• Raksha Mantri Shri Rajnath Singh has approved certain decisions regarding re-organisation of Army Headquarters.
• The approval has been given based on a detailed internal study conducted by the Army Headquarters.

• A separate Vigilance Cell under COAS with Tri-Services representation - Presently, the vigilance function for the COAS is through multiple agencies and there is no single point interface.
• An independent vigilance cell will be made functional under COAS. Accordingly, ADG (Vigilance) will be placed directly under the COAS for this purpose. It will have three Colonel-level officers (one each from Indian Army, Indian Air Force and Indian Navy). This will be done within the existing posts at AHQ.

• An umbrella organisation under VCOAS for enhanced focus on human rights issues - To give high priority to observance of human rights convention and values, it has been decided to set up a special Human Rights Section headed by ADG (Major General rank officer) directly under the VCOAS.
• It will be the nodal point to examine any HR violation reports. To enhance transparency and ensure the best of investigative expertise is available to the section, a Police officer of SSP/SP rank will be taken on deputation.

• Re-location of 206 Army Officers from AHQ to Formations/Units of the Field Army - A total of 206 officers will be optimized from AHQ and these officers will be made available additionally to Formations/Units of the Field Army, as per details given below:

Relevance IN - Prelims ( about mobile metallic rampto and about DRDO

What's the NEWS

• Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) handed over the design of Mobile Metallic Ramp (MMR) to the Indian Army

Know! more about Mobile Metallic Ramp

• With load bearing capacity of 70 metric ton (MT),the MMRhas been designed and developed by DRDO's premier research laboratory, Centre for Fire, Explosive and Environment Safety (CFEES) on the requirements projected by Army for reducing the Strategic Mobility time of mobilizing Armoured Fighting Vehicles.
• The ramp will provide the strategic mobility for Armoured and Mechanized units and formations of the Army. It is portable, modular in design, which can be easily assembled or disassembled. Since, it is modular in design and portable, which can be easily assembled or disassembled.

Know! about DRDO

• The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) is an agency of the Government of India, charged with the military's research and development, headquartered in New Delhi, India.
• It was formed in 1958 by the merger of the Technical Development Establishment and the Directorate of Technical Development and Production of the Indian Ordnance Factories with the Defence Science Organisation.
• It is under the administrative control of the Ministry of Defence, Government of India.

Space Awareness ( Chndrayaan-2 updates)
Chandrayaan-2 Enters Moon Orbit
Relevance IN - Prelims ( all about chandrayaan -2) + Mains ( GS III awareness in the field of space)

What's the NEWS

• Chandrayaan-2 successfully enters Moon's orbit: The spacecraft has been injected into an elliptical orbit that is 114 km away from the moon's surface at its nearest point and 18,072 km at its farthest.
• Now this orbit would be changed through another series of manoeuvres, to let the spacecraft eventually attain a near-circular orbit of 100 km around the moon.

Know! more about the developments (as of now)

• Chandrayaan-2, India's second Moon mission, entered the lunar orbit on August 20, 2019. According to the ISRO, the next major step of this mission is the separation of the Lander Vikram from the orbiter on September 2.
• Chandrayaan-2 will perform a series of four-orbit maneuvers till September 1. It will enable the spacecraft to enter its final orbit passing over the lunar poles at a distance of about 100 km from the Moon's surface.
• Almost 30 days after it was launched, the Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft moved into lunar orbit, in preparation for a landing on September 7.
• Chandrayaan-2, launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota on July 22, is India's first lander mission to the moon.
• At this point, the Vikram lander, along with the small Pragyaan rover, is slated to separate from the main composite module and start its incremental descent towards the moon's surface.
• The separation is scheduled for September 4, following which the lander and rover would position themselves in a lower orbit, while the landing is planned to take place at 0140 hours IST on September 7. The main spacecraft module would continue to go around the moon in its orbit for at least one full year.
• On September 3, before the planned separation, a three-second operation will be carried out to check the functioning of all onboard systems on the Vikram lander. The next day, the lander and the rover will separate from the main spacecraft through a manoeuvre that will last 6.5 seconds, Sivan said.
• After separating, Vikram will not immediately land on the moon's surface. Instead, it will go around the moon for three days, during which all its parameters will be checked. Its powered descent will start in the early morning of September 7, around 1.40 am, and it is expected to land within 15 minute

Governance/Internal Security
Aadhaar-social media account linking

Relevance IN - Mains ( GS III role of external state and non state actors in creating challenges to internal security + awareness in the field of IT, Computers)
What's the NEWS

• The Supreme court sought response from the Centre, Google, WhatsApp, Twitter, You tube and others on Facebook Inc's plea seeking transfer of cases related to linking of social media accounts with Aadhar pending in different high courts to the apex court
• The top court agreed to hear the Facebook plea and sought responses of Centre and the social media platforms by September 13
• Social media profiles of users need to be linked with Aadhaar numbers to check circulation of fake, defamatory and pornographic content as also anti-national and terror material, the Supreme Court.
• The suggestion was made by the Tamil Nadu government which is facing resistance from Facebook Inc on the ground that sharing of 12-digit Aadhaar number, the Biometric Unique Identity, would violate the privacy policy of users.
• The Supreme Court stressed on the need to find a balance between the right to online privacy and the right of the state to trace originators of messages that are fake, defamatory or aim to spread panic.

Government stand on it ( Tamil Nadu government who originated this)

• Attorney General K K Venugopal, appearing for the state government, said: "The linking of social media profiles of the users with the Aadhaar was needed to check fake news, defamatory articles, pornographic materials, anti-national and terror contents in the online media."

Resistance by Facebook

• Facebook Inc said that it cannot share the Aadhaar number with a third party as the content on its instant messaging Whatsapp was end-to-end encrypted and even they do not have access to it.
• Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for Facebook, said the question is whether Aadhaar can be shared with a private entity or not.
• He said that an ordinance has been promulgated, which says that Aadhaar can be shared with a private entity, if there was a larger public interest involved.
• There is end-to-end encryption on Whatsapp so it not possible access to the content. How can they tell them what is the Aadhaar number. They also have to take care of the privacy of the users", Rohatgi stated while defending Facebook.
• Facebook has contended that there are four petitions including -- two in Madras High Court, one in Bombay and one in Madhya Pradesh High Courts -- and they contained almost similar prayers.
• It said, "Transfer would serve the interests of justice by avoiding the possibility of conflicting decisions from the four common cases.

What if linked

• The linking of user profiles on social media with Aadhaar would make every message and post by the user traceable.
• Though the move will serve as a deterrent to social media instigators and perpetrators of defamatory and fake posts, it would also violate the privacy of the users, keeping a record of each message along with the registered mobile number or email account.
• This would mean the end of private communications. The privacy experts fear that the linking would allow India's nationalist government to force social media platforms to become surveillance tools.
  
  

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