18 Nov 2020: PIB Summary & Analysis

November 18th, 2020 PIB:- Download PDF Here

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Antique idols retrieved
2. Corps of Engineers
3. PM-FME Scheme
4. Global Prevention Coalition (GPC) for HIV Prevention
5. World Toilet Day
6. Param Siddhi Supercomputer

1. Antique idols retrieved

Context:

Culture Minister hands over bronze idols of Shri Rama, Sita and Lakshmana dating back to the 13^th century back to the Tamil Nadu Idol Wing.

Details:

• Earlier in September 2020, the stolen idols were handed over to the High Commission of India in London by the Metropolitan Police, London.
• As per the photo documentation done in 1958, these idols belong to the Sri Rajagopal Vishnu Temple (built during the Vijayanagara period) in Anandamangalam in Nagapattinam district of Tamil Nadu.
• As per the investigation carried out by the Idol Wing of Tamil Nadu Police, these idols were stolen from the Sri Rajagopal Vishnu Temple in 1978.
• The bronze idols of Lord Rama, Lakshmana and Goddess Sita are masterpieces of Indian metal art and are 90.5 cm, 78 cm, and 74.5 cm in height respectively. Stylistically, these sculptures are dateable to the 13^th century AD.
• It was in August 2019 that the Indian High Commission in London was informed by the India Pride Project that four idols (Rama, Sita, Lakshmana and Hanuman) that were stolen from the said temple were smuggled out of India, probably to the United Kingdom.
  • The India Pride Project is an online volunteer unit of art enthusiasts.
• Once the idols were verified with relevant records, the matter was taken up with the Art and Antique Unit of the London Metropolitan Police as well as the Idol wing of Tamil Nadu police.

2. Corps of Engineers

Context:

Indian Army celebrates 240^th Corps of Engineers Day.

About the Corps of Engineers:

• The Corps of Engineers provides combat engineering support, develops infrastructure for armed forces and other defence organisations and maintains connectivity along our vast borders besides providing succour to the populace during natural disasters.
• These tasks are executed through four pillars of the Corps – Combat Engineers, Military Engineer Service, Border Roads Organisation and Military Survey.
• The Corps of Engineers has three groups, i.e. Madras Sappers, Bengal Sappers and Bombay Sappers which were amalgamated into the Corps on 18 Nov 1932.
• The Corps of Engineers is one of the oldest arms of the Indian Army.
• The Corps officially recognises its birth as 1780 when the senior-most group of the Corps, the Madras Sappers were raised.
• The Corps’ motto is ‘Sarvatra’ meaning everywhere.

3. PM-FME Scheme

Context:

The Union Minister for Food Processing Industries inaugurates capacity building component of the PM-FME Scheme.

Read more about the PM-SME scheme in PIB dated June 29, 2020.

The Minister also launched the GIS One District One Product (ODOP).

About GIS One District One Product (ODOP):

• The GIS ODOP digital map of India provides details of ODOP products of all the states and facilitates the stakeholders.
• The digital map also has indicators for tribal, SC, ST, and aspirational districts.
• It will enable stakeholders to make concerted efforts for its value chain development.

4. Global Prevention Coalition (GPC) for HIV Prevention

Context:

Union Health Minister addresses the Global Prevention Coalition (GPC) for HIV Prevention.

About the GPC:

• In October 2017, the Global HIV Prevention Coalition (GPC) was established to strengthen and sustain political commitment for primary prevention by setting a common agenda among United Nations Member States, donors, civil society organizations and implementers.
• With countries and communities at the centre, the GPC seeks to ensure accountability for delivering prevention services at scale in order to achieve the targets of the 2016 Political Declaration on Ending AIDS, including a 75% reduction in HIV infections towards fewer than 500 000 infections by 2020, and to ending the AIDS epidemic by 2030.
• The GPC is under the aegis of UNAIDS.

5. World Toilet Day

Context:

World Toilet Day is observed on 19^th November annually.

About World Toilet Day:

• World Toilet Day is a United Nations Observance that celebrates toilets and raises awareness of the 4.2 billion people living without access to safely managed sanitation.
• It is about taking action to tackle the global sanitation crisis and achieve Sustainable Development Goal 6: water and sanitation for all by 2030.
• The theme of World Toilet Day 2020: Sustainable sanitation and climate change.
• The first official World Toilet Day was observed in 2013.
• Importance of this Day:
  • 1 in 3 people on this planet still don’t have access to a clean and safe toilet; 1,000 children die each day due to poor sanitation; and better sanitation supports better nutrition and improved health, especially for women and children.
• In India, the Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation (DDWS), Ministry of Jal Shakti leads the observance of the Day under ‘Swachh Bharat Mission – Grameen (SBMG)’ for promoting awareness on access to safe sanitation and felicitating districts/states for making a significant contribution towards Swachhata.

Read more about SBMG phase II in PIB dated March 4, 2020.

6. Param Siddhi Supercomputer

Context:

India’s AI supercomputer Param Siddhi 63^rd among top 500 most powerful non-distributed computer systems in the world.

About Param Siddhi:

• Param Siddhi is a high-performance computing-artificial intelligence (HPC-AI) supercomputer established under the National Supercomputing Mission (NSM) at C-DAC.
• The supercomputer with Rpeak of 5.267 Petaflops and 4.6 Petaflops Rmax (Sustained) was conceived by C-DAC and developed jointly with the support of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) under NSM.
• Param Siddhi Supercomputer is built on the NVIDIA DGX Super POD reference architecture networking along with C-DAC’s indigenously developed HPC-AI engine, software frameworks and cloud platform and will help deep learning, visual computing, virtual reality, accelerated computing, as well as graphics virtualization.

Read previous PIB here.

November 18th, 2020, PIB:- Download PDF Here