CURRENT AFFAIRS
13 December 2020
NATIONAL NEWS:
A) Ready for talks, but demands are the same say farmer leaders.
Sticking to their demands, leaders of various farmers’ groups today said they are ready to hold talks with the government, but will first discuss repealing the three new farm laws and also announced further intensification of their ongoing protest. Addressing a press conference at Singhu Border in New Delhi, farmer leader Kanwalpreet Singh Pannu said that thousands of farmers will start their ‘Delhi Chalo’ march from Rajasthan’s Shahjahanpur through the Jaipur-Delhi Highway at 11 am on Sunday. He said that farmers from other parts of the country are also on their way to join the protesters here and they will take the agitation to the next level in the coming days. If the government wants to hold talks, they are ready, but their main demand will remain the scrapping of the three laws. They will move onto their other demands only after that, the farmer leader said. Farmer union leaders will also sit on a hunger strike between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. on December 14 against the new agriculture laws, he said. Pannu alleged the government tried to weaken the agitation, but that the protesting farmers did not let it happen. The government on Friday had asked the protesting farmers to be vigilant against their platform being misused, saying some antisocial as well as Leftist and Maoist elements were conspiring to spoil the atmosphere of the agitation. Photographs of some protesters at the Tikri border seen holding posters demanding release of activists arrested under various charges had earlier gone viral on social media.
B) Movement infiltrated by Leftists, Maoists says Union Minister.
This was a line picked up by Union Minister Piyush Goyal on Saturday, who said the agitation no longer remains a farmers’ movement as it has been infiltrated by Leftist and Maoist elements demanding the release of those put behind bars for anti-national activities. This, he said, was clearly to derail agriculture reforms brought by the government. Mr. Goyal, however, did not say if the government had or is planning to take any action against any person belonging to banned outfits seen at the protests. They now realise that the so-called farmer agitation hardly remains a farmers’ agitation. It has almost got infiltrated by Leftist and Maoist elements, a flavour of which they saw over the last two days when there were extraneous demands to release people who have been put behind bars for anti-national (and) who have been put behind bars for illegal activities, Mr. Goyal, the Minister for Railways, Commerce and Industry and Food and Consumers Affairs, said at FICCI’s annual meeting.
C) New laws will bring maximum benefit to farmers: PM Modi.
Also speaking at the FICCI AGM, Prime Minister Narendra Modi today once again batted for the new farm laws, saying they would give farmers access to new markets and technology, while also helping increase the investments in the agricultural sector. Farmers will be able to access new markets and avenues. They will be able to leverage technology. With all this, more investment will come in the agriculture sector. And the maximum benefit will come to India’s farmers, the Prime Minister said. He added that in a vibrant economy, walls could not be erected around different sectors as this harmed the economy of the country. The reforms being undertaken will take these walls down and the recent agriculture reforms are a part of this process. To strengthen the country’s agri sector many steps have been taken. It has become much more vibrant. India’s farmers have the choice of selling their produce in the ‘mandis’ as well as outside them. The ‘mandis’ are undergoing a tech revolution, but farmers can now also sell and purchase goods using digital platform, he said.
D) India will meet national security challenge: Jaishankar.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Saturday said India was being tested in the seven month-long border standoff with China in eastern Ladakh and expressed confidence it will rise to the occasion and meet the national security challenge. In an interactive session, also at the FICCI AGM, Mr. Jaishankar also said that what has happened in eastern Ladakh was not actually in China’s interest as it has significantly impacted public sentiment in India. When asked whether the stand-off with China will be a long-haul or a breakthrough is expected soon, Mr. Jaishankar said that he would not go into prediction zone at all whether it is going to be easy or not, and what will be the timelines and so on. He also believe that what has happened is not actually in the interest of China. Because what it has done is it has significantly impacted public sentiment (in India). Professionally, he have seen the evolution of how the Indian public feels about China over the last many decades and he is old enough to remember much more difficult days, especially in his childhood and in his teens, he said. Mr. Jaishankar said a lot of work had gone into developing the relationship on both sides.
E) Not accountable to Home Minister, says TMC on summons over Nadda’s convoy attack.
Senior Trinamool Congress lawmaker Kalyan Banerjee wrote to Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla on Saturday, saying that West Bengal’s chief secretary and director-general of police were summoned to Delhi over the attack on BJP chief J.P. Nadda’s convoy with political motive, asserting that law and order is a state subject. Mr. Banerjee, the chief whip of the TMC in the Lok Sabha, alleged that the Centre was resorting to coercive means to intimidate the State administration, and the top officials were summoned at the instance of the Union Home Minister. BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya, however, said that everyone saw how Mr. Nadda’s convoy was attacked by alleged TMC workers on December 10 and Banerjee’s letter to Bhalla has little merit. It appears that with a political motive and at the instance of your minister, who is a political person belonging to Bharatiya Janata Party, you have issued the said letter. You are trying to coerce the officers of West Bengal with political vindictiveness. It appears you are interfering with the federal structure, Mr. Banerjee added. He said that in respect of law and order, the State government is accountable to the legislative assembly but not to you or to your Home Minister.
F) Workers go on a rampage at iPhone factory near Benagluru.
Thousands of workers at Wistron Infocomm Manufacturing (India), which is part of the Taipei-based Wistron Corporation and which makes iPhones for Apple at its Narasapura factory on the outskirts of Bengaluru, went on a rampage and ransacked the company premises over delays in payment of salary and overtime wages. A source said the protest began shortly after their shift ended, but took a violent turn by 6 a.m. on Saturday. The workers alleged that they have not been paid salary or overtime wages for three or four months. A contingent of police personnel was deployed on the premises and an additional force was called in to contain the situation. The company has around 15,000 employees, but only 1,400 of them are actually on the rolls. The rest are contract workers placed through five staffing firms.. According to the employees, most of them are paid in the range of ₹13,000 to ₹15,000.
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
A) U.S. approves Pfizer vaccine as millions of doses begin shipping.
The U.S. green lighted the Pfizer-BioNTech cov1D-19 vaccine late on Friday, paving the way for millions of vulnerable people to receive their shots in the world’s hardest-hit country. President Donald Trump immediately released a video on Twitter, where he hailed the news as a medical miracle and said the first immunizations would take place in less than 24 hours. It comes as infections across America soar as never before, with the grim milestone of confirmed deaths fast approaching. The U.S. is now the sixth country to approve the twodose regimen, after Britain, Bahrain, Canada, Saudi Arabia and Mexico. The move came earlier than expected, and capped a day of drama after it was reported that the White House had threatened to fire Food and Drug Administration chief Stephen Hahn if he did not grant emergency approval on Friday. Mr. Trump’s intervention reinserts politics into the scientific process, which some experts have said could undermine vaccine confidence. The U.S. is seeking to inoculate 20 million people this month alone, with long-term care facility residents and health care workers at the front of the line. The government also said that it is buying 100 million more doses of the Moderna vaccine candidate, amid reports the government passed on the opportunity to secure more supply of the Pfizer jab. Following Britain’s lead, the first vaccine shipments to 14 sites across Canada are scheduled to arrive Monday with people receiving shots a day or two later. Israel, which accepted its first shipment of the Pfizer vaccine on Wednesday, is targeting a rollout on December 27.
B) Iran executes dissident journalist.
Iran on Saturday executed a once-exiled journalist over his online work that helped inspire nationwide economic protests in 2017, authorities said, just months after he returned to Tehran under mysterious circumstances. Iranian state television and the state-run IRNA news agency said that Ruhollah Zam, 47, was hanged early Saturday morning. The reports did not elaborate. In June, a court sentenced Zam to death, saying he had been convicted of corruption on Earth, a charge often used in cases involving espionage or attempts to overthrow Iran’s government. Zam’s website AmadNews and a channel he created on the popular messaging app Telegram had spread the timings of the protests and embarrassing information about officials that directly challenged Iran’s Shia theocracy. Those demonstrations, which began at the end of 2017, represented the biggest challenge to Iran’s rulers since the 2009 Green Movement protests and set the stage for similar mass unrest in November of last year. The initial spark for the 2017 protests was a sudden jump in food prices. Many believe that hard-line opponents of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani instigated the first demonstrations in the conservative city of Mashhad in northeastern Iran, trying to direct public anger at the President.
