#Ranking of Indian Universities

The #UGC has launched the following schemes for making higher education relevant to the needs of the society and industry, namely: Career Oriented Programmes (COC), Community Colleges (CC) and introduction of degrees in vocational subjects in line with National Skills Qualification Framework (NSQF). The UGC, through collaboration with National Mission on Education thought ICT (#NMEICT), has undertaken e-content development of post graduate programmes called e-PG Pathashala. The UGC has notified several regulations with the objective of sustenance and improvement in the quality of higher education and for undertaking academic reforms. The regulations are on the following matters, namely: mandatory assessment and accreditation of higher educational institutions; affiliation of colleges by universities; regulation of private and deemed to be universities; minimum qualifications for appointment of teachers; minimum standards for grant of first degree, Master’s degree, M.Phil/Ph.D;  grievance redressal; promotion of equity; curbing the menace of ragging etc. The regulations are available at http://www.ugc.ac.in/page/UGC-Regulations.aspx. The UGC also laid down a list of Degrees specified for the Purposes of Section 22 of the University Grants Commission Act, 1956. No other degree can be granted by a University/College and Institutions empowered to grant degrees by an Act of Parliament.  The UGC supports access and expansion by financing development of the Central Universities, recognition of new State Universities and Colleges, regulation of private and deemed to be universities and establishment of Community Colleges. The UGC conducts inspection of private universities. These Private Universities are also inspected by the UGC with the help of Expert Committees, constituted by the UGC, which includes representatives from the concerned Statutory Council(s), to check their compliance with the laid down regulations and gives them opportunity for rectification of defects and non-conformity with the regulations. The Ministry of Human Resource Development had launched a Centrally Sponsored Scheme (CSS) namely Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (#RUSA) which seeks to improve overall quality of existing State higher educational institutions by ensuring their conformity to prescribed norms and standards and adoption of accreditation as a mandatory quality assurance framework.  RUSA is incentivizing State Governments to reform affiliating system, governance and academic and examination system in State higher educational institutions.  The total outlay for RUSA for the 12th Plan is Rs. 22,855 crores. The Project Approval Board of RUSA has approved infrastructure grants for five universities and thirty five colleges, two new professional colleges and grants for faculty improvement, vocationalization of higher education and equity initiatives in higher educational institutions in Gujarat.

Ishan Vikas and Ishan Uday Scholarship Schemes

It has the following components: ·         Visit of Class IX and Class XI students to 22 premier institutes [IITs, National Institutes of Techonology (NITs) and Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISERs)] with two groups in summer and one group in winter, consisting of 32 students each. Each group of 32 can be formed by taking 4 students from one single school in each of the eight North East states. Each school will send one teacher to accompany the students of that school, which means every group will consist of 32 students and 8 teachers. ·         Summer Internship for Engineering College students of the North-East for a duration of seven weeks at the Premier Institutes like IITs, NITs and IISERs. From 25 such Institutions, about 250 students will visit 16 IITs and 6 NITs every year. The Ministry of Human Resource Development has approved release of Rs. 605.45 lakhs from the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) to IIT, Guwahati under the Ishan Vikas programme. The University Grants Commission (UGC) has launched “Ishan Uday” a Special Scholarship Scheme for North East Region (NER) from academic session 2014-15. Under the scheme ten thousand fresh scholarships are to be provided for general degree course, technical and professional courses including medical and para-medical courses. The guidelines of the scheme are available at http://www.ugc.ac.in/pdfnews/ 2773585_final-NER-guidelines-with-annexures.pdf . An amount of Rs.3500/- p.m. for General Degree courses and Rs. 5000/- p.m. for Technical & Professional courses (including Medical & Para medical courses) will be given through Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) to the beneficiary student. The Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development earmarks 10% of the budgeted allocations under plan head, under its various schemes, for the development of tertiary education in the North East Region. Further, the Ministry of Human Resource Development had launched a Centrally Sponsored Scheme (CSS) namely Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA) which seeks to improve overall quality of existing State higher educational institutions in conformity with prescribed norms and standards.

#DigitalLiteracy

The Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development is currently implementing the National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NMEICT) to leverage the potential of ICT in teaching and learning process. Under the Scheme, apart from other activities, e-content in a number of subjects pertaining to the engineering, science, social science and humanities streams at Undergraduate (UG) and Postgraduates (PG) levels have been created for the benefit of the students and learners. The Information and Library Network (INFLIBNET) Centre of the UGC has taken up a number of initiatives for enhancing access to academic resources through ICT, namely: i) UGC-Infonet Digital Library Consortium that extends access to selected scholarly electronic journals and databases to the universities in different disciplines; ii) Shodhganga: A Reservoir of Indian Electronic Theses and Dissertations, that enables online submission of theses and dissertations by research scholars in digital repository set-up at the INFLIBNET Centre; iii) Shodhgangotri that enables research scholars to submit approved synopsis of research proposal submitted to the university; iv) Open Journals Access System (OJAS) that facilitates faculty and researchers in Indian universities to launch their open access journals on OJAS platform offered by the INFLIBNET Centre; v) Access management technologies that would facilitate users to access e-resources irrespective of their physical location. Besides, the Centre through a project entitled “National Library and Information Services Infrastructure for Scholarly Content” (N-LIST) provides access to electronic journals and electronic books to eligible colleges. The University of Delhi has informed that its Campus of Open Learning and Edinburgh College, Scotland have a MOU under UKIERI project (United Kingdom –India Education Research Initiative). As a result, University of Delhi organizes D-LITE (Digital Learning and Innovation for Tomorrow Education) where faculty members of the colleges are being trained on Digital/E-learning tools such as Web 2.0 tools, advanced presentation/audio-video lectures for classroom teaching with effect from 2013 to 2015. Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Madras along with its National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) partners and National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) have run, three Massive Online Open Courses (MOOCs) of 10 weeks each. lIT Madras is offering certification on successful completion of the course and nominal fee for online examination and certification is charged. Similarly IIT Kanpur has conducted five Online Courses with certification of 4-5 weeks duration. IIT Bombay has also run four courses globally and three more courses are currently going on. A project on the “Development of National Digital Library” has also been sanctioned to IIT Kharagpur.

Year 2015 as the "Year of Taxpayers Services"

Central Excise Day Celebrated; MoS(Finance) Shri Jayant Sinha Emphasizes that There is Urgent Need to Enhance the Tax to GDP Ratio in India as Well as Expanding the Tax Base and Improving the Tax Compliance; Exhorted the Officers to Work on Innovative Ideas to Facilitate Starting and Doing a Business

The Minister of State for Finance Shri Jayant Sinha emphasized that there was urgent need to enhance the tax to GDP ratio in India, which was lower than those in some of the developing economies such as Kenya, Uganda, and Nepal. Expanding the tax base and improving the tax compliance were therefore of utmost importance. Shri Sinha was speaking at a function organized here yesterday by the Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC), Ministry of Finance to celebrate the Central Excise Day. The Central Excise Day is celebrated every year to commemorate the Central Excise and Salt Act which was enacted on 24th February 1944. Speaking on the occasion, Shri Sinha who was the Chief Guest exhorted the officers to work on innovative ideas to facilitate starting and doing a business such as development of mobile applications to facilitate starting of business even by a small vendor or a group of students. Officers also needed to make it attractive for a businessman to be part of the tax-net than to avoid it. The Minister of State for Finance, Shri Sinha informed that the day was also historic for the reason that the 14th Finance Commission had recommended unprecedented hike in the States` share of Central taxes by 10 percentage points from 32% to 42%, which is a move in the direction of “cooperative federalism” strongly advocated by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself. Finally, he lauded the stellar role being played by the Central Excise Department in contributing to nation building and congratulated all the awardees and their families. Shri Jayant Sinha, Minister of State for Finance also gave away the Certificates of Appreciation to the selected 40 officers of the Department of different grades from all over the country, who by continued devotion and commitment to duty, had contributed to promoting excellence in the fields of Central Excise and Service Tax administration. Speaking on the occasion, Shri Shaktikanta Das, Revenue Secretary, the Guest Of Honour, underlined that the Department had to constantly strike a balance between trade facilitation and enforcement measure, which was not an easy task. He emphasised that the officers should focus on three F’s i.e. firmness, fairness and friendliness. Dr. Jyotsna Suri, President, FICCI and special invitee to the occasion thanked the Department for associating the representatives from the trade and industry to be part of an internal celebration of the Department which was indicative of better understanding and cooperation between the Department and the trade, who were both partners in the economic development of the country. Earlier, in his welcome speech, Shri Kaushal Srivastava, Chairman, CBEC informed that with a view to greater customer focus and service orientation, CBEC was celebrating the Year 2015 as the "Year of Taxpayers Services". He averred that the department was fully geared and committed to undertake the challenges for implementation of the Goods and Service Tax slated to come into effect from 1st April, 2016.

#Earthquake Prone Zone

Bureau of Indian Standards, based on the past seismic history, grouped the country into four seismic zones, viz. Zone-II, -III, -IV and –V. Of these, Zone V is the most seismically active region, while zone II is the least. The Modified Mercalli (MM) intensity, which measures the impact of the earthquakes on the surface of the earth, broadly associated with various zones, is as follows: Seismic Zone Intensity on MM scale II (Low intensity zone)                                   VI (or less) III (Moderate intensity zone)                         VII IV (Severe intensity zone)                              VIII V (Very severe intensity zone)                       IX (and above) Broadly, Zone-V comprises of entire northeastern India, parts of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal, Rann of Kutch in Gujarat, parts of North Bihar and Andaman & Nicobar Islands. Zone-IV covers remaining parts of Jammu & Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh, Union Territory of Delhi, Sikkim, northern parts of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal, parts of Gujarat and small portions of Maharashtra near the west coast and Rajasthan. Zone-III comprises of Kerala, Goa, Lakshadweep islands, and remaining parts of Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat and West Bengal, parts of Punjab, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Tamilnadu and Karnataka. Zone-II covers remaining parts of the country. Further, as part of pre-disaster preparedness measure, Government of India has also completed seismic microzonation studies of some of the major cities in the country such as, Jabalpur, Guwahati, Bangalore, greater Bharuch in Gujarat, Jammu in J & K, Shillong in Meghalaya, Chennai in Tamilnadu and sikkim state. These studies involving preparation of geological, geomorphological and land use maps followed by drilling, geological logging, standard penetration test and geophysical studies to demarcate the zones of least to most damage prone areas within the urban areas helps the respective town and country planning agencies to formulate perspective planning within the overall earthquake impact minimization efforts.

3685 Monuments/Sites in the Country Declared as of National Importance till Date

3685 monuments/sites in the country have been declared as of national importance till date. During the year 2013-14, an amount of Rs. 16963.86 lakhs was allocated for the protection and maintenance of monuments declared as of national importance. As per the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958, ancient monuments or archaeological sites and remains, as the case may be, which are of historical, archaeological or artistic interest, and have been in existence for not less than 100 years, may be declared by the Central Government as of national importance. The protection and maintenance of monuments, declared as of national importance is taken up by Archaeological Survey of India by way of structural repairs, chemical preservation and environmental development around the monument which is a regular and ongoing process and the required works are taken-up on need basis as per the established principles of conservation, subject to availability of resources. In addition, creating of tourist related amenities (e.g. drinking water, toilet blocks, facilities for physically challenged, pathways, cultural notice boards/signage, vehicle parking, cloak rooms, etc.) at the centrally protected monuments/sites are also the regular activities which the ASI undertakes as per needs and availability of resources.  Proposal to Include ‘Delhi’s Imperial capital cities’ in World Heritage List of UNESCO The State Government of Delhi has proposed UNESCO to include ‘Delhi’s Imperial Capital Cities’ among the World Heritage Cities. The nomination dossier of ‘Delhi’s Imperial Capital Cities’ had been forwarded to UNESCO in 2014 for the purpose of its inscription in the World Heritage List. As per the UNESCO Guidelines, after the submission of the nomination dossier, UNESCO sent their own evaluation mission. In October, 2014 an ICOMOS evaluation mission came to evaluate the site. They had asked for some additional information in respect to the property which was forwarded to UNESCO by November 2014. ICOMOS team had called for a meeting on 19th of January 2015 in France and Prof. A.G.K.Menon, Convenor, INTACH Delhi chapter attended the meeting.

Share of US, Russia, China And Japan in Foreign Trade

Percentage Share of countries like Japan, USA, China, Russia in India’s foreign Trade is as follows: 2013-14 2014-2015(Apr-Dec) Countries Export Import Total Trade Export Import Total Trade Japan 2.17 2.11 2.13 1.72 2.23 2.03 USA 12.45 5.00 8.06 13.76 4.63 8.31 China 4.72 11.34 8.61 3.88 13.12 9.40 Russia 0.67 0.87 0.79 0.70 0.94 0.85 India, based on its economic interests, explores possibilities of Free Trade Agreements with various countries, as a way to enhance trade and investment. During 2014-15 (Apr-Feb), Government has taken several steps to improve trade relations with other countries. Details of some of the activities /events are as under:- (i)        27th International Pharmaceutical R&D and Manufacturing Expo/Conference was held on 2ndJuly, 2014 in Tokyo. (ii)      Meeting of WTO was held in Geneva on July 2nd   2014. (iii)    ASEAN Economic Minister’s (AEM) meeting was held on 26th August, 2014. (iv)    7th Indian-Oman Joint Commission meeting was held on 29th October, 2014. (v)      2nd India – CLMV (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam) Business Conclave was held on 10th December, 2014 in New Delhi. (vi)    Meeting of India – Vietnam Sub-Commission on Trade was held on 21st January 2015. (vii)  7th India-Kenya Joint Trade Committee Meeting was held on 12th February, 2015 in New Delhi. (viii)   5th India-Myanmar Joint Trade Committee Meeting was held in Nay Pai Taw on 17th February, 2015.