iDEX 4 Fauji Initiative

• It is a first of its kind initiative, launched to support innovations identified by members of the Indian Armed Forces and will bolster frugal innovation ideas from soldiers/ field formations.
• There are more than 13 Lakh service personnel working in the field and on borders, handling extreme conditions and equipment and would be having many ideas and innovations to improve such equipment.
• There was no mechanism to support such innovations. 
• iDEX 4 Fauji would open this window and allow our Faujis to become part of the innovation process and get recognised and rewarded.
• Services Headquarters will provide support to the soldiers & field formations all over the country to ensure maximum participation.

• Amnesty International has recently announced that it will halt its operations in India due to reprisal from the Central government.
• The human rights watchdog said the complete freezing of its bank accounts by the Indian government compelled its staff in India to stop all campaign and research work.
• The government has said that the global rights watchdog has been receiving funds illegally and that it never registered under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act.
• As per the Ministry of Home Affairs, the watchdog "got money into India through the FDI (Foreign Direct Investment) route," which is not allowed in the case of non-profit organizations.

Amnesty International

• It is a United Kingdom based Non-Governmental Organization (NGO).
• Established in 1961, Amnesty describes itself as an organization working in the field of human rights.

• At the virtual Summit held recently, the Prime Ministers of India and Denmark agreed to elevate India-Denmark relations to a Green Strategic Partnership.
• Through this partnership, India and Denmark agree to be at the forefront in the global fight against climate change.
• Both countries have set very ambitious national targets on climate and energy that will contribute to an ambitious implementation of the Paris Agreement.
• Together, the two countries will show the world that delivering on ambitious climate and sustainable energy goals is possible.
• This partnership would build on and consolidate the existing agreement establishing a Joint Commission for Cooperation (signed 6 February 2009) between India and Denmark which envisaged cooperation within the political field; economic and commercial field; science and technology; environment; energy; education and culture.

Green Strategic Partnership

• It is a mutually beneficial arrangement to advance political cooperation, expand economic relations and green growth, create jobs and strengthen cooperation on addressing global challenges opportunities; with focus on an ambitious implementation of the Paris Agreement and the UN Sustainable Development Goals, according to the joint statement released after the Summit.

Time Use Survey (TUS)

• It is an important source of information about the activities that are performed by the population and the time duration for which such activities are performed.
• One distinguishing feature of Time Use Survey from other household surveys is that it can capture time disposition on different aspects of human activities, be it paid, unpaid or other activities with such details which is not possible in other surveys.
• The primary objective of Time Use Survey (TUS) is to measure participation of men and women in paid and unpaid activities.
• TUS is an important source of information on the time spent in unpaid caregiving activities, volunteer work, unpaid domestic service producing activities of the household members.
• It also provides information on time spent on learning, socializing, leisure activities, self-care activities, etc., by the household members.
• National Statistical Office (NSO), which is a wing of Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, has conducted the first Time Use Survey in India during January – December 2019.
• The survey will cover the whole of the Indian Union except the villages in Andaman and Nicobar Islands which are difficult to access.

Highlights

• As per the study, 57.3 per cent males were engaged in employment and related activities while the proportion was 18.4 per cent for females in the country.
• In the rural areas, the proportion of women engaged in employment and related activities was higher at 19.2 per cent compared to 16.7 per cent in cities.
• Overall 53.2 per cent of participants in the survey were engaged in unpaid domestic services for household members.
• The proportion of females in the category was higher at 81.2 per cent compared to 26.1 per cent for males.

• Union Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation has released a report titled ‘Health in India’.

Health in India Report

• The objective of the report is to gather basic quantitative information on India’s health sector.
• The survey defines ailment as any deviation from a person’s state of physical and mental well-being.
• The ‘Proportion of Persons who Responded as Ailing’, or PPRA, in a 15-day period when they were approached by the surveyors, were registered as those suffering from ailments.

Findings of the report

• Around 7.5 % of Indians reported that they were suffering from ailments.
• While in rural India only 6.8 % said that they were suffering from an ailment, this number in urban India was 9.1 %
• The Zoroastrian community remains the most susceptible to ailments (31.1 % of them were suffering from an ailment)
• The survey shows that women remain more susceptible to suffering from ailments than men.
• In rural India 6.1 % of males said that they were suffering from ailments, while 7.6 % of rural women said the same.
• While 8.2 % of urban males said that they were sick, 10 % urban females said the same.

• Recently, ICICI Prudential Mutual Fund, launched its ESG Fund.
• ESG stands for Environment, Social Responsibility And Corporate Governance.
• The ESG funds use these parametres as filters while picking stocks for investment.
• The focus is on companies that adopt environment-friendly practices, produce products or services that influence society positively and conduct their business ethically.
• There are no strict norms on what constitutes ESG companies.
• Each fund house follows different parameters to assign scores to companies on ESG to short-list stocks.    

• Recently, Sewage Treatment Plants are inaugurated in Uttarakhand to clean Ganga under Namami Gange Programme.
• Industrial Effluent Monitoring, Public Awareness are the main pillars of the Namami Gange Programme.
• The Programme is being implemented by the National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG).
• NMCG is registered as a society under Societies Registration Act 1860.
• It functions under the Department of Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation, Ministry of Jal Sakthi.

• Workshop was conducted to mark 20 years of Himalayan Chandra Telescope to highlight the science it produced.
• It has been used in many coordinated international campaigns to monitor stellar explosions, comets, and exo-planets, and has contributed significantly to these studies.
• The telescope remotely operated using a dedicated satellite communication link from the Centre for Research & Education in Science & Technology (CREST), Indian Institute of Astrophysics.

• The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), which is probing drug charges against actors, has seized and retrieved data from the mobile phones.
• Section 102 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) gives the police the right to seize material they think will be valuable as part of investigation.
• The police has the power to seize the mobile/laptop/private diary or anything and it doesn’t matter if the person is an accused or just a witness in the case as long as the police believe he/she has something that will aid the investigation.
• The NCB, a central agency which is technically not police, gets similar powers of ‘search and seizure’ from the NDPS Act.    

• World Tourism Day is commemorated each year on 27 September.
• The 2020 edition of World Tourism Day, theme is ‘Tourism and Rural Development’.
• 100% FDI in tourism industries is allowed under automatic route.
• 100% FDI in tourism and hospitality sectors including tourism construction projects like the development of hotels, resorts, and recreational facilities.
• Project Mausam is a Ministry of Culture scheme to showcase a transnational mixed route on the World Heritage List.