 A very good evening to all my dear friends. First of all Shankar IAS Academy would like to inform you that we had received overwhelming response towards our free main scholarship test 2020. So in this regard, all the registered aspirants must take note of some important instructions with regard to our free main scholarship test 2020. First of all, all the registered aspirants must participate and submit your answers on all the five days that is from 27th July 2020 to 31st July 2020. And the answers must be submitted within 24 hours after the question is published. And note that the portal to upload answers will be available for 24 hours from 6pm every day. And the link of the portal will be available in our daily news analysis video. Now talking about the answer sheets, the scanned copy of answer must contain your name, mobile number and unique ID. And aspirants should strictly other to the margins on the paper. And finally you should other to the word limit, that is you should write the answers in 150 words for 10 marks question, that is two pages. And for 250 words for 15 marks question, that is three pages. And also note that the words should be visible for evaluation. And the link for uploading your answers will be enabled from 27th July 2020 at 6pm. So Shankar IAS Academy wish all the aspirants a very good luck. Now we will start our Hindu news analysis for the date 26th July 2020. The list of the news articles along with the page numbers of five different editions is given here for your reference. And the time stampings for all the news articles taken up for today's discussion is given in the description section and also in the comment section for the best interest of the viewers. Let us now begin our analysis. Now this news assumes importance in the recent Rajasthan assembly issue which has led to a political crisis in the state. Particularly this article talks about the deadlock between Rajasthan governor and Rajasthan chief minister over the summoning of an assembly session for a floor test. We know that even day before yesterday the CM took his party MLAs to Rajgavan where they protested and demanded that an assembly session should be called. And the issue subsided only when the governor assured that he will follow the constitution of India. So to make a decision on summoning of the assembly section, the governor has noted some comments and sent an order to the CM. So now the Rajasthan cabinet has to address these comments. And this has raised some important questions of whether cabinet's decision is binding on the governor. And it also raised questions about what are the powers of governor regarding this. So we will answer all these questions in this discussion. The syllabus relevant for this analysis is highlighted here for your reference. Please go through it. So first to know whether a cabinet's decision is binding on the governor, we need to understand two important articles of the constitution. And they are article 174 clause 1 and article 163. The article 174 clause 1 provides that the governor shall summon the legislative assembly from time to time. So it is a legislative power of the governor. Now talking about article 163 clause 1, the first part of the article requires the governor to act on aid and advice of the council of ministers headed by the chief minister. But know that here there is an exception in the later part of the clause. And this is in regard to the matters where the governor is required to function in his or her discretion. The expression required signifies that the governor can exercise his or her discretionary powers only if there is a compelling necessity to do so. Here keep in mind the accepted principle of parliamentary democracy with a responsible form of government. It says that the powers of the governor as constitutional head or former head of the state should not be enlarged at the cost of the real executive that is the council of ministers. Thus article 163 does not give in general the discretionary power to the governor. Here discretionary power means to act against or without the aid and advice of the council of ministers. So understand that the area of exercising the governor's discretionary power is limited. And even in this limited area the governor's choice of action should not be arbitrary or fanciful. Rather it must be a choice dictated by reason, actuated by good faith and moderated by caution. So does the governor have discretionary power to act against or without the aid and advice of the council of ministers or the cabinet to summon a house? Now this doubt is cleared by the Supreme Court in 2016 case law which is discussed in this news article. It is Nabam Rabiya and Bamang Felix versus the deputy speaker of Arunachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly. So the constitution bench of Supreme Court has noted that when the confidence of the house is included in the question, the conclusion of two commissions report can be adopted as the correct expression of the constitutional interpretation. It is the Justice Sarkarya commission report and the Justice MM Panchi commission report. And based on these reports, the Supreme Court held that as long as the council of ministers enjoy the confidence of the house, the aid and advice of the council of ministers headed by the chief minister is binding on the governor. And it can be on the subjects of summoning, proroguing or dissolving the house of the state legislature. But this position will change if the government in power has lost the confidence of the house. Hence, as and when the chief minister does not enjoy support from the majority of the house, it is open to the governor to act on his or her own discretion. That is without the aid and advice of the council of ministers. And this means the aid and advice sustains and subsists till the government enjoy the confidence of the legislature. Now with respect to today's news, the Rajasthan chief minister has claimed that he has a majority and he has asked the governor to summon the house for a floor test. That means governor is bound to convene a meeting of the assembly for this floor test on the recommendation of the cabinet. Now we will briefly discuss about the powers and functions of the governor. Let's also see how it is different from that of the precedents powers and functions. Know that generally a governor processes executive, legislative, financial and judicial powers. And these are similar to the president. But know that the governor does not enjoy diplomatic, military or emergency powers like the president. Here executive power means appointing the chief minister and other ministers and also making rules for the more convenient transaction of business of the state government. And legislative power means the governor can promulgate ordinances when the state legislature is not in session. And talking about financial powers, it pertains to money bills which can be introduced in the state assembly only with the prior recommendation of governor. And finally judicial power pertains to granting pardons, reprise, respite and remission of the punishment or to suspend, remit and commute the sentence of any persons convicted for any offense against a state law. So in this discussion, we saw about the recent issue in the Rajasthan assembly and we saw the powers and functions of the governor and how it is different from that of the president. And we also saw the Supreme Court's interpretation about the discretionary powers of the governor. Now with this, we'll move on to the next news. Now this news article is about a recent research made on Neanderthal genomes. The study has found that some people from Central and South America and also from Europe have inherited a Neanderthal variant of a gene. And this gene encodes an ion channel in nerves that initiates the sensation of pain. So this explains how some people have a low threshold for pain. So in this context, let us discuss the origin and evolution of human beings. See, this topic is very important for pilgrims and the syllabus relevant for this particular topic is given here for your reference. Please go through it. So friends know that the human evolution is a lengthy process of change by which people originated from ape-like ancestors. The evidence shows that the physical and behavioral traits shared by all people originated from ape-like ancestors and evolved over a period of approximately six million years. And one of the earliest defining human traits that is bipedalism, which means ability to work on two legs, evolved over four million years ago. And other important human characteristics such as large and complex brain and the ability to make and use tools and also the capacity for language developed more recently. Many advanced traits such as complex symbolic expression, art and elaborate cultural diversity emerged mainly during the past one lakh years. As we know, humans are primates. Physical and genetic similarities show that the modern human species that is Homo sapiens has a very close relationship to another group of primate species that is apes. Note that humans and great apes of Africa such as chimpanzees and gorillas share a common ancestor that lived between eight and six million years ago. Humans first evolved in Africa and much of the human evolution occurred on the African continent. And the forces of early humans who lived between six and two million years ago come entirely from Africa. And know that the scientific study of human evolution is called paleoanthropology. And most scientists currently recognize some 15 to 20 different species of early humans. So let us see some of the important species from Prince point of view. See about 15 million years ago, primates called dryopithecus and Ramapithecus were existing. They were hairy and walked like gorillas and chimpanzees. The Ramapithecus was more man-like while dryopithecus was more ape-like. And few forces of man-like bones have been discovered in Ethiopia and Tanzania. This revealed hominid futures leading to the belief that about three to four million years ago, man-like primates walked in eastern Africa. And they were probably not taller than four feet but walked upright. And know that about two million years ago, Australopithecus probably lived in eastern African grasslands. Evidence show that they hunted with stone weapons but essentially ate fruits. So this creature was thought to be the first human-like hominid and was called Homo habilis. And their brain capacity was about 650 to 800 cubic centimeters. And they probably did not eat meat. And forces discovered in Java that is present day Indonesia in 1891 revealed the next stage of human evolution that is Homo erectus. And it was about 1.5 million years ago. And Homo erectus had a comparatively large brain which was around 900 cubic centimeters. And Homo erectus probably ate meat. The Neanderthal man with a brain size of 1400 cubic centimeters lived in Near East and Central Asia. And it was between 1 lakh to 40,000 years back. And they used hides or skin to protect their body and buried their dead ones. So we can relate our lifestyles and customs with Neanderthal man. Later the Homo sapiens arose in Africa and moved across continents and developed into distinct races. And during Ice Age between 75,000 years ago to 10,000 years ago modern Homo sapiens arose. And when we talk about prehistoric cave art know that the prehistoric cave art developed about 18,000 years ago. It is to be noted that agriculture came into existence 10,000 years ago and hence human settlements started. And the rest of what happened is part of human history of growth and decline of civilizations. So in this discussion we talked how human species evolved. And the practice questions related to this topic will be discussed in the end of the analysis. With this we'll move on to the next news. Now this news article is with reference to the report of the monitoring team of United Nations Security Council Committee concerning Islamic State in Iraq and Lebanon that is ISIL and Al-Qaeda. In this discussion we will see in brief about the committee and its monitoring team. We will also see the findings of the report of this monitoring team. The syllabus relevant for this analysis highlighted here for your reference. Please go through it. Initially there was a UNSC resolution 1267 and this resolution was adopted by the UNSC in 1999. So this resolution imposed a limited air embargo and assets freeze on the Taliban. The resolution also gave provisions to establish a committee of the Security Council and the committee will consist all the members of the Security Council. And this committee will undertake certain tasks to prevent Taliban from using their air bases for terrorist installations or for the purpose of terrorist attacks. And over the time the regime evolved and the measures became a targeted assets freeze with travel ban and arms embargo against designated individuals and entities. And in addition to Taliban, the focus was also specifically given to Al-Qaeda by the UNSC. And this is based on the UNSC resolutions in 2011 such as the resolution 1988 and 1989. And with adoption of these resolutions the UN Security Council decided that the list of individuals and entities subject to the sanction measures would be spread into two. The 1267 committee is to be called as Al-Qaeda sanctions committee. And it was mandated to oversee implementations of the measures against individuals and entities associated with Al-Qaeda. And a separate committee was established pursuant to resolution 1988. And this committee is to oversee the implementations of the measures taken against individuals and entities associated with the Taliban. And this committee is formally called as 1988 sanctions committee. In December 2015, the Al-Qaeda sanctions committee's mandate was expanded to include individuals and entities supporting ISIL also. And since then the committee is called as Al-Qaeda and ISIL sanctions committee. For the effective functioning of the 1267 committee, a team was required to carry out analysis, monitoring of the implementation of measures and other related functions. So for this purpose, a resolution was adopted in 2004 by the UNSC. And this resolution provided for establishing an analytical support and sanctions monitoring team shortly called as monitoring team. It was initially thought to be established temporarily for 18 months, but the team's mandate was extended from time to time. And at present the mandate is still December, 2021. So it is comprised of 10 experts and the team is based in New York. One of the important tasks of this monitoring team is to study and report on the changing nature of the threat posed by ISIL, Al-Qaeda and Al-Nasra friend and also Boko Haram and Taliban. The team will also report on best measures to confront these threats. So in person of these functions, the analytical support and sanctions monitoring team of UNSC has submitted a report in June, 2020. And this report was submitted to the sanctions committee, which we'll examine the report. So when we talk about this report, this report had two serious observations in connection with India with respect to the operations of few terror elements. One is that there is a terror group called Al-Qaeda in Indian subcontinent, that is AQIS. The report states that this group operates under the Taliban umbrella from Nimrish, Helmand and Kandahar provinces of Afghanistan. The group reportedly has between 150 to 200 members. And these members are not only from Bangladesh, Myanmar and Pakistan, but also from India. In September last year, the leader of this group was killed reportedly in a joint US-Afghan military operation in Afghanistan. So AQIS is reportedly planning retaliation operations in the region of Indian subcontinent to avenge the death of its former leader. The second finding is that there is an ISIL Indian affiliate called as Hindvileya. And this group was announced in 10 May, 2019. And it also has around 180 to 200 members. And through this group, the ISIL has significant number of its operatives in states of Kerala and Karnataka in India. So these are the two important informations from the report pertaining to India. So with this, we'll come to the end of analysis of this news article. So in this analysis, we discussed about the UNSC sanctions committee related to ISIL and Al-Qaeda. Then we saw about the analytical support and sanctions monitoring team of UNSC. And finally, we saw the two disturbing findings from the report regarding India. Now let us move on to the next news article. Now have a look at this question. This question is framed based on this news article which is about a recent decision by the national company law appellate tribunal that is NCLAT. It says that NCLAT approved the resolution plan which was submitted by Adani Pods Special Economic Zone Limited for Digipod Limited in Maharashtra. So in this context, let us see in brief about the national company law appellate tribunal. So before that, we will discuss about the insolvency and bankruptcy code of 2016. See, insolvency is a financial state when the value of total assets of an individual or a group exceeds its liabilities. Insolvency leads to a state of default which happens due to financial failure or business failure. So a person facing insolvency needs to take corrective actions to rectify the situation to avoid possible bankruptcy. Here, know that bankruptcy is the next state of insolvency. Here, an individual is declared as incapable of paying up his debts or bills at a time in present as well as in a foreseeable future. So generally speaking, failure of resolution process leads to bankruptcy. Know that resolution refers to a plan proposed by any authorized person or entity for enabling the overdue payments of a corporate debtor. This will be through restructuring of the entity or even through partial payments of the debts. And it will be done by allowing the corporate debtor to continue his business. So now comes the national company law tribunal. Know that the national company law tribunal or NCLT is the adjudicating authority under IBC 2016. It is in relation to insolvency resolution and liquidation for corporate persons including corporate debtors. And we also have national company law appellate tribunal or NCLT. So any person agreed by the order of national company law tribunal may prefer to appeal to national company law appellate tribunal. Here, we have explained about NCLT and NCLT in our 19th December 2019 news analysis. So assume a company is declared insolvent. If NCLT admits its insolvency proceeding under IBC it will appoint a resolution professional or RP. A resolution professional has a duty to preserve and protect the assets of the corporate debtor. And it also includes continuing the business operations of the corporate debtor. The resolution professional also has to invite the prospective lenders, investors and any other person to put forward resolution plans for the debtor company. Then the committee of creditors has to accept the resolution plan proposed by the investors or lenders. Note that all the decisions of the committee of creditors shall be taken by a vote of not less than 75% of voting share of the financial creditors. So the entire proceedings of IBC have been explained elaborately on our 16th November 2019 analysis. And friends, as an additional information know that the national company law appellate tribunal is also the appellate tribunal to hear and dispose of appeals against any directions issued or decisions made or orders passed by the competition commission of India. Now with this, have a look at this question with reference to the insolvency and bankruptcy court of 2016 which of the given statements is correct. We have the first statement, high courts of each state act as the adjudicating authority for matters related to insolvency, resolution and liquidation for corporate persons in that state. We know that this statement is incorrect. Here national company law tribunal is the adjudicating authority and not the high court. Now we have statement C, an operational creditor is a person or an institution that lends money to the company for its functioning. So this statement is also incorrect. Know that operational debt is a claim made in respect of the provisions of goods and services including employment to the company. And we have the fourth statement, the national company law appellate tribunal is established under the insolvency and bankruptcy court of 2016. So this statement is also incorrect. National company law appellate tribunal was constituted under section 410 of the company's act of 2013. Now see the second statement that is statement B. The committee of creditors that is COC consists of all the financial creditors of the corporate debtor. So this statement is correct. Here a financial creditor is a person or an institution that lends money to the company for its functioning. So the question asked for identifying the correct statement. Here the correct statement is statement B. With this we'll move on to the next news. Now have a look at this question. This question is framed based on the news article which mentions that IIT Kharagpur researchers have invented a novel portable non-invasive rapid diagnostic device to detect COVID-19 infection. The test is done with extracted RNA from saliva samples. And it can be conducted in an ultra low cost portable enclosure which is an alternative to specialized laboratory equipments. Know that it is a first of its kind device which enables testing at affordable costs for underserved community across the world. This is because it costs less than 400 rupees per test. And another advantage of this device is that the same portable unit can be used for large number of tests. This is because it deploys a disposable simple paper strip for chemical analysis and visualization of results. So by replacing the paper cartridge after each test the device can be reused. And also the device has been proven to produce results with remarkable accuracy and sensitivity compared to the standard RT-PCR tests. And the test results are available in a customized smartphone application which will be disseminated within one hour and doesn't require manual interpretation. Also it can be operated by minimally trained personnel thus preventing the need for skilled technicians. And further the test is designed to be capable of detecting any other kind of RNA virus that is not only COVID-19 by following the same generic procedure. So we can say that it will empower us to detect the unforeseen viral pandemics in the future. Now coming to RT-PCR it stands for reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction. It is a laboratory method used to make many copies of a specific genetic sequence for analysis. It uses an enzyme called reverse transcriptase to change a specific piece of RNA into a matching piece of DNA. And this piece of DNA is then amplified by another enzyme called DNA polymerase. The amplified DNA copies help to tell whether a specific messenger RNA or mRNA molecule is being made by a gene. In simple words, RNA is reverse transcribed to DNA using a specific enzyme. Then what happens is like, scientists then add additional short fragments of DNA that are complementary to the specific parts of transcribed viral DNA. So if the virus is present in the sample these fragments attach themselves to the target sections of the viral DNA. Some of the added genetic fragments are used for building the DNA and also for adding marker labels to the strands which are then used to detect the virus. It is then placed in the RT-PCR machine and the machine cycles through temperatures that heat and cools the mixture to trigger specific chemical reactions that create new identical copies of the target sections of the viral DNA. And as the new copies of the viral DNA sections are built, the marker labels attach to the DNA strands and then release a fluorescent dye. And this is measured by the machine's computer and it will be presented on the screen. That is, the computer tracks the amount of fluorescence in the sample after each cycle. If a certain level of fluorescence is surpassed then it means virus is present. Scientists also monitor how many cycles it takes to reach this level to estimate the severity of the infection. Fewer the cycles, the more severe will be the viral infection. So here we should know that RT-PCR based tests require an elaborate laboratory infrastructure and support system which includes the operational and maintenance cost to perform that test. And when we talk about the new equipment which was developed by the IIT researchers the cost for this equipment is around 2000 rupees. But an RT-PCR mission cost around 15 lakh. Now with this we'll see the question which of the following statements is not correct with reference to RT-PCR test often seen in news. We have four options given here and when you see option A, C and D they are correct and we have option B which is incorrect. Here the given statement is in this DNA is reverse transcribed to RNA using a specific enzyme. It is the other way around RNA is reverse transcribed to DNA using a specific enzyme. So statement B is incorrect so the correct answer is option B. With this we'll move on to the practice questions based on today's news analysis. The first question is based on governor. Consider the following statements. The governor shall make rules for the more convenient transaction of the business of the government of the state and for the allocation among ministers of the said business. The second statement is all the executive actions of the government of state shall be expressed to be taken in the name of the chief minister. So we know that the first statement is correct it is according to article 166, clause 3 and the second statement is incorrect. According to article 166, clause 1 it is to be taken in the name of the governor and not the chief minister. So we have to identify the correct statement or statements from the given statements. So here statement 1 is correct and statement 2 is incorrect. So the correct answer is option A, one only. Now we have the second question which is with reference to the evolution of human beings. Which among the following is the correct sequence of evolution of human beings? We have four options here. The correct answer is option A that is Australopithecus, Homo erectus, Neanderthal and then Homo sapiens. Now we have the third question which is a map based question. Arrange the following places in Afghanistan from east to west. We have three places given here. One is Helmand, second is Nimruz and third one is Kandahar. So here the correct answer is option B that is when we arrange from east to west Kandahar comes first, then comes Helmand and then comes Nimruz. And also make note of Kabul and Harad province of Afghanistan. Here Kabul lies in the east and Harad lies in the west part of Afghanistan. With this we'll come to an end of analysis of all the news articles taken up for today's discussion and also the discussion of practice questions. If you like this video press the like button, comment and share and do subscribe to Shankara IS Academy YouTube channel for latest videos and updates. Thank you.