May2011

Current Affairs For May 2011

National:

After Anna Hazare now it’s Baba Ramdev to fast
• After Anna Hazare, now it’s Baba Ramdev to follow up his footstep and to fast on Saturday, 08th may 2011 against the black money hoarding and corruption. More than 10 million people including civil rights activists are supposed to join baba in his fight against corruption. Baba Ramdev has decided to hunger strike demanding the government of India to take stern actions against black money hoarded abroad and to curb corruption. In his fasting decision, even Anna Hazare (who even fasted before for the Lokpal bill promotion) has extended his support for Baba Ramdev.
• Many government officials have tried negotiating with Baba Ramdev against his decision to fast. But it said that only next level talks with the government supreme can reach up to any conclusion. Ministers like A.K Antony, Pranab Mukharjee have met with P.M Monmohan Singh along with congress head Sonia Gandhi to discuss the matter. It’s still a big question for the government about how they will be stopping Baba Ramdev from fasting unlike their stint with Anna Hazare who fasted for the same issue.
Tanzania and India signed an agreement for double taxation avoidance.
• The Indian government signed on the double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA) with the United Republic of Tanzania. This agreement is meant for the prevention of fiscal evasion related to taxes on income to be payed. The agreement was signed on May 27th 2011 at Dar –es-Salaam. Shri K V Bhagirath, High Commissioner of India and Mr Pereira Ame Silima, Deputy Finance Minister of the Republic of Tanzania both are going to sign on the DTAA agreement on behalf of their respective countries.
• The DTAA states that all the business profits will be taxable in the state if the activities constitutes for a permanent establishment in the respective state. This agreement will in providing stability of taxes between India and Tanzania. And this will help in increment of mutual economic cooperation between the two countries.
History made- Mamata Banerjee sworn in as west Bengals 1st women C.M
• Mamata Banerjee on Friday was sworn in as the 1st women Chief Minister of West Bengal. She was made head by the joint alliance of Trinamool and Congress party. Mamata Banerjee took the oath in Bengali, which was administered by Governor Mr M K Narayanan in Raj Bhavan. The council under Mamata Banerjee’s ministry consist of 43 members out of which 36 are from Trinamool congress while the rest are from Congress party. The list of members includes Amit Mitra, Manish Gupta, Abdul Karim Chowdhury, Partha Chatterjee, Upen Biswas, Subrata Mukherjee, Sabitri Mitra, Sandhan Pandey, Noore Alam Chowdhary, Bratya Basu and Madan Mitra.
India and US to discuss Homeland security
• India and US will resume their homeland security talks on may 8th 2011. The delegation from the Indian side will be headed by Union home Minister P. Chidambaram and that from the US will be headed by the Secretary of Homeland Security Department, Ms Janet Napolitano. The main topic on interest that will be discussed comprise of coastal security, curbing illegal financing, counter terrorism, mutual investigation that includes Mumbai terror attacks etc.

Sports News:
Master blaster the leading cricketer of Widens 2010
• The master blaster became the 7th recipient of the Wisden award joining the league of other recipient like Ricky Ponting, Shane Warne, Muttiah Muralitharan, Jacques Kallis, and Andrew W Flintoff etc. Wisden regarded as the Bible of cricket named India’s Master blaster Sachin Tendulkar as its seventh recipient. Sachin if the 2nd Indian cricketer after Virender Sehwag who’s also among the wisden awardees’ league. In February itself sachin became the 1st world cricketer to score a double 100 in one dayers and before this he became the 1st cricketer to score 50 test tons.
• The 148th wisden edition was launched on Wednesday and this is the 1st time that master blaster has won this award since it began in the year 2004. Also sachin was even positioned at number 4 rank in the Wisden’s 2009 Test XI.
Annu Singh the Indian shooter to book berth for London’s Olympic
• Annu Raj Singh became the 5th Indian shooter to book her berth for the London’s Olympic to be held next year. She qualified for the Olympic seat after winning a silver medal at the ongoing ISSF World Cup in Fort Benning for the 10m Air Pistol. Singh who never won the world cup earlier qualified for the finals with a maximum of 389 points win. After this Singh is ranked at number 33 in the world. She is the next Indian to join the league for the Olympics after shooters Gagan Narang, Hari Om Singh, Sanjeev Rajput and Ronjan Sodhi.
• Her win was tied up with gold medallist Olena Kostevych of Ukraine.
Mary Kom strikes gold in Asian Cup
• India’s five time world champion M C Mary Kom won 1st gold medal of the year by winning in the Asian Cup Women’s Boxing tournament in Haikou, china.
• She won the medal for the 48Kg category. Kom became the winner after defeating Asian champion Kim Myong Sim of North Korea. The winning strike was lead by 4-3points in the finals. This was her 1st tournament since her bronze medal win at the 2010 Guangzhou Asian Games after which she made a place for herself in the weight division category after beating Kate Appari of Philippines.
• Though her North Korean counterpart was a stiff challenge for her but it was her skill and the agility of the champion that she made her way through the finals and won the gold.
• On the other hand another Indian in the line Pavitra (57kg) faced defeat in the finals against Tossamalee Thonalan of Thailand. She lost to her counterpart by 6-11 points.

International News: Most wanted deadly terrorist Osama Bin Laden Dead
• The most wanted terrorist Osama bin Laden was finally gunned down by the US troops in alliance with CIA agents. The deadly terrorist was killed in a house in Abbottabad, Pakistan. This city of Pakistan houses at least 5, 00,000 people that includes a Pakistani military base and a military academy. After Osama refused to surrender he was shot dead by the US military troops. News of his death spread like wild fire and the Americans relieved to joy.
• In the light of this news a Pakistani parliamentary training centre was attacked by two suicide bombers which killed 80 people and wounded more than 120 people. All this attack was announced as retaliation for the killing of Osama Bin Laden.
• Following the attacks the Taliban took the responsibility and even condemned the Pakistani government from failing to stop the US military raid.
IMF head arrested for sexual assault:
• IMF (International Monetary Fund) head Dominique Strauss Kahn was arrested for sexually assaulting a maid at a Manhattan Hotel. Dominique who’s also a political figure in France was taken into custody at Kennedy International Airport. His arrest aroused a mixed sense of disbelief, anger and embarrassment among the masses in France. Dominique had a well formed reputation among the political Supremes.
• Dominique was even considered as the next best candidate for presidential seat after the Nicolas Sarkozy. Following his arrest Strauss has resigned as the Managing Director of IMF. On may 19th Strauss was indicted with multiple charges like attempted to rape, sexual abuse amongst others.
Floods leads to massive Evacuations Along the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers : 
• Heavy rains have caused severe flooding in the regions of Ohio valleys and Mississippi. All the regions like Kentucky, Tennessee, Indiana, Missouri and Arkansas are flooded heavily and have been evacuated leaving people to leave their home and move towards higher planes for shelter. The engineers and disaster control management team have been working on how to lower the river level in order to stop further destruction. As per the sources the flooding water in the river of Mississippi is flowing at a massive speed nearly 17 million gallons a second. And the river level has risen above the danger level that is to 56.3 feet which is 13 feet above the danger level. Flood control department is deciding to open the portion Morganaza Spillway but it has its own danger effect that is it will flood the other areas’.
French nationals to sue sarkozy over crimes in Libya:
• Two French lawyers have said that they are planning to sue French President Nicolas Sarkozy against the Humanity crimes over the military campaign in Libya that was led by NATO. Jacques Verges and Roland Dumas two of the French lawyers have decided to represent the families of the victims during the military campaign. It was said that the military campaign that was initiated as a means to protect the civilians was in fact responsible for their killings. The two lawyers said the military campaign as an inhuman assault against the common man and a sovereign country, and that they have decided to defend the victims of the military campaign.
• It was said that the two lawyers have decided to defend the victims of the NATO bombings because they themselves saw the aftermath consequences of the bombings when they visited Libya.
• Though the western government has denied any civilian casualties caused during the NATO bombings, Verges and Dumas have said that they had seen several such casualties at various such hospitals and there are almost 20,000 such victims.
Pakistan gets Chinese aid against the US raids.
• After the killing of the deadly terrorist Osama Bin Laden, US have accused Pakistan Government for harbouring the deadly terrorist for many years. Now by doubling its military attacks on Pakistan the US wants to enter into the sphere that’s influenced by the Chinese Government. But in retaliation to the Obama Administration the Chinese government has again lend a helping hand towards Pakistan by providing air arsenal and even warned the US government that any sort of attack on Pakistan would considered as an inhuman and unfriendly attack on the Chinese government too.
• The Chinese government has clearly said that any attack on Pakistan will be considered as an attack against China which will not be tolerated. This is the 1st such blunt ultimatum for the US government after the Soviet warning during the crisis in Berlin in the year 1958-1961. This indicates the danger of war between the two countries Pakistan and the US.
• China’s support has been a critically important for the Pakistani government and this relation is not seen as good for the US and the Indian government as it has been said that: “If the US and the Indian government continues to put pressure on the Pakistani government, then Pakistan officials can say that we are not alone our friend China is Behind us. We have a super power nation as our friend”.
Death toll rising at fast pace and the massive unrest continues to grow
• The Syrian protests have entered their tenth week and thousands of protestors came to the streets all over the country after the Friday prayers. In order to keep police and the security forces at bay the protest this time were held during the nights over the weekends. As per the reports at least two people were killed during the army operation in Rastan away from the city of Homs. Even many activists called the day for massive demonstration against the brutal torture and killing of a 13year old boy named as Hamza-al-Khatib.
• As per the reports from the local media 32 soldiers and some police personnel were also injured during the clashes and 3 police men lost their life. Also a policeman’s son was among the ones who were killed during the clashes between the protestors and the forces.
• As the reports around 143 soldiers, police men and security forces have lost their lives from the day the unrest began in the country and more than 1000 people have been killed during the clashes and almost 10,000 arrested.
• In the midst of the clashes the Interior Minister Ibrahim al Shaar has announced that he is going to listen to the complaints of the civilians in person.
Fear grows as EU suspends all aid to Syria
• Almost 100 of people are about to lose their jobs as the EU has decided to cut down on all major aids to the Syrian government. Tishreen newspaper was quoted as saying that though the Syrian government will be affected by the aid cancellation but the common man will suffer the most as they will be on the verge to lose their jobs. It is said that in order to loosen up the stability of the Syrian government the stopping of aid is one such step by the European government.
• Meanwhile the G-8 has announced support of around 40bn for the Arab countries. This support is meant in order to help the Arab countries to move towards a better Democratic government policy. Half of the sum from the 40bn support will be spent for the Tunisian and the Egyptian government reform.
• Russian premier Dmitry Medvedev was quoted as saying that the Russian government is not going to back EU states and the US at the security council meet.
Science and Technology:
Our Milky Way in Midst of life crisis
• Planetary scientist say that our Milky way is in its mid life crisis as a result of which it will slow down its process of production of stars in the next billion years. As per the aeronautics the galaxies are classified under two categories namely- energetic blue galaxies and the lethargic red galaxies. The blue galaxies produce stars at a massive rate while the other one are slowly dying. But a team of scientist from the Swinburne University of Technology says that our Milky Way falls into neither of the two categories. It is in fact a green valley galaxy that lays half way between the blue galaxy and the red galaxy.
• This is the first time ever that scientists have compared both the galaxies with our Milky Way as the Astrophysical Journal reported. Though we are in our own galaxy and to determine its state was a tough job to accomplish was reported by the Astrophysical Journal.
Indian communication satellite GSAT-8 successfully launched
• India’s communication satellite GSAT-8 was launched successfully. The satellite was launched by Arianespace from Kourou in French Guiana. The satellite was launched to enable powerful services direct to our home. The satellite weighs 3100kg and is one the heaviest and high powered satellite developed by the Indian Scientist at the Bangalore- headquarters ISRO. The ISRO team that launched the satellite showed extreme pleasure at the successful launch of the satellite.
• “I am extremely delighted and happy to announce that ISRO successfully launched the satellite and we are happy to confirm that we have taken the charge of the satellite immediately after its injection into the orbit” ISRO Chairman K Radhakrishnan said.