• Recently, scientists from Jammu obtained a photographic record of the semi-aquatic carnivorous mammal in Neeru stream, a tributary of the Chenab
  • Neeru is a 30-km perennial stream that originates in the Kailash Lake at 3,900 metres above mean sea level and drains into the Chenab at Pul-Doda.
• Otters are mammals of the family Mustelidae consisting of 13 species.
  • They are found in every continent except Australia and Antarctica.
• The Eurasian otter covers the largest range of any Palearctic mammal.
• The species is persecuted as a pest in countries such as India, China and Nepal, and its populations have declined due to hunting for food and pelt, habitat loss, pollution and climate change.
• IUCN Red List classification- ‘Near Threatened’.
• It is regarded as a flagship species and indicator of high-quality aquatic habitats.

• Recently, the Bar Council of India permitted foreign lawyers and law firms to practice in India.
• BCI notified Rules for Registration and Regulation of Foreign Lawyers and Foreign Law Firms in India, 2022.
• About rules
  • Allows foreign lawyers and law firms to register with BCI to practise in India.
  • A foreign lawyer registered under rules shall be entitled to practice law in India in non-litigious matters only, which would be laid down by BCI in consultation with Ministry of Law.
  • They are allowed to practice transactional work /corporate work such as joint ventures, mergers and acquisitions, intellectual property matters, drafting of contracts and other related matters on a reciprocal basis.
  • However they will not be allowed to appear before any courts, tribunals or any other regulatory authorities.
• Significance of the move
  • Law firm will benefit from exposure to global best practices.
  • It will provide foreign firms and investors with some judicial comfort.

About BCI

• It was established by Parliament under section 4 of Advocates Act, 1961 to regulate and represent Indian bar.
• Statutory functions of BCI include:
  • prescribes standards of professional conduct.
  • Safeguard the rights, privileges and interests of advocates
  • Promote and support law reform
  • Deal with and dispose of any matter which may be referred by a State Bar Council
  • It also sets standards for legal education
  • grants recognition to universities for degree in law
  • Recognise foreign qualifications in law obtained outside India for admission as an advocate.
• Structure:
  • It consists of members elected from each state bar council, and the Attorney General of India and the Solicitor General of India who are ex officio members.
  • The council elects its own chairman and vice-chairman for a period of two years from among its members.

• It is the latest version of ChatGPT (Generative Pre-Trained Transformer), an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered chatbot, which can comprehend and generate natural language or human text.

About ChatGPT

• ChatGPT is an artificial-intelligence chatbot developed by San Francisco-based AI research company OpenAI in 2022.
• The dialogue format makes it possible to answer followup questions, admit its mistakes, challenge incorrect premises, and reject inappropriate requests. It can have conversations on topics from history to philosophy, generate lyrics and suggest edits to computer programming code.
• GPT is a kind of computer language model that relies on deep learning techniques to produce human-like text based on inputs.
  • Deep learning is a subset of machine learning, which is essentially a neural network with three or more layers.
  • These neural n etworks attempt to simulate behavior of human brain allowing it to learn from large amounts of data.
• GPT-4 is a large multimodal model (accepting image and text inputs, emitting text outputs) that is supposedly bigger, faster, and more accurate than earlier versions.
  • It can process a lot more information at a time and is also more multilingual.
• Issues: Not fully reliable, makes reasoning errors, can have various biases in its output and does not learn from its experience.

• US senate has recognised McMahon Line as international boundary between China and India.
• The resolution reaffirms India’s well-known and established position that Arunachal Pradesh, which China calls ‘South Tibet’, is an integral part of India.

About McMohan line

• McMahon Line serves as de facto boundary between China and India in the Eastern Sector.
• It specifically represents boundary between Arunachal Pradesh and Tibet, from Bhutan in the west to Myanmar in the east.
• It extends from corner of Bhutan to Isu Razi Pass on the Burma border.
• The McMahon Line was drawn during the Simla Convention of 1914, officially described as the Convention between Great Britain, China, and Tibet.
  • The line was determined by Sir Henry McMahon, then Foreign Secretary in the Government of British India, and it is called the McMahon Line after his name.
• According to the Shimla Treaty, the McMahon Line is the clear boundary line between India and China. On behalf of India, the British rulers considered Tawang of Arunachal Pradesh and the southern part of Tibet as part of India and which was also agreed by the Tibetans. Due to this, the Tawang region of Arunachal Pradesh became part of India.

• Padma Shri awardee and Millet Man of Himachal Nek Ram Sharma today urged students and women to play a leading role in bringing millets back to the food plate.

• Uttarakhand launched the country’s first “Resham Keet Bima” programme to safeguard its sericulturists. 200 sericulturists from five blocks in four districts—Dehradun, Haridwar, Udham Singh Nagar, and Nainital.
• The programme has been launched as a pilot project spanning five development blocks of four districts of the state in order to safeguard farmers from loss.
• The initiative is managed by Saral Krishi Beema.

• Denmark inaugurated a project to store carbon dioxide 1,800 metres beneath the North Sea, the first country in the world to bury CO₂ imported from abroad.
• The CO₂ graveyard, where the carbon is injected to prevent further warming of the atmosphere, is on the site of an old oil field.
• Led by British chemical giant Ineos and German oil company Wintershall Dea, the “Greensand” project is expected to store up to eight million tonnes of CO2 per year by 2030.

• Recently, the Prime Minister greeted the Sikh community on the commencement of Nanakshahi Sammat 555.
• Nanakshahi Sammat is a calendar system that was introduced by the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) in 2003.
• It is named after the founder of the Sikh religion, Guru Nanak Dev Ji to mark his 500th birth anniversary.
• It is a tropical solar calendar used in Sikhism.
• The Nanakshahi calendar is used by Sikhs around the world to mark important dates and festivals in the Sikh calendar, including the birth anniversaries of the ten Sikh Gurus, the martyrdom of Guru Arjan Dev, and the anniversary of the founding of the Khalsa Panth.
• It is based on the “Barah Maha” (Twelve Months), a composition composed by the Sikh gurus reflecting the changes in nature conveyed in the twelve-month cycle of the year.
• The year begins with the month of Chet, with 1 Chet corresponding to 14 March.
• The reference epoch of the Nanakshahi calendar is the birth of Guru Nanak Dev, corresponding to year 1469 CE.

• Recently, the first international conference of Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) on Shared Buddhist Heritage was held in New Delhi.
• Nodal Ministry: It was organized by the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of External Affairs and the International Buddhist Confederation.
• Objective- To re-establish trans-cultural links and seek out commonalities, between Buddhist art of Central Asia, art styles, archaeological sites and antiquity in various museum collections of the SCO countries.
• Focus of the Conference: India’s civilizational connection with the SCO nations.
• The event, under India’s leadership of SCO has brought together Central Asian, East Asian, South Asian and Arab countries on a common platform to discuss Shared Buddhist Heritage. It will celebrate Buddhist common heritage and build stronger and deeper bonds amongst the countries.

Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO)

• It is a permanent intergovernmental international organisation of Eurasian Nations.
• The SCO currently comprises of eight Member States (China, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Pakistan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan), four Observer States interested in acceding to full membership (Afghanistan, Belarus, Iran, and Mongolia) and six “Dialogue Partners” (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Cambodia, Nepal, Sri Lanka.
• Secretariat- Beijing, China.

• Recently Russia agreed to extend Black Sea Grain Deal for 60 days.
• BSGI was brokered by United Nations and Türkiye in July 2022 between Russia and Ukraine.
• The deal endeavours to tackle escalating food prices emanating from supply chain disruptions due to effective blockage of Black Sea.
• The deal put in place a Joint Coordination Centre (JCC), comprising senior representatives from Russia, Turkey, Ukraine and the UN for oversight and coordination.
• Objective- To provide for a safe maritime humanitarian corridor for Ukrainian exports (particularly for food grains and fertilizer including ammonia) from three of its key ports, namely, Chornomorsk, Odesa and Yuzhny/Pivdennyi on Black Sea.
• Ukraine is among the largest exporters of wheat, maize, rapeseed, sunflower seeds and sunflower oil, globally.