December 6, 2019
Front Page
RBI keeps interest rates unchanged
Belying expectations, the RBI didn’t decrease interest rates. Some analysts had expected the RBI to lower the rates to give a boost to the slowing down economy, but the RBI felt otherwise. Lowering the rates would have meant lower interests on Fixed Deposits that scores of old people depend upon for their maintenance. This was already causing widespread worry among the old people. The RBI preferred not to add to their worries. The other factor that weighed in the minds of the RBI authorities is the soaring inflation. Further lowering of rates would have increased money supply and worsened inflation.
Chidambaram, out of jail, laments government failure on economy
The former Finance Minister, Chidambaram, launched a blistering attack on the government for the plummeting GDP figures, and said, the ministers and planners in charge of economy are ‘clueless’ about the ways to spur growth.
National
JNU student protests gather storm
JNU campus has seen strident protests by students aggrieved by steep hike in charges, and some restrictions on their movement during night. The students maintain that JNU provides quality education to students coming from families in the fringes of society. Steep fee hikes will result in the public-funded university shutting its doors to the meritorious students coming from the poorest of the poor families. In a move to ratchet up their agitation, the students have said that they will boycott the examinations en masse if the fee hikes are not rolled back.
Good words used .. Ratchet up, En masse
Indians die in Sudan blast
The gas cylinder tanker blast that rocked Khartoum (the capital city) are laborers from U.P. Bihar, Rajasthan. This has been ascertained by the Indian embassy there.
Nirav Modi, will have all his Indian assets confiscated
Finally, the law seems to have caught up with the fraudster diamond merchant. A special Money Laundering Act court has ruled that the properties of the fugitive merchant who siphoned off millions from the Punjab National Bank can now be confiscated by the government authorities.
Swami Nityanand establishes his own sovereign country
The controversial guru, Swami Nityanand, who fled the country to avoid arrest under rape allegations has declared that he has established a new country named Kailasha. This bizarre announcement was made through his website Kailasha.org. The country will have its own constitution, passport, currency, and capital. The claim has been rubbished by government spokespersons who have alerted Indian missions abroad to look out for him.
Amnesty India asks for time to reply to ED notices
Amnesty India has been in the crosshairs of the government die to some of its actions that the authorities frowned upon. The ED now wants Amnesty to clarify if some of its actions have not broken the country’s law. While rebutting such charges, Amnesty has asked for more time to file a reply.
Good words and phrases used .. To be in the cross hairs of , Rebut, Frown upon
Social Media will come under new rules
Social media has recorded exponential growth in India in recent years as it affords unfettered freedom to citizens to express their views, and air their grievances. However, such freedom has also been misused in egregious scale to spread misinformation, malign people, and create communal discord. To rein in such vile tendencies, the government will soon bring an act making it obligatory for the service providers like Facebook, Twitter etc. to remove the objectionable material, and reveal the source of such content to the police.
Good words used .. Unfettered, Egregious, Malign
International
Iran developing nuclear-powered missiles
European countries like the United Kingdom, Germany and France have warned the United Nations that Iran has test-fired the Shahab-3 missile which is capable of delivering a nuclear weapon. This move of Iran violates the terms of the 2015 Iran Nuclear deal signed by the United States, the U.K, France, Germany, China and Russia. The United States has since unilaterally abrogated the deal, although the rest five members still stand by it. Iran has refuted the allegation. Analysts feel Iran is trying to signal that it is ready to revoke the deal, if the international community doesn’t act quickly to alleviate its economic pains caused the American sanctions.
Good words used .. Abrogate, Refute, Alleviate
Saudi Arabia’s Aramco raise a record $25.6 billion through share sale
The Saudi oil giant Aramco has raised a whopping 25.6b USD through Initial Public Offering (IPO) in Riyadh. This share sale beats the earlier figure of $25b recorded when the Chinese retail giant Alibaba sold shares in New York.
NATO wakes up to China threat
In the build-up to London summit of NATO heads of state, the organization’s Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has cautioned that Chin is aggressively pursuing a programme to strengthen its footprint in Africa and the Arctic region. ‘This evolving threat needs to addressed by NATO’s think-tank,’ he asserted.
Syrian documentary ‘For Sama’ wins Britissh Independen Film Award
‘For Sama’ that depicts the travails of a young widowed mother in war-torn Syria has won the prestigious British award. Critics described the documentary as “one of the most profoundly intimate depictions of the Syrian conflict ever put to film”.
France rattled by nation-wide strike
It is well-known that France’s welfare system is far too generous for it to afford. The load of such a benign regimen has eaten into the country’s budget. Successive presidents of France have tried to curtail the benefits so that the cost to the state is less, but all of them had to back off in the face of stiff trade union resistance. Not only the hole the welfare cost is making in the budget, it is also making French industries uncompetitive in the world market. The situation has reached a tipping point, and President Macron, an investment banker, understand how urgent it is for the government to roll back the welfare benefits so that the country could afford it. With this objective in view, President Macron unveiled an action plan to rationalize the welfare schemes and restore the viability of the economy.
The trade unions, and even the schools and colleges have reacted to the move of the government in a very belligerent way. They have gone on a country-wide strike to force Macron to reverse his plans to cut welfare benefits.
Good words used .. Rattled, Benign, Regimen, Unveil, Belligerent
Maldives finds the Chinese loans too heavy to afford
In the past few years, under a plan named Belt & Road Project, China has tried into link large parts of the globe through a system of roads, ports, rail networks, so that they serve China’s long-term objective of being the dominant commercial power of the world. To do this, it offered humongous amounts of money to recipient countries as loans so that they could build necessary infrastructure to augment the Belt & Road Project.
In the process weak and small countries like the Maldives have been saddled with large piles of debt that they can not service. Maldives is now requesting the Chinese to restructure its loans in a way soft enough for Maldives to repay.
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Writing task..
The Telengana police have killed the four rape accused in an encounter. Write five sentences each in support and against it.