9. Chip shortage? Tesla sold close to a million cars a year

• Electric carmaker Tesla sold close to a million vehicles in 2021, brushing aside the chip shortage that had crippled other auto giants the world over.
• To be precise, it sold 936,172 cars in the year gone by, an 87% from 202. The company delivered 308,600 cars in the last quarter of the year alone. Market analysts had expected sales of about 266,000 cars in the quarter.
• The record sales were powered by its Model 3 and Model Y cars, which together made up over 96% of the sales in the last quarter of 2021.
• Model 3 is, in fact, could well become the best-selling electric car in Europe in 2021, based on industry-wide figures from January through November. It is already the best-selling EV in the US and even outsells internal combustion competitors from the stables of BMW (3 series), Audi (A4) and Mercedes (C class) in the market.
• The record sales capped a year that saw Tesla breach $1 trillion market value as investors flocked to its stock anticipating even further growth of the EV market in the US. At present, EVs make up only single-digit market share in the US, outsold by large, fuel-guzzling trucks.

What’s new?

• China is now building a bridge across the Pangong Tso for faster troop mobility, as part of its continuing consolidation of military positions facing India amid the 20-month-long confrontation in eastern Ladakh.
• The People’s Liberation Army is also strengthening its military infrastructure with additional troop shelters, gun positions, helipads and jetties in the area between `Finger-8’ and its military bases to the east at Sirijap-I and II on the north bank of the Pangong lake.

The bridge

• The new bridge, in turn, is coming up in the Khurnak Fort area further to the east, reports TOI. “The bridge is being constructed, with prefabricated structures, well within Chinese territory. But it will help the PLA move troops and weaponry much faster from the north to the south banks of Pangong Tso and vice versa,” a source said.
• The Line of Actual Control (LAC) runs north to south at Finger-8 in the mountainous spurs region of the brackish 134-km long Pangong Tso, two-thirds of which is controlled by China as it extends from Tibet to India at an altitude of 13,900-feet.
• The north bank of Pangong Tso was also the site of a major clash in May 2020, with the PLA occupying and building fortifications in the 8-km stretch from Finger-4 to 8.

The talks

• India and China are now finalising the date for the 14th round of corps commander-level talks later this month. China had refused to complete the stalled troop disengagement at Patrolling Point-15 in the Hot Springs-Gogra-Kongka La area during the 13th round on October 10.
• Consequently, the two armies continue to forward deploy around 50,000 troops each, along with tanks, howitzers and surface-to-air missile systems, for the second consecutive winter along the frontier in the forbidding high-altitude area.

• Son-down in UP: The Uttar Pradesh Police, in a 5,000-page chargesheet submitted to a local court in Lakhimpur, has named Ashish Mishra, son of Union minister and BJP MP Ajay Mishra, as the prime accused in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case that left eight people, including four farmers and a journalist, dead.
• Father’s day out: However, the chargesheet excludes the name of minister Mishra and instead adds the name of one Virendra Shukla — a relative of Ashish’s — among the list of accused. The SUV — which mowed down the four farmers who were protesting against the visit of the state’s Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya to Lakhimpur Kheri district — allegedly belonged to the convoy of minister Mishra.
• Hardened stance: The police, in its chargesheet, has also sought to charge Mishra and the other accused under stiffer sections of the law — replacing Sections 304A (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), 279 (negligent driving) and 338 (causing grievous hurt) with Sections 307 (attempt to murder), 326 (causing hurt with dangerous weapon), 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) and 3/25 Arms Act.

• The launch of Covid vaccination for adolescents drew an enthusiastic response, with nearly 41.3 lakh youngsters between 15 and 18 years of age receiving jabs till 11:00 pm on Monday, boosting the daily vaccination tally to 98.6 lakh, just under a crore.
• Vaccination of the 15-18 cohort accounted for around 42% of the total doses administered during the day till 10:00 pm. This after registrations for the category, which opened from January 1, jumped to around 53.6 lakh from nearly 8 lakh till Sunday. As walk-ins were allowed, most children were registered on site.
• State of states: The highest number of youngsters — over 7.7 lakh — turned up for vaccination in Madhya Pradesh, followed by Gujarat with a footfall of over 5.55 lakh, Andhra Pradesh (4.87 lakh), Karnataka (4.14 lakh) and Rajasthan (3.57 lakh).
• Among bigger states, UP administered only 1.66 lakh doses in the 15-17 category. Other major states like Bihar vaccinated 1.70 lakh adolescents, Maharashtra 1.81 lakh, Tamil Nadu 1.87 lakh and West Bengal around 1 lakh youngsters on the first day of the rollout of the programme. In Delhi, 21,010 teens received the shots till 10:00 pm.
• Per health ministry projections, there are around 7.4 crore people in the age group. India is currently using only domestically made Covaxin for inoculating children.
• Elsewhere: Sixty-six passengers in a cruise ship that sailed from Mumbai to Goa have tested positive for Covid. Some 2,000 samples were tested on board Cordelia, that was carrying a large crowd who came to celebrate the New Year amid the Omicron threat.

News: A court in Canadahas ordered the seizure of financial assets of the Airport Authority of India held in the accounts of the International Air Transport Association (IATA) over India’s dispute with Devas Multimedia. Around $6.8 million belonging to AAI has been seized by Devas’ shareholders following the order.

Context:

• The dispute dates back to2005 when Bengaluru-based Devas Multimedia signed a contract with ISRO’s commercial arm, Antrix Corporation, to lease two communication satellites for 12 years to provide multimedia services to mobile platforms in India.
• The contract was annulled in 2011 after the two satellites and the required S-band spectrum was set aside by India for national and strategic purposes.
• The foreign shareholders of Devas have since won an award of $1.3 billion as compensation by an international arbitration tribunal. Last year, a court in the US awarded Devas’ shareholders $110 million, plus interest, as part of the tribunal award.
• Now, a court in Quebec, Canada, agreed to the contention that AAI, as a state-run firm, was India. Its dues with IATA were therefore ordered to be seized.

India’s pushback

• India, meanwhile, is investigating Devas over alleged corruption in the 2005 deal. CBI and ED are probing the case.
• Last year, the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) ordered the liquidation of Devas, ruling it was incorporated in a “fraudulent manner to carry out unlawful purposes”.
• Devas’ shareholders Monday called the probes in India “state-sponsored investigations intended to intimidate and scare-off victims of India’s unlawful acts”.

• Clue 1: It’s based on ‘night writing’ developed by Captain Charles Barbier in Napoleon Bonaparte’s army.
• Clue 2: Consisting of a code of 63 characters, there are versions in Chinese, Spanish, Arabic and other languages, apart from English.
• Clue 3: It’s named after its creator, a Frenchman who lost his sight as a result of a childhood accident.

Scroll below for answer

• A career best haul from Marco Jansen, well supported by Duanne Olivier and Kagiso Rabada, led a dominant bowling show from South Africa on the opening day of the second Test in Johannesburg as they bowled out India for just over 200 midway through the final session. The pace trio struck at regular intervals as the visitors couldn’t even manage a half-century stand and ended up losing their last six wickets for only 86 runs.
• This was after KL Rahul became India’s 34th Test captain — Virat Kohli was ruled out with upper back spasms — and chose to bat. And he stroked a masterful fifty, trying to hold up the innings together.
• No sooner was the first drinks break over than Jansen sent back Mayank Agarwal. Cheteshwar Pujara failed to survive the barrage of short balls that followed, lobbing a simple catch to gully off Olivier. And the very next ball, Rahane fell to a nothing shot, again to gully.
• The procession continued after lunch as Hanuma Vihari was fabulously caught by Rassie van der Dussen off Rabada, and a loose pull from Rahul off Jansen drew his top-edge. R Ashwin, however, launched a counterattack, before Rabada cleaned up the tail.
• In their reply, the Proteas suffered an early setback when Mohammed Shami trapped Aiden Markram lbw in the fourth over. But captain Dean Elgar and Keegan Petersen held on till stumps.
• Scorecard: India 202 (Rahul 50, Ashwin 46, Jansen 4/31, Rabada 3/64, Olivier 3/64) lead South Africa 35/1 by 167 runs

• The Supreme Court Monday agreed to hear a petition challenging the Inner Line Permit in the state of Manipur, and issued notices to the union and the state governments.
• The petitioner alleges that the system, a relic of the 140-year-old Bengal Eastern Frontier Regulation, 1873, is “reminiscent of the colonial oppression and discrimination”.
• It argues the system is violative of the fundamental rights of the citizens as it provides unbridled power to the state for restricting the entry and exit of non-indigenous persons.
• A person visiting a state or region under Inner Line Permit is required to take permission beforehand. Besides Manipur, such restrictions are in place in Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Mizoram. Manipur issues four such permits — temporary, regular, special and labour permits.

Meanwhile… The Nagaland Peace Centre (NPC), in a letter to the President, said the Armed Forces Special Powers Act is a “direct threat to peace; a violation to the right to life and depriving its citizens of their constitutional rights”.

The Delhi High Court Monday granted WhatsApp and its parent company Facebook more time to legally respond to notices issued by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) over the new privacy policy.

The matter:

• WhatsApp had introduced a new privacy policy early last year but had to postpone its implementation amidst opposition from users and pushback by the union IT ministry.
• Petitions against the proposed privacy update are being heard in Delhi High Court and Supreme Court.
• Under pressure, WhatsApp first postponed the update and later told the court that it would not transition to the new policy until India enacts the Personal Data Protection Law.
• But parallelly, CCI had initiated a probe into the privacy update to assess if WhatsApp was abusing its market dominance.
• WhatsApp had challenged the CCI probe in court saying the matter over privacy update was already in courts.
• The High Court today granted WhatsApp and Facebook India more time to respond to the CCI notices, and adjourned the matter for March 30, 2022.