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Union Coal Minister Pralhad Joshi announced that he had ordered the exclusion of three lignite blocks from the seventh tranche of auctions launched by his Ministry.
The inclusion of the East of Sethiathope, Michaelpatti and Vadaseri blocks — of which the first two were protected under the Tamil Nadu Protected Agriculture Zone Development Act, 2020, and the third was a major paddy-growing area — was opposed by all political parties.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday, expressing concern over their inclusion without any communication to the State and urging that they be removed from the auction.
All parties, including the BJP, called for the exclusion of these blocks through a special calling attention motion in the Assembly.
Mr. Joshi’s announcement came hours ahead of Mr. Modi’s visit to Chennai to flag off the Vande Bharat Express from Chennai to Coimbatore and to launch other projects.
A day after the Chief Minister’s letter to the Prime Minister, BJP State president K. Annamalai, along with the party’s national general secretary and Tamil Nadu in-charge C.T. Ravi, met Mr. Joshi, appealing for the exclusion of the three blocks from the auction.
In the spirit of cooperative federalism and keeping in mind the interest of people of T.N., I have directed to exclude them from the auction.
16th Finance panel will be constituted in November (Page no. 1)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Union government is gearing up to constitute the Sixteenth Finance Commission in November this year to recommend the formula for sharing revenues between the Centre and the States for the five-year period beginning 2026-27, a top government official has confirmed.
The critical fiscal panel, which is also tasked with recommending the distribution ratio of revenues between States, along with other terms of reference that the Centre proposes, is to be formed every five years according to Article 280 of the Constitution.
However, the Fifteenth Finance Commission, which was headed by N.K. Singh, had been given an extended mandate to make recommendations for six years, up till 2025-26.
News
Trials can be transferred only in exceptional cases: SC (Page no. 6)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Supreme Court has held in a judgment that criminal cases under trial should be transferred from one State to another only in “exceptional circumstances”. Unnecessary shifting of cases would affect the morale of the State judiciary and prosecution agency.
A Bench led by Justice Surya Kant was recently dealing with the murder of a political worker, Kurban Sha, in Purba Medinipur, West Bengal.
Sha was shot dead by goons in 2019. The family of Sha had approached the top court to transfer the trial to Assam. They alleged that a fair trial was not possible in West Bengal.
The State government suddenly, in 2021, ordered the public prosecutor to withdraw the prosecution against the accused. The Calcutta High Court pro-actively stepped in and annulled the government notification. The trial court also refused to grant bail to the accused after the victim’s family and witnesses complained of threats.
In his judgment for the top court Bench, Justice Kant commended the interventions of the judiciary, saying that “justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done”.
Declining the plea to transfer the case out of West Bengal, the court said the power to transfer cases under Section 406 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (Cr.PC) should be used sparingly and only when justice was apparently in grave peril.
This court has allowed transfers only in exceptional cases considering the fact that transfers may cast unnecessary aspersions on the State Judiciary and the prosecution agency.
Thus, over the years, this court has laid down certain guidelines and situations wherein such power can be justiciably invoked.
The judgment summarised a catena of apex court verdicts giving the possible situations in which an ongoing trial could be transferred.
These include when the State or prosecution is acting hand in glove with the accused; when there is material to show that the accused may influence the prosecution witnesses or cause physical harm to the complainant; when comparative inconvenience and hardships are likely to be caused to the accused; when there is a communally surcharged atmosphere indicating some proof of inability of holding fair and impartial trial because of the accusations made and the nature of the crime committed by the accused; existence of some material from which it can be inferred that some persons are so hostile that they are interfering or are likely to interfere either directly or indirectly with the course of justice.
World
Tsai’s U.S. visit prompts military drills by China in Taiwan Strait (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
China launched military drills around Taiwan, in what it called a “stern warning” to the self-ruled island’s government following a meeting between its President and the U.S. House Speaker.
Dubbed “United Sharp Sword”, the three-day operation — which state media said includes rehearsing an encirclement of Taiwan — will run, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) Eastern Theatre Command said.
Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen immediately denounced the drills, pledging to work with “the U.S. and other like-minded countries” in the face of “continued authoritarian expansionism”.
China’s war games would send planes, ships and personnel into “the maritime areas and air space of the Taiwan Strait, off the northern and southern coasts of the island, and to the east”.
A report from state broadcaster CCTV on to detail the type of weaponry China was putting through its paces, including “long-range rocket artillery, naval destroyers, missile boats, air force fighters, bombers, jammers and refuellers”.
Taiwan’s Defence ministry released a video showing soldiers loading anti-aircraft missile launchers, fighter jets taking off, and other military preparedness exercises.
The footage included surveillance of China’s Shandong aircraft carrier, which sailed through waters south of Taiwan earlier this week.
Science
In pursuit of a magic number, physicists discover new uranium isotope (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Tech)
While studying the atoms of heavy elements, physicists in Japan discovered a previously unknown isotope of uranium, with atomic number 92 and mass number 241, i.e. uranium-241.
The finding refines our understanding of nuclear physics. What shapes the large nuclei of heavy elements take and how often (or rarely) defines the boundaries of models that physicists use to design nuclear power plants and models of exploding stars.
The discovery of a new neutron-rich uranium isotope is the first since 1979,” Toshitaka Niwase, a postdoctoral fellow with the KEK Wako Nuclear Science Centre (WNSC), Japan, and a member of the study.
The arrangement of protons and neutrons in an atomic nucleus follows some rules. We know these rules are based on the nuclei’s properties and structure.
“In general, an atom’s mass is slightly lower than the sum of the masses of protons, neutrons, and electrons,” Michiharu Wada, head of the WNSC and another member of the group, explained via email.
So, systematically measuring the mass of “uranium and its neighbourhood elements yields essential nuclear information to understand the synthesis of such heavy elements in explosive astronomical events”.
The researchers accelerated uranium-238 nuclei into plutonium-198 nuclei at the KEK Isotope Separation System. The resulting nuclear fragments contained different isotopes. This is how they identified uranium-241 and measured the mass of its nucleus.
Theoretical calculations suggest it has a half-life of 40 minutes. The team used time-of-flight mass spectrometry to estimate the mass of each nucleus depending on the time it took to reach a detector. “Precise mass value is a good fingerprint of atomic nuclides.
There is particular interest in ‘magic number’ nuclei: containing a number of protons or neutrons such that the resulting nucleus is highly stable. The heaviest known ‘magic’ nucleus is lead (82 protons). Physicists have been trying to find the next such element.
Pelicans, mangroves, and salt marshes (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
The island of Sriharikota serves as a barrier that shields a brackish water lagoon that we call the Pulicat lake. Being mostly off-limits to tourists because it is an ISRO launch site, this area is teeming with 76 species of water birds. The lake itself has an average depth of only one metre, although it is nearly 60 km long.
The tidal flats, and both fresh and brackish water wetlands found here are ideal for the spot-billed pelican. Although classified as ‘Near-Threatened’ in the IUCN red list, this bird looms large in our minds when we think of water birds.
The spot-billed pelican’s comical walk points to weak leg muscles, which also means that the bird is not a great swimmer, and catches fish near the surface of the water. The common name comes from blue spots on the sides of the large bills.
A social bird, this species sometimes goes fishing in groups, forming a semi-circle that pushes the fish towards shallow water. It also forms a foraging partnership with the little cormorant.
Cormorants are divers, and their dives cause the fish present in deeper regions to scatter towards the surface, where the pelican awaits them.
Adult spot-billed pelicans weigh 4.5-5 kg. The pouch, which is called the gular, is for catching fish. In the breeding season, the adult may bring home 2 kg of fish in one catch.
Spot-billed pelicans form stable colonies along with other water birds. Nests are built on trees, and two-three eggs are laid. When they are about a month old, the chicks destroy the nests.
Breeding colonies occur very close to, or even within villages, and the birds do not seem perturbed by human activity, and the villagers welcome and protect the pelicans and the nests.Villagers use the droppings of the spot-billed pelican as a fertilizer. After the breeding season, pelican populations scatter over a very large area as they forage for food.
A detailed survey of spot-billed pelican populations by Kannan and Manakadan placed a crude estimate of their number in India at 6,000-7,000.
The survey identified breeding sites for these birds in South India at Karaivetti-Vettangudi near Thanjavur and Koonthankulam near Tirunelveli in Tamil Nadu, Kokkarebellur (Mandya District) and Karanji Lake (Mysuru city) in Karnataka, and Uppalapadu near Guntur and Nelapattu near the Pulicat lake in Andhra Pradesh.
Andhra Pradesh has recently lost a large breeding colony of the bird at the Kolleru lake, where aquaculture has contributed to a total degradation of the ecosystem.
Paleobotanists have shown that the Pulicat lake, now a salty marsh, was a thick mangrove forest in the 16th century. Wetland ecosystems lock up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, as ‘Blue Carbon’. As carbon sinks, mangroves can store 1,000 tonne of carbon per hectare.
Wetlands of global importance are called Ramsar sites, after the city in Iran where the Treaty on Wetlands was signed.
India has 75 Ramsar sites, of which 14 are in Tamil Nadu, including three added last year: the Karikili bird sanctuary, the Pallikaranai Marsh Reserve Forest and the Pichavaram mangrove. The spot-billed pelican is seen in all these places.
FAQ
What is behind China’s renaming spree? (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
On April 2, the Chinese government announced it would “standardise” the names of 11 places in Arunachal Pradesh. The Ministry of Civil Affairs in Beijing published a list of 11 places along with a map showing the Indian State of Arunachal Pradesh as a part of China’s Tibet Autonomous Region.
While India dismissed the renaming, which is a largely symbolic move and unlikely to have any tangible on-the-ground impact on the border dispute, it has underlined a hardening Chinese stance on the boundary, the dim prospects of any meaningful progress in the long-running talks, as well as the current strained relations between the neighbours.
The Chinese Ministry of Civil Affairs notification announced 11 “place names for public use”, in Mandarin, Tibetan and English (pinyin transliteration of the Chinese names).
These include five mountain peaks, two more populated areas, two land areas and two rivers. All of the 11 sites are on Indian territory, and the southernmost is close to Itanagar.
The Chinese government referred to the location of the sites as “Zangnan”, or “south Tibet”, which is how it refers to Arunachal Pradesh. China claims as much as 90,000 sq km in the eastern sector of the India-China boundary, covering the entire State.
The list of names follows a new rule on the management of place names by the State Council, or China’s cabinet, that came into effect on May 1 last year, which said the regulation “requires strict management over the naming and renaming of localities and sites” and standardising names.
This is the third time China is issuing names for places in Arunachal Pradesh, a gesture seen as provocative by India and one that has coincided with periods of strains in relations.
In 2017, the first list of “standardised” names was issued for six places in Arunachal, which was then seen as a retaliatory move after the Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, visited the State.
The second such list was issued in December 2021, more than a year into the crisis sparked by China’s multiple transgressions across the Line of Actual Control (LAC) starting in April 2020.
The second list coincided with a new border law passed by the Chinese government that called for various Chinese civilian and military agencies to take steps to “safeguard” Chinese territory, including through such administrative measures.
Will platforms have to take down ‘fake news’? (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology on Thursday amended the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021.
The amendment empowers the Union Government to designate an official fact checker for misinformation and ‘fake news’, and to regulate the online real money gaming industry, which comprises apps like fantasy sports sites, rummy and poker.
The fact check unit of the Press Information Bureau (PIB), which has been ‘debunking’ WhatsApp forwards and news articles on Central Government schemes and departments for years, will be notified as the official fact checker for the Union Government.
As such, whenever any news is notified as fake, social media companies will lose their “safe harbour” for such content, opening them up to lawsuits or other legal action.
Social media companies have traditionally enjoyed legal immunity for content posted by users, as the Information Technology Act, 2000 treats them as intermediaries.
Under the IT Rules they lose this status if, among other things, they don’t have a grievance officer for India, or don’t address user complaints on time.
Additionally now, with this amendment, they will lose their safe harbour immunity for posts that have been flagged by the government as misinformation.
The government claims to have conducted consultations with stakeholders before notifying this particular part of the amendment.
However, organisations like the Editors Guild of India and the Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF) have called the amendment “akin to censorship” and “legally contentious,” indicating that they were either not consulted or that their views were not taken into account.
The only change made from the draft version on this subject is a technical one recommended by the Department of Legal Affairs.