UTTAR PRADESH

PM led the first meeting of the National Ganga Council was held in Kanpur

Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi chaired the first meeting of the National Ganga Council in Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh.

The first meeting of the Council was aimed to reinforce the importance of a Ganga-centric approach in all departments of the concerned states and relevant Central Ministries.

The Council is given overall responsibility for superintendence of pollution prevention and rejuvenation of River Ganga Basin, including Ganga and its tributaries.

The council reviewed the progress of the amount of work done on various aspects of cleaning river Ganga with a focus on swachhta, aviralta and nirmalta.

INTERNATIONAL

Ethiopia’s PM receives Nobel Peace Prize

Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has received the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to achieve international peace and cooperation.

This year’s Nobel Peace Prize was the 100th to be awarded.

The Nobel Peace Prize consists of a diploma, a gold medal and a cheque for 9 million Swedish kronor (850,000 euros).

The Nobel Committee announced in October it was honouring Abiy Ahmed for his efforts to resolve the long-running conflict with neighbouring for Eritrea.

Greta Thunberg and 3 other are to be awarded the Right Livelihood Award

Four people won the Right Livelihood Award for the year 2019. The awardees are Greta Thunberg, Aminatou Haidar, Guo Juanmei and Davi Kopenawa Yanomami.

Awarded for:

The award aims to honour Greta Thunberg for her fight against climate change

Davi Kopenawa Yanomami for her commitment and efforts to protect the indigenous rights and land

Guo Juanmei was awarded for her work for women’s rights in China for 25 years
The award recognized Aminatou Haidar‘s efforts for the independence of Western Sahara. She spent four years in a secret prison, isolated from the outside world.

Peter Handke received the Nobel Literature Prize

Author Peter Handke was conferred the Nobel Literature Prize. He received the 9 million-kronor ($948,000) award from King Carl XVI Gustaf at a ceremony in Stockholm.

Handke was a staunch supporter of the Serbs and has disputed that the massacre of 8,000 Bosnian Muslims in the town of Srebrenica was genocide.

NATIONAL

Lok Sabha passed the 2019 Sanskrit Central Universities Bill

Lok Sabha passed the Sanskrit Central Universities Bill, 2019 recently.

The bill seeks to set up central Sanskrit universities.
The Bill also seeks to convert three deemed Sanskrit universities into central universities. The three universities are Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan, the Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeeth in New Delhi and the Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeeth in Tirupati.

The approval will grant power to the universities to affiliate to colleges and attract more students from within India and abroad.

The Sansthan was established in 1970. Lal Bahadur Shastri Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeeth was set up in 1962. The Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeeth in Tirupati was established in 1961. Later, all three universities were granted deemed university status by the UGC.

Rajya Sabha passed the bill to extend the reservation for SC, ST by 10 more years

Rajya Sabha passed a Constitution amendment bill to extend reservation to SCs and STs in Lok Sabha and state assemblies by another 10 years. The bill was passed by Lok Sabha on 10 December. The bill will now be sent to the states for ratification by 50% of the assemblies before it comes into force.

Reservation for members of Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) was given for the past 70 years in Lok Sabha and state assemblies. The reservation is due to end on 25 January 2020.
All those who do not come from the SC/ST communities have also extended help for their welfare.

Over 1,65,000 lakh farmers across India have been registered on e-NAM

Government said that over 1,65,000 lakh farmers across India have been registered on the National Agriculture Market (e-NAM) platform.

585 wholesale regulated markets have been integrated with e-NAM platform.

An additional of 415 markets have been approved for integration with it.

Till November 2019, 2,99,000 metric tonnes of agri-commodities have been recorded on e-NAM platform.

The government promotes the inter-state trade and inter mandi trade through e-NAM platform. It adds the states that have been advised to strengthen quality assaying facilities in e-NAM for proper quality testing of commodities, e-trading, online payment facility.

Wasim Jaffer became the first player in Indian cricket to feature in 150 Ranji matches

Wasim Jaffer, the former India opener, became the first player in Indian cricket to feature in 150 Ranji matches.

He is also less than 1000 runs away from completing 20,000 runs in first-class cricket. Jaffer has played 253 first-class games.

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