• Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address the 108th Indian Science Congress (ISC) through video conferencing.
• The 108th annual session of ISC will be held at Rashtrasant Tukadoji Maharaj Nagpur University, Maharashtra which is also celebrating its centenary this year.
• The first session of the Congress was held in 1914
• The focal theme of this year’s ISC is Science and Technology for Sustainable Development with Women Empowerment.
• It will witness discussions on issues of sustainable development, women empowerment and the role of science and technology.
• The participants will discuss and deliberate on ways to increase the number of women in higher echelons of teaching, research and industry, along with trying to find ways to provide women with equal access to Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics education, and economic participation.
• A special programme to showcase the contribution of women in science and technology will also be held, which will also witness lectures by renowned women scientists.

 Several other programmes will also be organised alongside ISC.

• Children’s Science Congress will be organised to help stimulate scientific interest and temperament among children.
• Farmer’s Science Congress will provide a platform to improve the bio-economy and attract youth to agriculture.
• Tribal Science Congress will also be held, which will be a platform for scientific display of indigenous ancient knowledge system and practice, along with focusing on the empowerment of tribal women.

• The government is working to boost surveillance at all 3,693 centrally protected monuments (CPMs) across the country with the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) launching a study on security needs of the monuments in collaboration with IIT-Delhi.
• The project comes on the back of acute shortage of security personnel at centrally protected monuments with the ASI recently telling the parliamentary committee probing the matter that security guards were posted at only 248 of the 3,693 CPMs. That comes to a dismal 6.7 per cent security coverage.
• The committee notes with dismay that out of the total requirement of 7,000 personnel for the protection of monuments, the government could provide only 2,578 security personnel at 248 locations due to budgetary constraints,” the report of the committee noted.
• The panel observed that budgetary constraints should not be an excuse for not providing security guards to protect India’s rich cultural heritage.
• It is the bounden duty of the government to protect our heritage sites. A budget should be provided to appoint 7,000 personnel for the protection of the monuments or as per the study conducted by IIT-Delhi.
• There is ban on construction within 100 metres of a Centrally protected monument and regulated construction within 100-200 metres under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958.
• The Act protects monuments and sites that are over 100 years old.

• Stock exchanges have been directed by the Securities and Exchanges Board of India (SEBI) to set up an Investor Risk Reduction Access (IRRA) platform. With the growing reliance on technology in the securities market, there is an increase in instances of glitches in trading members’ systems, some of which resulted in the disruption of trading services. In these cases, investors with open positions are at risk of the non-availability of avenues to close their positions, especially at times when the markets are volatile.

What is an Investor Risk Reduction Access (IRRA) platform?

• The Investor Risk Reduction Access (IRRA) platform will be jointly developed by the stock exchanges to enable investors to square off their position or cancel the pending orders if there is a disruption of services provided by the trading members. Trading members are those who trade on their own account as well as on the account of their clients.
• According to the new SEBI circular, the trading members can request the enablement of the IRRA service in case they face technical glitches that can cause disruption in the trading services.
• The market regulator has directed the stock exchanges to monitor parameters like connectivity, social media posts, order flow, and others. It also called on the stock exchanges to initiate the enablement of the service if required, irrespective of the trading member’s request.
• The SEBI also called on the stock exchanges to put in place a detailed framework to support the reverse migration from the IRRA system to the trading member’s trading system when the trading system is revived and a request is made in this regard.
• The stock exchanges are also required to periodically test the IRRA platform from time to time for the seamless functioning of the service.
• The SEBI has asked the stock exchanges and clearing corporations to operationalize the IRRA platform by October 1, 2023.

• The Allahabad High Court had ordered the Uttar Pradesh Government to conduct urban local body elections without the OBC reservations as the “triple test” requirement for the quota has not been fulfilled. The state government has recently constituted a commission to conduct the tripe test survey in the urban local bodies.

What is a triple test survey?

• The Supreme Court put forth the triple test in the case Vikas Kishanrao Gawali vs. State of Maharashtra and others on March 2, 2021. It involves the government implementing three tasks to finalize the reservation to the OBCs in the local bodies. These tasks are:

• Constitute a dedicated commission to conduct a rigorous empirical study into the nature and implications of the backwardness in local bodies
• To specify the proportion of reservation required in local bodies based on the commission’s recommendations
• To ensure that the reservations for SCs, STs and OBCs together do not surpass the aggregate of 50 percent of the total seats.

Why is triple survey used instead of rapid survey?

• In 2017, the Uttar Pradesh government conducted a rapid survey to determine the OBC population. This survey was conducted in each municipality, and based on its result, seats were reserved in proportion to the OBC population in the respective constituency.
• The rapid survey only focuses on the headcount of the OBC population. According to the Allahabad High Court, granting reservations based on the population alone does not consider the backwardness and the political representation of a class or a group.
• Disadvantages faced by a community in accessing education and job opportunities cannot be equated with the disadvantages in the area of political representation.
• This is because increasing participation in local self-government ensures immediate overall empowerment of an underrepresented community to which an elected representative belongs. Whereas, increasing access to education and jobs ensures only the socio-economic upliftment of individuals.

Why in News?

• Recently, India and Saudi Arabia discussed signing a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) to obtain formal assistance from each other in investigations related to criminal cases.

What is MLAT?

• It is a mechanism whereby countries cooperate with one another to provide and obtain formal assistance in the prevention, suppression, investigation and prosecution of crime to ensure that the criminals do not escape or sabotage the due process of law for want of evidence available in different countries.
• The Ministry of Home Affairs is the Central Authority of India for dealing with requests for mutual legal assistance in criminal matters.
• Section 105of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) explains the reciprocal arrangements to be made by the Central Government with the Foreign Governments with regard to the service of summons/warrants/judicial processes.
• India has so far signed MLATs with 45 countries.

• The International Year of Millets 2023 has officially kicked off.
  The government of India under Prime Minister Narendra Modi spearheaded the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) resolution for declaring the year 2023 as the International Year of Millets and the proposal of India was supported by 72 countries. UNGA declared 2023 as the International Year of Millets in March 2021.
• January 2023 is the focussed month for the Ministry of Sports and Youth Affairs, and the States of Chhattisgarh, Mizoram, and Rajasthan for conducting events and activities related to the millets year.
• India pushed for recognizing the importance of millet and creating a domestic and global demand along with providing nutritious food to the community.

What are millets?

• Millet is a common term for categorizing small-seeded grasses that are often called Nutri-cereals. Some of them are sorghum (jowar), pearl millet (bajra), finger millet (ragi), little millet (kutki), foxtail millet (kakun), proso millet (cheena), barnyard millet (sawa), and kodo millet (kodon).
• An essential staple cereal crop for millions of smallholder dryland farmers across Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia, millets offer nutrition, resilience, income and livelihood for farmers, and have multiple uses such as food, feed, fodder, biofuels and brewing.

Significance and benefits of millets:

• Millets are nutritionally superior to wheat and rice owing to their higher protein levels and a more balanced amino acid profile. Millets also contain various phytochemicals which exert therapeutic properties owing to their anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidative properties.
• Further, besides being climate resilient, millet grains are rich sources of nutrients like carbohydrates, protein, dietary fibre, and good-quality fat; minerals like calcium, potassium, magnesium, iron, manganese, zinc and B complex vitamins.
• Most importantly, millet production is not dependent on the use of chemical fertilizers.

Background of millets in India:

• Millets were traditionally consumed, but due to the push given to food security through Green Revolution in the 1960s, millets were less consumed and almost forgotten.
• Before the Green Revolution, millets made up around 40 per cent of all cultivated grains, which has dropped to around 20 per cent over the years.
• Not only has the consumption of millets declined, but the area under production has been replaced with commercial crops, oilseeds, pulses, and maize. These commercial crops are profitable, and their production is supported by several policies through subsidized inputs, incentivized procurement, and inclusion in the Public Distribution System. This has resulted in changes in dietary patterns with preferential consumption of fine-calorie-rich cereals.
• India produces more than 170 lakh tonnes of millet, which is 80 percent of Asia’s and 20 percent of global production.
• India produces all the nine commonly known millets and is the largest producer and fifth-largest exporter of millets in the world.
• Most of the states in India grow one or more millet crop species. Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana are the major millets producing states.

India’s millet trade:

• India exported millets products worth of USD 34.32 million during 2021-22. In 2020- 21, India exported millets worth USD 26.97 million against USD 28.5 million in 2019-20.
• India’s major millet exporting countries are UAE, Nepal, Saudi Arabia, Libya, Oman, Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen, the UK, and the US.
• The major millet-importing countries in the world are Indonesia, Belgium, Japan, Germany, Mexico, Italy, the US, the UK, Brazil, and the Netherlands.

A look at the trend of MSP:

• The Minimum Support Price for jowar, bajra, and ragi increased 73 percent, 65 percent, and 88 percent to Rs 2,990, Rs 2,350, and Rs 3,578, respectively, data showed.

Why in News?

• Recently, the Karnataka Cabinet decided to categorise the two dominant communities, Vokkaligas and Lingayats, as “moderately backward” from the “backward” category in a move that could increase their share in reservation for Other Backward Classes (OBC).

About

• Karnataka currently has 32% quota for OBC, and 17% and 7% quota for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, respectively, taking the total to 56%.
• The Panchamasali sub-sect of Veerashaiva Lingayats has demanded inclusion in the 2A category which has 15% quota from their current 3B category which has 5% quota.
• The Vokkaliga community, which is currently in the3A category, will be moved to a newly-created 2C category with 4% reservation. And the Lingayat community, which is in the 3B category, will now be in a new 2D category with 5% reservation.
• The Cabinet ensures that there is no sub-categorisation of the Lingayat community.
• It was decided on the basis of recommendations of the Karnataka State Commission for Backward Classes, which had submitted an interim report to Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on December 23.
• The increase in reservation from the one granted currently to these communities — 4% for Vokkaligas and 5% for Lingayats— via redistribution of the EWS quota will be based on the population of various communities assessed by the Karnataka State Commission for Backward Classes.
• Karnataka government will petition the Centre to approve the hike in the reservation by including it under Schedule 9 of the Constitution.

• The Ninth Schedule contains a list of central and state laws which cannot be challenged in courts.
• It became a part of the Constitution in 1951, when the document was amended for the first time.
• It was created by the new Article 31B, which along with 31A was brought in by the government to protect laws related to agrarian reform and for abolishing the Zamindari system.

• Lingayats are considered the most populous community in the state, followed by

Who are Lingayats & Vokkaligas ?

• Lingayats:

• The term Lingayat denotes a person who wears a personal linga, an iconic form of god Shiva, on the body which is received during the initiation ceremony.
• The tradition of Lingayatism is known to have been founded by social reformer and philosopher Basavanna in 12th century Karnataka.
• Lingayats had been classified as a Hindu subcaste called “Veerashaiva Lingayats” and they are considered to be Shaivites.
• The emergence of the Lingayat sect can be located within the larger trend of Bhakti movements that had swept across South India from the 8th century AD onwards.

• Vokkaligas:

• The agricultural communities of south Karnataka are called Vokkaligas. People belonging to the Vokkaliga community are known as Okkalia of Utkala Kingdom.
• As a community of warriors and cultivators they have historically had notable demographic, political, and economic dominance in Old Mysore (region).
•  It is believed by some historians that the Rashtrakutas and Western Gangas were of Vokkaliga origin. The Vokkaligas occupied administrative positions in the Vijaynagar Empire.

Lingayat separate religion demand

• The theological base of the demand lies in 20th century scholarship of the Vachana movement, a movement which is given liturgical (considered holy) respect among significant sections of the Veerashaiva-Lingayat sect.
• This scholarship on the Vachana movement emphasised the movement as a 12th century revolution led by Basavanna against inequality and Sanatana Dharma (Hinduism).
• The political and religious leaders of these sections, that is, those who view Basavanna as the founder of the sect/religion and reject the Vedas and the Agamas, now call themselves ‘Lingayats’ and take pains to show that they are different from the rest, whom they call ‘Veerashaivas’ as the latter accept the authority of the Vedas and do not give importance to Basavanna in their Guru-parampara.

Reservation provisions in India for OBC

• The Kalelkar Commission, set up in 1953, was the first to identify backward classes other than the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) at the national level.
• TheMandal Commission Report, 1980 estimated the OBC population at 52% and classified 1,257 communities as backward.

• It recommended increasing the existing quotas, which were only for SC/ST, from 22.5% to 49.5% to include the OBCs.

• The central government reserved 27% of seats in union civil posts and services for OBCs [Article 16(4)].

• The Constitution refers to the term ‘backward classes’ in Articles 15(4), 16(4) and 340(1). 
• Articles 15(4) and 16(4) empower the State to make special provisions for any socially and educationally backward class of citizens

• In 2008, the Supreme Court directed the central government to exclude the creamy layer (advanced sections) among the OBCs.
• The 102nd Constitution Amendment Act, 2018provided constitutional status to the National Commission for Backward Classes (NCBC), which was previously a statutory body under the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment.

Why in news?

• Croatia adopted the European Union’s common currency, the euro, and joined the Schengen Area, Europe’s visa-free travel area, on January 1.
• With this, Croatia became the fully integrated member of EU. The country had joined the EU in 2013.

• It was the last time a country was admitted as a new member nation of EU.

What Is the Eurozone?

• All European Union Member States are part of Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and coordinate their economic policy-making to support the economic aims of the EU.
• However, a number of Member States have taken a step further by replacing their national currencies with the single currency – the euro.
• These Member States form the euro area, also known as eurozone.
• In other words, it is a geographic and economic region that consists of the European Union countries that have fully incorporated the euro as their national currency.
• As of January 2023, the eurozone consists of 20 countries in the European Union (EU):

• Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Spain.

What are the requirements for joining the eurozone?

• In order to join the eurozone and use euro as their currency, EU nations must meet certain criteria consisting of four macroeconomic indicators that focus on:

• Price stability by demonstrating sustainable price performance and average inflation no more than 1.5 percent above the rate of the three best-performing member states.
• Sound and sustainable public finances – the government must run a budget deficit no greater than 3% of GDP and hold public debt no greater than 60% of GDP.
• The durability of convergence – It is assessed through its long-term interest rates, which cannot be more than 2 percent above the rate in the three member states with the most stable prices.
• Exchange rate stability – The nation must demonstrate exchange rate stability by participating in the Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) II for at least two years without severe tensions and without devaluing against the euro.

What is Schengen area?

• Schengen Area signifies a zone where 27 European countries, abolished their internal borders, for the free and unrestricted movement of people.

• Croatia became the 27^th nation in the passport free Schengen zone.

• Member of this area include: 23 of the 27 EU member states and all members of the European Free Trade Association (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland).
• Being part of this area means that countries:

• do not carry out checks at their internal borders, except in cases of specific threats;
• carry out harmonised controls at their external borders, based on clearly defined criteria.

• The state government has appointed RD Dhiman, the incumbent Chief Secretary, as the Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) of the
• RD Dhiman will retire from the post of Chief Secretary on December 31.
• His appointment as CIC will be for three years from the date on which he assumes the office.
• The post of CIC had been lying vacant since June, when last CIC Narendra Chauhan’s term had expired.

• The industrial sector saw the state getting mega projects like bulk drugs park and medical device park this year with Prime Minister Narendra Modi laying their foundation stones.
• The foundation stone of the Rs 350-crore medical device park at Nalagarh was laid on October 5.
• Himachal Pradesh is one of the four states that has been selected for this park. Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) of more than Rs 800 crore have been signed for this project with prospective investors.
• Himachal Pradesh is the second state where a bulk drugs park is being set up while only three states have been granted this key project. Its foundation stone was laid by the Prime Minister on October 13.
• For the Rs 1,923-crore Bulk Drug Park Project, the Central grant will be worth Rs 1,118 crore while the state government will contribute the remaining amount of Rs 804. 54 crore.
• The drug park is expected to attract an investment of Rs 8,000 to Rs 10,000 crore and likely to generate employment for 15,000-20,000 persons.
• The project is slated to provide a major fillip to the socio-economic development of the region. Setting up of this park will reduce export dependence of active pharmaceutical ingredients of the pharmaceutical industries.
• Apart from these projects, as many as 209 industrial projects were approved in the state this year which are slated to generate employment for 25,564 persons, while fetching an investment of Rs 8,314.98 crore.
• A  Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) worth Rs. 5000 crore  was signed between the State Government and M/s SMPP Private India Ltd regarding setting up of ammunition manufacturing facility in the State for tanks and artillery guns.
• In a bid to develop the state’s industrial hub of Baddi-Barotiwala-Nalagarh, the National Industrial Corridor Development Corporation Limited (NICDC) has initiated an exercise under the Amritsar-Kolkata Industrial Corridor Project. It will provide ease of logistics to the industry, create jobs and spur economic growth.