Latest Current Affairs 13 February 2021

CURRENT AFFAIRS
13 February 2021

NATIONAL NEWS:

 

A) Not conceded any territory as result of agreement with China: Govt. 

India on Friday said it has not conceded any territory as a result of the agreement finalised with China for disengagement of troops in Pangong lake areas in eastern Ladakh. Hours after Congress leader Rahul Gandhi alleged that the government had ‘ceded’ Indian territory to the Chinese, the Ministry of Defence issued a strongly-worded statement, saying the effective safeguarding of the country’s national interest and territory in the Eastern Ladakh sector has taken place because the government reposed full faith in the capabilities of the armed forces. Those who doubt the achievements made possible by the sacrifices of our military personnel are actually disrespecting them, the statement said. The Ministry also made certain clarifications in the statement, and said that the assertion that Indian territory is up to Finger 4 is categorically false. The territory of India is as depicted by the map of India and includes more than 43,000 sq km currently under illegal occupation of China since 1962. Even the Line of Actual Control (LAC), as per the Indian perception, is at Finger 8, not at Finger 4. That is why India has persistently maintained the right to patrol up to Finger 8, including in the current understanding with China, the MoD said. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Thursday told Parliament that as per the provision of the agreement, China will pull back its troops to east of Finger 8 areas in the northern bank of Pangong lake while the Indian personnel will be based at their permanent base at Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3 in the region. India has not conceded any territory as a result of the agreement. On the contrary, it has enforced observance and respect for LAC and prevented any unilateral change in the status quo, it said. The Ministry also asserted that permanent posts of both sides at the north bank of Pangong Tso are longstanding and well-established. On the Indian side, it is Dhan Singh Thapa Post near Finger 3 and on the Chinese side, east of Finger 8, the MoD said, adding the current agreement provides for cessation of forward deployment by both sides and continued deployment at these permanent posts.

B) PM Modi a coward who can’t stand up to China: Rahul Gandhi. 

Earlier in the day, former Congress president Rahul Gandhi launched a scathing attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, accusing him of cowardice and giving away Indian territory to China. In a press conference today morning, Gandhi told reporters that Indian territory was up to Finger 4 in the Pangong area where the Indian post used to be located but now the government had agreed to move it back to Finger 3. On Thursday, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh informed Parliament that Indian and Chinese troops had agreed on disengagement on both sides of Pangong Tso in a phased, coordinated and verified manner.  The Congress leader said it was China that can claim success, as Prime Minister Narendra Modi had handed over a portion of Bharat Mata [Mother India] to them. Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi addressing a press conference, in New Delhi on Friday. Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi addressing a press conference, in New Delhi on Friday. Why has Prime Minister Modi given up Indian territory to the Chinese? This is the question that needs to be answered by him and the Defence Minister, Gandhi said, adding that the Prime Minister was betraying the sacrifices of our Army. It is about absolutely 100% cowardice to give our holy land. The Prime Minister is a coward who cannot stand up to the Chinese. That’s the fact, and he is spitting on the sacrifice of our Army, asserted the animated Congress leader. Lauding the efforts of the armed forces in protecting the borders, he said none in India should be allowed to undermine them.

C) Consent of the family or clan not necessary when two adults agree to marry: SC.

Educated youngsters are showing the way forward to reduce caste and community tensions in India by going in for inter-caste marriages, the Supreme Court said in a judgment. Educated younger boys and girls are choosing their life partners, which is a departure from the earlier norms of society where caste and community played a major role. Possibly, this is the way forward where caste and community tensions will reduce by such intermarriages, a Bench led by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul said in a recent verdict. Justice Kaul quoted B.R. Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste, in which the ‘Father of the Constitution’ said that he is convinced that the real remedy is intermarriage. Fusion of blood can alone create the feeling of being kith and kin, and unless this feeling of kinship, of being kindred, becomes paramount, the separatist feeling—the feeling of being aliens—created by caste will not vanish. Even as more and more cases challenging religious conversion laws enacted by several States reach the Supreme Court, Justice Kaul observed in the judgment on February 8 that consent of the family or community or clan is not necessary once the two adult individuals agree to enter into a wedlock and that their consent has to be piously given primacy. 

D) Mallikarjun Kharge to be leader of the Opposition in Rajya Sabha. 

Senior Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge is all set to become the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Rajya Sabha, as incumbent Ghulam Nabi Azad’s term ends on February 15. There has been no official word from the Congress, but it is learnt that the party has informed the Rajya Sabha Secretariat about Azad’s replacement.Former Law Minister and senior Congress leader Salman Khurshid was among the first leaders to congratulate Kharge. Best wishes to Sh @kharge ji for being appointed as Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha, Khurshid tweeted. Kharge, known to be a Gandhi family loyalist, was the Congress leader in the Lok Sabha between 2014 and 2019. After losing the 2019 Lok Sabha poll, he was brought into the Rajya Sabha in June last year. Senior leader Anand Sharma, who along with Azad came to be identified with the group of 23 dissenters that had sought a revamp of the Congress in a letter to party chief Sonia Gandhi last August, is the Deputy Leader of the Congress in the Rajya Sabha.

E) SC issues notice on plea alleging Twitter is ‘sympathetic to terrorist groups’. 

The Supreme Court on Friday decided to examine a plea that claimed that Twitter is sympathetic to terrorist groups. A Bench led by Chief Justice of India Sharad A. Bobde issued notice to the government and Twitter Communications India Private Limited on a petition by Vinit Goenka, Prabhari – IT and Social Media Vibhag for BJP Delhi Pradesh. Goenka accused platforms such as Twitter of promoting and circulating prohibited content and hate messages. He said there was no mechanism or law to deal with the problem. Respondent 4 (Twitter) is sympathetic to terrorist groups. Global terror groups like ISIS, Al Qaeda and Indian Mujahideen use the platform of Respondent 4 (Twitter) and other social networking platforms to circulate hate speeches because it helps them avoid detection, the petition, filed through advocate Ashwani Kumar Dubey, contended.

 

F) TMC MP Dinesh Trivedi announces resignation from Rajya Sabha. 

TMC MP Dinesh Trivedi announced his resignation from the Rajya Sabha on Friday, saying he feels suffocated in the House as he is unable to do anything for the violence going on in his state, West Bengal. The Trinamool Congress (TMC) MP said he was unable to bear what was happening in West Bengal. He is grateful to his party that it has sent him here, but now he feel a little suffocated. They are unable to do anything and there is atrocity (going on). His voice of conscience is saying what Swami Vivekananda used to say arise, awake and stop not till the goal is reached, Trivedi said, while announcing his resignation from the House. Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman Harivansh Narayan Singh said there is a due process for resigning from the House and asked Trivedi to submit his resignation in writing to the chairman.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

A) Trump’s lawyers all set to rebut impeachment case. 

Lawyers for Donald Trump take the Senate floor later on Friday to rebut the Democratic led impeachment of the former President for inciting insurrection, with Republican lawmakers then widely expected to vote to acquit him. Democratic impeachment managers rested their case on Thursday after two days of often emotional presentations. Now the Republican property tycoon’s lawyers will get a chance to respond. They are expected to make arguments brief, hastening the Senate verdict.  There’s no reason for them to be out there a long time. As he said from the start of this thing, this trial never should have happened, one of the lawyers, David Schoen, told Fox News. The impeachment team charged Mr. Trump with stoking an insurrection after losing reelection to Joe Biden on November 3. According to the case against him, the former President began to lay the groundwork for the riot within weeks of refusing to concede with claims that he had only lost because of mass voter fraud. On January 6 he staged a fiery rally near the White House, calling on the crowd to march on Congress, which was in the process of certifying Mr. Biden’s victory. Impeachment managers insist that Mr. Trump, who has never expressed remorse for his encouragement of the violent crowd, is so dangerous he should be barred from holding office again. But the former President’s lawyers are set to argue that his speech was rhetorical and that he cannot be held responsible for the actions of the mob. They also argue that the trial itself is unconstitutional because Mr. Trump is now out of office, although the Senate has rejected this claim.

B) Slap sanctions on Myanmar, say UN rights envoy and U.S.

The United Nations human rights investigator for Myanmar on Friday urged the UN Security Council to consider imposing punitive sanctions, arms embargoes and travel bans in response to a military coup. The United States, which imposed its own sanctions on Thursday, urged other UN member states to follow suit, in its first remarks to the Human Rights Council since returning to the forum this Special Rapporteur Thomas Andrews said there were growing reports and photographic evidence that Myanmar security forces had used live ammunition against protesters since seizing power almost two weeks Security Council resolutions dealing with similar situations have mandated sanctions, arms embargoes, and travel bans, and calling for judicial action at the International Criminal Court or ad hoc tribunals, he told the Council. The 47-member forum was meeting at the request of Britain and the European Union to consider a resolution calling for the release of ousted Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi, and for Mr. Andrews and other UN monitors to be allowed to visit. Russian ambassador Gennady Gatilov said human rights issues should be addressed through open dialogue and cooperation. The special session is clearly not conducive to that attempts to whip up hype around the situation in Myanmar need to cease.

C) Former European bank chief Draghi set to be Italy’s new PM. 

With almost all the political parties behind him, Mario Draghi on Friday entered the final leg in his bid to form a new government to lead Italy through the COVID-19 pandemic. The former European Central Bank chief, called in after the outgoing centre-left coalition collapsed, could visit President Sergio Mattarella as early as Friday to be officially named Prime Minister. Mr. Draghi has spent the last nine days assembling a government of national unity to manage the deadly pandemic that hit Italy almost a year ago, triggering a deep recession. After securing the support late Thursday of the last key player, the populist Five Star Movement (MSS), Mr. Draghi has almost all the main parties on board, from leftists to the far. right League. The Draghi government is born, headlined Rome-based daily II Messaggero, while the Corriere Della Sera said, Draghi in the home stretch. However, the 73 year-old economist has shown he is willing to take his time, and could take a few more days to finalise his cabinet. Italy has high hopes for Mr. Draghi, dubbed Super Mario after vowing to do whatever it takes to save the euro single currency in the 2010s debt crisis.