WHY IN THE NEWS?

• The Reserve Bank of India has announced the theme for the Third Cohort under the Regulatory Sandbox (RS) as ‘MSME Lending’. The application for the Third Cohort will be kept open from October 01, 2021 to November 14, 2021.
• Regulatory Sandbox (RS) refers to live testing of new products or services in a controlled/test regulatory environment for which regulators may (or may not) permit certain regulatory relaxations for the limited purpose of the testing.
• First Cohort: First Cohort under the Regulatory Sandbox was launched by RBI in December 2020, with the theme as ‘Retail Payments’. Six entities have completed the testing phase of the cohort.
• Second Cohort: Second Cohort under the Regulatory Sandbox was announced by RBI in December 2020 with the theme as ‘Cross Border Payments’. Eight entities have been selected for the ‘Test Phase’.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• India’s Raja Randhir Singh has taken over as acting president of the Olympic Council of Asia as Sheikh Ahmad Al-Fahad Al-Sabah appeals a guilty verdict in a Swiss forgery trial. A five-time Olympic shooter and an Asian Games gold medallist in 1978, Singh was promoted to the role from his position as an honorary life vice president.
• During the interim period, Raja Randhir Singh will carry out the duties and responsibilities of the OCA President, starting with the OCA Executive Board Meeting scheduled to be held on 13th September 2021.”
• Singh had been part of OCA as secretary-general for 24 years since 1991 and is the longest-serving executive board member. He is also an honorary member of the International Olympic Committee.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• Hyderabad-based International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) has been awarded the Africa Food Prize for 2021 for improving food security in sub-Saharan Africa.
• The Tropical Legumes Project developed 266 varieties of improved legumes and half a million tons of seeds for a range of legume crops, including cowpeas, pigeon peas, chickpea, common bean, groundnut, and soybean.
• The improved seeds benefitted over 25 million farmers in climate-resilient approaches and to control pest outbreaks across the region. ICRISAT is a non-profit, non-political public international research organisation that conducts agricultural research for development in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa with a wide array of partners throughout the world.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• A Hyderabad-based Space technology startup, Skyroot Aerospace has become the first private company to formally enter into an agreement with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
• The Framework MoU will allow the company to undertake multiple tests and access facilities at various ISRO centres and avail the technical expertise of ISRO for testing and qualifying their space launch vehicle systems and subsystems.
• Skyroot, founded by former ISRO scientists, is building the Vikram series of rockets to carry small satellites into space.
• The startup has already test-fired its solid propulsion rocket engine named Kalam-5, whose bigger version will power its rockets.
• Skyroot Aerospace is building the Vikram series of rockets to carry small satellites into space. The first launch vehicle in the series, Vikram-1 is scheduled to be launch in 2022.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• India and the United States of America (USA) have launched the “Climate Action and Finance Mobilization Dialogue (CAFMD)”. It will strengthen India-US bilateral cooperation on climate and environment.
• The dialogue was launched by Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Bhupender Yadav and Mr John Kerry, U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate (SPEC) in New Delhi.
• “Climate Action and Finance Mobilization Dialogue (CAFMD)” is one of the two tracks of the India-U.S. Climate and Clean Energy Agenda 2030 partnership launched at the Leaders’ Summit on Climate in April 2021. The other track is Strategic Clean Energy Partnership.
• CAFMD will demonstrate how the world can align swift climate action with inclusive and resilient economic development, taking into account national circumstances and sustainable development priorities

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• Justice M. Venugopal has been named as the new Acting Chairperson of the appellate tribunal, National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT). This is the third time in a row that an Acting Chairperson is at the helm of the NCLAT, after the retirement of permanent Chairperson Justice S J . Mukhopadhaya on March 14, 2020.
• The NCLAT was constituted under Section 410 of the Companies Act, 2013 for hearing appeals against the orders of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT).
• It is also an appellate tribunal for hearing appeals against the orders passed by NCLT under the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC), and by the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (IBBI).
• It is also the appellate tribunal to hear and dispose of appeals against any direction issued or decision made or order passed by the Competition Commission of India (CCI).

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• Haryana has topped among all other states of the country in terms of installation of off-grid solar pumps under Pradhan Mantri Kisan Urja Suraksha Evam Utthan Mahaabhiyaan (PM-KUSUM), as per the data by the Union Ministry of New and Renewable Energy.
• Haryana has installed 14,418 pumps against 15,000 sanctioned pumps for the year 2020-21. Haryana was given a target of 15,000 pumps for the year 2020-21 with a total cost of Rs 520 crore.
• The centrally-sponsored PM-KUSUM scheme was launched in 2019 with the target to install 20 lakh standalone solar pumps.
• Under this scheme, farmers have to bear 40 per cent of the pump’s cost, while the central and state governments subsidize the remaining 60 per cent for solar pumps that have a capacity of up to 10 HP.
• However, Haryana and some other states have provided additional top-up on the subsidies, which has reduced the farmer’s share to less than 25 per cent

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• Nuakhai Juhar, the agrarian festival of Western Odisha, was celebrated with religious fervour and tradition. It is celebrated 1 day after the celebration of Ganesh Chaturthi.
• Nuakhai is a crop festival celebrated by people of Western Odisha and Southern Chhattisgarh, to welcome the new rice of the season. Nua means new and khai means food. So, the festival of nuakhai is a festival to celebrate newly harvested food by the farmers

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• Civil aviation minister Jyotiradtiya Scindia has launched a first of its kind “Medicine from the Sky” project in Telangana. The project has aimed at transporting vaccines and other essential products to remote areas using drones.
• The Medicine from the Sky project will be taken up on a pilot basis in 16 green zones in Telangana and later scaled up on the national level based on data.
• “This ‘Medicines from the Sky’ project will be taken up in 16 green zones.
• The data will be analysed for three months.
• Along with the health ministry, IT ministry, state government and the Centre will together analyse the data and make a model for the whole country.

WHY IN THE NEWS?

• Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel has announced the launch of ‘Millet Mission’, which aims to provide proper price rates to farmers for minor cereal crops.
• The initiative is also a step towards the Chief Minister’s vision for the state to become India’s millet hub.
• To implement the mission, the state government has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Indian Institute of Millet Research (IIMR), Hyderabad and the collectors of 14 districts of the state.
• Other important benefits under the Millet Mission to farmers will include input assistance for millet, procurement arrangements, aid farmers in the processing of crops and ensure that the farmers get the benefit of the expertise of experts.