ANSWER: D

• In a unique and first-of-its-kind initiative, the Department of Science and Technology, DST has undertaken to set up India’s first-ever Night Sky Sanctuary in Ladakh.
• It will be completed within the next three months.
• The proposed Dark Sky Reserve will be located at Hanle in Ladakh as a part of Changthang Wildlife Sanctuary.
• It will boost Astro tourism in India and will be one of the world’s highest-located sites for optical, infrared, and gamma-ray telescopes.
• Science and Technology Minister Dr. Jitendra Singh said that a tripartite MoU was signed recently among the UT administration, Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council LAHDC Leh and the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, IIA, for launching the Dark Space Reserve.
• He said, the site will have activities to help in boosting local tourism and economy through interventions of Science and Technology.
• Jitendra Singh said, a high-level delegation of scientists and officials from Central Leather Research Institute, Chennai will visit Ladakh by the end of this year to explore the possibility of setting up a regional branch of CLRI.
• Ladakh has a very rich and wide variety of animals for leather research and industry and to promote bio-economy of animal skin-derived products.
• He also complimented CSIR for organising 4 training workshops, two each at Leh and Kargil for treatment of diseases of famous Pashmina Goats.
• Ladakh Administration has taken a decision to start the commercial plantation of Leh Berry.
• The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research CSIR is promoting Leh Berry which is an exclusive food product of the cold desert and also a means of wide-ranging entrepreneurship as well as self-livelihood.

ANSWER: C

• Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Hardeep Singh Puri will lead an official and business delegation to Milan, Italy to attend the Gastech Milan-2022.
• Gastech, the World’s largest gathering focused on LNG as an abated bridge fuel will bring together leading Ministers and CEOs to discuss the evolving energy landscape, assess post-pandemic economic recovery and navigate a route to a just energy transition.
• During the three-day visit, Mr. Puri will participate in the select Ministerial Panel of the Opening Ceremony along with the Egyptian Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources and State Secretary of Energy of Portugal.
• He will also take part in Ministerial Panel discussions titled “Energy Security and Transition” and “A just energy transition for developing nations”.
• The Minister will chair the “India Spotlight: Powering India’s energy industry – new avenues for a sustainable future” panel discussion.
• During the visit, Mr Puri will have bilateral meetings with his counterpart Ministers and with CEOs of global energy companies, who are attending the Gastech Milan-2022.
• He will also inaugurate the Exhibition stalls of Indian energy companies which are being showcased at the Exhibition.
• Petroleum Ministry said, the visit will be an opportunity to highlight India’s economic growth story and the investment opportunities that exist in India across the entire energy value chain.

ANSWER: D

• The United States announced hosting the first-ever US-Pacific Island Country Summit in the last week of this month amid the growing influence of China in the Indo-Pacific region.
• According to the announcement made by the Biden administration, the Summit will be held in Washington from 28th to 29th   September.
• The Summit will demonstrate the United States deep and enduring partnership with Pacific Island countries and the Pacific region that is underpinned by shared history, values, and people-to-people ties.
• Notably, the announcement came a week after the United States accused Beijing of expanding its nuclear arsenal and claimed the extreme build-up process could harm the stability of the Indo-Pacific region.
• Addressing a press conference in Indonesia last week, US Indo-Pacific Commander, Admiral John Aquilino said China is the only country that is expanding its nuclear arsenal and it had 300 nuclear silos going in.

ANSWER: D

• The Ramon Magsaysay Awards Foundation (RMAF), which is widely regarded as the “Nobel Peace Prize of Asia,” recently announced this year’s awardees in a global announcement ceremony.
• The 2022 Ramon Magsaysay Awardees are Sotheara Chhim (Cambodia), Bernadette Madrid (Philippines), Tadashi Hattori (Japan) and Gary Bencheghib (Indonesia).

About recipients Ramon Magsaysay Award 2022:

• Sotheara Chhim-He is a mental health advocate from Cambodia. He is a leading voice in Cambodian trauma syndrome. He is being recognized for “his calm courage in surmounting deep trauma to become his people’s healer”. As a child, he was forced to work in Khmer Rouge camps for more than three years until their rule ended in 1979.
• Tadashi Hattori-He is a sight-saving humanitarian from Japan. He is being recognized for his simple humanity and extraordinary generosity as a person and a professional. He decided to become a doctor at age 15 when he witnessed the rude treatment that his cancer-stricken father received in a hospital.
• Bernadette J. Madrid-She is a children’s rights crusader from the Philippines. She is being recognized for “her unassuming and steadfast commitment to noble and demanding advocacy. Since 1997, she has led the country’s first child protection centre at the Philippine General Hospital in Manila. It has served more than 27,000 children as of last year.
• Gary Bencheghib-He is an anti-plastic pollution warrior from Indonesia. He is being recognized for Emergent Leadership for “his inspiring fight against marine plastic pollution.

About Ramon Magsaysay Award:

• The Ramon Magsaysay Award, established in 1957, is Asia’s greatest honour and distinction. The award is managed by RMAF.
• It is named after Ramon Magsaysay, the third president of the Philippines. The award is regarded around the world as ‘’Asia’s Nobel Prize’’.
• The prize is annually presented in a ceremonial ceremony in Manila, Philippines on August 31.
• The first Ramon Magsaysay Awards ceremony was held on 31st August 1958.

ANSWER: D

• Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has successfully demonstrated a new technology with Inflatable Aerodynamic Decelerator (IAD).
• Designed and developed by ISRO’s Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC), IAD is a game-changer with multiple applications for future missions including to Mars and Venus.
• The IAD was successfully test flown in a ‘Rohini’ sounding rocket from Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station. Rohini sounding rockets are routinely used for flight demonstration of new technologies being developed by ISRO as well as by scientists from India and abroad.
• The IAD was initially folded and kept inside the payload bay of the rocket.
• At around 84 km altitude, the IAD was inflated and it descended through the atmosphere with the payload part of a sounding rocket.
• The IAD has systematically reduced the velocity of the payload through aerodynamic drag and followed the predicted trajectory.
• After witnessing the launch, ISRO Chairman S Somanath said, this demonstration opens a gateway for cost-effective spent stage recovery using the Inflatable Aerodynamics Decelerator technology and this IAD technology can also be used in ISRO’s future missions to Venus and Mars.

ANSWER: C

• A State Bank of India report said India will surpass Germany in 2027 and most likely Japan by 2029 at the current rate of growth.
• The report said that the country has undergone a large structural shift since 2014 and is now the 5th largest economy overtaking the United Kingdom.
• The path taken by India since 2014 reveals the country is likely to get the tag of 3rd largest economy in 2029, a movement of 7 places upwards since 2014 when India was ranked 10th.
• The report is authored by Soumya Kanti Ghosh, group chief economic adviser, SBI.
• Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said, the International Monetary Fund’s own forecasts show India overtaking the UK in dollar terms on an annual basis this year.
• This has put India, the Asian powerhouse, just behind the US, China, Japan and Germany.

ANSWER: A

• Union Home Minister Amit Shah launched the mascot and the anthem for the 36th National Games at Trans Stadia in Ahmedabad.
• The mascot is named as Savaj which means cub in Gujarati.
• The theme of the anthem is Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat.
• The National Games will be organised between September 29 to October 12 at six cities in the state namely Ahmedabad, Gandhinagar, Surat, Vadodara, Rajkot and Bhavnagar.
• Addressing the gathering, the minister said Prime Minister Narendra Modi has left no stone unturned to promote sports in the country.
• He said the budget allocated for sports in the year 2014 was 866 crore which was increased to 2 thousand crores in 2022.
• The minister said be it Olympic or commonwealth games, number of India’s medal is increasing.
• The event also witnessed the closing of 11th Khel Mahakumbh.
• Winners of Khel Mahakumbh were given away prizes at the hands of Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
• Four Parathletics from Gujarat were also felicitated with Khel Pratibha awards on the occasion.
• Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel, Union Minister of Youth Affairs and Sports Anurag Thakur as well as eminent dignitaries were present at the curtain raiser event.

ANSWER: B

• In Leh, all is set to host the first-ever Mountain Bicycle, MTB, World Cup- the ‘UCI MTB Eliminator World Cup’ in India.
• Ladakh Police in collaboration with the Administration of Union Territory of Ladakh and Cycling Association of India is organizing this International Cycling event on Sunday.
• Ladakh leg of Eliminator world cup is part of series of ten professional races held in various cities across the world.
• UCI MTB Eliminator World Cup is a short track race with Cross Country Eliminator, XCE, format of five hundred meters with natural and artificial obstacles.
• Twenty international, 55 national and local cyclists are participating in the event.
• Ladakh MP Jamyang Tsering Namgyal, Leh CEC Tashi Gyaltson and Ladakh ADGP SS Khandare will flag off time tials for men and women, Kids joy ride and Cross Country Eliminator, XCE, for men respectively.
• Ladakh Lieutenant Governor RK Mathur will flag off the Cross-Country Eliminator Heats and Finals at Leh main bazaar.

ANSWER: C

• Himachal has not only attained the top position in the Interoperable Criminal Justice System (ICJS) ranking in the country, but has also managed to bring down crime against women.
• The ICJS ranking for July was released recently by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). The ICJS is an initiative of the e-Committee of the Supreme Court to enable seamless transfer of data and information among different pillars of the criminal justice system like courts, police, jails and forensic science laboratories.
• The ICJS was implemented in Himachal in December 2020.
• This platform is backed by Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and System (CCTNS) and Investigation Tracking System for Sexual Offences (ITSSO).
• The state has also topped among the hilly states in the CCTNS ranking and stands fourth overall.
• The compliance rate under ITSSO has increased from 22.9 per cent in 2018 to 82.6 per cent in 2022 due to weekly monitoring.
• The ITSSO is an online module that helps monitor the investigation into sexual offences. There are 3,927 sexual offenders in the state.
• As a result of several initiatives aimed at checking crime against women, the number of cases from January to July had declined marginally from 960 in 2021 to 936 in 2022.

ANSWER: C

• A photo exhibition by Dr Madhumeet Singh, entitled “The Spiti valley”, depicting various hues of the tough terrain of the Spiti valley of Lahaul and Spiti district was inaugurated at Artist Residency at Sobha Singh Art Gallery at Andretta.
• Prof Dhara Pathania and Bibi Gurcharan Kaur, daughter of artist Sobha Singh, jointly inaugurated the exhibition.
• They said the services of such artists depicting the beauty of the state should be utilised by the agencies concerned as brand ambassadors of the state.
• Organised on the eve of Teachers’ Day, the exhibition has been dedicated to his teacher parents by photo artist Dr Madhumeet.
• He said the 30 exhibited photographs depicted geography, flora and fauna, art and culture and life of the Spiti valley.

Sobha Singh Art Gallery– Andretta

• Andretta is a village located near Palampur in the Kangra District.
• The Sobha Singh Art Gallery is a very significant art center and an integral part of Punjab’s history.
• The majority of the paintings here are influenced by the Kangra School of art and have been executed in western classical oil painting techniques.
• Sculptures and busts of M.S. Randhawa, Prithviraj Kapoor, and Nirmal Chandra can be found in the art gallery.
• Sobha Singh has created portraits of many Indian national heroes such as Bhagat Singh, Kartar Singh Sarabha, Mahatma Gandhi, and Lal Bahadur Shastri in addition to that of the Sikh Gurus.

About S. Sobha Singh

• Sobha Singh, regarded as one of India’s best painters of the twentieth century, was born on November 29, 1901, in Sri Hargobindpur (Gurdaspur), Punjab, India.
• He learned and perfected painting by self-study. As a draughtsman, S.Sobha Singh joined the British Indian Army and was stationed in Iraq.
• He was much inspired by the works of English painters and studied European paintings.
• He left the army in 1923 and returned to Amritsar, where he established an art studio. On the auspicious day of Baisakhi of the same year, he married Bibi Inder Kaur.
• He had studios in Amritsar, Lahore (1926), and Delhi (1931).
• Sobha Singh had the opportunity to participate in art shows in Delhi, where he received accolades and medals.
• Being a portrait painter, he was commissioned to paint portraits of various Indian Emperors.
• S Sobha Singh painted hundreds of paintings during his 38-year residence at Andretta. Sikh Gurus, their lives and work, where his main emphasis.
• His dedication to the spiritual souls was manifested in his depiction of Gurus. He used to say, “ I have painted Gurus to inspire people.”  Guru Nanak, he believed, was a manifestation of his meditation.
• He also painted powerful portraits of various national heroes such as Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh, Kartar Singh Sarabha, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Mahatma Gandhi, and others, as well as many Indian army war heroes.
• Sobha Singh, popularly known as people’s painter passed away on 22 August 1986 at Chandigarh and was cremated with full state honors.