Kumartuli’s sculptures, AMRUT Scheme, Court Vacations

• Kerala is all set for the southwest monsoon today (30^th May), two days ahead of its normal onset date.
• Southwest monsoon usually sets in over Kerala around June 1 and progresses northward in surges, covering the entire country around July 15.
• There are three major criteria set for the declaration of monsoon over Kerala:
• Rainfall over 14 stations in Kerala and neighbouring areas should record over 2.5 mm for two consecutive days.
• The Outgoing Longwave Radiation (OLR) should be below 200 W m⁻².
• The depth of the westerly winds, which should be up to 600 hPa, indicates the strength of the monsoon winds, Westerly winds should prevail up to 4.5km in height in the atmosphere.
• Kerala also witnessed some unusual weather events in this year’s summer.
• For the first time in the history of Kerala, a heatwave was confirmed.
• The monthly and seasonal forecast issued by the IMD for June and the entire four-month season has warned of above-normal rainfall in Kerala.

Dig Deeper: Which factors impact the progress of Monsoon in India?

• Kumartuli is known globally for its age-old tradition of modelling clay idols, especially of Goddess Durga for Navaratri.
• The working and living conditions of Kumartuli remain poor.
• In 2022, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) included Durga Puja on its Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity list.

Dig Deeper: Read about all the Intangible Cultural Heritage Sites recognised by UNESCO in India.

• The Indian science ecosystem is now ranking third globally in research output, and eleventh in quality, according to the Nature Index.
• ‘Ease of doing science’ can lead to discoveries and innovation hinges on robust infrastructure and resources.
• From 2014 to 2021, the number of universities in India rose from 760 to 1,113.
• Essential resources such as instrumental access, sophisticated labs and access to the literature underpins research.
• There has been a pioneering initiative, I-STEM, to bridge the gap by cataloguing all publicly funded research facilities nationwide and making them available to researchers based on need.
• The call for ‘One Nation, One Subscription (ONOS)’ proposes a centralised model of subscription to scientific journals, making them universally available to all publicly funded institutions.
• A much larger fraction of articles is available via Open Access (OA), which means that articles are available freely for everyone online.
• An analysis of publications indexed in the Web of Science shows that the fraction of OA publications globally increased from 38% in 2018 to 50% in 2022.
• Green Open Access: Every article authored by Indian researchers and funded by taxpayer money should be archived in publicly funded OA repositories. This practice exemplifies Green Open Access.

Dig Deeper: Read about the research and development programmes of the Department of Science.

• Around 36% of India’s population is living in cities and by 2047 it will be more than 50%.
• The AMRUT (Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation) scheme was a flagship programme launched by the NDA-1 government in June 2015, with its 2.0 version launched on October 1, 2021.
• Some financial assistance from the Centre and the rest of the share mobilised by both States and respective cities.
• The mission was drawn to cover 500 cities and towns with a population of over one lakh with notified municipalities.
• The purpose of the AMRUT mission was to
• Ensure that every household has access to a tap with an assured supply of water and a sewerage connection
• Increase the value of cities by developing greenery and well-maintained open spaces such as parks and
• Reduce pollution by switching to public transport or constructing facilities for non-motorised transport.
• AMRUT 2.0 was aimed at making cities ‘water secure’ and providing functional water tap connections to all households in all statutory towns.
• Ambitious targets were set up such as providing 100% sewage management in 500 AMRUT cities.

Dig Deeper: Is Jal Jeevan Mission part of the AMRUT scheme?

• The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) successfully flight-tested the indigenously-developed RudraM-II air-to-surface missile from a Su-30 MKI jet off the Odisha coast.
• The flight test met all the trial objectives, validating the propulsion system and control & guidance algorithm.
• The performance of the missile has been validated from the flight data captured by range tracking instruments, it added.

Dig Deeper: Read about India’s Surface to Air missiles along with

• The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has imposed business restrictions on Edelweiss Asset Reconstruction Company (EARCL) and ECL Finance Ltd (ECL) due to improper practices, such as evergreening loans and incorrect valuation of security receipts (SRs).
• Evergreening of loans refers to extending more loans to prevent defaults, a temporary solution that circumvents regulations.
• The RBI found that EARCL and ECL engaged in structured transactions to evergreen stressed exposures of ECL, using EARCL and connected Alternate Investment Funds (AIFs).
• The RBI has directed both companies to enhance their compliance functions to ensure adherence to regulations.

Dig Deeper:  Evergreening of Patents (Section 3d of Indian Patents Act).

The Supreme Court has 193 working days a year for its judicial functioning, while the High Courts function for approximately 210 days, and trial courts for 245 days.

• The Supreme Court breaks for its annual summer vacation which is typically for seven weeks — it starts at the end of May, and the court reopens in July.
• The court takes a week-long break each for Dussehra and Diwali, and two weeks at the end of December.
• While this judicial schedule has its origins in colonial practices, it has come under criticism for quite some time now.
• Generally, two or three judges, called “vacation benches”, hear important cases that cannot wait.
• Cases such as bail, eviction, etc. often find precedence in listing before vacation benches.
• For example, in 2015, a five-judge Bench of the Supreme Court heard the challenge to the constitutional amendment setting up the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC) during the summer vacation.

Dig Deeper: Procedure for appointment of Judges in Supreme Court in India, USA and UK.

• Global temperature records are increasingly being broken due to climate change.
• The highest temperature ever recorded on Earth was 56.7°C in Death Valley, California, in 1913.
• An analysis by Carbon Brief shows that nearly 40% of the Earth’s surface recorded its highest-ever daily temperature between 2013 and 2023, including places in Antarctica.
• India’s highest temperature was recorded in Phalodi, Rajasthan, during this period.
• Delhi recently recorded a potentially record-breaking 52.9°C in Mungeshpur, but this reading is under verification due to discrepancies with other stations.
• Globally, 2024 is expected to continue the trend from 2023, the warmest year on record.
• April 2024 marked the 11th consecutive month of record-high global average temperatures.
• From May 2023 to April 2024, global temperatures were about 1.61°C higher than pre-industrial levels.
• India’s annual mean temperatures have risen by 0.7°C since 1900.

Dig Deeper: Read about Wet and Dry Bulb Temperatures.