Current Affair 1:

Biodiversity Management Committees

Read three important points from Act itself.

 

The BMC consists of a chairperson, and six persons nominated by local bodies, including 1/3rd women and 18% SC/ST.

The functions of BMCs are as under:

1. Prepare, maintain and validate People’s Biodiversity Register (PBR) in consultation with the local people. The BMC is to maintain a Register giving information about the details of biological resources and traditional knowledge available within the jurisdiction of BMC.
2. Advice on any matter referred to it by the State Biodiversity Board or Authority for granting approval, to maintain data about the local vaids and practitioners using the biological resources.

 

Current Affair 2:

National Clean Air Programme (NCAP)

The Central Government launched National Clean Air Programme (NCAP) as a long-term, time-bound, national level strategy to tackle the air pollution problem across the country in a comprehensive manner with targets to achieve 20% to 30% reduction in Particulate Matter concentrations by 2024 keeping 2017 as the base year for the comparison of concentration. Under NCAP, 122 non-attainment cities have been identified across the country based on the Air Quality data from 2014-2018.

It was launched by the Ministry of Environment Forest &Climate Change in January 2019.

Current Affair 3:

School Innovation Council

Ministry of Education’s Innovation Cell and AICTE has launched the School Innovation Council program for schools across the country.

The Programme aims at fostering a culture of Innovation, Ideation, Creativity, Design Thinking and Entrepreneurship in Schools. SIC will promote out of box thinking in school education as envisioned in National Innovation and National Education Policy 2020.

It was launched on 1 July 2022 and has been introduced to all schools of all the states.

It is a council of teachers, students, and experts from industry and academia to conduct round-the-year activities for students and teachers on Innovation and Entrepreneurship, monitored through the SIC portal of the MIC, to record the influence at the ground level.

SIC will enable mindset change, awareness, and training on Ideation, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, design thinking, Intellectual Property Rights, start-up finance, and HR among teachers and students.

It will also enable the ranking system for schools on the level of innovation-oriented activities.

Current Affair 4:

Bilateral Air Service Agreement

Bilateral agreements are air service agreements between two countries that provide different degrees of freedom of the air, which are a set of commercial aviation rights granting a country’s airlines the privilege to enter another country’s airspace.

Any designated foreign airline may fly to/from India if it is designated as a point of call under the bilateral Air Services Agreement (ASA) signed between India and the nation that selected the airline.

Under the terms of bilateral ASAs signed by India with foreign nations, Indian designated carriers are free to operate scheduled flights to/from any international airport.

Currently, the Government of India is not awarding any non-metro airport as a new point of call to any foreign airline for the purpose of running passenger services due to a major imbalance in the number of points of call-in favor of foreign carriers. Major countries in the ASA include UAE, UK, USA, China, Brazil, Israel, Russia, and France.

India has signed ASAs with 116 foreign nations.

How it looks like, see one example below:

The sovereignty of a country over the airspace above its territories is recognized by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO).

 

Current Affair 5:

GST collections has increased

Gross revenues from the Goods and Services Tax (GST) hit a record high in December 2020, with collections of ₹1,15,174 crores, 12% higher than a year ago and 9.7% greater than the previous month’s inflows.

The increase in GST collection is because of the following reasons.

• Economic Recovery (more demand more consumption)
• Higher domestic Inflation (GST is Ad-Valorem tax, so higher price leads to higher collection)
• Higher imports (IGST is levied on the value of imports. The imports increased in value terms because of higher global commodity prices and higher demand)
• Greater enforcement actions against anti-evasion activities

All of the above factors have led to an increase in 'Buoyancy in GST'.

Tax Buoyancy = % change in tax revenue/%change in GDP

So, tax buoyancy is an indicator to measure the efficiency and responsiveness of revenue mobilization in response to growth in GDP.

 

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