RAJASTHAN

Stretches of two rivers in Rajasthan, Banas and Chambal are polluted by sewage. A report by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) aimed at restoring water qualityin rivers has revealed that these two rivers are among 351 polluted river stretches across the country.

Water samples drawn from the Banas (along with Bisalpur Dam, Swaroopganj, Nevta Dam) and Chambal (Sawai Madhopur to Kota) were found be affected by varying degrees of pollution. The samples were studied based on biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), which quantifies the amount of dissolved oxygen used by micro-organisms to decompose organic matter in water.

A high BOD concentration points to increased levels of pollution. The CPCB has listed five categories on the basis of BOD concentration, with Priority I being the most severe, and Priority V the least. The CPCB report states that of the Banas river in Rajasthan, is under Priority III, while Chambal falls under ‘priority V’.

INTERNATIONAL

In a boost to Prime Minister Narendra Modi-initiated International Solar Alliance (ISA), Japan announced joining the group submitting the instrument of ratification.

Japan will be the 71st country to sign and 48th country to ratify the ISA Framework.

The decision was announced at the end of bilateral Summit between Prime Minister Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe.

· India ranked 65 in Global Passport Index, Singapore tops the chart

The ranking improved nine notches since the previous year and means that the Indian passport holders has been granted visa-free access to 65 countries.
The other countries are India, Kyrgyzstan and Zimbabweshare the 65th rank.
Singapore and Germany have the world’s “most powerful” passport with access to 165 countries.

NATIONAL

The World Bank released its latest Doing Business Report (DBR, 2019) in New Delhi. India has recorded a jump of 23 positions against its rank of 100 in 2017 to be placed now at 77^thrank among 190 countries assessed by the World Bank.

India’s leap of23 ranks in the Ease of Doing Business ranking is significant considering that last year India had improved its rank by 30 places, a rare feat for any large and diverse country of the size of India.

As a result of continued efforts by the Government, India has improved its rank by 53 positions in last two years and 65 positions in last four years.

The Doing Business assessment provides objective measures of business regulations and their enforcement across 190 economies on ten parameters affecting a business through its life cycle.

The DBR ranks countries on the basis of Distance to Frontier (DTF), a score that shows the gap of an economy to the global best practice.

For the third year in a row, New Zealand retained its position at the top of the Doing Business rankings.

· IIT-Madras researchers designed India’s 1st microprocessor ‘Shakti’

The ‘Shakti‘ family of processors was fabricated at ISRO’s Chandigarh semi-conductor laboratory, making it the first ‘RISC V Microprocessor’ to be completely designed and made in India.

Its design originates from open source instruction set architecture (ISA), a set of basic instructions called RISC V, which makes it customisable to any device.

Shakti microprocessor can be used in mobile computing devices, embedded low power wireless systems and networking systems.

‘Shakti’ will reduce dependency on imported microchips and the risk of cyber attacks.

Centre in collaboration with the Delhi, UP and Haryanagovernments organise ‘Clean Air Week‘ between November 1-5in Delhi and four other National Capital Region (NCR) cities – Faridabad, Gurgaon, Ghaziabad and Noida.

On Diwali, citizens would be allowed to burst crackers only between 8 pm to 10 pm.

National women’s emergency helpline facilityis to be launched in India. Women in distress can call helpline 181. Women can get assistance for any situations such as police, medical, legal, psycho-social or rescue shelter emergency.
In Tamil Nadu, the 1091 helplineis functioning in providing assistance for women. It provides police assistance to women in distress. However, for 24×7 service, 181 helplines, under the Department of Social Welfare and Nutritious Meal Programme, will provide all types of assistance and information to women. The helpline will function from the Amma Call Centre premises in Ambattur.