1. Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991
CONTEXT: Motivated litigation aimed at altering the status of a place of worship, a questionable ex parte court order, and the violent protest that it evoked, led to the killing of four persons in Sambhal district, Uttar Pradesh, recently. The Supreme Court of India’s order calling for preserving peace and harmony has provided some respite from the tension.
Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991
- It is described as an Act to prohibit conversion of any place of worship and to provide for the maintenance of the religious character of any place of worship.
- The Act declares that the religious character of a place of worship shall continue to be the same as it was on August 15, 1947.
- It says that no person shall convert any place of worship of any religious denomination into one of a different denomination or section.
Exemption:
- The disputed site at Ayodhya was exempted from the Act. Due to this exemption, the trial in the Ayodhya case proceeded even after the enforcement of this law.
- Any place of worship which is an ancient and historical monument, or any archaeological site covered by the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958.
- A suit that has been finally settled or disposed of.
Any dispute that has been settled by the parties or conversion of any place that took place by acquiescence before the Act commenced.
2. Care economy
CONTEXT: The Centre will soon bring out a national policy document on female labour force participation with a focus on providing an enabling atmosphere like a viable care economy structure.
- An inter-ministerial team from the Ministries of Skill Development, Labour, Rural Development, and Women and Child Development is working on it, informed sources told The Hindu.
- Care economy is the sector of economic activities related to the provision of care, both paid and unpaid, for the present and future populations. It includes direct care, such as feeding a baby, as well as indirect care, such as cooking and cleaning, health care, education, and other personal and domestic services.
The move comes amid a recent World Bank report which said women faced a sharp drop in their labour force participation post-marriage in India.
According to the report, it is estimated that in India post-marriage, female employment rates drop by 12 percentage points, about one-third of the female pre-marital employment rate, even in the absence of children.
- One of the initiatives being explored is a core skilling package for caregivers for children, the sources said. The policy paper will also look at providing child care facilities for women in the informal sector such as for workers under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.
The Ministry of Women and Child Development already runs the ‘Palna’ scheme, or the National Programme on Anganwadi-cum-Crèche, which provides day-care facilities for children of working parents. A total of 1,000 Anganwadi creches have been made operational till now as part of this scheme, the sources said.
3. Donald Trump threatened BRICS Nations 100% tariffs
CONTEXT: President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday threatened 100% tariffs against a bloc of nine nations if they act to undermine the U.S. dollar.
- His threat was directed at countries in the so-called BRICS alliance, which consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates.
- The dollar represents roughly 58% of the world’s foreign exchange reserves, according to the IMF and major commodities like oil are still primarily bought and sold using dollars. The dollar’s dominance is threatened with BRICS’ growing share of GDP and the alliance’s intent to trade in non-dollar currencies – a process known as de-dollarisation.
- At a BRICS summit in October, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused the U.S. of “weaponising” the dollar and described it as a “big mistake”. “It’s not us who refuse to use the dollar,” he said. “But if they don’t let us work, what can we do? We are forced to search for alternatives.”
Russia has specifically pushed for the creation of a new payment system that would offer an alternative to the global bank messaging network, SWIFT, and allow Moscow to dodge Western sanctions.
4. Garima Grehs for transgender people
CONTENTS: Facing fund crunch, Garima Grehs are struggling to keep doors open to transgender people.
- In November 2021, the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment said in a press release that it had initiated 12 pilot shelter homes or Garima Grehs for transgender people and provided financial assistance to community-based organisations for setting them up.
- The Centre has the SMILE (Support for Marginalised Individuals for Livelihood and Enterprise) scheme. This includes a sub-scheme, the Comprehensive Rehabilitation for Welfare of Transgender Persons, of which a component is the setting up of shelter homes.
- The idea was to run the pilot and progress to setting up at least one in each State.
- According to SMILE guidelines, each Garima Greh is to house 25 transgender people and have 12 staffers, including a counsellor, cook, manager, and director. However, the 12 existing homes are facing the threat of shutting down as funds from the government have stopped.
- According to the Transgenders Persons Act, 2019, transgender means a person whose gender does not match with the gender assigned to that person at birth.
India’s 2011 Census was the first census in its history to incorporate the number of ‘trans’ population of the country. The report estimated that 4.8 million Indians identified as transgender.
5. Cyclone Fengal
CONTEXT: Four deaths were reported in Puducherry as Cyclone Fengal barrelled across the region on Saturday night, triggering an unprecedented 48.4 cm of rainfall in a 24-hour period, inundating several residential localities, knocking down trees and disrupting power supply across the city. Seven persons were feared trapped inside their houses after a landslip in Tiruvannamalai.
- The name ‘Fengal’ was proposed by Saudi Arabia and is rooted in Arabic.
- It reflects a combination of linguistic tradition and cultural identity.
- A cyclone is a large-scale system of air that rotates around the centre of a low- pressure area. It is usually accompanied by violent storms and bad weather.
- A cyclone is characterised by inward spiralling winds that rotate anticlockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere.
- Historical data underscore Bay of Bengal’s predisposition to cyclones, with approximately 58% of them making landfall on India’s eastern coast, compared to just 25% in the Arabian Sea.
The Arabian Sea gets fewer cyclones due to its narrower and deeper nature, cooler water and higher salinity. Its partially landlocked geography also contributes to reduced cyclonic activity.
6. Prior Sanction: Supreme Court Ruling and Implications
7. Turning the Tide Oceans as Climate Guardians
