“Online Grievance Management Portal” launched
Union Minister for Communication & IT and Law & Justice Ravi Shankar Prasad launched the “Online Grievance Management Portal of National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC)”.
About the Portal
NCSC Grievance Management portal would make it easier for Scheduled Castes population of our country to register their complaint from any part of the country.
The portal shall enable them to file their application and other atrocity and services related grievances online and to get them addressed in a time bound manner.
NCSC aims to streamline the grievance redressal specially of the Scheduled Caste population through this portal.
The portal designed in collaboration with the Bhaskaracharya Institute for Space Applications and Geoinformatics (BISAG-N), a Centre of Excellence under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Government of India will facilitate an end-to-end e-filing of complaints and grievances and their tracking.
Finally, it is intended to make the hearing process work on similar lines as e-courts.
This portal is linked to the Commission’s website and one can file one’s complaint upon registering on it.
The facility to upload documents and audio/video files is also available. This would supplement the physical submission of complaints and grievances.
Important takeaways for all competitive exams
The National Commission for Scheduled Castes (NCSC) was set up under the Article 338 of the Constitution of India.
Mental-Health Digital Platform MANAS Launched
The Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India virtually launched the “MANAS” App to promote wellbeing across age groups.
About MANAS
– MANAS stands for Mental Health and Normalcy Augmentation System.
– MANAS is a comprehensive, scalable, and national digital wellbeing platform and an app developed to augment mental well-being of Indian citizens.
– The App integrates the health and wellness efforts of various government ministries, scientifically validated indigenous tools with gamified interfaces developed/researched by various national bodies and research institutions.
– It was initiated by the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India.
– It was jointly executed by NIMHANS Bengaluru, AFMC Pune and C-DAC Bengaluru.
– The app must be integrated with the public health schemes like the National Health Mission, Poshan Abhiyan, e-Sanjeevani and others so that it is used widely.
– Catering to the overall wellbeing of people of all age groups, the initial version of MANAS focuses on promoting positive mental health in the age group of 15-35 years.
Important takeaways for all competitive exams
The Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India is Prof. K Vijay Raghavan.
Pohela Boishakh (Subho Noboborsho) 2021
It marks the new Year for Bengal Community. Across the world, Bengali’s celebrate this day. Usually, the Bengali New Year falls around 14 April or 15 April. This year it is celebrated on 15 April in India.
About celebration and festival
The day is marked by cleaning and decorating the houses with beautiful rangolis or alpona outside homes.
Some people visit temples and pray for prosperity in the coming year.
The day also signals the beginning of the financial year for the Bengali business class.
On this day, shopkeepers invite customers and even distribute sweets and calendars.
The traces of celebration of the festival roots back to Mughal rule and also the proclamation of tax collection reforms of Akbar.
On this day a notable event in Bangladesh is the “Mangal Shobhajatra” organised by the students and teachers of Fine Arts of Dhaka University, which takes place at dawn. The festivity in 2016, was declared as a cultural heritage of humanity by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).
Important takeaways for all competitive examinations
In Bengali, the word Pahela means ‘first’ and Boishakh is the first month of the Bengali calendar. In Bengali New Year in Bengal is reffered as Nobo Borsho.
A ‘Healthy normal’ Monsoon forecasts by Skymet
Skymet which is a private weather forecast company and its weather report states:
The report states:
– This year, the monsoon is likely to be 103% of the long period average (LPA). The LPA is the average of all India monsoon consisting of rainfall of 88 cm and is 50-year mean.
– The odds of an El Nino, characterised by a heating of the equatorial central Pacific over half a degree, are low this year.Presently, the Pacific is in a La Nina mode.
– The North India plains along with a few parts of northeast India are at risk of being rain deficient through the season.
– The Indian Ocean Dipole, characterised by a temperature gradient in the western and eastern Indian Ocean. It is expected to be slightly on the negative. Usually a positive dipole aids the monsoon.
– During the season in India, the monsoon in 2019 and 2020 was only the third time in a century of back-to-back years of above normal rainfall.
What is the Impact?
– As per the studies a positive IOD year sees more than normal rainfall over central India.
– A negative IOD complements El NiNo leading to severe drought.
– Also, positive IOD results in more than usual in Arabian Sea.
– In Bay of Bengal, negative IOD results in stronger than usual cyclogenesis. During this time, cyclogenesis in Arabian Sea is suppressed.
Important takeaways for all competitive exams
What is IOD?
It is Indian Ocean Dipole, an atmosphere-ocean coupled phenomenon in the tropical Indian Ocean which is characterised by a difference in sea-surface temperatures.
HGCO19 an mRNA Vaccine Candidate
An additional government funding has been received by India’s mRNA-based Covid-19 vaccine candidate-HGCO19 for its clinical studies. This funding has been awarded under the ‘Mission Covid Suraksha’.
About HGCO19
– HGCO19, the novel mRNA Vaccine candidate has been developed by Pune-based biotechnology company Gennova Biopharmaceuticals Ltd. in collaboration with HDT Biotech Corporation, USA.
– It has already demonstrated safety, immunogenicity, neutralization antibody activity in the rodent and non-human primate models.
– For Phase 1/2 clinical trials for its vaccine candidate HGCO19, Gennova has initiated the enrolment of volunteers.
– One of the advantage of mRNA vaccine is that they are considered safe due to non-infectious, non-integrating in nature, and degraded by standard cellular mechanisms.
– They are also highly efficacious and mRNA vaccines are fully synthetic.
Important takeaways for all competitive examinations
Mission Covid Suraksha is India’s targeted effort to enable the development of indigenous, affordable and accessible vaccines for the country. It is led by the Department of Biotechnology and implemented by a dedicated Mission Implementation Unit at Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council (BIRAC).
