Current Affair 1:

Committee of Experts on Sustainable Finance

 

International Financial Services Centres Authority(IFSCA) constituted an Expert Committee to recommend an approach towards development of Sustainable Finance Hub and provide a road map for the same. The expert committee is chaired by Shri C.K. Mishra, Former Secretary to Government of India, Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change.

The key Terms of Reference of the committee are as follows:

Need for Sustainable Finance

Sustainable finance is the investment decision that actively evaluates ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance ) factors of economic activity or project. It plays a vital role in meeting the net zero aspirations of the nations by shifting capital towards sustainable projects.

Regulatory and policy initiatives in India towards sustainable finance

1. Since 2007, India has started emphasising on green/sustainable finance. The RBI released a regulation in 2007 titled "Corporate Social Responsibility, Sustainable Development, and Non-financial Reporting — Role of Banks”, which highlights the significance of global warming and climate change in the context of sustainable development.
2. The NAPCC was created in 2008 with the objective of laying out a broad policy framework for mitigating climate change impacts.
3. The CCFU was established in 2011 within the Ministry of Finance as a coordinating body for India's different green finance organisations.
4. Since 2012, the SEBI has made it essential for the top 100 listed businesses on the BSE and NSE based on market capitalization to publish annual corporate responsibility reports, which it has updated from time to time.
5. In May 2017, SEBI issued guidelines for green bond issuance specifying the disclosure requirements.
6. From FY 2022-23, SEBI mandated the top 1000 listed companies as per market capitalization to disclose material ESG risks and opportunities, the financial implications, and their approach to mitigating or adapting to the risks through BRSR in their annual reports.
7. Also, recently SEBI has proposed guidelines to direct ESG fund managers to have at least 80% of their total assets in sustainability-themed securities from October 2022.  

The Committee has given ha big report. Not needed for you people to read.

 

Current Affair 2:

U.S.-India Strategic Clean Energy Partnership (SCEP)

 

News:

Now important points:

During the April 2021 Leaders’ Summit on Climate, President Biden and Prime Minister Modi announced a high-level U.S.- India Climate and Clean Energy Agenda 2030 Partnership, to accelerate progress toward shared climate and clean energy goals.

The agenda 2030 Partnership includes two tracks of engagement:

1) the Strategic Clean Energy Partnership (SCEP), and

2) the Climate Action and Finance Mobilization Dialogue.

The U.S.-India SCEP builds upon a longstanding bilateral energy dialogue focused on energy security and innovation. The revitalized SCEP will continue to advance energy security and innovation with greater emphasis on electrification and decarbonization of processes and end uses; scaling up emerging clean energy technologies; finding solutions for hard-to-decarbonize sectors; and deploying technical solutions.

The SCEP organizes inter-governmental engagement across five pillars of cooperation: (1) Power and Energy Efficiency; (2); Responsible Oil and Gas; (3) Renewable Energy; (4) Sustainable Growth and (5) Emerging Fuels.

Current Affair 3:

India emerges as the world’s largest producer and consumer of sugar

 

Sugar Season (Oct-Sep) 2021-22 has proven to be a watershed season for Indian Sugar Sector. All records of sugarcane production, sugar production, sugar exports, cane procured, cane dues paid and ethanol production were made during the season.

With this, India has emerged as the world’s largest producer and consumer of sugar as well as the world’s 2nd largest exporter of sugar.

During SS 2021-22, sugar mills procured sugarcane worth more than 1.18 lakh crore and released payment of more than 1.12 lakh crore with no financial assistance (subsidy) from Government of India. Thus, cane dues at the end of sugar season are less than ₹ 6,000 crore indicating that 95% of cane dues have already been cleared.

Government has been encouraging sugar mills to divert sugar to ethanol and also to export surplus sugar so that sugar mills may make payment of cane dues to farmers in time and also mills may have better financial conditions to continue their operations.

Another shining highlight of the season is the highest exports of about 109.8 LMT that too with no financial assistance which was being extended up to 2020-21.

Current Affair 4:

Removal of Governors: What does the law say?

 

What does the Constitution say?

As per Article 155 and Article 156 of the Constitution, a Governor of a state is an appointee of the President, and he or she holds office “during the pleasure of the President”.  If a Governor continues to enjoy the “pleasure of the President”, he or she can be in office for a term of five years.  Because the President is bound to act on the aid and advice of the Council of Ministers under Article 74 of the Constitution, in effect it is the central government that appoints and removes the Governors.

“Pleasure of the President” merely refers to this will and wish of the central government. The Supreme Court’s interpretation in 2010, a constitutional bench of the Supreme Court interpreted these provisions and laid down some binding principles (B.P. Singhal v. Union of India). The Supreme Court held:

• The President, in effect the central government, has the power to remove a Governor at any time without giving him or her any reason, and without granting an opportunity to be heard.
• However, this power cannot be exercised in an arbitrary, capricious or unreasonable manner.  The power of removing Governors should only be exercised in rare and exceptional circumstances for valid and compelling reasons.
• The mere reason that a Governor is at variance with the policies and ideologies of the central government, or that the central government has lost confidence in him or her, is not sufficient to remove a Governor.  Thus, a change in central government cannot be a ground for removal of Governors, or to appoint more favorable persons to this post.
• A decision to remove a Governor can be challenged in a court of law.  In such cases, first the petitioner will have to make a prima facie case of arbitrariness or bad faith on part of the central government.  If a prima facie case is established, the court can require the central government to produce the materials on the basis of which the decision was made in order to verify the presence of compelling reasons.

Governors of States in India (Article 152-162): A governor is a nominal head of a state, unlike the Chief Minister who is the real head of a state in India. According to the 7th Constitutional Amendment Act 1956, the same person can be the Governor of two or more states. The Governor of a State shall be appointed by the President by warrant under his hand and seal.  Removal:   The Governor shall hold office during the pleasure of the President.   Can be terminated earlier by: Dismissal by the president, at whose pleasure the governor holds office or Resignation by the governor. There is no provision of impeachment, as it happens for the president.

 

 

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