Archives November 2012

I have a pet named Ruby. It is a beautiful golden fishwhich I purchased from the Kamla Market. I do not know the kind of this fish, but I like it verymuch. It is a small one and I keep it in a glass aquarium.It keeps flitting in the water. It so happened that once I was going through the market with my mother. It was a festival day. I had been given the option to purchase anything for myself, within the range of two hundred rupees. Suddenly, my eye fell on the fish which was shining under the light of the fluorescent tube fixed overhead in, the shop. I loved the shining golden fish so much that I asked my mother to buy it for me. Without a moment's hesitation, my mother bought it for me. This is how I came by it. I keep the water in the more...

In recent years, the term ' global ization' has become a catchphrase for those interested in the world and the way it works. At the same time, n has become a bogeyman for those who fear change, and for those who believe the modem world has taken a turn for the worse. Those who are critical of the globalization of corporate capitalism are considered part of the anti-global ization movement, also commonly referred to as the global justice movement, after-global ization movement, anti-corporate globalization movement, or movement against neo-liberal global ization.  Participants of anti-global ization movement oppose large, multi- national corporations having unregulated political power as well as the powers exercised through trade agreements and deregulated financial markets. Specifically, they accuse corporations of seeking to maximize profit at the expense of sabotaging work safety conditions and standards. Labour hiring and compensation standards, environmental conservation principles, and the integrity of national more...

The term 'environmentalism' refers to political and ethical movement that seeks to improve and protect the quality of the natural environment through changes l" environmentally harmful human activities; through the adoption of forms of political, economic, and social organization that are thought to be necessary for, or at least conducive to, the benign treatment of the environment by humans; and through a reassessment of humanity's relationship with nature. In various ways, environmentalism claims that living things other than humans, and the natural environment as a whole, deserve consideration in reasoning about the morality of political, economic, and social policies. In other words, environmentalism is a concern for planed as a whole. Environmentalism is a broad philosophy and social movement hoarding concerns for environmental conservation and improvement of the state of the environment. It can also be defined as a social movement that seeks to influence the political process by lobbying, more...

Indian Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) experiments progressed rapidly after the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) convinced the government on its ability to develop BMD technology in late 1999. India initiated the program in the light of Pakistan's eschewing of a nuclear 'no first use' policy and heightened tensions during the Kargil war including a possibility of full scale nuclear war. DRDO is developing a two-tier BMD system, capable of tracking and destroying incoming hostile missiles both inside (endo) and outside (exo) the earth's atmosphere. DRDO's HMD program has a two-tiered system consisting of two interceptor missiles, namely prithvi Air Defence (PAD) for high altitude interception and Advanced Air Defence (AAD) for lower altitude interception. The PAD missiles are for intercepting ballistic missiles at altitudes between 50 SO kin while (lie AAD missile is for destroying them at heights between 15 -HI km. The PAD is an anti-ballistic missile developed more...

Reform of the United Nations Security Council encompasses live key issues: categories of membership, the question of the veto held by the five permanent members, regional representation, the size of a enlarged Council and its working methods. The issues arc contested as Member States, regional groups and other Member Stale interest groupings have developed different positions and proposals on how to move forward. The Security Council has changed very little since its inception in 1945. The UN Charter was shaped by the winners of the Second World War in their national interests. The geopolitical reality of the world has changed a lot since then with the emergence of several new nations. The collapse of Soviet Union, the unification of Germany, etc. As ,1 result, old structures and procedures are increasingly challenged. The only significant reform of the Security Council came to pass in 1965 after the ratification of two-thirds of more...

According to World Food Programme (WFP) figures, there are 1.02 billion undernourished people in the world today. That means our in nearly six people do not get enough food to be healthy and lead an active life. In fact, hunger and malnutrition are the number one risk to the health worldwide—greater than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined. While natural disasters, conflict, poverty, poor agricultural infrastructure and over-exploitation of the environment remain the key causes of hunger, the recent economic slowdown in many countries have pushed more people into hunger. Besides the obvious sort of hunger resulting from an empty stomach, there is also the hidden hunger of micronutrient deficiencies which make people susceptible to infectious diseases, impair physical and mental development, reduce their labour productivity and increase the risk of premature death. Economists estimate that every child whose physical and mental development is stunted by hunger and malnutrition stands in more...

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act aims at enhancing the livelihood security of people in rural areas by guaranteeing hundred days of wage-employment in a financial year to a rural household whose adult members volunteer to do unskilled manual work. The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) was renamed after the Father of Nation Mahatma Gandhi as Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA) on 2nd October 2009, commemorating Golden Jubilee of Panchayati Raj in India. It was on 2nd October, 1959 that Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India had laid the foundations of Panchayati Raj at Naguar in Rajasthan. The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act was enacted by legislation on August 25, 2005 and came into effect on February 2, 2006. It was introduced with an aim of improving the purchasing power of the rural people, primarily by providing semi or un-skilled work more...

In order to issue unique identity cards to citizens, the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) constituted under me j Chairmanship of Nandan Nilekani, has started collecting demographic and biometric data. The UIDAI is collecting two sets of information on an individual resident of India. First is the demographic information like I his or her name, date of birth, sex, age, address, father's, mother's or guardian's name, etc. which is very simple information. The second is the biometric information for the purpose of uniqueness, and that is all the ten finger prints, the face and the iris of both the eyes. The Unique Identity (UTD) cards would be given to every individual above 15 years, including NRIs and foreigners. The Authority aims to release around 600 million unique identity cards within a span of four to five years. To ensure that the date collected remains confidential, the Government is in more...

Climate change is already happening, and further increases in temperature are inevitable. Global warming will have an increasing and significant effect on the environment and the economy, with implications In virtually all nations including India. In fact, climate change is no longer a distant threat as catastrophic events have already started occurring, and are likely to increase in frequency. The Fourth Assessment Report of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) amply demonstrates that we are already experiencing climate change induced by human activities. Ever since the invention of fire, human activities have generated carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. However, till the advent of the Industrial Revolution, these emissions were well within the carrying capacity of the atmosphere. The Industrial Revolution, based on the combustion of hydrocarbons—initially coal, later also petroleum and natural gas, led to ever-increasing levels of emission and accumulation of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, precipitating more...

In the first crash of' its kind,  two communication satellites collided on  February  10, 2009 in  orbit shooting out a pair of huge debris clouds  and poising a slight risk to the  International Space Station (ISS). The collision occurred nearly 800km over Siberia and involved a US Indium commercial satellite (launched in 1997) and a defunct Russian satellite cosmos2252 (launched in 1993). Iridium satellite weighed 560 kg, while the Russian craft nearly a tonne. The incident raised questions over how it was allowed to happen and what will become of the cloud of orbital debris, which adds to one of the biggest headaches in space. The collision has fuelled concerns over l.ick of' traffic controls in space and the rising volumes of junk that endanger vital satellites and manned flights. Just a month after the Indium accident, a stray motor chunk hurtled inward the International Space Station. Cruising at an more...