Ø Parliament cleared both the Mines and Minerals (Development and
Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2015, and the Coal Mines (Special Provisions) Bill,
2015, two days after the select committees submitted their reports to the Rajya
Sabha. Referring to the Land Bill cleared by the Lok Sabha, Parliamentary
Affairs Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu told journalists that it “will be taken up
in the Rajya Sabha during the next phase of the session.”
Ø At least 38 passengers of the Dehradun-Varanasi Janata Express were
killed and nearly 150 injured when four of its coaches derailed near the
Bachrawan station in Rae Bareli district on Friday.
Ø India and the U.S. are “currently exchanging” the signed texts of the
administrative arrangements finalised during US President Barack Obama’s visit
to India in January for civil nuclear cooperation between the two countries.
Administrative arrangements pertain to the monitoring, handling, inspection and
safeguard of the nuclear material procured from the U.S. In line with that, the
government organised a workshop on the “Indian Nuclear Insurance Policy”
attended by over 100 companies in the nuclear field doing business in India to
understand the insurance pool and working under the Indian liability law. After
this companies will be in a position to enter into commercial deals. External
Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj will undertake bilateral visit to Tanzania and
South Africa from March 28-31. In South Africa apart from bilateral meetings,
Ms. Swaraj will co-chair the joint commission between India and South Africa as
well as a tripartite meeting between the Foreign Ministers of India, Brazil and
South Africa under the “India, Brazil and South Africa dialogue forum,”
Ø Singer Lata Mangeshkar was on Friday presented the ‘Laadli Voice of the
Century’ award here during the sixth edition of the national Laadli Media and
Advertising Awards for Gender Sensitivity. Queen won the best movie award, while advertising
agency Ogilvy and Mather won the “Laadli Grand Prix” for its Titan Raga — ‘tum
nahi badle’ advertisement.
Ø Ratan Tata is appointed as chairman of ‘Kayakalp Council’ – a body to
reform Indian Railways.
Ø US scientists are proposing to send a robot submarine to the oily seas
of Saturn’s moon Titan. The seas are filled not with water, but with
hydrocarbons like methane and ethane. These compounds exist in their liquid
state on the moon, where the temperature averages 180{+0}C. Titan
resembles a deep frozen version of Earth, making it an attractive target for
exploration. The plan is funded by an initiative called Nasa Innovative
Advanced Concepts (NIAC), where researchers are encouraged to think out of the
box. That’s quite liberating, says the scientist behind the project, Dr.
Ralph Lorenz, who is outlining the concept here at the Lunar and Planetary
Science Conference (LPSC) in Texas. Dr. Lorenz believes the mission is
eminently achievable with the right resources, timing and technology. Unmanned
underwater vehicles (UUVs) are now widely used for military purposes, by search
teams, in oil exploration and scientific investigation. So existing
technologies could be adapted for use on another world. One of the most
striking aspects of the proposal is a plan to deliver the sub in a variant of
the U.S. military’s secretive mini-space shuttle, the X-37B. The sub
would fit in the payload bay of the unmanned shuttle, with the stack then
launched on a rocket. Once at Titan, the shuttle and its payload would glide
down through the moon’s soupy atmosphere.
Ø Mammoth Russian military drills ordered by President Vladimir Putin from
the Pacific to the Black Sea are designed to send a message to the West: keep
your distance and do not overplay your hand on Ukraine. Since the start
of the Ukraine crisis more than a year ago, Russia has flexed its muscles with
a series of war games but the scale of the latest military exercises —
including sending nuclear bombers to Crimea and ballistic missiles to
Kaliningrad in central Europe — has triggered a series of new questions.
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