Topic 1: Zarth App
Context: A new application is developed for knowing about the transients.
Key details:
- A team of researchers has developed an app that allows anyone with a smartphone to ‘hunt’ for transients.
- The app uses the open-source Sky Map and adds data daily from the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF)’s robotic telescope at the Palomar Observatory in California.
- Palomar is also home to one of the oldest, largest, and most powerful telescopes in the world: the 200-inch Hale reflector.
- The ZTF scans the entire northern sky every two days and uses the data to make large area sky maps that have important applications in tracking near-earth asteroids and studying supernovae.
- The new app, called ZARTH, short for ‘ZTF Augmented Reality Transient Hunter’, is built along the lines of the augmented reality mobile game Pokemon Go.
- Once a player catches a transient, ZARTH shares more information about it, earn points, and go on to collect more transients.
- The app is loaded daily with transients detected in real-time by the ZTF, an incredible 100,000 every night. These include:
- supernovae,
- flaring stars (variable stars that flare up for a short while),
- white dwarf binaries (burnt remains of dead stars that orbit one another and often merge and explode in supernovae),
- active galactic nuclei, etc.
Topic 2: Buzkashi of Afghan society
Context: In the book “Games without Rules: The Often-Interrupted History of Afghanistan”, the author writes about a game called Buzkashi.
About Buzkashi:
- Buzkashi is played only in Afghanistan and the central Asian steppes.
- It involves men on horseback competing to snatch a goat carcass off the ground and carry it to each of two designated posts while the other players, riding alongside at full gallop, fight to wrest the goat carcass away.
- The men play as individuals, each for his own glory.
- There are no teams.
- There is no set number of players.
- The distance between the posts is arbitrary.
- The field of play has no boundaries or chalk marks.
- No referee rides alongside to whistle plays dead and none is needed, for there are no fouls.
- The game is governed and regulated by its own traditions, by the social context and its customs, and by the implicit understandings among the players.
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Significance of the term:
- 200 years ago, Buzkashi offered an apt metaphor for Afghan society.
- The major theme of the country’s history since then has been a contention about whether and how to impose rules on the Buzkashi of Afghan society.
- Taliban’s ascent and their rule over the last two years is an example of the country, which has refused to play with any rules of the world.
Topic 3: Person in news: Madan Lal Dhingra
Context: Madan Lal Dhingra was an Indian revolutionary who was hanged to death on August 17, 1909, at the age of only 24, for killing British official Curzon Wyllie.
Early life:
- Madan Lal Dhingra was born in 1883 in an affluent family of Amritsar.
- After completing school education in Amritsar, in 1904, Dhingra was sent to Lahore for his Master’s degree.
- Having an innate sense of justice, Dhingra was also very much concerned by the poverty he witnessed in India.
- He would eventually be expelled from the college in Lahore for protesting against the mandation of Britain-imported cloth for blazers, and then refusing to apologise to the management for his protest.
- In 1906, his family convinced him to study in London, where he took admission in the University College of London to learn mechanical engineering.
Contact with Savarkar and nationalist activities in London
- While studying in London, Dhingra came in contact with Vinayak Damodar Savarkar and Shyamji Krishna Varma, both active in revolutionary circles in the city.
- A year back, Varma had founded India House – a student accomodation for Indians in north London, and a hub of revolutionary Indian nationalism.
- Dhingra would frequent India House and participate in meetings and discussions.
- He became a member of the secretive Abhinav Bharat Mandal founded by Vinayak Savarkar and his brother Ganesh.
- It was here that Dhingra’s eventual plan of assasinating Curzon Willie would materialise, and he would pick up the required shooting skills to carry out the killing.
- By this time, Madan Lal’s father had gotten to know of his son’s activities and publically disowned him, even publishing advertisements in newspapers to that effect.
Killing Curzon Wyllie
- William Hutt Curzon Wyllie (1848-1909) was a British Indian officer and later on, a political official and an intelligence officer in the British Indian government.
- At the time of his assasination, he was trying to collect information on Dhingra and his fellow revolutionaries.
- On July 1, 1909, Dhingra attended the annual ‘At Home’ function hosted by the Indian National Association at the Imperial Institute, London.
- Curzon Wyllie, at the time selected to be the political aide-de-camp to the Secretary of State for India, was also present in the function with his wife.
- When he was leaving the function, Dhingra fired at Curzon Wyllie which also hit Carwash Lalcaca, a Parsi doctor who tried to save the British official.
- Both Curzon Wyllie and Lalcaca died on the spot and Dhingra was arrested immediately and put through a rapid trial.
- Dhingra was pronounced guilty and executed on August 17, 1909 at the Pentoville prison in London.
- Dhingra would be buried in London with his remains returning to India only in 1976.
- He was cremated at Amritsar’s Mal Mandi area that year, and the location of his cremation was conscecrated with a statue, the first in his hometown, decades after his sacrifice.
A memorial
- On August 15, 2021 it was announced that the Amritsar Improvement trust will provide land and the Municipal Corporation of Amritsar will build a memorial in name of Dhingra.
- Roughly 2.5 crores have been spent on the memorial spread across 4,000 square yards.
Topic 4: Lokniti-CSDS’s survey
Context: Findings of Lokniti-CSDS (Centre for the Study of Developing Societies) survey was released recently.
Key details:
- More than one in three (36%) Indians between the ages of 15 and 34 believe unemployment is the biggest problem before the country.
- About one in six (16%) think it is poverty, and 13% think it is inflation.
- These findings suggest that the youth identify challenges relating to the economy as the most significant facing the nation.
- About 6% of respondents identified corruption as the most significant challenge, 4% each identified problems in education and high population.
Concerns over jobs
- The proportion of youth identifying unemployment as the biggest problem has increased by 18 percentage points from the results of a similar survey in 2016.
- The share of those identifying price rise as the primary concern has increased by 7 percentage points.
- Unemployment is a significant concern across all economic classes, it is particularly pronounced among middle-class youth.
- 40% of highly educated respondents (graduate and above) identified unemployment as the most pressing concern.
- In contrast, only 27% of non-literate individuals cited unemployment as their primary concern, likely due to their greater willingness to take on a range of jobs.
- Forty-two per cent of men said unemployment was the most significant problem; among young women, this number was 31%.
- Poverty and price rise emerged as a more prominent problem for youth from lower economic backgrounds.
- A larger proportion of women (across economic classes) expressed concerns about price rise and poverty.
Occupational status
- Almost half of respondents (49%) said they were engaged in some form of work.
- Almost a fourth (23%) of youth with jobs were self-employed.
- Sixteen per cent were professionals such as doctors or engineers.
- 15% were involved in agriculture.
- Semi-unskilled and skilled workers made up 27% of the total.
- Only 6% were in government jobs.
Job aspirations
- Asked what their ideal occupation would be if they had the freedom to choose, almost 16% of youth mentioned jobs in the health sector, such as doctors, nurses, and other medical staff.
- The education sector was the second most preferred (14%), followed by science and technology-related jobs and starting their own businesses (10% each).
- Six per cent wanted to be in a government job.
- Only 2% of respondents said they would like to continue in their current jobs.
Govt job vs Private jobs
- Asked to choose from a government job, a private job, or setting up their own business, three out of five respondents chose government jobs, and more than one out of four opted for own business.
- The preference for setting up an own business has grown consistently over this period — from 16% in 2007 to 27% in 2023.
Topic 5: Ponzi scheme
Context: Odisha police arrested the India head of Chinese earning application (online ponzi scam).
About Ponzi scheme:
- A ponzi scheme is an investment plan in which the operator or the operating company pays returns to investors from the new capital coming in from new investors instead off the profits of the business.
- The investors get attracted to these schemes because of the unusually high rate of return offered within shorter time spans compared to other conventional investment options.
- These schemes start off as legitimate businesses.
- However, they often fail to sustain them with operating income alone.
- So, in order to meet the promises made to their investors, the capital gathered from new members gets used up.
- For example, a hedge fund can turn into a ponzi scheme if it faces unexpected losses and cannot legitimately meet the desired returns.
- The promoters then start forging reports instead of admitting their failures.
- To gain confidence of investors, the promoters usually give decent payouts in the first few months, luring investors to put in more money.
- This sets off a ripple effect, bringing in new investors to participate.
- The initial ones then get paid out from the funds received from new investors.
- Such schemes can unravel due to any of the below mentioned reasons:
- The promoter vanishes with the entire investment fund without giving payouts to investors
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New investments stop flowing in, creating a liquidity crunch.
- This causes a panic situation as more people start demanding returns.
- Market forces prompt mass withdrawal of funds creating an issue for the promoter.
History
- The scheme got its name from Charles Ponzi, a fraudster who duped thousands of investors in 1919.
- Ponzi promised a 50% return within three months on profits earned from international reply coupons.
- Due to the fluctuations in postage prices, it wasn’t unusual to find that stamps were pricier in one country than another.
- Ponzi saw an opportunity in the practice and decided to hire agents to buy cheap international reply coupons on his behalf then send them to him.
- He exchanged the coupons for stamps, which were more expensive than what the coupon was originally bought for.
- The stamps were then sold at a higher price to make a profit.
- This type of trade is known as arbitrage, and it’s not illegal.
- Under the Securities Exchange Company, he invited people to invest in the company, promising 50% returns within 45 days and 100% within 90 days.
- Given his success in the postage stamp scheme, no one doubted his intentions.
- Unfortunately, Ponzi never really invested the money, he just plowed it back into the scheme by paying off some of the investors.
Concerns of Ponzi Schemes
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Promise of high returns with minimal risk
- In the real world, every investment one makes carries with it some degree of risk.
- In fact, investments that offer high returns typically carry more risk.
- So, if someone offers an investment with high returns and few risks, it is likely to be a too-good-to-be-true deal.
- Chances are the investor won’t see any returns.
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Overly consistent returns
- Investments experience fluctuations all the time.
- Investors should always be skeptical of investments that generate high returns consistently regardless of the fluctuating market conditions.
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Unregistered investments
- Before rushing to invest in a scheme, it’s important to confirm whether the investment company is registered.
- If it’s registered, then an investor can access information regarding the company to determine whether it’s legitimate.
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Unlicensed sellers
- Most Ponzi schemes deal with unlicensed individuals and companies.
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Secretive, sophisticated strategies
- One should avoid investments that consist of procedures that are too complex to understand.
Topic 6: Warship Vindhyagiri
Context: President of India launches warship Vindhyagiri
Key details:
- It is the last in the series of three Project 17A (Alpha) frigates built by the Indian Navy.
- Just like its predecessors, INS Nilgiri, Udaygiri, Himgiri, Taragiri, and Dunagiri, Vindhyagiri is named after a mountain range in Karnataka.
- Stealth features
- The P17A ships are 149-metre-long frigates and equipped with improved stealth features, advanced weapons and sensors as well as platform management systems.
- Speed & capabilities
- They have a displacement of about 6,670 tonnes and a top speed of 28 knots.
- They are capable of neutralising threats in all three dimensions – air, surface and underwater.
- Design
- The Project 17A ships have been designed in-house by the Indian Navy’s Warship Design Bureau, a pioneer organisation for all warship design activities
Topic 7: Floodwatch app
Context: The Central Water Commission launched an app, called ‘Floodwatch’.
Key details:
- It can forecast the chances of floods a day in advance.
- It also provides a seven-day advisory on the chances of floods at various stations in the country where the CWC maintains its measurement gauges.
- The app has a map of India with coloured circles at water stations across the country indicating the current risk of flooding.
- green circle indicates ‘normal’;
- yellow indicates above normal;
- orange indicates ‘severe’; and
- red indicates ‘extreme’.
- Clicking on a circle shows the water level at the station, the danger level and warning level.
- The warnings are in English or Hindi with an option for a voice-enabled prompt.
- The app will also provide State-wise/basin-wide flood forecast up to 24 hours or flood advisory, up to seven days, that can be accessed via selecting specific stations.
| About Central Water CommissionCentral Water Commission (CWC) is a technical organisation that functions as part of the Ministry of Jal Shakti in the Government of India.They are entrusted with the responsibilities of:providing consultation to various state governments on water bodies related issues,coordinate various governmental schemes for conservation, control, and utilisation of water resources.Central Water Commission help state governments in devising and analysing flood control measures.They undertake flash flood forecast as well.Water Power Development is another area where central water commission undertakes the tasks of investigations, construction and executions.The Chairman of the Central Water Commission has the status of Ex-Officio Secretary to the Government of India.The three Wings of Central Water Commission are:Designs and Research (D&R),River Management (RM) Wing,Water Planning and Projects (WP&P) Wing.Each of these wings is a responsibility of a full-time Member with the status of Ex-Officio Additional Secretary to the Government of India. |
Topic 8: Kalka-Shimla heritage railway line
Context: The 94-km Kalka-Shimla railway line will be out for service for three to four weeks to carry out repairs after heavy rain and floods battered the UNESCO World Heritage Site.
About the heritage site:
- The Kalka-Shimla railway line is divided into four parts:
- Kalka to Koti,
- Koti to Barog,
- Barog to Solan and
- Solan to Shimla.
- The railway was built under the direction of Herbert Septimus Harington between 1898 and 1903 to connect Shimla, the summer capital of India during the British Raj.
- In 2008, UNESCO added the Kalka–Shimla Railway to the mountain railways of India World Heritage Site.
| UNESCO World Heritage tag The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) identifies World Heritage Sites that have been nominated by nations that have signed the UNESCO World Heritage Convention 1972.The sites includes:Monuments such as:architectural works,monumental sculptures,inscriptions,groupings of structures, andplaces comprise cultural heritage including archaeological sites.Natural heritage:physical and biological formations,geological and physiographical formations – including habitats of vulnerable species of animals and plants, andnatural locations that are valuable for science, conservation, or natural beauty.India signed the treaty in 1977.In India, there are now 40 World Heritage Sites:32 are cultural,7 are natural, and1 is mixed.India has the world’s sixth-highest number of sites. |