Current Affairs 4th September 2017

 Current Affairs 4th September 2017 - Important Points

• India’s first full-time woman Defence Minister - Nirmala Sitharaman
• Hockey India sacks head coach Roelant Oltmans on - 2nd September 2017
• Winners of International Literacy Prizes 2017 announced by - UNESCO
•  Solid garbage dumping banned in Ghazipur, Bhalswa landfills by - Delhi L-G Anil Baijal
• Foundation stone for Link-4 of SAUNI Scheme laid by - President Ram Nath Kovind
•  Entire Assam declared as ‘disturbed area’ under AFSPA for six months on - 1st September 2017
•  North Korea claims successful test of hydrogen bomb on - 3rd September 2017
• Locky Ransomware spreading stated by - CERT-In

Current Affairs 4th September 2017 - Details

India’s first full-time woman Defence Minister - Nirmala Sitharaman

Nirmala Sitharaman, a JNU alumni and former Minister of State (Independent Charge) Commerce has been appointed as the new Defence Minister on 3rd September 2017, thus gaining entry into Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Union Cabinet.
The trained economist took the key ministry charge from Arun Jaitley who had been handling the portfolio after Manohar Parrikar quit to become Goa's chief minister.
After this development, Sitharaman has become India's first full-time Defence Minister and second all-time one, after Indira Gandhi who had held the portfolio twice, first from 1st- 21st December in 1975 and the second time from 14th January 1980 to 15th January 1982.
So, India has a woman at the helm of the key ministry, 35 years after the last one.

Important Highlights

• Born in Madurai in Tamil Nadu in 1959, Sitharaman is an economics major from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
• She formerly served as a Senior Manager, Research and Analysis in one of the big four, PwC (PriceWaterhouseCooper), London and also briefly with BBC World Service.
• She also served as a Deputy Director of the Center for Public Policy Studies at Hyderabad.
• She also started a school in Hyderabad and was a member of the National Commission for Women between 2003 and 2005.
• Sitharaman joined the BJP Party in 2006 and was enlisted as one of the six party spokespersons in March 2010.
• She, however, quickly grew in rank with her remarkable speaking style and debating skills.
• When the BJP came into power in 2014, Sitharaman was inducted into the ministry, serving as Minister of State for Finance and Corporate Affairs.
• She was sworn in as Minister of State (Independent Charge) Commerce in May 2016.

Hockey India sacks head coach Roelant Oltmans on - 2nd September 2017

Hockey India sacked Roelant Oltmans, who served as the head coach of the men’s hockey team on 2nd September 2017. Following a meeting of the Hockey India High Performance and Development Committee for 3 days, this step was taken collectively.
He is the sixth Indian coach to be sacked in the last 10 years.
Hockey India Selection Committee selection committee chairman Harbinder Singh stated that the decision was taken due to the unsatisfactory performance of the Indian team in last two years 2016 and 2017. He stated that The Committee came to bring the decision together since they were collectively
could not get satisfied with the Indian Men’s Hockey team’s performance in 2016 and 2017 and felt that wins in Asia could not be a benchmarked for success anymore.

 More about Roelant Oltmans

• He is a Dutch hockey coach.
• He was the coach of the men's team of Larensche Mixed Hockey Club before serving as the head coach in India's men hockey team.
• He has also served as the coach of the Dutch men's team and the women's team.
• High Performance Director David John will be taking charge in the interim until a suitable replacement has been decided upon.

Winners of International Literacy Prizes 2017 announced by - UNESCO

United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) announced the winners of the 2017 International Literacy Prizes that honour excellence and innovation in the field of global literacy on 30th August 2017.

There are two categories for these prizes which are the UNESCO Confucius Prize for Literacy that is sponsored by China and the King Sejong Literacy Prize sponsored by South Korea.

UNESCO Confucius Prize Winner 2017

This prize recognises the projects that benefit rural populations and out-of-school youth especially girls and women. This year, The UNESCO Confucius Prize will be granted to:

• AdulTICoProgram: This program was the initiative of the Secretariat of Information and Communications Technologies of Armenia (In Colombia) to teach digital competencies to seniors.
  The Citizens Foundation (in Pakistan): The foundation was chosen for its Aagahi Literacy Program for Women and Out-of-School Girls including digital educational needs assessments and gives teaching services to support the education of younger girls and older women.
• 
  FunDza (In South Africa): The organisation has launched readers and writers project to develop a culture of reading and writing for pleasure through an online platform that gives
  writing competitions and reading courses.

King Sejong Literacy Prize 2017

• This prize is dedicated to mother-tongue literacy education. The winners of 2017 are:

CSLP (Centre for the Study of Learning & Performance): The Center at Concordia University (Canada) was chosen for its 'Using Educational Technology in order to Develop Essential Educational Competencies in Sub-Saharan Africa project'.

• We Love Reading (In Jordan): This program offers online read-aloud trainings for parents, mobilizes volunteers to read aloud in community spaces to children.
• All these five winners will receive a medal, a certificate and USD 20000 respectively.
• These awards will be handed over to them on the occasion of International Literacy Day on 8th September 2017.

 Solid garbage dumping banned in Ghazipur, Bhalswa landfills by - Delhi L-G Anil Baijal

Delhi Lieutenant-Governor Anil Baijal banned the dumping of solid waste at East Delhi’s Ghazipur landfill and North Delhi’s Bhalswa landfill after his meeting with Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on 2nd September 2017.

The decision to ban dumping of waste at Ghazipur, Bhalswa landfills came following the collapse of a
portion of Ghazipur landfill on 1st September 2017 in which two people were killed. Traffic near the landfill was diverted from the adjoining road immediatly as a safety measure.

New sites to dump the garbage are East and North Delhi. The EDMC (East Delhi Municipal Corporation), which manages Ghazipur landfill site, will now send collected garbage to dispose to Ranikhera near Delhi-Haryana border. The permissible height for a garbage dump is 20 meters as per the government. But the Ghazipur dump was 60 meters high.

The other major dumping sites in the city are in Narela-Bawana and Okhla.

Foundation stone for Link-4 of SAUNI Scheme laid by - President Ram Nath Kovind

Ramnath Kovind, President of India laid the stone for link – 4 of SAUNI (Saurashtra Narmada Avataran Irrigation) Scheme foundation on 4th September 2017 in Rajkot district. The Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched this project during his tenure as Gujarat Chief Minister.

Important Highlights

• The project focuses to fill up 115 major dams by diverting excess water of Sardar Sarovar dam across river Narmada, by a web of pipeline network.
• Prime Minister Narendra Modi had visited Rajkot when Aji dam was filled with the
  Narmada water under the SAUNI(Saurashtra Narmada Avataran Irrigation) project earlier in June 2017.
• The third phase of this yojana has already been dedicated to the people following completion of the work.

 Entire Assam declared as ‘disturbed area’ under AFSPA for six months on - 1st September 2017

The Assam Government declared the entire state as “disturbed area” for six months beginning 1st September 2017 under Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958 (AFSPA).

This is the first time in 27 years that the state government took call on Armed Force Special Powers Act and extended the term of the Act.

This declaration was made after the state government had assessed the present law and order situation in the state which has continued to be a matter of concern due to couple of violent incidents by underground outfits.

Earlier, On 3rd August 2017, the Union Government has declared entire Assam as “disturbed” under the AFSPA with effect from 3rd August to 31st August 2017.  And the same has now been extended by the state government for a period of next six months. AFSPA is continuing in Assam since November 1990.

 North Korea claims successful test of hydrogen bomb on - 3rd September 2017

North Korea announced that it successfully tested a hydrogen bomb that can be placed on an intercontinental ballistic missile on 3rd September 2017. The state news agency has made this announcement after geological agencies registered a man-made quake in the northeast of the country.
Previous North Korean nuclear tests have resulted in earthquakes however, a 6.3 magnitude tremor has indicated that the size of the nuclear test was larger than previous ones, as per the analysts.
South Korea's Meteorological Administration estimated that the test was five to six times more powerful than North Korea's fifth nuclear test back in September 2016, which caused a 5.3 magnitude earthquake that time. It said it was about 10 times stronger than a nuclear test held back in January 2016.
The nuclear test has been condemned worldwide. In fact, South Korea and Japan has called for new United Nations sanctions on North Korea.

Locky Ransomware spreading stated by - CERT-In

The Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) stated on 2nd September 2017 that the Locky Ransomware is spreading through massive spam campaign.
More than 23 million messages have been sent in this campaign as per the reports. Common subjects like "please print", "documents", "photo", "Images", "scans" and "pictures" are included in the messages. However the subject texts may change in targeted spear phishing campaigns.
The messages have zipped attachments with Visual Basic Scripts embedded in a secondary zip file.
It is also reported that a spam campaign that shows links to fake dropbox sites is being used to spread Locky variants. If these pages are viewed in Chrome or Firefox, they show a fake notification stating “you don't have the HoeflerText font”. With a fake update button it returns a malicious JavaScript (.js) file.
The CERT-In advised the users to be careful while opening emails and to deploy anti spam solutions and update spam block lists especially in organizations.

 More about Indian Computer Emergency Response Team

• It is a nodal agency to deal with  cyber security threats like hacking and phishing with an office within the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology .
• Security-related defence is strengthened by it for the Indian Internet domain.
• CERT-In reported there was a rise in the cyber attacks on Government organisations like banking and finance, oil and gas and emergency services back in December 2013. It has issued a list of security guidelines to all critical departments.
• CERT-In reported a critical flaw in Android Jelly bean's VPN implementation in March 2014.