• According to the 2018 report on “vital statistics of India based on the Civil Registration System (CRS), Arunachal Pradesh recorded the best sex ratio in the country while Manipur recorded the worst sex ratio.
• Sex ratio at birth is the number of females born per thousand males.
• Child Sex ration is the number of females per thousand males in the age group 0–6 years in a human population.
• Arunachal Pradesh recorded 1,084 females born per thousand males, followed by Nagaland (965) Mizoram (964), Kerala (963) and Karnataka (957).
• The worst was reported in Manipur (757), Lakshadweep (839) and Daman & Diu (877), Punjab (896) and Gujarat (896).
• Delhi recorded a sex ratio of 929, Haryana 914 and Jammu and Kashmir 952.
• The prescribed time limit for registration of birth or death is 21 days. Some States however register the births and deaths even after a year.

• Param Siddhi, the high performance computing-artificial intelligence (HPC-AI) supercomputer established under National Supercomputing Mission (NSM) at C-DAC has achieved global ranking of 63 in TOP 500 most powerful non-distributed computer systems in the world released recently.
• The supercomputer was conceived by C-DAC and developed jointly with the support of Department of Science and Technology (DST), Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) under NSM.
• Param Siddhi Supercomputer is built on the NVIDIA DGX Super POD reference architecture networking along with C-DAC’s indigenously developed HPC-AI engine, software frameworks and cloud platform and will help deep learning, visual computing, virtual reality, accelerated computing, as well as graphics virtualization.

• A rare Ebola-like illness that is believed to have first originated in rural Bolivia in 2004 can spread through human-to-human transmission, researchers from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have discovered.

Chapare Virus

• The Chapare hemorrhagic fever (CHHF) is caused by the same arenavirus family that is responsible for illnesses such as the Ebola virus disease (EVD).
• According to the CDC website, arenaviruses like the Chapare virus are generally carried by rats and can be transmitted through direct contact with the infected rodent, its urine and droppings, or through contact with an infected person.
• The virus, which is named Chapare after the province in which it was first observed, causes a hemorrhagic fever much like Ebola along with abdominal pain, vomiting, bleeding gums, skin rash and pain behind the eyes.
• Viral hemorrhagic fevers are a severe and life-threatening kind of illness that can affect multiple organs and damage the walls of blood vessels.
• However, not a lot is known about the mysterious Chapare virus.
• Scientists believe that the virus could have been circulating in Bolivia for many years, even before it was formally documented.
• Infected people may have been misdiagnosed with dengue as the mosquito-borne illness is known to cause similar symptoms.

• Recently, the Chief Justice of India during the hearing of a plea filed for release of Kerala journalist Siddique Kappan, said the court is trying to discourage petitions filed under Article 32.

Article 32

• Article 32 grants the right to move the Supreme Court by appropriate proceedings for the enforcement of the fundamental rights guaranteed under Part III of the Indian Constitution.
• The rights guaranteed by Article 32 shall not be suspended except as otherwise provided for by the Constitution.
• It allows incarcerated people to directly approach the top court against violation of their fundamental rights.
• It gives Supreme Court the power to issue directions or orders or writs, including writs in the nature of habeas corpus, mandamus, prohibition, quo warranto and certiorari, whichever may be appropriate, for the enforcement of any of the rights conferred under Part III.

• Only the Fundamental Rights guaranteed by the Constitution can be enforced under Article 32 and not any other right like non-fundamental constitutional rights, statutory rights, customary rights and so on.
• In case of the enforcement of Fundamental Rights, the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court is original but not exclusive.
• It is concurrent with the jurisdiction of the high court under Article 226.

• Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and his Australian counterpart Scott Morrison have signed a landmark defence deal in a bid to counter China's growing influence in the South China Sea and over the Pacific island nations.

Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA)

• It comes weeks after foreign ministers of the Quad alliance, which includes the US and India, met in Tokyo.
• The pact allows Japanese and Australian troops to visit each other's countries and conduct training and joint operations.
• The joint statement said, the two sides also agreed on the need for a framework to allow Japanese military to protect Australian forces if needed.
• It also expressed serious concern about the situation in the South China Sea and reconfirmed their strong opposition to any coercive or unilateral attempts to change the status quo and thereby increase tensions in the region.