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Competition (Amendment) Bill passed: Effect on Big Tech

Context: Just as the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal released its final verdict upholding the competition’s regulator’s findings that Google abused its market dominance in the Android ecosystem, the Lok Sabha passed a piece of competition-related legislation, the Competition (Amendment) Bill, 2023 which could pose a new frontier of challenges for Google and other global […]

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IMF bailout

Context: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) executive board approved a nearly $3 billion bailout plan for Sri Lanka last week, of which about $333 million was to be disbursed immediately to alleviate the country’s humanitarian crisis. What is IMF bailout? In a general sense, a bailout means extending support to an entity facing a threat […]

GS PAPER III

Angel Tax

Context: A recently proposed detail has Indian start-ups worried. These new age firms, that offer their shares to foreign investors, may have to pay ‘angel tax’, which was earlier only supposed to be paid for investments raised by resident Indian investors, as per a motion made in the Finance Bill, 2023. Importance: The move could […]

GS PAPER III

ISRO’s LVM-3 launch

Context: The launches not only established LVM3 as a commercial vehicle propelling ISRO’s entry into the commercial heavier launch market, it also earned the agency upwards of Rs 1,000 crore. The second commercial launch of the Indian Space Research Organisation’s LVM-3 saw 36 OneWeb satellites placed in orbit. This was also the second launch that […]

GS PAPER III

WILDLIFE (PROTECTION) AMENDMENT ACT 2022

Rationalizing schedules:Currently, the Act has six schedules for specially protected plants (one), specially protected animals (four), and vermin species (one).  Vermin refers to small animals that carry disease and destroy food.  The amended act reduces the total number of schedules to four by: (i) reducing the number of schedules for specially protected animals to two […]

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Wood-burning as renewable energy source

Context: The European Union’s race to rid itself of dependence on Russian fossil fuels is well underway. The International Energy Agency says widespread bids to beef up energy security “turbocharged” growth of green power in 2022, and EU parliamentarians hope to ramp up renewables targets to reach 45% of bloc-wide energy consumption by 2030. Importance: The word […]

GS PAPER III

Additional Tier-1 (AT-1) bonds

  CONTEXT: The haste at which the purchase of Credit Suisse, a Swiss bank, by ubs, its great rival, was arranged left investors scrambling to understand the deal. One consequence is causing particular pain. The decision to write down around sfr16bn ($17bn) in Additional-Tier 1 (at1) bonds issued by Credit Suisse has evoked fury from […]