APRIL 2013 ARCHEOLOGICAL, SPACE, DISASTERS ETC

ARCHAEOLOGY

ARCHAEOLOGISTS DISCOVER  12,000 YEARS OLD PAINTINGS IN BETUL

The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) has discovered prehistoric caves with rock paintings dating back to 12,000 years on the Satpura mountain range near Betul on the Maharashtra Madhya Pradesh border. A team of archaeologists, carrying out explorations on the Satpura ranges in Gawilgarh Hills, stumbled on these ancient paintings, dispelling the myth that Vidarbha and its neighbouring region is bereft of such artistic treasures from past. About 71 rock shelters harbouring paintings and engravings have been found.

CLUSTERS OF 2000 YEARS OLD PYRAMIDS FOUND IN SUDAN

Around 35 small ancient pyramids, alongwith graves, dating back 2,000 years have been discovered clustered closely together at a site in Sudan, archaeologists say. The biggest pyramids  discovered in Sedeinga are 22 feet wide at base with the smallest example, likely constructed for the burial of a child, being only 30 inches long. "The density of the pyramids is huge", said Vincent Francigny, a research associate with the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

PROJECTS

ENVIRONMENT MINISTRY GIVES APPROVAL FOR TAWANG HYDEL PROJECT

Within days of China announcing three new hydroelectric projects on the Brahmputra river and catching India by surprise, the Centre has set the ball rolling to build the strategic Tawang hydroelectric project in Arunachal Pradesh.

The 800 MV power project proposed to be built on the Tawang Chu river has got the forest clearance, with the Environment ministry waiving the cumulative impact assessment for stage-I clearance that it was earlier insisting. While the project proposal had been discussed at two meetings of the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) in April and September last year, it was felt that a comprehensive study was needed to assess the cumulative impact of the projects planned in the Tawang basin before the projects are considered for clearance.

The FAC has also cleared the Along-Kaying-Tato road in West Siang district, noting the strategic importance of the road for the Indian Army and its need to ease communication for the local population.

With both the State Government and the Centre now raising the pitch in favour of the projects, the FAC cleared the project at a meeting on January 21-22. Power Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia had also met Environment Minister Jayanthi Natarajan on the issue and had suggested that the cumulative study on the Tawang basin be delinked from stage-I forest clearance, a proposal backed by the State Government as well.

The  National  Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) that will be setting up the hydel project has submitted before the FAC that the State Government has already identified the organisation that will carry out the basin study and a MoU will soon be signed.

NHPC has also informed the FAC that the issue of environmental flow has also been addressed through the commitment it has made in its environment management plan to assure minimum flow of 10 cumcc in the lean season.

Considering the 'reasonable progress' made by the State Government and user agency and the demands made by the Government of India, the FAC has said that "there is every likelihood that scientific inputs will be available for taking decisions about final approval of projects as well as for considering other projects proposed in the river basin".

It has accordingly decided to 'relax' its recommendations of completion of cumulative impact assessment study prior to stage-I clearance and recommended the proposal. The Committee has, however, clarified that any subsequent hydro-electric project in the Tawang basin shall be considered only after the cumulative assessment report and its recommendations, according to minutes of the FAC meetings.

The Tawang hydroelectric project will require diversion of 116 hectares of forest land including 19.6 hectares for underground use.

While there is no violation of the Forest Conservation Act involved in the diversion, 62 families will be affected by the project and a rehabilitation programme has been prepared for the same. The nearest protected area is the Eagle Nest Wildlife Sanctuary that is about 27 km away from the barrage site and 32 km away from the Power-House. The project is a run-of-the-river scheme and a pondage of 6.19 ha. including the riverbed will be created by 28 m high barrage.

DISASTER

METEOR HITS RUSSIA TOWN, 750 INJURED

[Sonic boom caused by meteor's fall shattered windows in Chelyabinsk]

A meteor streaked through the sky and exploded on February 15, 2013 over Russia's Ural Mountains with the power of an atomic bomb, its sonic blasts shattering countless windows and injuring more than 750 people. The spectacle deeply frightened thousands, with some elderly women declaring the world was coming to an end. The meteor estimated to be about 10 tons entered the earth’s atmosphere at a hypersonic speed of at least 54000 kmph and shattered about 30-35 km above the ground, the Russian Academy of Sciences said in a statement. It released the energy of several kilotons above the Chelyabinsk region, the academy said.

Amateur video broadcast on Russian television showed an object speeding across the sky about 920 am local time, just after sunrise, leaving a thick white contrail and an intense flash.

Small pieces of space debris-usually parts of comets or asteroids-that are on a collision course with the Earth are called meteoroids. They become meteors when they enter the Earth's atmosphere. Most meteors burn up in the atmosphere but if they survive the frictional heating and strike the surface of the Earth they are called meteorites.

Meteors typically cause sizeable sonic booms when they enter the atmosphere because they are travelling much faster than the speed of sound. Injuries on the scale reported on February 2013, however, are extraordinarily rare.

Space

NASA SPACECRAFT FINDS A MONSTER COMET

A NASA space craft that had been ‘put to sleep’ has photographed a comet with a 64000 km long tail hurtling towards the sun. Deep Impact, the spacecraft, acquired the first images of Comet C/2012 S1 (ISON). The images were taken by the spacecraft's medium-resolution imager over a 36-hour period on January 17 and 18, 2013. At that time Deep Impact was 793 million kilometre away from the comet, a Nasa statement said. ISON is lurking just inside of Jupiter at present. In November, it will come to within 1.6 million kilometre of the Sun, according to NASA.  NASA Curiosity Collects Historic Sample on Mars For the first time, NASA's curiosity rover has used its on-board drill to collect a sample of Martian bedrock that might offer evidence of a wet environment which may have once hosted life on the red planet. This is the first time any robot has drilled into a rock to collect a sample on Mars, the US space agency said. The fresh hole, about 0.63 inch wide and 2.5 inches deep in a patch of fine grained sedimentary bedrock, can be seen in latest images and other data curiosity beamed to Earth. The rock is believed to hold evidence about long-gone wet environments.

PLACES IN THE NEWS

MAENAM WILDLIFE SANCTUARY, SIKKIM

The first wildlife skywalk of India will be coming up in Maenam wildlife sanctuary, Sikkim. The State Government of Sikkim proposed to construct 22 km rope-way from Maenam sanctuary to skywalk which would be built on edge of Bhalleydhunga steep face. This will also have rain shelter as well as public conveniences. Maenam wildlife sanctuary in Sikkim is 65 km south from Gangtok, the capital of the state. It is a popular tourist destination as well.

The environment ministry too has approved the proposal of Sikkim government for the first wildlife skywalk of India proposal that would cost Rs. 500 crore.

This skywalk would be like the one in Grand Canyon in

North America. The skywalk in Grand Canyon in North America gets more than 300000 visitors every year, inspite of opposition from the wild-lifers.

KISHANGANGA PROJECT

The Court of Arbitration at The Hague on February 18, 2013 allowed India to go ahead with the Construction of the Kishanganga hydro-electric project in Gurez valley near Bandipura in North Kashmir, the court rejected the plea of Pakistan that the construction was a violation of 1960 Indus Water Treaty.

The Court of Arbitration, chaired by Stephen M. Schwebel in its orders stated that India can move ahead with the diversion of water plans of Kishanganga that is a tributary of Jhelum, for generation of hydro-electric power. But it restrained India from adoption of the draw down technique of flushing for clearing the sedimentation of the run-of-the river project that had been designed and asked it to adopt a different technique for generation of 330 MW power facilities. The Court had also demanded the environmental flows statistics of the project.     Bhaswati Mukherjee, Indian Ambassador and her Pakistani counterpart Fauzia Mazhar Sana received the

Judgement of the Court at The Hague. Pakistan initiated the arbitration against India with a charge that India violated the provisions of the Water Treaty between the two countries. But India denied the

charges forced on to it by explain that the country reserved

its rights to divert the water from one of the tributaries of Jhelum to another.

HYDERABAD

Two bomb-blasts took place in Dilsukhnagar, the busy shopping area of Hyderabad, the Capital City of Andhra Pradesh on February 21, 2013. 14 people were reported dead and 119 were critically injured in the serial blasts that rocked the city around 6: 50 pm. Investigations were ordered by both the Central

Government and the State Government to find out the group involved in the blast. The State Government of Andhra Pradesh appointed a probe team into the matter. The blasts were triggered using the Improvised Explosive Devices (IED), which were placed on two different bicycles at a distance of 100 metres from each other near Konark and Venkatadri theatres. The area of blasts lie on the Hyderabad-Vijaywada National Highway within Cyberabad police limits.

GWADAR FORT

Pakistan finally took the decision of handing over the

strategically vital Gwadar port the Chinain in February

2013. The government on February 19, 2013 formally awarded a multi-billion dollars contract for construction and operation of Gwadar Port to China with the hope that the port's development would open up new vistas of progress in Pakistan, particularly Balochistan.

Located at the top of Arabian sea and mouth of Gulf near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, Gwadar port is at the apex of busy trading and oil shipping route and surrounded by a region that houses around two-thirds of the world's oil reserves. Besides Pakistan and China, its natural beneficiaries will be the landlocked, but energyrich, Central Asian Republics and Afghanistan, for whom it is the nearest warm-water sea port.

It is located at the mouth of the Persian Gulf, approximately 460 km (290 mi) west of Karachi, 75 km (47 mi) east of Pakistan's border with Iran and 380 km (240 mi) km northeast of the nearest point in Oman across the

Arabian Sea. It is situated on the eastern bay of a natural hammerhead-shaped Peninsula protruding into the Arabian sea from the coastline.

BALRAMPUR

Chhattisgarh has signed an agreement with the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) to set up the country's first geothermal power plant in its newlyformed Balrampur district.

A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the project was signed in February 2013 between the NTPC and the Chhattisgarh Renewable Energy Development Agency (CREDA). The plant will come up at Tata Pani in Balrampur, a district located in extreme northern region of the state.

BOOKS AND AUTHORS

·     Inventing the Enemy-By Umberto ECO, Random House

·     Land of the Seven Rivers-A Brief History of India's Geography        -By Sanjeev Sanyal, Penguin Books

·        Accidental Apprentice-By Vikas Swarup Simon and Schuster.

·     Salvation of a Saint    -By Keigo Higashino

·        The Blind Man's Garden-By Nadeem Aslam Randum House. It is a novel that vividly brings out the human face of conflict.

·         Ash in the Belly-India's Unfinished Battle Against 'Hunger    -By Harsh Mander Penguin Written with reason and compassion Ash in the Belly should be read by all concerned Indians, policy makers and planners. The writing on the wall has a vital message for all those concerned about hunger and the future of Indian democracy.

IMPORTANT DAYS

National Days

April  5:      National Maritime Day

April  21:    National Civil Services Day

International Days

April  7       : World Health Day

April  22     : International Mother Earth Day

April  25:    World Malaria Day