THE CONTEXT: An international collaboration of astronomers has identified a curious occurrence of nine stars like objects that appeared and vanished in a small region within half an hour in an old photographic plate.

Analysis

• Astronomers collaborating across counties track vanishing and appearing celestial objects by comparing old images of the night sky with new modern one, register unnatural phenomena, and probe deep into such phenomena to record changes in the Universe.
• Scientists, investigated early form of photography that used glass plates to capture images of the night sky from the 12th of April 1950, exposed at Palomar Observatory in California, USA.
• They detected these transient stars which were not to be found in photographs half an hour later and not traced since then.
• Such a group of objects appearing and disappearing at the same time have been detected for the first time in the history of astronomy.
• The astronomers have not found any explanation in well-established astrophysical phenomena like gravitational lensing, fast radio bursts, or any variable star that could be responsible for this cluster of fast changes in the sky.
• The scientists are still exploring the reasons behind the observation of these strange transient stars and are still not sure about what triggered their appearance and disappearance.
• The astronomers are examining the possibility that the photographic plates were contaminated with radioactive particles causing false stars on the plates.
• But if the observation is proven to be real, another option is solar reflections from reflective, unnatural objects in orbit around Earth several years before the first human satellite was launched.
• The astronomers who belong to the collaboration Vanishing & Appearing Sources during a Century of Observations (VASCO) have still not sorted out the root cause of the “nine simultaneous transients”.
• They are now eager to look for more signatures of solar reflections in these digitized data from the 1950s in a hope to find aliens.

ABOUT GRAVITATIONAL LENSING

• As the light emitted by distant galaxies passes by massive objects in the universe, the gravitational pull from these objects can distort or bend the light. This is called gravitational lensing.
• Strong gravitational lensing can actually result in such strongly bent light that multiple images of the light-emitting galaxy are formed.
• Weak gravitational lensing results in galaxies appearing distorted, stretched or magnified.
• Although difficult to measure for an individual galaxy, galaxies clustered close together will exhibit similar lensing patterns.
• Analysing the nature of gravitational lensing patterns tells astronomers about the way dark matter is distributed within galaxies and their distance from Earth.
• This method provides a probe for investigating both the development of structure in the universe and the expansion of the universe.

THE CONTEXT: The Centre has taken complete control of the district mineral foundation (DMF) funds, negating states’ right to sanction or approve any expenditure out of the funds accrued from mandatory contribution from mining lease holders

Analysis:

• Since their inception in 2015-16, over Rs 49,400 crore have flown into the DMF funds.
• The move is seen by many states as yet another bid by the central government to usurp the states’ fiscal powers and undermine their constitutionally defined role in governance, so might spark a political storm.
• In a notification issued on July 12, the ministry of mines said the move was necessitated as “there are instances where a part of the funds of the DMF are being transferred to the treasury/consolidated fund of the state or state level funds (by whatever name called) or Chief Minister’s Relief Fund or other funds or schemes,” thereby “defeating the very purpose” of the creation of the DMF.

WHAT IS THE ISSUE?

• The Centre’s unhappiness with the way the states use the DMF kitty or the states being the custodian of these funds came to the fore in March 2020.
• Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman suggested, as part of the first tranche of the Atmanirbhar package, that, “We will request the state governments to utilise the funds which are available at the DMF at the district level so that medical testing, medical screening and also providing of health attention will not suffer”.
• Though she did not allege fund diversion clearly, industry and mines ministry officials were in the know of fund diversion by the states.
• The order said, “In fact, such transfer of funds from DMF to state level agency defeats the very purpose of depositing the contribution and setting DMF at district level. Therefore, transfer of any part of the fund of DMF to any state level entity for its utilisation is violation of the provision of section 9B of the Act.”
• While the guidelines say that 60% of the DMF funds have to be utilised for ‘high priority sectors’ such as drinking water supply and education, 40% is earmarked for ‘other priority sectors’ such as physical infrastructure, energy and cowshed development.
• According to the MMDR Rules, 2015, “every holder of a mining lease or a prospecting licence-cum-mining lease shall, in addition to the royalty, pay to the DMF of the district in which mining operations are carried on, an amount at the rate of 10% of the royalty in respect of mining leases or prospecting licence cum-mining lease granted on or after January 12, 2015, and 30% of the royalty in respect of mining leases granted before January 12, 2015”.
• The DMF fund collections have been the highest in mineral-rich Odisha (Rs 13,336 crore), followed by Chhattisgarh (Rs 6,995 crore), Jharkhand (Rs 6,856 crore), Rajasthan (Rs 5,008 crore) and Madhya Pradesh (Rs 4,015 crore)

ABOUT DMF

• As per the MMDR (Amendment) Act, 2015, state governments must establish DMFs in all districts for the interest and benefits of the persons affected by mining-related operations;
• Lease holders are required to contribute to these not-for-profit foundations as a defined percentage of royalty, in addition to the royalty paid to state governments.
• While the sub-section 3 of Section 9(B) of the MMDR Act brought in through the 2015 amendment says, “The composition and functions of the DMF shall be such as may be prescribed by the state government”, an earlier amendment to the Act added a proviso to the sub-section that, “provided that the central government may give directions regarding composition and utilisation of fund by (the DMF)”.
• However, going a step ahead, the July 12 order said, “No sanction or approval of any expenditure out of the fund of the DMF shall be done at the state level by the state government or any state level agency.”
• Clearly, the idea is to deprive the states of discretion in the utilisation of DMF funds.
• The DMFs are required to use these funds for the welfare of persons and areas affected by mining-related operations, the tribal population being the principal intended beneficiaries.
• The scheme is called Pradhan Mantri Khanij Kshetra Kalyan Yojana.

THE CONTEXT: To strengthen the mentoring capacity of teachers, CBSE, in collaboration with the Innovation Cell, AICTE, Ministry of Education, launched the programme to train 50,000 school teachers

Analysis

• These teachers will become mentors and guide these young students to pursue innovation and entrepreneurship and will nurture young students for problem-solving and critical thinking at the school level.
• More than 10,000 schools have nominated 5 teachers each from their schools to participate in this training programme.
• The training will be provided to the teachers in phased manner. The first batch of training will start from July 20, 2021.

WHAT WILL THE INNOVATION AMBASSADORS DO?

• The trained ‘Innovation Ambassadors’ will perform the following tasks at school level:
  • Creating the culture of innovation in their respective schools.
  • Mentor the teachers and students of their respective and nearby schools
  • Provide support to other schools as a resource person
  • Spread the message of innovation and start-ups among the students and faculty
  • Act as an evaluator for Idea competitions conducted at the national level
  • Act as a Mentor for the national level program on Innovation and related activities.

ABOUT AICTE

• AICTE is an abbreviated form of the All India Council for Technical Education.
• AICTE is the statutory body and the national-level council for technical education in the country
• AICTE was formed in November 1945 with the vision to promote development of the education system in India.
• Till 1987, it was acting as an advisory body under the Department of Education, Ministry of HRD. In 1987, it was given a statutory status by an Act of Parliament, enabling it to exercise in a more effective manner.
• AICTE as a body is responsible for accrediting all postgraduate and graduate programs, under specific categories of technology for Indian institutions.
• This is its major point of difference with UGC (University Grants Commission) as UGC only accredits non-technical education in India.
• Apart from the accreditation, AICTE also has major involvement in training, research and development of technical education in the country, which includes the variety of study areas like commerce and industry trade, science and engineering, medicine and healthcare, arts, environment, architecture, vocational studies, management, hospitality, food science and many more.
• AICTE is based in New Delhi. AICTE has its various operational regional offices in different cities

THE CONTEXT: The Supreme Court has stated that it has undertaken to frame a system to ensure that bail orders are sent electronically to jail authorities.

Analysis

• The Bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI)NV Ramana and Justices L Nageswara Rao and AS Bopanna made the observation while hearing the suo motu case regarding delay in releasing convicts by prison authorities even after being granted bail by courts.
• The top court noted took exception to the fact the prisons do not release inmates even after court passes orders to that effect and instead wait for orders to be sent by post.
• “In this age of information and communication technology, we are still looking at the skies for pigeons to communicate orders, “CJI Ramana said.
• “Prisoners are waiting for Supreme Court orders to be sent by post. We had ordered release in some matters and they were not released since they did not receive authentic copy of orders. This is too much,” he added.

WHAT IS THE NEW SYSTEM?

• The procedure is termed as FASTER(Fast and Secured Transmission of Electronic Records) System, for transmission of e-­authenticated copies of the Judgments /final orders/interim orders to the concerned Courts / Tribunals and other duty holders for execution.
• New scheme announced by Supreme Court is to reduce time period of communication of court orders to jail authorities.
• Under this scheme, Supreme Court would instantly, directly, securely and electronically transmit bail and other orders to jail authorities, district courts and High Courts.
• The Secretary General of the Supreme Court was directed to submit a comprehensive report formulating the scheme within two weeks.
• The Court has also directed all states to answer whether jails in states have proper internet facility since it will be needed to access the secure system for transmission of orders being put in place.

BACKGROUND OF THE ISSUE

• Recently, the Supreme Court had granted interim bail to 13 convicts lodged in Agra Central Jail.
• The order was passed on July 8 but the convicts walked out of jail after four days, since the prison authorities stated that they did not receive the certified copy of the order by post.
• The convicts had spent between 14 and 20 years in prison despite being juveniles at the time of committing the crimes