DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS IAS | UPSC Prelims and Mains Exam – 4th November 2024

 Syllabus

• Prelims & Mains – CURRENT EVENT

Context: The World Health Organization (WHO) released its Global TB Report 2024.

Background: –

• Globally, 82 lakh people were newly diagnosed with TB in 2023 – the highest number recorded since WHO began global TB monitoring in 1995 — making it the leading infectious killer again, surpassing Covid-19 in 2023.
• India continues to have the highest burden of the disease, accounting for more than a quarter of the global cases.

Key takeaways

• TB is caused by an organism called mycobacterium tuberculosis, which mainly affects the lungs, but can also impact other parts of the body. TB spreads through the air when an infected individual coughs, sneezes, or speaks.
• According to the Global TB Report 2024, India saw a slight decline in the estimated number of tuberculosis cases and deaths in 2023. India had an estimated 28 lakh TB cases in 2023, accounting for 26% of the global cases. And, there were estimated 3.15 lakh TB-related deaths, accounting for 29% of the deaths globally.
• The report also said the gap between the estimated number of cases and the number of people actually getting diagnosed has been closing. India reported 25.2 lakh cases in 2023, increasing from 24.2 lakh the previous year.

India’s effort in eliminating TB

• Although the elimination of tuberculosis is one of the sustainable development targets to be achieved by 2030 by the world, India has set a target for 2025.
• The national strategic plan 2017-2025 sets the target for India to report no more than 44 new TB cases or 65 total cases per lakh population by 2025.
• In India, the government offers free medicines for TB treatment, which is essential as the medicines can be expensive and the therapy may continue for as long as two years.
• One of the big challenges with tuberculosis treatment is the long duration for which people have to take medicines. The government has been working on devising innovative ways to ensure compliance such as pill boxes that track and remind the patient to take medicine as well as introducing shorter courses of treatment.
• An online Ni-kshay portal has been set up to track the notified TB cases. The government also launched a community engagement program where Ni-kshay Mitras can adopt TB patients and provide them with monthly nutritional support.
• Newer drugs such as Bedaquiline and Delamanid for the treatment of drug-resistant TB have been included in the government’s basket of drugs provided to free TB patients.

Source: Indian Express

 Syllabus

• Mains – GS 2

Context: Nepal Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli is likely to undertake an official visit to China next month, his first bilateral, four months after he took over as head of the new government replacing the Left coalition government led by Pushpa Kamal Dahal (Prachanda).

Background: –

• Oli completed 100 days in office last week and has now directed officials to update him on the progress of projects underway in Nepal by China along with Belt and Road Initiative.

Key takeaways

• Oli’s China visit is seen as a visible break from the ‘tradition’ of the new Nepali PM undertaking his first trip to India.
• Oli’s visit to China is scheduled at a time when the two biggest coalition partners in the government — Nepali Congress and Oli-led Communist Party of Nepal-Unified Marxist Leninist— are at odds over the conditions of executing projects under China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).
• While the Nepali Congress is firm that BRI projects should be accepted only under grants, the CPN-UML supports projects with loans from China’s Exim bank.
• Nepal and India have a unique relationship. The open border, shared culture, economic interdependence and deep-rooted people-to-people relationship make bilateral ties special.
• India is Nepal’s largest trading partner, the top-source country for tourists, the only supplier of petroleum products and the largest source of total foreign investment.
• India also provides transit for almost all of Nepal’s third-country trade and accounts for a significant share of inward remittances from pensioners, professionals and labourers working in India. It has always been the first responder during disasters and emergencies in Nepal.

Source: Indian Express

 Syllabus

• Mains – GS 2 & GS 3

Context: World Cities Day (October 31) was observed recently.

Background: –

• The theme for this year’s World Cities Day is ‘Youth Climate Changemakers: Catalysing Local Action for Urban Sustainability’

Key takeaways

• India’s urbanisation trajectory differs from the cities in the Global North.
• In Western countries, urbanisation followed industrialisation, which created jobs that absorbed rural labour. Their urbanisation was sustained also because of massive economic transfers from colonies. Economist Utsa Patnaik has highlighted that India alone contributed over $45 trillion to England’s economy during colonial rule.
• In contrast, India’s urbanisation is largely driven by economic distress, resulting in “poverty-driven urbanisation,” with both rural-to-urban and urban-to-urban migration.
• During the COVID-19 pandemic, the strain on urban planning became apparent, as reverse migration trends highlighted gaps in infrastructure.

What are urban challenges in India?

• The main challenges Indian cities face include inadequate spatial planning, climate change, massive migration, growing inequality and social segregation, and governance limitations.
• Urban planning agencies have struggled due to two main issues.
  • First, spatial and temporal plans are outdated and fail to accommodate population growth. Since the 1980s, deindustrialisation has led to job losses in cities like Ahmedabad, Delhi, Surat, and Mumbai. Many workers displaced by this trend moved to peri-urban areas, where they live in overcrowded conditions. Currently, 40% of India’s urban population resides in slums.
  • Second, plans often focus on capital growth rather than people’s needs, leading to a lack of local ownership and engagement in the planning process.
• Similarly, climate change severely impacts Indian cities. Cities face severe pollution and are increasingly subject to urban flooding and “heat island effects.”
• Additionally, urbanisation was once believed to be neutral regarding social and religious dynamics, but Indian cities are increasingly segregated along these lines.
• Inequality is widening, with exclusive developments catering to the wealthy while millions lack basic housing. For instance, DLF’s “The Dahlias” project in Gurugram offers apartments starting at ₹100 crore, a stark contrast to the two crore urban Indians without shelter. Most city jobs (around 90%) are in the informal sector.
• Despite the 74th Constitutional Amendment, most Indian cities remain controlled by undemocratic bodies. Though cities have elected representatives, they rarely control urban planning, which is often outsourced to parastatals and private entities. For example, less than three of the 18 functions outlined in the 12th Schedule have been universally transferred to urban governments, and cities receive a mere 0.5% of the GDP in intergovernmental transfers.

Source: The Hindu

 Syllabus

• Prelims & Mains – SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY

Context: The first science result from the Aditya-L1 mission, India’s first scientific mission dedicated to studying the Sun, is out.

Background:

• The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) launched Aditya-L1 on September 2, 2023, from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota.

Key takeaways

• Scientists who developed Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC) onboard Aditya-L1 precisely estimated the onset time of a coronal mass ejection that erupted on the Sun on July 16.
• VELC is the spacecraft’s primary payload. VELC was developed by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIAp), Bengaluru.
• The Sun is a very active object and often spews vast quantities of plasma in violent eruptions called coronal mass ejections (CMEs).
• Observation of the CMEs as they originate on the Sun and understanding their plasma characteristics is one of the major science goals for VELC.

About Aditya L1

• Aditya-L1 is India’s first space mission dedicated to studying the Sun.
• Type: It is a solar observatory mission that will orbit around the Lagrange Point 1 (L1), located approximately 1.5 million kilometers from Earth, between Earth and the Sun.
• Primary Goals:
  • Study the Sun’s outermost layers, including the photosphere, chromosphere, and corona.
  • Observe solar phenomena like solar flares, coronal mass ejections (CMEs), and solar wind to understand their impact on Earth’s space environment.
• Payloads: Aditya-L1 carries seven payloads, including:
  • Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC): For studying the solar corona.
  • Solar Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (SUIT): Observes the photosphere and chromosphere.
  • Plasma Analyser Package for Aditya (PAPA) and Aditya Solar Wind Particle Experiment (ASPEX): Study solar winds and particle emissions.

Significance of L1 Point

• Constant Solar Observation: The L1 point is about 1.5 million kilometers from Earth  in the direction of the Sun. It allows for continuous, uninterrupted observation of the Sun without the interference of Earth’s shadow.
• Stable Orbit: The L1 point is a position in space where the gravitational forces of the Earth and the Sun balance each other. This enables the spacecraft to remain in a  stable orbit with minimal fuel consumption for station-keeping.

Source: The Hindu

 Syllabus

• Mains – GS 1, GS 2 & GS 3

Context: With over 80 per cent of the world’s poor living in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, India is among the countries with the largest number of the world’s poor, found the 2024 Global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) report.

Background: –

• The report also stated that almost 84 per cent of the world’s poor live in rural areas and they are poorer than their counterparts in the urban areas. In the case of India, rural poverty has been a persistent issue for policymakers.

Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI)

• The MPI, developed by Sabina Alkire and James Foster and adopted by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in 2010, measures deprivation across health, education, and standard of living, and not monetary poverty.
• National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) in collaboration with the UNDP and Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI), developed a National Multidimensional Poverty Index to monitor multidimensional poverty at national, state, and district levels in the country.
• In January this year, NITI Aayog released a discussion paper titled Multidimensional Poverty in India since 2005-06 which claims that the country has seen a significant decline in multidimensional poverty from 29.17 per cent in 2013-14 to 11.28 per cent in 2022-23.
• The discussion paper sends a positive message that India is on its way to achieve Sustainable Development Goal 1.2 of “halving multidimensional poverty by 2030”.
• The paper also notes rural India has seen a larger decline in multidimensional poverty. Between 2015-16 and 2019-21, poverty in rural India decreased from 32.59 per cent to 19.28 per cent, while urban poverty fell from 8.65 per cent to 5.27 per cent.

Rural poverty: Disparities and deprivations

• Rural poverty, which refers to poverty in rural areas, is characterised by factors including poor living conditions, heavy reliance on agriculture, landlessness and limited access to basic services. In addition, the rural poor are often affected by social constraints stemming from caste, gender, and ethnicity, which can limit social mobility and access to opportunities.
• For instance, the 2018 National Sample Survey (NSS) on education highlighted significant disparities, with rural literacy at 73.5 per cent compared to 87.7 per cent in urban areas.
• Also, the 76th round of the NSS underlined notable differences in access to basic services. About 29 per cent of rural households lack access to toilets, in contrast to nearly 4 per cent in urban areas; and more than 40 per cent of rural households do not have drinking water facilities within the home, compared to 20 per cent in urban areas.
• Around 65 per cent of India’s population lives in rural areas, but a disproportionately high percentage – about 90 per cent – of the nation’s poor reside in rural areas.
• The Periodic Labour Force Survey data shows that around 59 per cent of the rural workers are engaged in agriculture and allied activities. Among agricultural workers, there is a disparity in the incidence of poverty based on whether a worker is a cultivator or a casual wage worker.
• The incidence of poverty is much higher among agricultural labourers than cultivators. Among the rural non-agricultural workers, the type of non-agricultural work is important. Self-employment in non-farm work or precarious and casual non-farm work like in construction may not lead to poverty reduction.
• Another way of understanding rural poverty is by looking at access to land and land ownership. Data reveals that the small (1-2 hectares of land) and marginal (less than 1 hectare) farming households are the most affected and poor groups.
• India is also the only country in South Asia where poverty is significantly higher among female-headed households as compared to male-headed households. Around 19.7 per cent of female-headed households are poor in India while 15.9 per cent of male-headed households are poor.
• Hence, along with regional factors, gender, caste, and religion are also important determinants in understanding poverty in India. For instance, studies have found that both Scheduled Tribes and Scheduled Castes in India contribute more to multidimensional poverty than their population share.
• While rural poverty has been a persistent issue for Indian policymakers, the country has also seen significant rural-urban migration. As of 2020-21, about one-third of India’s total population is migrants. Migrants form 34.6% of the total population in urban areas. This has led to growing debates on “urbanisation of poverty”.

Source: Indian Express

 Syllabus

• Mains – GS 3

Context: A study paper, published in the journal Frontiers in Forests and Global Change has reported that a rising sea and coastal flooding could actually enhance the resilience of some coastal tree species while being detrimental to others.

Background: –

• Global warming is raising sea levels and making flooding more common in some areas. Researchers have held both these effects among others responsible for discouraging the growth of plants of many tree species in coastal areas. But the new study has called for a pause in this thinking.

Coastal Flooding:

• It is a sudden and abrupt inundation of a coastal environment caused by a short-term increase in water level due to a storm surge and extreme tides.
• The magnitude and extension depend on the coastal topography, storm surge conditions, and broader bathymetry of the coastal area.

Causes of Coastal Flooding:

• Rising sea levels due to global warming increase the frequency and intensity of coastal flooding. As per the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2014, there is a high degree of certainty that sea levels will rise by between 28 – 98cm by 2100, with the most likely rise being 55cm by 2100.
• Storm surges are short-term changes in sea levels caused by events such as tsunamis and cyclones one of the leading causes for coastal flooding.
• Cyclones, storms, and tsunamis can exacerbate coastal flooding, leading to severe damage and loss of life and property.
• Construction of infrastructure, such as ports and resorts, in coastal areas can increase vulnerability to flooding.
• The combination of rising seas and more powerful storms accelerates erosion, causing the loss of beaches and wetlands that act as natural buffers.
• Deforestation and erosion of coastal ecosystems can weaken natural barriers against flooding.

Impacts of Coastal Flooding:

• It results in significant loss of life and property damage, particularly in densely populated areas.
• Infrastructures like roads, bridges, etc. can be severely damaged leading to disruption of essential services.
• Industries such as tourism, fisheries, and agriculture suffer due to flooding, with coastal regions facing direct losses from halted operations, reduced productivity, and damaged assets.
• Persistent flooding can force communities to relocate leading to internal migration straining urban infrastructure and potential social conflicts in destination areas.
• Coastal ecosystems, such as mangroves and coral reefs, can be severely impacted by flooding, leading to a loss of biodiversity.

Government Initiatives for Coastal Management:

• MISHTI Initiative is a government-led initiative aimed at increasing the mangrove cover along the coastline and on saltpan lands.
• The National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management aims to promote integrated and sustainable management of the coastal and marine areas in India for the benefit and well-being of the traditional coastal and island communities.
• Integrated Coastal Zone Management Plan is a process for the management of the coast using an integrated approach, regarding all aspects of the coastal zone, including geographical and political boundaries, in an attempt to achieve sustainability.
• The Coastal Regulation Zone notification was issued in 1991 under the Environmental Protection Act of 1986, by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change to regulate activities in coastal areas of India.

Source: The Hindu

Q1.) Which of the following statements is/are correct about the Aditya-L1 mission?

1. Aditya-L1 is India’s first mission dedicated to the study of the Sun.
2. The Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC), the mission’s primary payload, is designed to study the L1 Lagrange point.
3. Aditya-L1 aims to provide continuous observations of solar phenomena, including solar flares, coronal mass ejections (CMEs), and solar wind.
   Select the correct answer using the codes given below:

(a) 1 and 2 only

(b) 1 and 3 only

(c) 2 and 3 only

(d) 1, 2, and 3

Q2.) Consider the following statements:

1. India accounts for more than one-quarter of the global TB cases according to Global Tuberculosis (TB) Report 2024
2. India has set a target to eliminate TB by 2025, ahead of the global target of 2030.
3. TB is caused by an organism called mycobacterium tuberculosis, which mainly affects the lungs, but can also impact other parts of the body.
   Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

(a) 1 and 2 only

(b) 2 and 3 only

(c) 1 and 3 only

(d) 1, 2, and 3

Q3.) World Cities Day is observed on

(a) 30th October

(b) 31st October

(c) 2nd November

(d) 1 st November

Comment the answers to the above questions in the comment section below!!

ANSWERS FOR ’  4th November 2024 – Daily Practice MCQs’ will be updated along with tomorrow’s Daily Current Affairs

Q.1) –  b

Q.2) – a

Q.3) – c