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Daily PIB/ 29 March
General Studies- I
Topic- Modern Indian history from about the middle of the eighteenth century until the present- significant events, personalities, issues.
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Matua Dharma Maha Mela 2022
Context:
On the occasion of the 211th birth anniversary of Harichand Thakur, Prime Minister Modi will address Matua Dharma Maha Mela 2022 at Shreedham Thakurnagar, Thakurbari, West Bengal.
Highlights:
- Harichand Thakur devoted his life to the cause of betterment of the oppressed, downtrodden and deprived persons in undivided Bengal during the pre-independence era.
- The social and religious movement started by him originated in Orakandi (now in Bangladesh) in 1860 and led to the formation of the Matua Dharma.
- Matua Dharma Maha Mela 2022 is being organised by All India Matua Mahasangha from March 29th to April 5th 2022.
About Matua Mahasangha:
Matua Dharma / Matua Mahasangha is a religious reformation movement that originated, around 1860 AD, in modern-day Bangladesh.
- It has a considerable number of adherents both in Bangladesh and in West Bengal of India.
- Matua is a sect of depressed class Hindus who are Namasudras, a Scheduled Caste group.
- The movement was launched as a reformation by the followers of Harichand Thakur.
- Matua-mahasangha believe in Swayam-Dikshiti (“Self-Realisation”) through the chanting of Harinaam, i.e., chanting the Holy name of God Hari.
- Harichand stressed the congressional chanting of Lord’s name kirtan as the sole means to Mukti.
- His followers in 19th century were enchanted by congregational chanting of Lord Hari, which in Bengali called ‘hariname matuara’ giving the sect current name ‘Matua’.
About Harichand Thakur:
Harichand Thakur was born to a peasant family belonging to the Namasudra community.
- According to historian, Thakur “experienced atma darshan or self-revelation, through which he realized that he was the incarnation of God himself, born in this world to bring salvation to the downtrodden
- Thakur attained atmadarshan at an early age and would subsequently preach his Darshan in Twelve Commandments.
- Reforming Vaishnava devotionalism, he established the Matua sect of Hinduism.
- The sect was centered in Thakur’s ancestral village, Orakandi, Faridpur, Bengal Presidency (now in Bangladesh.
His teachings:
The teachings of Thakur establish education as preeminently important for the adherent and the upliftment of the population the adherent’s duty, while also providing a formula for ending social conflict.
General Studies- III
Topic- Infrastructure: Energy, Ports, Roads, Airports, Railways etc.
Dam Rehabilitation and Improvement Project (DRIP)
Context
Under the World Bank funded Dam Rehabilitation and Improvement Project (DRIP) Phase-I programme implemented during April 2012 to March 2021, 223 existing large dams located in 7 States have been comprehensively audited and rehabilitated.
- After completion of DRIP Phase- I programme, Government of India has now taken up DRIP Phase-II & III.
- Recently, The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs recently approved second and third phases of Rs10,211 crore Dam Rehabilitation and Improvement Project to improve safety and operational performance of 736 dams across the country.
Highlights:
The Project has been approved with the financial assistance of the World Bank (WB), and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
- It aimed to improve the safety and operational performance of selected dams across the whole country, along with institutional strengthening with system wide management approach.
- The Project will be implemented over a period of 10 years duration in two Phases, each of six years duration with two years overlapping from April, 2021 to March, 2031.
DRIP Phase II & Phase III envisages the following objectives:
- To improve the safety and performance of selected existing dams and associated appurtenances in a sustainable manner.
- To strengthen the dam safety institutional setup in participating states as well as at central level, and
- To explore the alternative incidental means at few of selected dams to generate the incidental revenue for sustainable operation and maintenance of dams
What is the DRIP Project?
Dam Rehabilitation and Improvement Project (DRIP) was launched in 2012 by the Ministry of Water Resources (MoWR) and River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation (Ministry of Jal Shakti) with assistance from World Bank.
- The Central Dam Safety Organisation of Central Water Commission, assisted by a Consulting firm, is coordinating and supervising the Project implementation.
- Originally the project was envisioned for rehabilitation and improvement of about 223 dams in 4 States, namely Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, and Tamil Nadu.
Now the project has been extended to 736 existing dams located across India.
Need for:
Globally India ranks third after China and the USA in terms of the number of large dams with 5264 large dams in operation and 437 large dams under construction.
- About 209 dams in India are over 100 years old and were built in an era when design practices and safety considerations were much below the current design and safety norms.
- Several of these dams may be experiencing distress and are in need of attention for ensuring their structural safety and operational efficiency.
General Studies- III
Topic-Inclusive growth and issues arising from it.
Mandatory Packaging in Jute Materials
Context:
Cabinet approves Extension of Norms for Mandatory Packaging in Jute Materials.
Highlights:
- The 100% of the foodgrains and 20% of the sugar shall be mandatorily packed in diversified jute bags.
- To pack sugar in diversified jute bags will give an impetus to the diversification of the jute industry.
- The decision also mandates that initially 10% of the indents of jute bags for packing foodgrains would be placed through reverse auction on the Gem portal.
- This will gradually usher in a regime of price discovery.
- The Government has expanded the scope of mandatory packaging norms under the Jute Packaging Material (JPM) Act, 1987.
Background:
- Nearly 3.7 lakh workers and several lakh farm families are dependent for their livelihood on the jute sectors.
- The government has been making concerted efforts for the development of jute sector; increasing the quality and productivity of raw jute, diversification of jute sector and also boosting and sustaining demand for jute products.
The Jute Packaging Materials (Compulsory use in Packing Commodities) Act, 1987:
- It is also known as the JPM Act.
- It provides for the compulsory use of jute packaging material in the supply and distribution of certain commodities in the interest of production of raw jute and jute packaging material and of persons engaged in the production thereof.
Benefits Packaging in Jute Materials:
- The approval will benefit farmers and workers located in the Eastern and North Eastern regions of the country particularly in the states of West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha, Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Meghalaya and Tripura.
- The jute industry is predominantly dependent on Government sector which purchases jute bags of value of more than Rs. 7,500 crore every year for packing food grains.
- This is done in order to sustain the core demand for the jute sector and to support the livelihood of the workers and farmers dependent on the sector.
Other Support provided to the Jute Sector:
Approximately two lakh jute farmers are being assisted with improved agronomic practices such as line sowing using seed drills, weed management by using wheel-hoeing and nail-weeders, distribution of quality certified seeds and also providing microbial assisted retting.
- To support jute farmers, a grant of subsidy of Rs. 100 crore for two years starting from 2018-19 has been approved.
- To support diversification of jute sector, the National Jute Board has collaborated with National Institute of Design and a Jute Design Cell has been opened at Gandhinagar.
- To boost demand in the jute sector, Government of India has imposed Definitive Anti-Dumping Duty on import of jute goods from Bangladesh and Nepal with effect from 5th January, 2017.
- To promoting transparency in jute sector, Jute SMART, an e-govt initiative was launched in December, 2016.
Further, the JCI is transferring 100% funds to jute farmers online for jute procurement under MSP and commercial operations.
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Rashtriya Sanskriti Mahotsav 2022
The second leg of the festival Rashtriya Sanskriti Mahotsav (RSM) 2022 will begin in Warangal, Telangana.
- The National Cultural Festival of India, Rashtriya Sanskriti Mahotsav 2022 started at Rajamahendravaram, Andhra Pradesh on 26th March, 2022 under the Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav.
- Rashtriya Sanskriti Mahotsav (RSM), was conceptualized by the Ministry of Culture, Government of India in 2015.
- It aims to celebrate the spirit of Tradition, Culture, Heritage and Diversity of our incredible country.
- It also aims to Preserve, Promote & Popularize the heritage of Indian Spirit & reconnect the new generation with our culture and to showcase to the country and the world our soft power of unity in diversity.
- The first Rashtriya Sanskriti Mahotsav which was organized in the grounds of IGNCA, New Delhi in November, 2015.
Supercomputer Param Shakti
Petascale Supercomputer Param Shakti inaugurated at IIT Kharagpur under National Supercomputing Mission (NSM) – a joint initiative of Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) and Department of Science and Technology (DST).
- The supercomputer PARAM Shakti is based on a heterogeneous and hybrid configuration of Intel Xeon Skylake processors, and NVIDIA Tesla V100.
- The system was designed and implemented by HPC Technologies team, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC).
Waste Management Technology Park
- The Waste to Wealth Mission of the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India, in collaboration with the East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) is inaugurating Decentralised Waste Management Technology Park in New Jaffrabad, East Delhi on March 29, 2022, for onsite processing of fresh Municipal solid waste.
- The aim is to make a scalable onsite processing Technology Park with aim of zero waste and zero energy which can be replicated.
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