Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC)   

• The Organisation of the Islamic Conference was established by the First Islamic Summit Conference held in Rabat, Morocco, in 1969.
• The OIC was known as the Organisation of the Islamic Conference until 2011.
• It is the 2nd largest inter-governmental organisation in the world after the United Nations, with a membership of 57 countries spread across 4 continents.
• It is the collective voice of the Muslim world, and its objective is to safeguard and protect the interests of the Muslim world in the spirit of promoting international peace and harmony among various people of the world.
• The OIC has reserved its membership for Muslim-majority countries.
• The Central African Republic, Russia, Thailand, Bosnia & Herzegovina, and the unrecognised Turkish Cypriot state have Observer status.

The OIC and India

• As the country with the world’s second largest Muslim community, India had been invited to the founding conference at Rabat in 1969, but was humiliatingly ejected at Pakistan’s behest.
• In 2006, Saudi Arabia invited India to join as an observer, but India turned it down.
• Hence, India is neither a member nor an observer of the OIC.

National Action for Mechanised Sanitation Ecosystem (NAMASTE) Scheme

• Namaste is a Central Sector Scheme of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment (MoSJE) as a joint initiative of the MoSJE and the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA).
• It envisages safety and dignity of sanitation workers by creating an enabling ecosystem that recognizes sanitation workers as one of the key contributors in operations and maintenance of sanitation infrastructure.
• The scheme aims to provide sustainable livelihood and enhancing their occupational safety through capacity building and improved access to safety gear and machines.
• It aims at providing access to alternative livelihoods support and entitlements to reduce the vulnerabilities of sanitation workers.
• It aims to enable them to access self-employment and skilled wage employment opportunities and break the inter generationality in sanitation work.
• In addition, NAMASTE would bring about a behaviour change amongst citizens towards sanitation workers and enhance demand for safe sanitation services.
• NAMASTE aims to achieve the following outcomes:
  • Zero fatalities in sanitation work in India.
  • All sanitation work is performed by skilled workers.
  • No sanitation workers come in direct contact with human faecal matter.
  • Sanitation workers are collectivized into SHGs and are empowered to run sanitation enterprises.
  • All Sewer and Septic tank sanitation workers (SSWs) have access to alternative livelihoods.
  • Strengthened supervisory and monitoring systems at national, state and ULB levels to ensure enforcement and monitoring of safe sanitation work.
  • Increased awareness amongst sanitation services seekers (individuals and institutions) to seek services from registered and skilled sanitation workers.

Gokul Grams

• It is an initiative of the Ministry of Fisheries, Animal Husbandry & Dairying.
• The Department of Animal Husbandry & Dairying, under Rashtriya Gokul Mission (RGM) has released funds for setting up of 16 Gokul Grams.
• The aim is the conservation and development of indigenous bovine breeds in a scientific and holistic manner.
• Setting up of Biogas Plant was also included as one of the component under Gokul Grams and their performance evaluation has not been carried out.
• They have not been connected with the Gobardhan Yojana as the said scheme was not in place during the inception of Gokul Gram component under RGM.
• Due to implementation of the RGM and other measures taken by Government of India milk production in the country has increased.
• The scheme is leading to multiplication of elite animals of indigenous breeds and increased availability of indigenous stock.

Agristack Project

• The Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare has commenced the work for creating Agristack in the country.
• In order to create Agristack, the department has finalized the core concept of India Digital Ecosystem of Agriculture (IDEA) which lays down a framework for Agristack.
• For this, a Task Force was constituted and in furtherance, a concept paper on IDEA was prepared and comments were invited from subject experts, farmers, Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs) and general public.
• Agristack is a federated structure and ownership of data is with the States only.
• Access to federated Farmers’ database is with Government only. No private company is involved in developing the federated Farmers’ database.
• As of now, the federated database is being built by taking the publicly available data as existing in the Department and in various data silos in Government.

Base Editing

• The technology was invented only 6 years ago.
• Base editing is a CRISPR-Cas9-based genome editing technology that allows the introduction of point mutations in the DNA without generating double strand breaks (DSBs).
• Bases are the language of life.
• The four types of base - adenine (A), cytosine (C), guanine (G) and thymine (T) - are the building blocks of our genetic code.
• Just as letters in the alphabet spell out words that carry meaning, the billions of bases in our DNA spell out the instruction manual for our body.
• Base editing allows scientists to zoom to a precise part of the genetic code and then alter the molecular structure of just one base, converting it into another and changing the genetic instructions.
• It is part of the gene therapy methods used in treating cancer.