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC), who decided forest clearance proposals, is also a member of the NTCA that approved the TCP.
• Thus, the activities do not amount to diversion of forest land and utilisation of forest land for non-forest purpose attracting the provisions of the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980.

National Power Portal (NPP)

• Ministry of Power has recently launched the National Power Portal.
• It is a centralized platform for collation and dissemination of Indian power sector information.
• It act as the single point interface for all Power Sector Apps launched previously by the Ministry, like TARANG, UJALA, VIDYUT PRAVAH, GARV, URJA, MERIT.
• It has been designed and developed to disseminate analyzed information about the sector through GIS enabled navigation and visualization chart windows.
• NPP is integrated with associated systems of Central Electricity Authority (CEA), Power Finance Corporation (PFC), Rural Electrification Corporation (REC) and other major utilities.
• It would serve as single authentic source of power sector information to apex bodies.
• The Nodal Agency for implementation of NPP and its operational control is CEA.

Source: The Hindu, PIB