UPSC Daily Current Affairs for Prelims and Mains Exam 26 May 2020

Read here Today’s Most Important News from Indian Express Daily current affairs, Hindu Current Affairs Today for UPSC 2020. Read here 24th May UPSC Current Affairs updated on daily basis. We cover Daily News by choosing the most relevant topics from a number of newspapers in this article.

Tag: GS3 ; Tag Economy

Air Travel resumes but 50% seats on 532 flights go empty

• Airlines ferried more than 39,000 passengers on 532 flights on Monday as domestic air travel was resumed after two months.
• Large number of passengers was left stranded as airlines were forced to cancel half the flights just hours before take-off due to poor co-ordination between the Centre and the States.
• “From no domestic passenger flights yesterday to 532 flights & 39,231 passengers today, action has returned to Indian skies. With Andhra Pradesh set to resume operations from tomorrow & West Bengal from 28 May, these numbers are all set to increase further,” Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Puri tweeted on Monday.

Tag: GS3 ; Tag: Science & Technology

Testing up in States seeing massive return of Migrants

• The Union Health Ministry has admitted that Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal and Odisha, currently witnessing a large scale return of migrant workers, and remote areas need aggressive COVID-19 testing capacity scale-up to clear any backlogs.
• The Indian Council of Medical Research to scale up its testing laboratories. So far, we have scaled up with 15 testing laboratories in Bihar, 17 in Odisha, 28 in Uttar Pradesh and 36 in West Bengal.

Tag: GS2 ; Tag: International Relations

India – China Border Dispute

• The India-China border has been witnessing tension over the past month, with incidents reported in at least four different locations along the Line of Actual Control(LAC)
• The border is not fully demarcated and the LAC is neither clarified nor confirmed by the two countries
• India and China Border is divided into three sectors:

1. The LAC in the western sector falls  in the union territory of Ladakh and is 1597 Km long
2. The Middle sector of 545 Km length falls in UK and HP
3. The 1346 Km long eastern sector falls in the states of Sikkim and AP

• The main differences are in the Western and Eastern sectors. India sees China as occupying 38000 sq Km in Aksai Chin. In the east, China claims as much as 90,000 sq km, extending all across Arunachal Pradesh.
• The middle sector is the least disputed sector, while the western sector witnesses the highest transgressions between the two sides.

Tag: GS3 ; Tag Sports

BALBIR SINGH DOSANJH

• Balbir Singh Senior, the three- time Olympic gold medal- winning hockey legend passed away. He was 95 Years.
• Balbir Singh Dosanjh (1923-2020) was an Indian hockey player. He was often called  Balbir Singh Senior to distinguish him from other Indian hockey player named Balbir Singh.
• He was three-time Olympic gold medalist, having played a key role in India’s wins in London (1948), Helsinki (1952) as vice captain, and Melbourne (1956) as Captain Olympics.
• His Olympic record for most goals scored by an individual in an Olympic men’s hockey final remains unbeaten. Singh set this record when he scored five goals in India’s 6-1 victory over Netherlands in the Gold Medal game of the 1952 Olympic Games.
• One of the country’s greatest athletes, Balbir Singh was only Indian among 16 legends chosen by the International Olympic Committee across modern Olympic history.
• Singh was the first sports personality to be honored with the Padma Shri Award, in 1957.

Tag: GS3 ; Tag Economy

JIOMART: JIO KI NAYI DUKAN

• Reliance Industries (RIL) has taken its e-commerce platform JioMart live in an attempt to take on rivals Amazon and Flipkart. Pilots were carried out in Navi Mumbai, Thane and Kalyan.
• Jiomart , an online-offline model that combines the strengths of Reliance Jio and Reliance Retail, has started offering products at a minimum 5% discount to the maximum retail price on selecte products.
• JioMart has started offering more than 50,000 products in the fruits and vegetables, dairy and bakery, staples, snakes, branded foods, beverages, personal care, home care etc.
• Customers can get free home delivery on no min. order value, with no questions asked return policy.
• Facebook and Whatsapp had signed a commercial agreement with Reliance Jio over JioMart, So that the online venture’s customers can place order though the social media platform.

Tag: GS3 ; Tag Science & Tech

Earth’s Magnetic Field is Weakening,

Here’s What it Means for Telecommunications and Satellite Systems

• The magnetic field of the Earth helps us in numerous ways. From protecting us from solar radiation to aiding the communication of satellites and spacecraft, it performs various functions
• Published in The Independent, the magnetic field is on a continuous decline. In fact, it has lost almost 10% of its strength in the last two decades.
• South Atlantic Anomaly(SAA):A rapid shrink has been observed in the South Atlantic Anomaly, a stretch between Africa and South America. It is an area where the Earth’s inner Van Allen radiation belt comes closest to the Earth’s surface,  dipping down  to an altitude of 200 Kms.
• The researchers claimed the latest study is based on the data provided by European Space Agency’s (ESA) Swarm constellation of satellites.
• There has been a rapid loss of the strength of magnetic field over the South Atlantic Anomaly. This stretch lies between Africa and South America
• ESA predict that the weakening of the magnetic field might be a sign of its flipping, with the North Pole and South Pole switching places.

Tag:GS2; Tag: Governance

Uttar Pradesh Government releases first skill map of Migrant Workers

• The government has said it will provide them employment in the State as per their skills and experience and will constitute a Migrant Commission for the purpose.
• So far, 23-24 lakh migrant workers have returned to Uttar Pradesh during the lockdown, the government said.

Construction Sector

• The largest set of these migrant workers are related to the construction sector, with over 1.52 lakh engaged in work in real estate or construction agencies.
• The list also includes painters (26,041), carpenters (16,064), drivers (9,052), electricians and persons associated with electronics (4,980), security guards (3364), furniture and fitting workers (2,234) and auto-repair mechanics (1,557), said a senior official.
• Pointing out that around 12,103 migrant workers were linked to the garment and tailoring sector.