Current Affairs Questions & Answers - Oct 28, 2016

ANSWER: Both of the above

Explanation:
Two Yazidi women, Nadia Murad Basee and Lamiya Aji Bashar who escaped after sexual trafficking and enslavement by Islamic State of Iraq and Syria/ISIS have won the top human rights award of the EU- the Sakharov prize.

• The announcement of the joint laureates of 2016 was made following a decision by the European Parliament on 27th Oct 2016.
• The Sakharov prize award ceremony will be held on 14th December in Strasbourg.
• Nadia Murad Basee was also appointed the UNODC Goodwill Ambassador.
• Basee and Bashar were among thousands of Yazidi girls and women abducted by IS militants and forced into sex slavery in 2014.
• Both survived and campaign for the Yazidi community currently.
• The lady activists were nominated by S&D and Liberal ALDE group in the European Parliament.
• Both Basee and Bashar are advocates for women surviving sexual enslavement by IS.
• They are both from Kocho, a village near Sinjar in Iraq taken over by the IS terrorists in 2014.
• They are public advocates of the Yazidi community in Iraq.
• The Yazidi community is a religious minority that has been subjected to a genocidal campaign by ISIS militants.
• Murad also promotes recognition of the Yazidi genocide.
• The Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought is annually awarded by the EU parliament.
• It was conceived in December 1988 to honour those who have dedicated their lives to fight for the cause of human rights and fundamental freedoms.
• It is awarded annually in memory of Andrei Sakharov, a Soviet scientist and dissident.

ANSWER: 27th Oct

Explanation:
World Day for Audiovisual Heritage was observed across the globe on 27th Oct 2016.

• The theme for the day was It’s Your Story– Don’t Lose It.
• The World Day for Audiovisual Heritage works to create awareness of the need for urgent measures to be taken for safeguarding audiovisual document.
• It focuses on acknowledging the importance of audiovisual documents as part of the national identity.
• On this day, UNESCO works with organisations, governments and communities to promote the World Day for Audiovisual Heritage on Oct 27 each year.
• Logo competitions, local programs, panel discussions and special film screenings will be held as part of the world day for audiovisual heritage.
• Audiovisual documents such as films, radio and television programs are the common heritage as they contain primary records of the 20th and 21st centuries.
• This maintains the cultural identity of the people.
• Due to sound recordings, moving images and other audiovisual material being lost, the day was selected by the UNESCO to celebrate and preserve these audiovisual records.
• UNESCO General Assembly in 2005 approved Oct 27 as the World Day for Audiovisual heritage to raise awareness about the importance of audiovisual documents as integral part of national identities and draw attention to the vital need to protect these.
• The theme is observed this day each year by organising activities around a theme agreed by the Coordinating Council of Audiovisual Archive Associations, the UNESCO designated body to oversee the annual celebrations of the day.

ANSWER: South Korea

Explanation:
India and South Korea on 26th Oct 2016 signed a revised Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement for the avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income.

• The provisions of the new DTAA will have an effect in India with respect to income derived in fiscal years beginning on or after April 1, 2017.
• Earlier DTAA Convention between India and Korea was inked on 19th July, 1985 and notified on Sept 26, 1986.
• It provides for source based taxation of capital gains arising from shares alienation comprising more than 5 percent of share capital.
• To promote cross border flow of investments and technology, the revised DTAA provided for reduction in withholding tax rates from 15 to 10 percent on fees for technical services and from 15 to 10 percent on interest income.
• It expands the scope of dependant agent Permanent Establishment provisions in concordance with Indian policy of source based taxation.
• It provides for exclusive residence based taxation of shipping income from global traffic under Article 8 of the revised DTAA.
• It provides recourse to taxpayers of both countries to apply for Mutual Agreement Procedure in transfer pricing disputes as well as apply for bilateral Advance Pricing Agreements.
• The Article on Exchange of Information is updated to the latest international standard to provide for the exchange of information to the maximum possible extent.
• As per the revised Article, the country from which information is requested cannot leave aside the information on grounds of domestic tax interest.
• It inserts the new Article for assistance inc collection of taxes between tax authorities.
• It inserts new Limitation of Benefits Article i.e. anti-abuse provisions to ensure the benefits are availed by genuine residents of the two nations only.
• It also seeks to avoid the burden of double taxation for taxpayers of two countries to promote and stimulate the flow of investment, technology and services between India and Korea.

ANSWER: Justice L Narasimha Reddy

Explanation:
The one-man judicial committee on One Rank One Pension submitted its report to the Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar on 26th Oct 2016.

• Committee was appointed under the chairmanship of Justice L Narasimha Reddy retd Chief Justice pf Patna HC to look into the anomalies if any arising out of implementation of the OROP.
• Union Government appointed L. Narasimha Reddy to head the OROP judicial committee.
• The judicial committee has held hearings in 20 cities/towns across the country and interacted with many former servicemen and their associations.
• Committee also received 704 representations from individuals and various ex servicemen associations that held a lot of interactions with stakeholders before submitting the report.
• In simple terms, OROP implies that the uniform pension to be paid to the armed forces personnel retiring in the same rank with the same length of service, regardless of the date of retirement.
• Differential payments occur as salaries of personnel are revised on the basis of pay commissions recommendations.

ANSWER: Use of the debit cards at ATMs without authorisation

Explanation:
The RBI has requested that banks should change debit cards whose security is suspected to have been bargained in the wake of being utilised as part of ATMs.

• The issue was initially suspected by some payment gateways For example VISA, Mastercard and Rupay by the National Payments Corporation of India when it was noticed security could be ruptured in a few occasions.
• Credit and debit cards confront security issues when unapproved parties get access to classified details inserted in the card- such access may happen even as the card is being utilised as part of an ATM.
• Cards falling in the suspicious activities and requires substitution is estimated around 17.5 lakh.
• Total aggregate debit card base in the nation was 697 million starting July 2016.
• Banks for instance SBI, HDFC and BoB has began supplanting the cards.
• SBI, the nation’s biggest bank has begun the way towards supplanting 0.6 million check cards.
• A few banks such as Axis Bank, HDFC and ICICI Bank have conceded being hit by comparative digital assault driving Indian banks to either change or ask for clients to change their ATM pins around 3.2 million debit cards.
• In Sept 1st week, some banks witnessed fraudulent exchanges in which debit cards were utilised in China and the US whereas card holders are in India.
• Cardholders found many activities and filed complaints with banks.
• Banks held that NPCI which has regulation over retail payment frameworks in India should intervene.
• Test by NPCI found a malware prompted security break in the frameworks of Hitachi PaymentServices which gives ATMs, PoS and other different services in India.
• After the test found that ATM security could have been breached in May 2016, all there service suppliers asked banks to tell their customers who could be at hazard to change their PIN or issue them new cards.
• Many banks requested that clients change their ATM pins and issued new cards by making old ones null and void.
• This is one of the biggest information breaches in the nation with around 3.2 million cards issued by Indian banks could possibly be replaced.
• Holders were also requested that their PINS could be changed to avoid frauds.
• As per NPCI, 90 ATMs have been compromised and no less than 641 card holders of 19 banks have lost 1.3 crore as consequence of deceitful transactions on their debit cards.
• Malware is noxious programming including infections, worms, trojans, ransomware, spyware and different programs that harm PC frameworks at ATMs, bank servers and permit cybercriminals to get private debit card information.

ANSWER: Gland Pharma

Explanation:
Pharmaceutical giant Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories Ltd on 26th Oct 2016 announced a strategic partnership with Gland Pharma.

• Companies seek to distribute a diverse portfolio of eight injectable Abbreviated New Drug Applications.
• The portfolio is a mix of filed ANDAs pending approval by the US FDA and ANDAs that will be filed imminently.
• The portfolio comprised genetic injectables administered in hospitals and clinics in the US.
• Dr Reddy’s Laboratories is an Indian MNC pharma company based in Hyderabad, Telangana.
• The company was founded by Anji Reddy who previously worked in the mentor institute- Indian Drugs and Pharmaceutical Limited.
• Dr. Reddy’s manufactures and markets a wide range of pharma in India and overseas.
• The company has over 190 medications, 60 active pharmaceutical ingredients for drug manufacture, diagnostic kits, critical care and biotechnology products.

ANSWER: Global Gender Gap Report 2016

Explanation:
World Economic Forum on 25th October 2016 released the Global Gender Gap Report 2016 which provides scores for144 nations compared to 145 countries included in the 2015 report.

• More than a decade of data has revealed that progress is too little for realising the complete potential of humanity within the lifetimes.
• Iceland topped the Gender Gap Index in the 8th consecutive year in a row.
• India stood at 87th position from the 108th position in 2015.
• As per the report, the global gender gap across health, education, economic opportunity and politics will take 83 years across 107 nations covered since the report was first released to close the gap completely.

Top 10 countries with high gender equality are as follows:
1. Iceland
2. Finland
3. Norway
4. Sweden
5. Rwanda
6. Ireland
7. The Philippines
8. Slovenia
9. New Zealand
10. Nicaragua


• Five countries with the least gender equality are Yemen, Pakistan, Syria. Saudi Arabia and Chad.
• Non European nations in the top 10 included Rwanda, The Philippines, New Zealand and Nicaragua.
• Of the 142 countries covered by the Index both this and last year, 68 nations have increased their overall gender gap score compared to 2015 while 74 have seen it decrease.
• No country in the world has closed the gender gap, but 4 out of 5 Nordic countries and Rwanda have closed more than 80 percent of theirs Yemen, the lowest ranking country has closed slightly less than 52 percent of its gender gap
• The Global Gender Gap Index reveals that all countries can do more to close the gender gap.
• Across the index, there are 5 countries that have closed 80 percent of the gap or more.
• Additionally, 64 countries have closed between 60 to 70 percent while 10 countries have closed between 50 to 60 percent.
• India has ranked at 87th position and succeeded in closing the gender gap with regard to wage equality and all indicators of Educational Attainment sub-index completely closing primary and secondary education enrolment gender gaps.
• It sees some regression on women estimated earned income and continues to rank third lowest in the world on health and survival.
• It is the world’s least improved country on this sub index over the past 10 years.
• Economic participation and opportunity was a field where India ranked in 136th position with 0.408 score.
• In the segment, India’s performance was one of the lowest among surveyed countries.
• In 2015, India was placed at 139th position while India was ranked at 113rd position with 0.408 score.
• In this segment, India’s performance was one of the lowest among the surveyed countries.
• In 2015, India was placed at 139th position.
• With an average remaining gender gap of 33 percent, the South Asia region is the second lowest scoring on this year’s Global Gender Gap Index ahead to the MENA and behind the Sub-Saharan Africa region.
• Bangladesh and India are top ranked nations in the region, having closed just over 70 percent and 68 percent of their overall gender gap, while the lowest ranked countries are Bhutan and Pakistan, having closed 64 percent and 56 percent of their overall gender gap respectively.
• No country in the region has fully closed its Educational Attainment gender gap and only one country Sri Lanka has completely closed its Health and Survival Gap.
• The region is home to one of top 5 climbers over the past decade on the overall Index and on Educational Attainment: Nepal.
• The ranks of BRICS countries in ascending order are South Africa, Russia, Brazil, China and India.
• Three basic concepts underlying the Global Gender Gap report include focuses on measuring gaps rather than levels, capturing gaps in outcome variables rather than input variables and ranking countries according to gender equality rather than women’s empowerment.

ANSWER: Karnal Singh

Explanation:
Senior IPS officer Karnal Singh on 26th Oct 2016 was appointed director of the ED.

• The appointments committee of cabinet approved the appointment of Singh till 31st August 2017 which marks the date of his superannuation.
• Singh was already holding the post as additional charge for over a year.
• His regular positing was Special Director, ED for the Northern Region.
• The DG of Economic Enforcement is a law enforcement agency and economic intelligence unit responsible for fighting economic crime in India.
• It comprises officers of the IRS, IPS and IAS.
• The Directorate dates back to May 1, 1956 when an Enforcement Unit was formed in the DEA for handling Exchange Control Laws violations under FERA Act 1947.
• In 1957, the unit was named Enforcement Directorate.