India's Satyarthi, Pakistan's Malala win Nobel Peace Prize
- An Indo-Pak and Hindu-Muslim combination of Kailash Satyarthi and Malala Yousafzai today shared the Nobel Peace Prize honours for 2014 for their work on promoting child rights in the troubled sub-continent.
60-year-old Satyarthi, who runs an NGO in India that has been in the forefront of rescuing children from forced labour and trafficking, and 17-year-old Malala, who shot to limelight after the Taliban militants pumped bullets into her for advocating education for girls, were named by the Nobel Peace Prize Committee for the top global award this year.
"The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2014 is to be awarded to Kailash Satyarthi and Malala Yousafzai for their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education," the jury said.
India’s first national policy on mental health launched
- The union health ministry on Friday launched the country’s first ever mental health policy to provide access to good quality treatment to mentally ill people with the focus on those living in poverty.
The policy, launched by Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, is backed up by the “Mental Health Action Plan 365” which spells out the specific roles to be played by the Centre, the state governments, local bodies and civil society organisations.
The government also came out with two booklets providing training modules for general physicians or the common man.
“Universal access to mental health care is a specific goal of the government. It would find substantial articulation in the evolving National Health Policy and National Health Assurance Mission (NHAM),” Harsh Vardhan told the media after the launch.
The minister also said that Oct 10, which is observed as the world mental health day, would now also be observed as the national mental health day.
Indian-American activist wins prestigious US food award
- Washington: IANS: Indian-American food justice activist Navina Khanna is one of the five winners of the prestigious James Beard Foundation Leadership awards for 2014, considered North America’s highest honour for food and beverage professionals.
Khanna, Fellow at Movement Strategy Centre, has won the award “For her work as a food justice activist organizing across communities for equitable and ecological food systems on local, regional, and national levels.”
The JBF awards covering all aspects of the industry -from chefs and restaurateurs to cookbook authors and food journalists to restaurant designers and architects – are presented each spring at Lincoln Centre.
“Saansad Adarsh Gram Yojana” launched
- The Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi will launch tomorrow an ambitious village development project, called Saansad Adarsh Gram Yojana, SAGY, under which each Member of Parliament will take the responsibility of developing physical and institutional infrastructure in three villages by 2019. The goal is to develop three Adarsh Grams or model villages by March 2019, of which one would be achieved by 2016. Thereafter, five such Adarsh Grams (one per year) will be selected and developed by 2024. The Project to be launched on the occasion of birth anniversary of Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan aims to keep the soul of rural India alive while providing its people with quality access to basic amenities and opportunities to enable them to shape their own destiny. Inspired by the principles and values of Mahatma Gandhi, the Scheme places equal stress on nurturing values of national pride, patriotism, community spirit, self-confidence and on developing infrastructure.
Fortune’s ’40 under 40' powerful people list
- New York: Four Indians, including a Harvard University professor and the co-founder of India’s largest online marketplace Snapdeal, have been named by Fortune in its list of the 40 most powerful, influential and important people in business under the age of 40.
The Fortune’s 2014 ’40 under 40' list has been topped by ridesharing service company Uber’s 38-year-old co-founder Travis Kalanick and community-driven hospitality company Airbnb’s 33-year-old CEO Brian Chesky.
The list of super-achievers, who “don’t like limits, and they don’t like being told no” includes Founder and CEO of Facebook 30-year-old Mark Zuckerberg at the number two spot and Italy’s youngest Prime Minister Matteo Renzi (39) at the third position.
The Indians on the list are Economics professor at Harvard Raj Chetty, who is ranked 16, Micromax co-founder and CEO Rahul Sharma (ranked 21), Snapdeal Co-Founder and CEO Kunal Bahl (ranked 25) and Twitter’s General counsel and the only woman on the company’s executive team Vijaya Gadde (28).
Fortune said this year’s list of “young hotshots who are rocking businesses” includes many from sector as diverse as technology, finance, fashion and film and all have “power, influence, leverage, scale, and ideas that disrupt.”
The list also includes 38-year-old co-founder and CEO of texting company WhatsApp, Jan Koum on rank 5, Yahoo’s 38-year old CEO Marissa Mayer (ranked 6), New York Stock Exchange President 38-year-old Tom Farley (ranked 7) and Twitter co-founder and CEO 37-year-old Jack Dorsey (ranked 11).
India close to allowing Euroclear settlements for sovereign funds
- India is close to allowing sovereign wealth funds to settle government bonds on Euroclear, the world's largest securities settlements system, and is likely to set aside up to $3 billion for these long-term investors, according to two officials aware of the discussions.
One of the sources said the government would for now exclude foreign institutional investors (FIIs), the biggest investor base from overseas in India, as reported by Reuters in August.
A final decision to exclude FIIs would signal policymakers's skittishness about opening up India's debt market too much given concerns about sudden destabilising outflows, even as India depends on these foreign investors to fund its current account deficit.
The officials did not give a more specific timeline on when the government would finalise talks to join Euroclear.
Some lingering issues to be resolved include amendments in laws governing foreign investments in bonds and settlements when trades involve a domestic counterparty.
Cyclone Hudhud turns 'very severe'
NEW DELHI: The severe cyclonic storm 'Hudhud' turned "very severe" on Friday, said India's national weather forecaster while pin-pointing districts of Andhra Pradesh and Odisha which need to be extra careful till Sunday.
Suggesting complete evacuation from coastal areas of north Andhra Pradesh and south Odisha, it said sea condition will be "rough" to "very rough" from Saturday morning and would reach dangerous level on Sunday morning.
The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) said the storm surge of about 1-2 metres above astronomical tide would inundate low lying areas of Visakhapatnam, Vijayanagaram and Srikakulam districts of north coastal Andhra Pradesh at the time of landfall.
Though the wind speed (120-130 kmph gusting to 145 kmph) predicted by the weather department a day before remained more or less the same throughout the day on Friday, the weather forecaster in its latest bulletin broadened the extent of its warning and preferred to go into details of "damage" expected on Saturday-Sunday.
It predicted extensive damage to 'kutcha' houses, uprooting of big trees, partial disruption of power and communication lines and damage to agricultural crops for East Godavari, Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram and Srikakulam districts in north Andhra Pradesh.
Besides, it also predicted minor damage to power and communication lines and uprooting of small trees for certain districts of south Andhra Pradesh including West Godavari and Krishna. It predicted similar damage for Ganjam, Gajapati, Koraput and Malkangiri districts of south coastal Odisha.
Sanitation drive ineffective in improving health in rural India: Lancet
- Total Sanitation Campaign - the world's largest sanitation initiative in India - provided almost 25,000 individuals in 100 rural villages in Odisha access to toilets but it did not reduce exposure to faecal pathogens or decrease the occurrence of diarrhoea or child malnutrition, says a study.
Moreover, many householders do not always use the latrines, added the study funded by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and reported by the prestigious journal The Lancet.
"This, combined with continued exposure from poor hygiene, contaminated water, and unsafe disposal of child faeces may explain the lack of a health impact. The programme is effective in building latrines but not all households participate," explained lead study author professor Thomas Clasen from Emory University in Atlanta and London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in Britain.
Current Affairs Quiz
- 1. Who amongst following won the Nobel peace prize 2014 ?
A. Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and UNICEF
B. Malala Yousafzai and Kailash Satyarthi
C. European Union and CRY
D. CRY and Kailash Satyarthi - 2. Which cyclone is in news because it is expected to cross north Andhra Pradesh and adjoining Odisha coast?
A. Hudhud
B. Phailin
C. Matmo
D. Soulik - 3. World Post Day observed globally on ____________.
A. 10 October
B. 9 October
C. 8 October
D. 7 October - 4. Kailash Satyarthi is connected with which organisation ?
A. CRY
B. Swaraj
C. India's future
D. Bachpan Bachao Andolan - 5. Who amongst following recently resigned as Sangeet Natak Akademi chairperson ?
A. Leela Samson
B. Sharmila Tagore
C. Anupam Kher
D. Vijay Anand - 6. Madhav Vittal Kamath recently died. He was well known as _____________.
A. Hotel owner
B. Journalist
C. RTI Activist
D. Actor - 7. Recently, which Bollywood actor, director and producer was appointed as the Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF in South Asia ?
A. Shahrukh Khan
B. Aamir Khan
C. Salman Khan
D. Imran khan - 8.Indian Air Force celebrated 82nd Air Force Day on ______________.
A. October 4
B. October 8
C. October 10
D. October 2 - 9. The Nobel Prize in Physics 2014 is awarded to Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano, and Shuji Nakamura for the invention of _________________________________.
A. theoretical discovery of a mechanism that contributes to our understanding of the origin of mass of subatomic particles- Boson
B. efficient blue light-emitting diodes used in energy-saving lights.
C. discovery of the accelerating expansion of the Universe through observations of distant supernovae.
D. experimental methods that enable measuring and manipulation of individual quantum systems. - 10. The Nobel Prize in Literature-2014 is awarded to ___________ historical author and novelist Patrick Modiano.
A. French
B. English
C. American
D. African - Answer:
1)B 2)A, 3)B, 4)D, 5)A, 6)B, 7)B, 8)B, 9)B 10)A
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