River Ganga and Yamuna have been declared as ‘living
persons’ by the Uttarakhand High Court
The Uttarakhand High Court, on Monday,
declared that the rivers Ganga and Yamuna, all their tributaries and streams
were “living persons”, having the status of a legal person with all
corresponding rights, duties and liabilities of a living person. The court
ordered that the Director of the Namami Gange programme, the Uttarakhand Chief
Secretary, and the Advocate-General of Uttarakhand would serve as “parents” for
the rivers and would be the human faces to “protect, conserve and preserve” the
rivers and their tributaries.
A river in New Zealand, The Whanganui
River, was the first in the world to be granted the same legal rights as a
person (March 15th, 2017). The NZ Parliament passed a bill recognising the river
as a legal entity. The river’s interests will be represented by two people –
one from the Maori tribes (who had been fighting for over 160 years to get this
recognition for their river) and one from the crown.
India-based Neutrino Observatory
West Bodi Hills in Tamil Nadu will be
the place where above observatory will be located.
Since the laboratory cavern needs to
be more than 1000 m underground (so that there is at least 1000 m cover
all-round to absorb/reduce natural cosmic radiation), the choice of site is
primarily dictated by the rock quality, in order to obtain a stable safe
environment for such long-term activity. Geologically, southern Indian
mountains have the most compact, dense rock while the Himalayas are mostly
metamorphic sedimentary rock. The mountains of Tamil Nadu (Specifically, the
West Bodi Hills), in general, are the most attractive possibility, offering
stable dense rocks with maximum safety for locating such a laboratory.
Interesting Facts on Neutrino
We led neutrino research when our
physicists used a gold mine at Kolar in Karnataka to set up what was then
(1960s) the world’s deepest underground laboratory. This was called the Kolar
Gold Field Lab.
Neutrinos are so abundant among us
that every second, there are more than 100 trillion of them passing right
through each of us — we never even notice them. This is the reason why INO
needs to be built deep into the earth — 1,300 metres into the earth. At this
depth, it would be able to keep itself away from all the trillions of neutrinos
produced in the atmosphere and which would otherwise choke an over-the-ground
neutrino detector.
Can neutrinos cause cancer? Not at
all! Neutrinos are the least harmful of all elementary particles, as they
almost never react with solid bodies. A few people with whom we have discussed
this topic, tend to confuse the “neutrino” for the “neutron”. This has also led
to the confusion that neutrinos can be weaponised, which is far from the truth.
Special Notified Zone for Diamond
India Diamond Trading Centre, the only
Special Notified Zone in the country, enables rough diamonds to enter and exit
duty-free, for the purpose of viewing.
Amendments have been made to our laws
to enable rough diamonds to enter and exit, duty free for the purpose of viewing.
The Special Notified Zone at the Bharat Diamond Bourse became operational in
November, 2015. This has already shown good results. Earlier only eighty to
ninety big merchants used to get access to global rough diamonds by travelling
to Belgium, Africa and Israel. Now, about three thousand small and medium
merchants have this privilege through the new Special Notified Zone.
India is the world’s largest
manufacturer of cut and polished diamonds.
GST Related Legislations
The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime
Minister Shri Narendra Modi has approved the following four GST related bills:
The
Central Goods and Services Tax Bill 2017 – provisions for levy and collection of tax on
intra-state supply of goods or services or both by the Central Government.
The
Integrated Goods and Services Tax Bill 2017 – provisions for levy and collection of tax on
inter-state supply of goods or services or both by the Central Government.
The
Union Territory Goods and Services Tax Bill 2017 – provisions for levy and collection
of tax on intra-UT supply of goods and services in the Union Territories without
legislature. Union Territory GST is akin to States Goods and Services Tax
(SGST) which shall be levied and collected by the States/Union Territories on
intra-state supply of goods or services or both.
The
Goods and Services Tax (Compensation to the States) Bill 2017 (The Compensation
Bill) –
provides for compensation to the states for loss of revenue arising on account
of implementation of the goods and services tax for a period of five years as
per section 18 of the Constitution (One Hundred and First Amendment) Act, 2016.
Indian Sign Language Research and Training Center
Indian Sign Language Research and
Training Centre (ISLRTC) is an autonomous organization of the Government of
India established under Society Registration Act, 1860 under the aegis of
Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (Divyangjan) under
Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment. The main objectives of the ISLRTC
are:
* to develop manpower for using,
teaching and conducting research in Indian Sign Language (ISL),
* to promote the use of ISL as an
educational mode,
* to carry out research in collaboration
with universities, national and international bodies to create linguistic
records in ISL,
* to train and orient various
professionals (and community leaders and the public at large for understanding
and using Indian Sign Language) and
* to collaborate with organizations of
the Deaf.
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