National Building Code of India, 2016

• The code is a national instrument providing guidelines
  for regulating the building construction activities across the country.
• It serves as a Model Code for adoption by all
  agencies involved in building construction works be they Public Works Departments, other government construction departments,
  local bodies or private construction agencies. 
• It was published by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS).

Frequent Hospital fires and the implementation of NBC

• Part 4 of the Code deals with Fire and Life Safety.
• The document provides specifications and guidelines for design and materials that reduce the threat of destructive fires.
• Under the Code, all existing and new buildings are classified by nature of use, such as residential, educational, institutional, assembly (like cinemas and auditoria), business, mercantile, industrial, storage and hazardous.
• Hospitals come under the institutional category.
• National Building Code (NBC) is a “recommendatory document”, and States have been asked to incorporate it into their local building bylaws, making the recommendations a “mandatory requirement”.
• Evidently, fire safety rules exist in every State, but the provisions of the Code are ignored in practice, and even mandatory certifications do not reflect compliance.

• Scientists have recently discovered a new species of wood snake in the Western Ghats of Tamil Nadu.

Xylophis deepaki

• It is a tiny snake of just 20 cm length with iridescent scales.

• First stumbled upon in a coconut plantation in Kanyakumari, is now reported to be an endemic species of Tamil Nadu and has been sighted in a few locations in the southern part of the Western Ghats.
• The species is named in honour of Indian herpetologist Deepak Veerappan for his contribution in erecting a new subfamily Xylophiinae to accommodate wood snakes.

Wood snakes

• Wood snakes are harmless, sub-fossorial and often found while digging soil in farms and under the logs in the Western Ghat forests.
• They feed on earthworms and possibly other invertebrates.
• Interestingly, their close relatives are found in northeast India and Southeast Asia and are known to be arboreal.

• Jaldapara Wildlife Sanctuary is situated at the foothills of the Eastern Himalayas in Alipurduar District of northern West Bengal.

Asian Development Outlook 2021

• It was released recently by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
• According to the report, the ongoing ‘second wave’ of COVID-19 pandemic could put India’s economic recovery at risk.
• The report said excluding the second wave, India’s economy, was expected to grow 11 per cent in fiscal year 2021, which ends March 31, 2022, amid a strong vaccine drive.
• India’s gross domestic product (GDP) was expected to expand 7 per cent in 2022.
• The report said that the pandemic was the biggest threat to Asia and the Pacific (including India).
• This was mainly due to delay in vaccine rollouts or major new outbreaks.

• At least 44 people were crushed to death in a stampede as tens of thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews gathered in northern Israel to celebrate the annual Lag B’Omer festival.

Lag B’Omer festival

• It is an annual Jewish festival observed during the Hebrew month of Iyar.
• It is celebrated on the 33rd day of the Omer, the 49-day period between Passover and Shavuot.
• Lag B’Omer is the only day during the 49-day period when celebration is permitted.
• Hence, it is common for Jews to schedule weddings on this day every year.
• Young boys, who have reached the age of three, are also traditionally brought here for their first hair cut.

Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS)

• The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has joined the Central Banks and Supervisors Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS) as a member.
• NGFS launched at the Paris One Planet Summit on December 12, 2017.
• It is a group of central banks and supervisors willing to share best practices and contribute to the development of environment and climate risk management in the financial sector.
• It also seeks to mobilise mainstream finance to support the transition towards a sustainable economy.
• The secretariat is hosted by the Banque de France.

Consolidated Sinking Fund

• CSF was set up in 1999-2000 by the RBI to meet redemption of market loans of the States.
• Initially, 11 States set up sinking funds. Later, the 12th Finance Commission (2005-10) recommended that all States should have sinking funds for amortisation of all loans, including loans from banks, liabilities on account of National Small Saving Fund (NSSF), etc.
• State governments maintain a CSF with the Reserve Bank as a buffer for repayment of their liabilities.
• As per the scheme, State governments could contribute 1-3% of the outstanding market loans each year to the Fund.
• The Fund is administered by the Central Accounts Section of RBI Nagpur.

Sedition Law

• It is defined as any action that brings or attempts to bring hatred or contempt towards the government of India and has been illegal.
• Sedition laws were enacted in 17th century England when lawmakers believed that only good opinions of the government should survive, as bad opinions were detrimental to the government and monarchy.
• Bal Gangadhar Tilak was first to prosecute under this law in 1897 .
• In 1962, the Supreme Court decided on the constitutionality of Section 124A in Kedar Nath Singh v State of Bihar.
• It upheld the constitutionality of sedition, but limited its application to “acts involving intention or tendency to create disorder, or disturbance of law and order, or incitement to violence”.
• It distinguished these from “very strong speech” or the use of “vigorous words” strongly critical of the government.
• In 1995, the Supreme Court, in Balwant Singh v State of Punjab, held that mere sloganeering which evoked no public response did not amount to sedition.
• Recently Supreme Court to agree to examine the constitutional validity of sedition law.

Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) mission

• It was selected as the second mission under the NASA Earth System Science Pathfinder (ESSP) Program in May 1997.
• It is a joint partnership between the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in the United States and Deutsche Forschungsanstalt für Luft und Raumfahrt (DLR) in Germany.
• It was aimed at accurately mapping variations in the Earth's gravity field over its 5-year lifetime.
• Its objective was to map the Earth's gravity fields by making accurate measurements of the distance between the two satellites, using GPS and a microwave ranging system.
• The gravity variations that GRACE were:

1. Changes due to surface and deep currents in the ocean;
2. Runoff and ground water storage on land masses;
3. Exchanges between ice sheets or glaciers and the oceans; and
4. Variations of mass within the Earth.

SUTRA Model

• It was first released in 1984, a three-dimensional groundwater model that simulates solute transport (i.e. salt water) or temperature in a subsurface environment.

• The SUTRA (Saturated-Unsaturated Transport) is a computer program that simulates fluid movement and the transport of either energy or dissolved substances in a subsurface environment.
• It employs a weight grid that is based on a finite element and integrated finite difference hybrid method framework.
• Ministry of Science & Technology has announced that the scientists are working on SUTRA model for charting the trajectory of COVID-19.