Current Affairs Question - 30 August 2019

Explanation :

• It is an over-arching initiative to improve school education system by creating a junction for all online portals and websites relating to various activities of the Department of School Education and Literacy in the Government of India.
• The word ‘Shagun’ is coined from two different words-
• ‘Shala’ meaning Schools
• ‘Gunvatta’ meaning Quality
• Websites of 1200 KendriyaVidyalayas, 600 NavodayaVidyalayas, 18000 other CBSE affiliated schools, 30 SCERTs, 19000 organisations affiliated with NTCE among others are integrated with Shagun.
• An Integrated National School Education Treasury (INSET) will be set up which envisages a fully integrated, instantly accessible and seamless information network for all parameters relating to the students, teachers, and schools in the country.

Significance

• The newly created platform will provide all school related information at one place .This will help students, parents and other stakeholders in ensuring all round development of the child. This platform will not only give information but people can also give their suggestions, which will help in the creation of a better system.

Source: Civil Services Chronicle Online

Explanation :

• In a move to boost employment in the coastal shipping sector, India has become the first country in the world to issue a Biometric Seafarer Identity Document (BSID) to its seafarers.
• The BSID has the dimensions of a smart ID card. It introduces modern security features like an embedded biometric chip, as well as optical security features such as micro prints/micro texts and Unique Guilloche pattern.
• It is a marked improvement over the two fingers or iris based bio-metric data, with modern security features.

Significance

• The new document will give a foolproof identification to Indian seafarers which will facilitate their movement and help in identifying them from any location in the world.

Source: Civil Services Chronicle Online

Explanation :

• Coke making is effectively the carbonization of coal at high temperatures.
• Coking coal, also known as metallurgical coal, is used to create coke, one of the key inputs for the production of steel.It is a solid fuel made by heating coal in the absence of air(reducing atmosphere) so that the volatile components are driven off.
• The property that really sets coking coals apart from other coals is its coking ability, which is the specific property required in order to make coke suitable for steel making.
• Bituminous coal - generally classified as a metallurgical grade—is harder and blacker and contains more carbon and less moisture and ash than low-rank coals.

Source: Civil Services Chronicle Online

Explanation :

• The government enacted Compensatory Afforestation Fund Act 2016 to provide a proper institutional mechanism for compensatory afforestation matters. Related rules were notified in 2018.
• The Act established National Compensatory Afforestation Fund (NCAF) under the Public account of India and State Compensatory Afforestation Funds under public accounts of states.
• The National Fund will receive 10% of these funds, and the State Funds will receive the remaining 90%.
• The funds can be used for treatment of catchment areas, assisted natural generation, forest management, wildlife protection and management,relocation of villages from protected areas, managing human-wildlife conflicts, etc.
• Compensatory afforestation means that every time forest land is diverted for non-forest purposes such as mining or industry, the user agency pays for planting forests over an equal area of non-forest land, or when such land is not available, twice the area of degraded forest land.

Source: Civil Services Chronicle Online