‘World Sanskrit Award’

Thailand’s Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn was presented with the first ‘World Sanskrit Award’ for her exemplary contribution for the promotion of the language for the year 2015. Besides, American linguist and Indologist Prof. George Cardona was also presented with this award for the year 2016. They were bestowed with the award by Vice President Hamid Ansari at a function held in New Delhi.

About World Sanskrit Award The award was instituted by the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR). It was announced by the Union External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj during her inaugural address in the 16th World Sanskrit Conference in Bangkok in June 2015. It is presented to eminent Sanskrit scholars to recognise their outstanding contribution to the study/research/ teaching in Sanskrit language and literature.

PM Modi launches affordable housing scheme for poor: 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that the government aims to provide house to every Indian by 2022.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has launched the Pradhan Mantri Gramin Awas Yojana (PMAY-G), flagship housing for all scheme in Agra, Uttar Pradesh. 

Under PMAY-G Government aims to provide affordable, environmentally safe and secure pucca house to every rural household living below the poverty line by 2022. 

Features of Scheme

 PMAY-G is part Union Government’s flagship ‘Housing for All’ scheme and has replaced previous rural housing scheme Indira Awas Yojana The beneficiaries for this scheme will be selected through a completely transparent process using the Socio Economic Census 2011 data and validating it through the Gram Sabha. 

It uses ICT and space technology to further confirm correct selection of beneficiaries and progress of work. Under it, financial assistance will be provided for construction of dwelling units and upgradations of existing unserviceable kutcha houses. 

The entire payments will be done through transparent IT/DBT mode with Aadhaar linked Bank accounts with consent, to ensure complete transparency and accountability. The unit cost for houses has been increased with convergence of a minimum support of nearly Rs. 1.5 lakh to Rs. 1.6 lakh to a household is available. If the beneficiary desires, then there is also a provision of Bank loan upto Rs. 70,000. PMAY-G will be also serve as a major step forward in bringing together Skill India, Make In India, IT/DBT Aadhaar platform, Digital India and Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana. The scheme allows over 200 different housing designs across country based on a detailed study of housing typologies, households’ requirements and environmental hazards. It will provide skilling for 5 lakh Rural Masons by 2019 and envisages large scale use of local materials. Houses built under the scheme will have cooking space, electricity provision, LPG, toilet and bathing area, drinking water etc through convergence.

India ranks 20th on Climate Change Performance Index

CCPI underlined that countries like India are making "great efforts" in the fields of renewables and energy efficiency

India has been ranked 20th on Climate ChangePerformance Index (CCPI) 2017, which underlined that countries like India are making "great efforts" in the fields of renewables and energy efficiency.

With the historic Paris Agreement having recently entered into force, the latest CCPI confirms a boost for renewable energy and positive developments in energy efficiency.

The publication was issued by Germanwatch and Climate Action Network Europe.

While these encouraging trends are happening on a global scale, the necessary energy revolution is still happening too slowly, the publication said.

"Morocco (rank eight) continued its upward trend. With massive investments in renewable energy and ambitious mid-term and long-term targets, Morocco is a frontrunner in Africa,” the publication said.

"Positive trends are seen as well among emerging economies of G20 like India (rank 20), Argentina (36) and Brazil (40), which all improved their ranking," it said.

It said some developing countries like Morocco, India, and South Africa are starting to catch up and are already making great efforts in the fields of renewables and energy efficiency.

In terms of climate policy, it said India, Sweden, Luxembourg, Norway, and Germany managed to hold their positions.

"All countries are now expected to put forward national emissions reduction plans, and the G20 countries have to take a leading role in doing so by 2018.

"Although, India belongs to the ten largest CO2 emitting countries, per capita emissions are still relatively low, resulting in a good performance in this category," it said.

National experts value that the Indian government runs one of the largest renewable capacity expansion programmes in the world, which leads to a good policy performance for the country, it said.

Canada (55), Australia (57) and Japan (60) are in the bottom group (rated "very poor") of the index while Japan once again dropped two places as national experts criticize their government for a very poor climate policy.

The Climate Change Performance Index is an instrument designed to enhance transparency in international climate politics and aims to put political and social pressure on those countries which have, up until now, failed to take ambitious action on climate protection.

On the basis of standardised criteria, the index evaluates and compares the climate protection performance of 58 countries that together are responsible for about 90% of global energy-related CO2 emissions.

Jan Burck, Germanwatch, key author of the CCPI comments said that the conditions for a global energy revolution have never been better.

"Due to the falling costs of renewable energy and efficiency technologies, national governments have no more excuses not to enshrine the Paris Agreement into national law.

"Besides the vast development of renewable energy, we see positive signals that fossil fuels increasingly are put on the defence. So far, falling oil prices did not cause an increase in demand for the energy source while a growing number of countries are starting to turn their backs on coal," he said.

new ‘super Earth’ type exoplanet named as GJ 536b

Scientists have discovered a new ‘super Earth’ type exoplanet named as GJ 536b orbiting a very bright star near to our Sun. The planet was jointly detected by Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias (IAC) and the Geneva Observatory. 

Key Facts The exoplanet GJ 536b has a mass of around 5.4 Earth masses. It is orbiting a star much smaller and cooler than the sun It is not within the star’s habitable zone and has short orbital period of 8.7 day. The luminosity of its star makes it an attractive candidate for investigating its atmospheric composition. Besides, the planet’s short orbital period would come handy in conducting future studies of biological activity. 

How GJ 536b was discovered? It was detected using the HARPS (High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Seeker) spectrograph on the 3.6M ESO Telescope (La Silla in Chile) and HARPS North on the Telescopio Nacional Galileo (TNG) Roque de los Muchachos Observatory (Garafia in Spain). HARPS is a second-generation high-precision radial velocity planet finding spectrograph. It is the most successful planet finder after the Kepler Space 

Observatory Astronomical terms Exoplanet: It is a planet that does not orbit the Sun and instead orbits a different star, stellar remnant, or brown dwarf. It is also termed as extrasolar planet. 

Super-earths: They are extrasolar planets which are larger than the Earth. However they have mass substantially below the solar system’s giant planets namely Neptune and Uranus.

India becomes associate member of CERN

Becoming an associate member of CERN will enhance participation of India’s young scientists and engineers in various projects

ndia on Monday became an associate member of the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN), the world’s largest nuclear and particle physics labaratory.

The agreement was signed on Monday by Sekhar Basu, chairman of Atomic Energy Commission and secretary of Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), and CERN director general Dr. Fabiola Gianotti at the DAE’s office here. Last year, the Union cabinet green-lit the proposal for India officially entering the Geneva-based body, following which the CERN Council accepted India as an associate member.

India had ‘observer’ status till September this year, when the CERN Council adopted a resolution upgrading its position. “There are three major activities going on in our laboratory—accelerators, detectors and computing. Indian scientist fraternity is good at all the three areas; hence we have taken decision to upgrade the status,” Gianotti told reporters here.

Becoming an associate member of CERN will enhance participation of young scientists and engineers in various CERN projects. It will also open opportunities for Indian industries to participate directly in CERN projects, Gianotti said. The industries now can directly bag contracts for specified requirements of CERN.

Earlier, the supply of required material, components and services was in the form of kind (without any charge). Now, the companies can directly bag the order and provide the services, she added.

After becoming an associate member, India also has to contribute a certain amount of money for research activities. “This would involve annual contribution of 11.5 million swiss frank from Indian government to CERN,” Gianotti said.

The membership comes at a time when there was criticism within the scientific community over the delay in India accepting the membership. Pakistan became an associate member of the body in 2014. The organisation is the world’s largest nuclear and particle physics laboratory, where scientists and engineers are probing the fundamental structure of the Universe using the most sophisticated scientific instruments and advanced computing systems.

Presently CERN has 22 member states, four associate member states, and the observer status is given to four states and three International Organisations.

“We already have met some industries in Bengaluru and talks were more related to computing. We will explore more in India and what can be contributing to CERN,” said Gianotti.

Uttarakhand (UKPCS) Lower PCS -2016 Pre exam solution (SET D) by SAMVEG IAS

Uttarakhand (UKPCS) Lower PCS -2016 Pre exam solution (SET D) by SAMVEG IAS

 

UK Lower pcs -2016 paper analysis & cuttoff
over all good paper .
general study paper was easier but aptitude part was moderate .cut off should be in range of 102 (+/-5).Lets wait for result.

Dear candidates
we are providing tentative solution of Uttarakhand(uk) Lower PCS -2016 Pre exam.If you find some error or not satisfied with answers please mention it .

Q1 -WHO ABOLISHED THAGI--ANS:lord william bentinck (c)
Q2 INTRODUCTION OF POSTAL SERVICE:1854 (B)
Q3 VANDE MATRAM :(A) ANAND MATH
Q4 DRAIN OF WEALTH : D DADA BHAI NAOROJI
Q5 TRI RATNA :C,BUDDHA,DHAMMA,SANGHA
Q6 MUMTAJ MAHAL:D
Q7 1 ST SPEAKER :C
Q8 J&K :B
Q9  REVISION OF CONSTITUTION :C
Q10 :C
Q11 A,OPERATING SYSTEM
Q12 C ,MS OFFICE
Q13 B
Q14 D SCANNER
Q15 D 72.5 M
Q16 A 1236
Q17 D AKBAR
Q18 IST ANGLO MARATHA -C TREATY OF SALBAI

Q19  C  ,3.5 ,FISCAL DEFICIT
Q20 B KAHAR,TANWAR
Q21 D 2009-10
Q22 C RS12/YEAR
Q23 B ODISHA
Q24 C 0.609
Q25 B
Q26 C NORTON
Q27 A REGULATING
Q28 D HIMANSHU JOSHI
Q29 B SHUBHA MUDGAL
Q30 C PAURI
Q31 C MEDHA
Q32 C KALI
Q33 A SEARCH ENGINE
Q34 C WEB BROWSER
Q35A 8APRIL
Q36 D RS 8000/

Q37 A
Q38 A SOUND WAVE
Q39 B
Q40 D
Q41 A METHANE
Q42 B 2001
Q43 C
Q44 C DENMARK
Q45 D NORWAY
Q46 C SPRATELY
Q47 C KERALA
Q48 A VINOD MEHTA
Q49 C BAHUBALI
Q50 A RAGHUBIR
Q51 D PANCREAS
Q52 C ,K
Q53 C HALOPHYTES
Q54 * NAINITAL
Q55 HIGHEST RAIN IN HIMALAYAS-A ,SHIVALIK
Q56 SOIL FOR TEA CROP : B BROWN,RED YELLOW
Q57 C   4TH NAINITAL
Q58 C BHOTIA
Q59 A ,BAGHESHWAR,COOLIE BEGAR
Q60  C BHAGIRATHI
Q61 D ,HALDWANI
Q62 A 1950
Q63 B,1969
Q64 B ,02
Q65 A,CHILDREN
Q66 D,HINDI NOVELIST
Q67 B PAURI GARHWAL
Q68 B
Q69 D MANDAKINI



Q70  D,CHANDPUR
Q71 A VISHWAMBHAR DATT
Q72 C CHANDRA SINGH
Q73  B1949
Q74 C
Q75 D NALANDA
Q76 B 20TH
Q77 A
Q78 C LANGUAGE
Q79 B SUDARSHAN SHAH
Q80 C 1973
Q81 C,356
Q82 B ,POTASSIUM
Q83 A,KOL




Q84 C,243
Q85 D B C KHANDURI
Q86  D ,UTTARAKHAND
Q87 A,10
Q88 C BANGLADESH
Q89 D MEGHALAYA
Q90 A SOUTH PENINSULAR HILLS
Q91 C MP
Q92B,MAHARASHTRA
Q93 D SHIFTING
Q94 B MAHANADI
Q95 D UTTARAKHAND
Q96 B
Q97 C LIQUOR
Q98D KASHIPUR
Q99 C,GOVERNOR
Q100 A 5/65

Q101 D

 

Q102C

 

Q103D

 

Q104 B

 

Q105 -

 

Q106 C

 

Q107 A

 

Q108-

 

Q109-

 

Q110B

 

Q111 C

 

Q112 A

 

Q113-D

 

 

Q114-B

 

Q115 B

 

Q116 C

 

Q117D

 

Q118A

 

Q119C

 

Q120B

 

Q121B

 

Q122C

 

Q123 A

 

Q124B

 

Q125 A

 

Q126D

Q127 D
Q128 C
Q129 A
Q130C
Q131C
Q132 A
Q133C
Q134B
Q135A
Q136D
Q137 B
Q138 A


Q139 A
Q140B
Q141B
Q142 C
Q143A
Q144 B
Q145 C
Q146 A
Q147B
Q148D
Q149 C
Q150 D

Aditi Ashok (18) became the first Indian woman to win a Ladies European Tour title.

Teen golf sensation Aditi Ashok (18) became the first Indian woman to win a Ladies European Tour title. She achieved this feat by winning the Hero Women’s Indian Open held at the DLF Golf and Country Club in Gurugram, Haryana. She won a prize purse of 60,000 dollar. She won the tournament with a score of 3-under-par 213. Her round included birdies on the par-four second and 10th holes and bogeys on the seventh, 13th and 17th. Aditi Ashok is the first and the only Indian golfer who had played the Asian Youth Games (2013), Youth Olympic Games (2014), Asian Games (2014) and Rio Olympics (2016).