22 October 2019: PIB Summary & Analysis

Read the daily PIB update and stay up-to-date on current affairs for the UPSC exam.

October 22nd, 2019 PIB:- Download PDF Here

Pulse Polio Programme

Context:

25 years of Pulse Polio Programme to be celebrated in October 2019.

About the Pulse Polio Programme:

• The Pulse Polio Campaign was first started in 1994 in Delhi after the success of the first large-scale supplementary immunization campaign with OPV (oral polio vaccine).
• The campaign was inaugurated with the tagline ‘Do Boond Zindagi Ki’.
• The campaign in Delhi reached nearly one million children up to the age of three years with two doses of OPV being administered on 02 October and 04 December through exclusive booth-based strategy.
• This strategy was later adopted and implemented by the Government of India all over the country as Pulse Polio Campaigns.
• India’s attainment of polio-free status in 2014 was coined by the World Health Organization as “one of the most significant achievements in public health,” and marked not just India but the entire South East Asia Region being declared polio-free.
• The last case of polio in the country was in 2011.
• The global initiative of eradicating polio was started by the WHO in 1988.
• Around 17.4 crore children of less than five years across the country are given polio drops as part of the drive of the Government of India to sustain polio eradication from the country.
• The Pulse Polio Initiative was started with an objective of achieving a hundred per cent coverage under Oral Polio Vaccine. It aimed to immunize children through improved social mobilization, plan mop-up operations in areas where poliovirus has almost disappeared and maintain a high level of morale among the public.
• Read more on Anti-immunization Propaganda at the linked article.

Khadi and Village Industries Commission

Context:

The Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC) and the Goa State Government have joined hands with an aim to generate employment opportunities in Goa.

About the Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC):

• KVIC is a statutory body established by an Act of Parliament in 1956.
• The body is charged with the planning, promotion, organisation and implementation of programs for the development of Khadi and other village industries in the rural areas in coordination with other agencies engaged in rural development wherever necessary.
• Objectives of KVIC:
  • The social objective of providing employment.
  • The economic objective of producing saleable articles.
  • The wider objective of creating self-reliance amongst the poor and building up of a strong rural community spirit.
• Its functions also comprise building up of a reserve of raw materials and implements for supply to producers, creation of common service facilities for processing of raw materials as semi-finished goods and provisions of facilities for marketing of KVI products.
• It also imparts training to artisans engaged in these industries.
• It also engages in research of production techniques and equipment employed in the Khadi and Village Industries sector.
• It also provides financial assistance to institutions and individuals for the development and operation of Khadi and village industries and guides them through the supply of designs, prototypes and other technical information.
• It functions under the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, and is headquartered in Mumbai.

What is Khadi?

Khadi, also called khaddar, is a hand-spun, hand-woven natural fibre cloth. It is woven from cotton. It may also include silk or wool. It originates from India and Bangladesh. It is associated with the freedom struggle and Mahatma Gandhi, who urged people to use Khadi and ditch foreign imported cloth.

Two-day International Workshop on Environmental Flows Assessment and Implementation for India held in New Delhi

Read more about this in CNA dated 22^nd Oct 2019 here.

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October 22nd, 2019 PIB:- Download PDF Here

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