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The Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) has confirmed that the mysterious disease resulting in “dwarfing” of rice plants, reported mainly from Punjab and Haryana, has been caused by the Southern Rice Black-Streaked Dwarf Virus (SRBSDV).
The virus is spread by the white-backed plant hopper, an insect pest, which injects it while sucking the sap from mostly young plants.
The presence of the virus was detected both in the infected plants and the body of the vector insect, whose RNA was isolated. But the virus was not found in the seeds collected from the infected plants.
The virus is specific to the phloem (plant tissues that transport sugar and organic nutrients from the leaves to other parts) and is not transmitted by seed or grain.
An IARI team surveyed a total of 24 fields in Sonepat, Panipat, Karnal, Kurukshetra, Ambala and Yamunanagar districts of Haryana.
In the fields where the disease was recorded, the infected plants varied from 2 to 10 per cent. In a severely-affected field in Panipat, up to 20 per cent incidence was recorded.
The affected plants showed severely stunted appearance. The roots were poorly developed and turned brownish. The infected tillers can be easily pulled out,” the IARI said in its report that has been submitted to the Union Agriculture Ministry.
The institute carried out a comprehensive investigation to diagnose the cause of the mystery “dwarfing” disease, using three independent methods: transmission electron microscopy, RT-PCR and real-time quantitative PCR.
The first method indicated the presence through visualisation of the SRBSDV, which belongs to the Fijivirus genus and was first detected in China in 2008.
The second method confirmed it by “using specific primers targeting two different genomic components of the virus”. The third “further validated” the infection in the symptomatic samples and the white-backed plant hopper vector, besides confirming the absence of the virus in the seeds collected from the plants.
Govt. and Politics
Mann Ki Baat: PM Modi urges people to join fight against malnutrition (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 2, Issues Relating to Poverty & Hunger)
PRIME MINISTER Narendra Modi on Sunday urged people to take part in the efforts to eradicate malnutrition in September, which is observed as a “PoshanMaah” every year.
In the 92nd episode of his monthly radio programme ‘Mann Ki Baat’, the Prime Minister said, “The month of September is dedicated to festivals as well as a big campaign related to nutrition. We celebrate the PoshanMaah every year from the 1st to the 30th of September.”
Efforts for social awareness play an important role in tackling the challenges of malnutrition. I would urge all of you to take part in the efforts to eradicate malnutrition in the coming nutrition month.
The Prime Minister mentioned various initiatives and campaigns being run to end malnutrition in the country. “Many creative and diverse efforts are being made all over the country against malnutrition. Better use of technology and also public participation has become an important part of the nutrition campaign.
Among the government initiatives he mentioned was launch of a Poshan Tracker to monitor the accessibility of Anganwadi services, move to provide mobile devices to millions of Anganwadi workers, inclusion of girls aged 14-18 years under the purview of the PoshanAbhiyan in the all Aspirational Districts and North-East states.
The solution to the malady of malnutrition is not limited just to these steps. In this fight, many other initiatives also play an important role. For example, take the Jal Jeevan Mission, this mission is also going to have a huge impact in making India malnutrition free.
Speaking about the “Sampoorna” project being run in Assam’s Bongai village, the Prime Minister said, “The purpose of this project is to fight against malnutrition and the method too is very unique.
Under this, the mother of a healthy child from an Anganwadi centre meets the mother of a malnourished child every week and discusses all the nutrition-related information. That is, one mother becomes a friend of another mother, helps her, and teaches her.
In this region, in one year, malnutrition has been eradicated in more than 90 per cent children.Observing that 2023 has been declared International Year of Millets, he said, “Today, around the world, craze for these coarse grains, millets, is rising.
Editorial Page
SC must undo injustice (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Supreme Court (SC) on August 25 issued a notice in a petition challenging the remission of the 11 convicts in the BilkisBano case.
The petition was filed by CPI(M) MP Subhashini Ali, journalist RevatiLaul and academic RoopRekhaVerma challenging the Gujarat government’s decision. The court also asked the petitioners to implead the 11 convicts and listed the matter after two weeks.
While discussing the remission granted to the accused in the BilkisBano case, we must first answer the question of whether the communal violence that took place in Gujarat in 2002 was “spontaneous” or if it was waiting to happen through the systemic degradation of the ecosystem due to the long-term build-up of hate speech against the minority community.
While the SC held in the Zakia Jafri case that the violence was “spontaneous”, no evidence was placed before the Court to substantiate this statement.
In 2003, a writ petition by the NHRC to the Supreme Court (SC) pointed out that widespread communal violence had taken place in Gujarat.
It also noted that the accused were being acquitted without a proper trial and requested the SC needed to intervene. In response, the SC appointed Harish Salve as amicus curiae and set up a Special Investigation Team (SIT).
It asked for reinvestigation in nine cases of atrocities in nine districts. While there may or may not have been a conspiracy, one fails to understand the Court’s reason for describing the violence as “spontaneous”.
BilkisBano had also approached the Court about the mass murder of her family members and her own gang rape. Salve was also appointed an amicus in her case. The pattern of atrocities now becomes clear.
The SC transferred the trial of the accused in the BilkisBano case to Maharashtra. All of them, now set free, were found guilty and convicted.
Let us now focus on the remission granted to the convicts after the completion of 14 years and five months of their sentence. Rape, by any reckoning, can never be said to be “spontaneous”.
Curtains for pegasus (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 3, Cyber Security)
With the Supreme Court-appointed Committee rubbishing the Congress’s charges of the government spying on individuals using Pegasus, a spyware developed by Israeli cybersecurity firm NSO Group, the truth is finally out.
The truth is that Congress, its leader Rahul Gandhi and other Opposition leaders once again tried to create a false narrative against the Narendra Modi government and sully India’s reputation globally.
The Committee, supervised by retired Supreme Court judge, R V Raveendran, did not find any definitive proof of the use of Pegasus, thus absolving the government of the charges of spying made by a consortium comprising the Congress party and a section of the Opposition, dubious global and Indian NGOs, biased media houses and so-called civil rights activists.
The entire episode once again points towards a well-hatched controversy against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the central government. The Pegasus issue is nothing but an extension of the tirade against the prime minister, which the nation has been witnessing since 2014.
Deeply disturbed by the growing popularity of PM Modi and the continued electoral successes of the BJP, the Congress party has been trying to derail India’s growth story, and defame India on various international fora. By repeatedly disturbing the proceedings of Parliament using fake narratives and falsehood, the Congress party has been indulging in impropriety, trying to demean our rich democratic heritage.
The Congress party and its leaders have a history in this regard. An example of this is the Rafale deal, which Rahul Gandhi and the Congress party tried to scuttle to hurt India’s defence preparedness.
Similarly, we saw Rahul Gandhi and the Congress party casting aspersions and creating confusion over the “Made in India” Covid-19 vaccines. During Congress rule, it used to take years for vaccines to reach India, and no efforts were made to develop indigenous capabilities for creating life-saving vaccines.
The Congress should remember its past. It should not forget how the UPA government tapped phones and watched email accounts and that its Home Minister was accused of bugging the office of another senior Congress minister. Who can forget the 2013 Prism phone spying controversy by a foreign government in which the then Congress government did nothing to protect Indian citizens?
More recently, the Congress government in Rajasthan was involved in a phone tapping controversy. Congress has a long history of infringing on people’s privacy and freedom. This is the true character of the party and its leaders.
Now contrast this with the efforts of the Narendra Modi government to protect the rights of Indian consumers in the digital age. The BJP government has strengthened consumer rights in many areas.
With the Supreme Court ruling that privacy is a fundamental right of every citizen, the Narendra Modi government is formulating a comprehensive framework to ensure data protection and privacy to protect citizens in the current digital age.
The Idea Page
Light on dark matter (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
Humankind’s fascination with the heavens is as old as humankind itself. The sight of countless stars and the faint band of light which stretches from horizon to horizon must have been the cause of amazement and awe for the earliest homo-sapien as she trudged along the plains of East Africa.
From the hunter-gatherer to our own times, every culture has developed its own cosmology — the system of beliefs or theories, which explain the origin and structure of the universe.
To study the heavens, a variety of instruments have been used throughout history. From sundials and astrolabes to telescopes and now gravitational wave detectors, we have tried to observe, chart, study and measure the universe.
These observations have, in turn, led to the formulation of our theories of the universe. Thus, it was Kepler’s observations of the planets which provided the impetus to Newton to formulate his law of gravitation which still forms the basis of celestial mechanics.
In the early 20th century, the observation of receding galaxies by Hubble led to the model of the expanding universe.
The quest to probe the universe received a major impetus with the commissioning of the James Webb Space Telescope. Costing around $10 billion, the telescope has taken more than three decades from planning to commissioning and is truly a symbol of humanity’s intellectual and creative potential.
Launched in 2021, it reached its final orbit at a distance of around 1.5 million km from the Earth in early 2022 and it took the engineers and scientists another six months to ready the instruments before they could be used.
The observatory has four major components — the Integrated Science Instrument Module (ISIM) which houses four instruments to analyse the light that is captured by the optical telescope element that has a 21 feet diameter gold-plated beryllium primary mirror made of 18 hexagonal mirrors and a secondary mirror to guide the light collected by the primary mirror to the instruments.
There is also a huge foldable sunshield to block the radiation from the Sun, Earth and the Moon since the instruments need to operate at a temperature of -220 degrees celsius. Finally, there is the spacecraft bus with all the equipment for the operation of the observatory.
The World
For mars and more: Why NASA is again sending astronauts to moon (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
That is the catchphrase that NASA is using in the lead-up to the debut flight of its new moon rocket, which could launch as early as Monday at 8:33 a.m. Eastern time.
It is a phrase repeated by agency officials, added as a hashtag on social media postings and proclaimed on banners hung around the launch site at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
NASA officials today argue that the moon missions are central to the human spaceflight program and not simply a do-over of the Apollo moon landings from 1969-72.
“It’s a future where NASA will land the first woman and the first person of color on the moon,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said during a news conference this month.
And on these increasingly complex missions, astronauts will live and work in deep space and will develop the science and technology to send the first humans to Mars.
That’s a change from as recent as 2010, when President Barack Obama delivered a speech at the site where Americans launched to the moon and said NASA should aim for more ambitious destinations like asteroids and Mars and move beyond the moon.
Today’s program was named Artemis by NASA leaders during the Trump administration. In Greek mythology, Artemis was the twin sister of Apollo.
The program’s first step will be the upcoming test flight of the moon rocket, known as the Space Launch System, with the Orion capsule on top where astronauts will sit during future missions.
This uncrewed flight, during which Orion will swing around the moon before returning to Earth, is to wring out any issues with the spacecraft before putting people on board.
In case any weather or technical issues prevent the rocket from getting off the ground Monday, it can try again Friday or the following Monday.
Weather forecasters on Saturday predicted a 70% chance of favorable weather for the launch.
In addition to the mission’s function as a proving ground for technologies needed for a much longer trip to Mars, NASA is also hoping to jump-start companies looking to set up a steady business of flying scientific instruments and other payloads to the moon, and to inspire students to enter science and engineering fields.
Explained Page
Full court meeting (Page no. 13)
(GS Paper 2, Judiciary)
Within hours of taking over, the new Chief Justice of India U ULalit called a meeting of the ‘full court’ Saturday where the judges discussed how to deal with issues relating to listing and backlog of cases.
A full court meeting literally means one which is attended by all the judges of the court.There are no written rules dealing with this. As per convention, full-court meetings are called by the Chief Justice of India to discuss issues of importance to the judiciary.
The senior designations of practising advocates in the Supreme Court and high courts are also decided during the full court meetings.
The basic idea is to take everyone along. Full court meetings are an ideal occasion to arrive at common solutions to deal with problems that beset the country’s legal system and to make any amends, if necessary, in the administrative practices of the court.
As a full court meeting is convened at the discretion of the Chief Justice of India, it does not follow any particular calendar.
Full court meetings have been held many times in the past. In March 2020, it was convened to discuss demands by associations of lawyers to close the court till further notice following the Covid-19 outbreak and its subsequent spread among court staff, and to decide the further steps to be taken.
Also, a full court meeting held on May 7, 1997 decided that “every Judge should make a declaration of all his/her assets in the form of real estate or investment” held in own name or in the name of spouse or any person dependent within a reasonable time and thereafter make a disclosure “whenever any acquisition of a substantial nature is made”.
The meeting resolved that an in-house procedure should be devised by the Hon’ble Chief Justice of India to take suitable remedial action against judges who by their acts of omission or commission do not follow the universally accepted values of judicial life, including those indicated in the “Restatement of Values of Judicial Life” that lays down certain judicial standards and principles to be observed and followed by SC and HC judges.
Story of wall street fraud ,starring two IIT alums who met in the news (Page no. 13)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
In late July this year, several Indian-origin people in the US were charged with committing financial crimes in separate cases. Among them was BrijeshGoel (37), a former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. vice president and banker, who was arrested on July 24 for allegedly participating in an insider trading scheme with his close friend, AkshayNiranjan (33).
Between 2017 and 2018, Goel tipped Niranjan on at least seven deals that resulted in approximately $290,000 in illegal profits, according to federal prosecutors.
Goelhas been charged with four counts of securities fraud and one count of obstruction of justice, each carrying a maximum term of 20 years in prison.
He has been charged with conspiracy to commit securities fraud and tender offer fraud as well, carrying a maximum term of five years in prison. He is currently out on a $1 million bond, and cannot travel beyond New York and northern California, reported Bloomberg. What is the case against them that led to charges by a US government agency?
While working at Goldman Sachs, Goel regularly received material nonpublic information (MNPI) about corporate merger and acquisition transactions, as well as potential public offerings in which his investment bank was acting as a financial adviser.
Considered to be inside information, MNPI remains undisclosed to the general public because its release could affect the market value or trading price of the issuer’s securities or stocks.
From February 2017 onwards, Goel misappropriated confidential information from strictly internal emails and gave Niranjan, who was employed at Barclays Bank Plc, the names of the potential target companies.
Niranjan then used that MNPI to trade call options, which are financial contracts that give the option buyer the right but not obligation to buy or sell certain stocks.
The indictment against the two states that these call options would become profitable if the price of a company, that was targeted for acquisition, increased.
These included stocks of companies like Lumos Networks Corp., Patheon N.V., PharMerica Corporation, and Calgon Carbon Corporation, according to the indictment.
Niranjan placed the trades in a personal brokerage account held in his brother’s name. After their acquisitions were publicly announced, Niranjan sold, exercised or assigned the options in the account. Niranjan and Goel then divided the profits netted from the insider trading scheme.
Both Goel and Niranjan had been students at different campuses of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) before they met at the University of California’s Berkeley Haas School of Business in 2012, where they completed their master’s degrees, reported Bloomberg. After graduating in 2013, they both moved to New York to pursue lucrative careers in finance.
Less active dogs more likely to get doggy dementia :study (Page no. 13)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
Just like dementia in humans, dogs too experience a decline in cognitive functions, which is known as canine cognitive dysfunction (CCD) or doggy dementia.
A large sample-size study published in the journal Scientific Reports on August 25 has reported that a dog’s chances of developing CCD rise by 52% with each additional year of age.
Among dogs of the same age, health status, breed type, and sterilization status, odds of CCD were 6.47 times higher in dogs who were not active compared to those who were very active.
It noted that odds of having CCD went up in cases where the dogs had a history of eye, ear, or neurological problems.
Some earlier studies have found dementia can occur in at least 14% to 35% of older dogs, The New York Times reported.
The results of the new study were arrived at after analysing data from surveys completed by the owners of 15,019 dogs as part of the Dog Aging Project.
The disease, the study said, is difficult to diagnose as it is often confused with age-related issues among canines like loss of vision or hearing.
However, symptoms that pet owners should look out for include changes in the dog’s sleep cycle, forgetting years of house training, wandering around the house as if lost, among others.
Another clinical sign that the study points to is altered social interaction — with the dog either being withdrawn or getting aggressive.
According to the researchers, the risk factors linked to CCD mirror some of the factors for humans with dementia.
Given increasing evidence of the parallels between canine and human cognitive disease, accurate CCD diagnosis in dogs may provide researchers with more suitable animal models in which to study aging in human populations.
Economy
PM: Maruti Suzuki’s success symbol of strong India-Japan partnership (Page no. 15)
(GS Paper 2, International Relations)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday said that India has targeted to be self-reliant in meeting its energy requirement in the next 25 years.
He was addressing a gathering at Mahatma Mandir Convention Centre here to virtually lay foundation stones for an electric vehicle (EV) battery manufacturing plant of Japanese automobile giant Suzuki Motor Corporation in Hansalpur, Gujarat and Maruti Suzuki’s vehicle manufacturing facility at Kharkhoda, Haryana, while also commemorating 40 years of Suzuki in India.
Friends, in the AmritKaal of next 25 years, it is our target that India become atmanirbhar (self-reliant) in meeting with its energy requirement. We know that a big chunk of energy consumption is associated with transport.
And therefore, innovation and efforts in that direction must be our priority. I am confident that with cooperation from all of you and all the friends from auto sector, India will attain this target.
In this context, Modi also referred to various efforts being made by his government to give impetus to the EV ecosystem in India by offering various incentives to the buyers of EV vehicles.
The speed with which the EV market has grown, one would not have imagined it some years ago. One big characteristic feature of electric vehicles is they are silent.
Whether it is a two-wheeler or four-wheeler, they don’t make noise. This silence is not only of its engineering, but also of the beginning of a silent revolution in this country.
He expressed happiness that Suzuki was working on alternatives like biofuel, ethanol blending, hybrid EV etc, and suggested the company also start projects in exploring possibilities related to compressed bio gas (CBG).
Modi also congratulated Maruti Suzuki for completing 40 years of partnership, calling it a symbol of the strong partnership between India and Japan.
The success of Maruti Suzuki is also a symbol of strong partnership between India and Japan. In the last eight years, this relationship between the two countries has achieved new heights.
Today, the bullet train between Maharashtra and Gujarat and RudrakshCenter in Banaras of Uttar Pradesh are examples of India-Japan friendship,” he said, while remembering the late former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
The Prime Minister said Japan has maintained a special bond with Gujarat since the organisation of the Vibrant Gujarat Summit, where Japan has always been a partner country. The relation between India and Japan is much higher than diplomatic limits.
Recollecting his days as the Chief Minister of Gujarat, Modi said he then used to say he wanted to create a “mini-Japan” in the state. “The feeling behind that (sentence) was to ensure that our guests from Japan get the feel of Japan.
Financial inclusion major step towards inclusive growth: FM (Page no. 15)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
Financial inclusion is a major step towards inclusive growth which ensures the overall economic development of the marginalised sections of society, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said.
The success of the Pradhan Mantri Jan DhanYojana (PMJDY) since August 28, 2014 is reflected in terms of the opening of over 46 crore bank accounts with deposit balance of Rs 1.74 lakh crore with its expanded coverage to 67 per cent rural or semi-urban areas as well as 56 per cent of women Jan Dhan account holders, she said on the eighth anniversary of the flagship financial inclusion scheme.
Continuation of PMJDY beyond 2018 saw a marked shift in approach to meet challenges and requirements of the emerging FI (financial inclusion) landscape in the country.
There has been a shift in focus from 'every household' to 'every adult', with added emphasis on usage of accounts by enhancing Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) flows through these accounts, promoting digital payments through the use of RuPay cards, etc.
The underlying pillars of PMJDY namely, banking the unbanked, securing the unsecured and funding the unfunded -- has made it possible to adopt a multi-stakeholders collaborative approach while leveraging technology for serving the unserved and underserved areas as well, she observed.
The Jan DhanYojana, which was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his Independence Day address in 2014, was launched on August 28 of the same year.
She also said the JAM (Jan Dhan-Aadhaar-Mobile) pipeline created through account holders' consent-based linking of bank accounts with Aadhar and mobile numbers of the account holders, which is one of the important pillars of the financial inclusion ecosystem, has enabled instant DBT under various government welfare schemes to the eligible beneficiaries.
The advantage of the architecture created under the FI ecosystem came handy during the COVID-19 pandemic when it facilitated direct income support to farmers under PM-KISAN and transfer of ex-gratia payment to women PMJDY account holders under PM GaribKalyan Package in a seamless and time-bound manner.
On the occasion, Minister of State for Finance Bhagwat Karad said PMJDY has been one of the most far-reaching initiatives toward financial inclusion not only in India but the world.
Stressing that financial inclusion is among the top-most priorities of the government, he said it provides an avenue to the poor for bringing their savings into the formal financial system, an avenue to remit money to their families, besides taking them out of the clutches of the usurious money lenders.