28 JANUARY 2016

Ø  The Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the Centre and Arunachal Pradesh Governor J.P. Rajkhowa to furnish relevant material backing their claim of breakdown in the constitutional machinery of the sensitive border State, leading to the proclamation of emergency by President Pranab Mukherjee on Republic Day. Attorney-General Mukul Rohatgi contested that the entire petition was misconceived and pre-mature. He said there was no President’s rule in Arunachal Pradesh at the time of filing this petition on January 25 before the apex court. It was only late afternoon on Republic Day that the President gave his approval and a notification was issued declaring emergency in the State and suspended animation of its Legislative Assembly.

Ø  India has climbed nine points to rank 76th in this year’s global corruption index launched here on Wednesday topped by Denmark, with watchdog Transparency International calling graft a global “blight”. According to Transparency International’s International Corruption Perceptions Index 2015, India is placed at 76th position along with Thailand, Brazil, Tunisia, Zambia and Burkina Faso out of 168 countries. India has improved its past year’s position of 85 and has a grade index score of 38 out of a possible 100 which indicates the least corrupt, said the report topped by Denmark. The index was prepared by using data from institutions including the World Bank, the African Development Bank. According to Berlin-based Transparency International, 68 per cent of countries worldwide have a serious corruption problem and half of the G20 are among them. North Korea and Somalia remained at the bottom with unchanged scores of 8. The U.S. rose one spot this year to 16th place with a score of 76, tying with Austria. The U.K. rose three spots to place 10th, with a score of 81 that tied it with Germany and Luxembourg.