General Awareness

GENDER/ HEALTH/ EDUCATION - January 2019

Jan 2019

Nov 15, 2020

EU Seeks Powers to Declare Health Emergencies

The European Commission proposed rules which would give the EU the power to declare a health emergency and stress test national plans to tackle pandemics, in a potential blow to the World Health Organization.
The move follows an often uncoordinated reaction by the 27 EU governments to the COVID-19 pandemic, which at the beginning of the crisis led to competition on vital medical gear and export bans on medicines.
It also comes after the WHO was criticised for having declared the pandemic, which first emerged in China at the end of last year, too late. The U.N. agency has repeatedly denied the accusation.
Under the proposals, the EU would be able to declare an EU-level public health emergency, which would, in turn, trigger more coordination among EU states.
Currently, the EU relies on the WHO to declare such an emergency.
The new rules will enable the activation of EU emergency response mechanisms without making it contingent upon the WHO`s own declaration of a Public Health Emergency of International Concern.

Bande Utkala Janani to be Part of School Curriculum

Odisha's state song 'Bande Utkala Janani' will be part of the school curriculum for students of class 9 and 10. A notification in this regard was issued after the proposal was approved by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik.
As per the notification, 'Bande Utkala Janani' written by legendary poet Lakhmikanta Mohapatra will be part of the school curriculum in class 9 and 10.
Earlier this year, the Odisha government had accorded the state song status to the 'Bande Utkala Janani'.

Kolkata to Start First of its Kind Young Readers' Tramcar Library

A young readers' tramcar library, which will be giving free access to books to all the children to motivate them to read and learn, began covering its route in Kolkata on the occasion of Children's Day 2020.
The Apeejay Anand Children's Library has teamed up with the West Bengal Transport Corporation (WBTC), which runs the country's only functional tramways, to launch the "Kolkata Young Readers' Tramcar", which gives free books to the city's children.
The Oxford Bookstore is also participating in this initiative by curating a unique selection of titles and literature for various young reading age groups for the tramcar library.
The library on wheels has been decorated with attractive artworks of children reading, hand-painted by local artists. Priti Paul, director of Apeejay Surrendra Group, which has partnered with WBTC in this novel venture, said that it will perhaps be the very first children's library on a tramcar anywhere in the world, with free access to all children.

Nov 14, 2020

IIT Madras Conducts First Ever Online Orientation for Students

Indian Institute of Technology Madras conducted an orientation session for the new batch of students for the academic year 2020-21 in online mode for the first time. Parents also attended the event organised to welcome the first-year students of BTech, Dual Degree, and MA.
The Academic year for the incoming students will commence on Monday, November 16, 2020. A total of 938 BTech students,175 Dual Degree Students, and 52 MA Students have been admitted for the Academic Year 2020-21.
Prof. Bhaskar Ramamurthi, Director, IIT Madras, said that we have one of the most flexible academic curriculum in the system in India and anywhere in the world. In all programs and all departments, at least 40 per cent of your courses are electives, and half of these courses, you can opt for any elective in the Institute. The rest of the electives will have some restrictions but students will still get to choose.
These MTech. courses are in several new, emerging, and interesting interdisciplinary areas such as data science, robotics, computational engineering, quantum science and technology, biomedical engineering, nanotechnology and energy systems, among other areas. More and more such programs are being created by IIT Madras faculty and will be offered in the years to come.

Seven New UG, PG Programmes By Indian Railways' Institute

The National Rail and Transportation Institute (NRTI) in Vadodara launched seven new programmes at the undergraduate (UG) and postgraduate (PG) level. The programmes consist of two at the undergraduate level (BTech) and five at the postgraduate level (2 MBA and 3 MSc).
According to the Ministry of Railways, the BTech programmes are focused on rail infrastructure, rail systems and communications engineering, while the MBA programmes are focused on transportation and supply chain management. The MSc programmes are focused on systems engineering and integration, systems and analytics, policy and economics.
Also, the MSc programme on Systems Engineering and Integration is offered in collaboration with the University of Birmingham, and the students will get international exposure.

Nov 13, 2020

Tamil Nadu University Scraps Arundhati Roy's Book from Syllabus

A Tamil Nadu University's decision to remove Arundhati Roy's book from their syllabus, based on a petition from the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), BJP's student wing, has riled opposition parties in the state.
Although there is no official letter yet in this regard, the Vice-Chancellor of Manonmaniam Sundaranar University in Tirunelveli has confirmed on having scrapped the book 'Walking with the Comrades', which is about the author's visit to Maoist hideouts, from the institution's postgraduate English syllabus.
The book was part of the syllabus from 2017 for 3rd semester MA English Literature course. Last week, some controversial contents of the book regarding Maoists were brought to our notice. ABVP gave a written request and other syndicate members also informed us. So a committee was formed involving three deans and two chairmen of the board of studies and took a call to have this book scrapped and replaced from the syllabus.

Online Education System 'CDX' Inaugurated at SPPU

University Grants Commission (UGC) Vice Chairman Dr Bhushan Patwardhan, while inaugurating online education system Content Express Delivery (CDX), said that the technology will revolutionise the field of education. The online education system has been developed by Savitribai Phule Pune University's (SPPU) e-Content Development and Learning Innovation Center (eCDLIC).
SPPU, through its eCDLIC, is providing a learning management system (LMS) that is moodle-based and customised to the needs of academic institutions in the University. The LMS has a user-friendly interface for faculties and students, which enables discussions, reading material being uploaded by faculties, video-based teaching through an asynchronous mode and assignment uploading and evaluation.
SPPU Vice-Chancellor Nitin Karmalkar said that 175 colleges are currently using the CDX and that the SPPU was able to provide e-content to these colleges during the lockdown in a short period of time.

Nov 12, 2020

"MegaScope" for Personalised Healthcare

IIT Alumni Council has launched "MegaScope" for personalised healthcare. MegaScope has been launched to include testing, data analysis and genomics to precisely diagnose infections and to prescribe personalised medicines.
MegaScope will add host genome data mapping along with Artificial Intelligence, machine learning and data backbone to the MegaLab initiative.
The main aim of MegaScope is to improve accuracy of testing, prediction of likely disease severity and progression, enhance efficiency of treatment and avoid casualties.
As per the president of the council, use of the same medicine for all or same test for all is coming to an end now. COVID-19 has shown that pathogens can react differently from one person to another and that is why there is a need of personalized medicine. This need will be fulfilled by MegaScope.

Nov 11, 2020

Lockdown Word of the Year 2020

Collins Dictionary has declared 'lockdown' as its Word of the Year 2020 after it was used frequently due to the Covid-19 pandemic this year. From just 4,000 last year, the usage of 'lockdown' in 2020 rose to 250,000, lexicographers recorded.
Definition of lockdown: Collins Dictionary defines the word as "the imposition of stringent restrictions on travel, social interaction, and access to public spaces".
Collins said that the word signifies "a unifying experience for billions of people across the world, who have had, collectively, to play their part in combating the spread of Covid-19."
The word 'lockdown' was used very commonly as governments around the world battled the coronavirus.
The dictionary had shortlisted 10 words in the run-up to select Word of the Year 2020. Most of the other words were also mostly related to the Covid-19 pandemic and they were: Furlough, key worker, self-isolate, social distancing and coronavirus.

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