December 11th, 2020 PIB:- Download PDF Here

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. e-Courts Project
2. Indigenous mRNA vaccine candidate supported by DBT gets Drug Controller nod
3. International Bharathi Festival
4. PM SVANidhi
5. Ramanujan Prize for Young Mathematicians
6. The draft Indian Ports Bill, 2020

1. e-Courts Project

Context:

• It is a Pan-India Project, monitored and funded by Department of Justice, Ministry of Law and Justice, Government of India for the District Courts across the country.
• The eCourts Project was conceptualized on the basis of the “National Policy and Action Plan for Implementation of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in the Indian Judiciary – 2005” submitted by eCommittee, Supreme Court of India with a vision to transform the Indian Judiciary by ICT enablement of Courts.
• The objective of the e-Courts project is to provide designated services to litigants, lawyers and the judiciary by universal computerization of district and subordinate courts in the country by leveraging Information and Communication Technology (ICT) for improved justice delivery.

Overall objectives

• To provide efficient & time-bound citizen-centric services delivery as detailed in eCourt Project Litigant’s Charter.
• To develop, install & implement decision support systems in courts.
• To automate the processes to provide transparency in accessibility of information to its stakeholders.
• To enhance judicial productivity, both qualitatively & quantitatively, to make the justice delivery system affordable, accessible, cost effective, predictable, reliable and transparent.

2. Indigenous mRNA vaccine candidate supported by DBT gets Drug Controller nod

Context

• India’s first indigenous mRNA vaccine candidate has received approval from Indian Drug regulators to initiate Phase I/II human clinical trial.
• The novel mRNA vaccine candidate, HGCO19 has been developed by Gennova, Pune and supported with seed grant under the Ind-CEPI mission of Department of Biotechnology of M/o Science & Technology.

Reference: mRNA vaccine.

3. International Bharathi Festival

Context

• Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi addressed International Bharathi Festival 2020 through video conferencing which was organised by Vanavil Cultural Centre to celebrate the 138th birth anniversary of Mahakavi Subramanya Bharathi.
• Scholar Shri Seeni Viswanathan received the  Bharathi  Award for the year 2020.

Subramanya Bharathi

• Popularly known as “Mahakavi Bharathi”, he was a Tamil writer, poet, journalist, Indian independence activist, social reformer and polyglot.
• He fought for the emancipation of women, against child marriage, stood for reforming Brahminism and religion.

His work as a Journalist

• Bharati, as a young man began his career as a journalist and as a sub-editor in “Swadesamitran” in 1904.
• He brought out a weekly, “India” in May 1906. It declared as its motto the three slogans of the French Revolution: Liberty, Equality and Fraternity.
  • “India” was the first paper in Tamil Nadu to publish political cartoons

Strong willed social reformer

• Bharati was against casteism. He undertook several revolutionary measures challenging orthodoxy, by adorning many Dalits in Tamil Nadu with the upanayana (sacred thread).
• Bharati advocated and ensured entry of Dalits into temples.

Champion of gender justice

• He visualised ‘woman’ as Shakti or Power. Bharati also brought out a front cover for the magazine, “Chakravarthini”, in 1906, which focussed mainly on the empowerment of Indian women.
• He also advocated and campaigned for women to participate in politics, their rights and education.

Bharathi Award

• It was instituted in 1994 by Vanavil Cultural Centre.
• Every year it is being conferred on eminent persons who have done laudable service in any field of social relevance and thus worked towards the fulfilment of Bharathi’s dreams.

4. PM SVANidhi

Context

• Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs launched a programme of Socio-Economic Profiling of PM SVANidhi beneficiaries and their families

Details

• Under this, a complete profile of each PM SVANidhi beneficiary and their family members will be prepared.
• Based on the profiled data, benefits of the various eligible Central Schemes would be extended to them for their holistic socio-economic upliftment.

Background

• Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) is implementing Prime Minister Street Vendors AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) Scheme, with an objective to provide affordable working capital loan up to ₹10,000 to Street Vendors for facilitating the resumption of their livelihoods adversely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Reference: PM SVANidhi. 

5. Ramanujan Prize for Young Mathematicians

• The Ramanujan Prize is given every year to young mathematicians less than 45 years of age who have conducted outstanding research in a developing country.
• The Prize has been instituted by Department of Science and Technology (DST) in the memory of Srinivasa Ramanujan, a genius in pure mathematics who was essentially self-taught and made spectacular contributions to elliptic functions, continued fractions, infinite series, and analytical theory of numbers.
• Researchers working in any branch of the mathematical sciences are eligible.
• The Prize carries a $15,000 cash award.

Context

• The Ramanujan Prize for Young Mathematicians 2020 has been awarded to Carolina Araujo, Mathematician from the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics (IMPA), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in a virtual ceremony
• Her work area focuses on birational geometry, which aims to classify and describe the structure of algebraic varieties.

6. The draft Indian Ports Bill, 2020

Context

• Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways circulated the draft of Indian Ports Bill 2020 for public consultation which will repeal and replace the Indian Ports Act, 1908.

Key Features

• It seeks to enable the structured growth and sustainable development of ports to attract investments in the Port sector
• The proposed Bill will provide measures to facilitate conservation of ports, taking into account the prevalent situation with respect to the high number of non-operational ports.
• It shall ensure greater investment in the Indian maritime and ports sector through the creation of improved, comprehensive regulatory frameworks for the creation of new ports and management of existing ports.

Significance

• The proposed Bill would ensure safety, security, pollution control, performance standards and sustainability of Ports.
• The Bill ensures that all up-to-date conventions /protocols to which India is a party, are also suitably incorporated.
• This will promote marine safety and security in the true sense.
• The Bill will fill up the gaps for achieving scientific development of Ports and Port Network.
• Enhancing “Ease of Doing Business’, it will provide greater impetus to a self-reliant domestic investment climate in the maritime sector, towards Atamanirbhar Bharat initiatives of the Government.

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December 11th, 2020 PIB:- Download PDF Here