Context: Union Minister of Housing & Urban Affairs inaugurated India’s first ‘Zero Waste Street Food Festival’ in Delhi ,highlighted the role of Prime Minister Street Vendor's AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) Scheme in empowerment of street vendors.

Key Features of PM-SVANidhi: - The PM-SVANidhi is a Central Sector Scheme, fully funded by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, aiming to provide working capital loans, incentivize regular repayment, and reward digital transactions for street vendors.

• It introduces a 3rd term loan of up to ₹50,000, in addition to the 1st and 2nd loans of ₹10,000 and ₹20,000, respectively.
• The loans are provided without the need for collateral.
• Lending agencies include Microfinance Institutions, Non-Banking Financial Companies, and Self-Help Groups, leveraging their ground-level presence
• Eligibility is based on states and union territories that have notified rules and schemes under the Street Vendors (Protection of Livelihood and Regulation of Street Vending) Act, 2014. Meghalaya, with its own State Street Vendors Act, is also eligible
• The scheme is open to all street vendors engaged in urban vending, extending the benefit to those active on or before March 24, 2020.
• Early repayment of loans brings benefits such as interest subsidy at 7% per annum through direct benefit transfer, credit limit extension, and no penalty on early repayment.
• The scheme encourages digital transactions by providing monthly cashback to street vendors.
• A digital platform with a web portal and mobile app is being developed for effective delivery and transparency, integrating with the UdyamiMitra portal of SIDBI and the PAiSA portal of MoHUA for credit management and interest subsidy administration.
• PM-SVANidhi aims to integrate vendors into the formal financial system and includes capacity building and financial literacy programs, along with Information, Education, and Communication (IEC) activities.
• Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) will play a crucial role in implementing the scheme, targeting beneficiaries efficiently.

Context: Warli Whisperers, an exhibition by the Inherited Arts Forum, traces the artistic journey of the celebrated Mashe family from Maharashtra

About:

• Origin: Warli art, until the 1970s, focused on representing the joy and happiness of the Warli Tribes' lives. Traditionally, women practiced this art form.
• Method: Cow dung layers serve as the canvas, painted in mud brown for the background. Bamboo-stick paint brushes are used to create art lines. Jivya Soma Mashe brought new meaning to the art by capturing the cyclical movement of life on the canvas. The paintings use geometric shapes - circle, triangle, and square - symbolizing elements in nature. The circle represents the sun and the moon, the triangle symbolizes mountains and conical trees, and the square signifies a human invention like a sacred enclosure or a piece of land. The central motif in ritual paintings is a square known as "chauk" or "chaukat."
• Theme: Warli paintings depict scenes of hunting, fishing, farming, festivals, and folk dances. People and animals are represented by two inverse triangles, symbolizing the balance of the universe.
• Social Importance: Mashe's Warli art records important events, transmitting local stories pictorially. It shifted from religious imagery to narratives of tribal lives, values, and self-expression. Warli art helps tribals reflect on social injustices caused by power imbalances.

About Warli Tribe:

• Origin: The Warli Tribe is an indigenous community primarily located in the mountainous and coastal regions of western India, spanning across Maharashtra and Gujarat.
•  Culture: The Warli Tribe follows animism and engages in the worship of nature spirits and ancestors. They use painting as a means to portray their traditional way of life, customs, and traditions.

Context: Forest officials in the Anamalai Tiger Reserve (ATR) rescued a wild elephant calf who was found separated from the herd

About Anamalai Tiger Reserve:

- Location:
        The Anamalai Tiger Reserve is a protected area situated at an elevation of 1400 m in the Anamalai Hills within Pollachi and Coimbatore Districts of Tamil Nadu. Positioned to the south of the Palakkad gap in the Southern Western Ghats, the reserve is bordered by the Parambikulum Tiger Reserve to the East, Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary, and Eravikulum National Park to the South-West.
        Additionally, it is surrounded by the reserved forests of Nenmara, Vazhachal, Malayattur, and Marayur in Kerala.
        Designated as a Tiger reserve in 2007.

  - Habitat:
        The Anamalai Tiger Reserve encompasses diverse habitat types, including wet evergreen forests, semi-evergreen forests, moist deciduous, dry deciduous, dry thorn, and shola forests.
        Unique habitats like montane grasslands, savannah, and marshy grasslands are also present

  - Flora:
        The reserve hosts around 2500 species of angiosperms, featuring various species of Balsam, Crotalaria, Orchids, and Kurinchi.
        Rich in wild relatives of cultivated species such as mango, jackfruit, wild plantain, ginger (Zingiber officinale), turmeric, pepper (Piper longum), cardamom, etc.
  - Fauna:
Notable wildlife within the reserve includes Tiger, Asiatic elephant, Sambar, Spotted deer, Barking deer, Jackal, Leopard, Jungle cat, and more.

Context: From the New Year, all wages under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) scheme must be paid through an Aadhaar-based payment system (ABPS), which requires workers’ Aadhaar details to be seeded to their job cards.
Background:

•    The deadline for making Aadhaar-enabled Payment System (ABPS) mandatory, extended five times, concluded on December 31, 2023.
•   Activists in the field note a significant increase in the deletion of MGNREGA job cards since the initiation of the mandatory ABPS enforcement.
•  According to data from the Union Rural Development Ministry, as of December 27, 34.8% of job card holders still do not qualify for ABPS payments.
•  The data suggests that a substantial portion of job card holders remains ineligible for ABPS, indicating challenges and concerns in the implementation process.

Need:
1. Preventing Leakages and Combating Black Money:

• Real-time necessity for Aadhaar lies in its ability to prevent leaks and address issues related to black money.

2. Aadhaar-based Direct Benefit Transfer:

•  The immediate need for Aadhaar is evident in facilitating direct benefit transfers, ensuring efficient and transparent disbursal of government subsidies and assistance.

3. Jan Dhan Yojana and Financial Inclusion:

•  Aadhaar is crucial for the success of initiatives like Jan Dhan Yojana, ensuring widespread financial inclusion by enabling every individual to have a bank account.

4. Social Inclusion of Migrant Population:

•    Aadhaar plays a vital role in socially including migrant populations across the country, ensuring they have access to essential services.

5. Door-Step Banking through AePS:

•   The real-time requirement for Aadhaar is seen in enabling door-step banking access through Aadhaar-enabled Payment System (AePS), making financial services more accessible.

6. Expediting Passport Processing:

• Aadhaar facilitates faster processing of passport applications, streamlining the verification process for a more efficient and prompt issuance of passports.

7. Utilizing Digi Locker for Document Safety:

•    Aadhaar is essential for accessing the benefits of Digi Locker, providing a secure digital storage solution for important documents.

8. Empowering Residents with Trusted Identity:

•  The immediate need for Aadhaar is to empower residents with a widely trusted and verifiable identity, establishing a secure foundation for various services.

9. Paper-Less User Verification and Instant Services:

• Aadhaar is crucial for achieving paperless user verification, ensuring instant access to a range of services and enhancing overall efficiency.

Issues:

• The claimed savings due to Aadhaar are contested, with doubts raised about the assumption that Aadhaar has increased efficiency and reduced payment delays in MGNREGA.
• Analysis of over 18 lakh MGNREGA wage invoices for H1 2021-22 revealed that 71% of payments were delayed beyond the mandated period, challenging the government's assertion that Aadhaar reduces payment delays.
• Pressure to increase Aadhaar linking led to the deletion of 57% of genuine workers' job cards between 2015 and 2019, as revealed in a recent study of nearly 3,000 MGNREGA workers.
• Payment failures in APBS often occur due to "Inactive Aadhaar," resulting from software mapping failures with the National Payments Corporation of India, causing confusion and lack of resolution.
• APBS experiences cases of misdirected payments where Aadhaar numbers get linked to the wrong bank accounts, making detection challenging and raising concerns about transaction accuracy.
• Despite UIDAI's mandate to establish facilitation centers and grievance redressal mechanisms, such systems are reported to be absent, leaving workers and officials clueless about resolving payment failures and other issues.

Current status of Aadhaar linking:

• According to the Prevention of Money-laundering (Maintenance of Records) Third Amendment Rules, 2019, Aadhaar linking is mandatory to receive benefits or subsidies under schemes notified under section 7 of the Aadhaar Act, 2016.
• Aadhaar is also a preferred KYC document for other banking services.
• Amendments to the Telegraph Act, 1885, allow telecom users to use Aadhaar as a KYC document voluntarily, along with authentication, to obtain a new mobile connection.
• Aadhaar is not compulsory for school admissions or examinations conducted by CBSE, NEET for medical entrance, or the University Grants Commission.
• While Aadhaar is mandatory for availing state subsidies, benefits, and services, individuals without an assigned Aadhaar number cannot be denied essential entitlements such as ration or pension until they obtain Aadhaar.

Way forward:
Moving Beyond Technological Blame:
Advocate for a shift from blaming technology for governance issues and emphasize the importance of constitutional propriety and accountability in the use of technologies.
Nomenclature Overhaul:
Propose a change in the terminology from "beneficiaries" to "rights holders" for individuals receiving welfare measures, highlighting the shift towards recognizing entitlements as rights.
Feedback Mechanism Importance:
Stress the necessity of implementing a feedback mechanism to gather user experiences from recipients and field-level bureaucrats, ensuring a more inclusive and responsive governance approach.
Voluntary Aadhaar Linking Concerns:
Express concerns about the unpredictability of making Aadhaar linking with voter ID voluntary, drawing from prior experiences with Aadhaar in other domains, raising questions about potential misuse of authority

context: The Japan Meteorological Agency issued a tsunami warning along coastal regions of Ishikawa, Niigata and Toyama prefectures.

The Japan Meterological Agency reported quakes off the coast of Ishikawa and nearby prefectures one of them with a preliminary magnitude of 7.6.

Earthquakes

An earthquake is the shaking of the earth, a natural occurrence caused by the release of energy that produces waves spreading in all directions. Seismic waves, known as vibrations, are created during earthquakes and traverse through the Earth, being detected by instruments named seismographs. The starting point below the Earth's surface where the earthquake originates is termed the hypocenter, while the corresponding spot directly above it on the Earth's surface is identified as the epicenter.

Causes:

• Earthquakes result from the tectonic movements of the Earth, where energy is released, generating waves that propagate in all directions.
• The release of energy occurs at a specific point known as the focus or hypocentre, typically situated around 60 km below the Earth's surface.
• This release causes energy waves to radiate outward. The focus, or hypocentre, is the precise point of energy release.
• On the Earth's surface directly above the focus, the epicentre is located, serving as the initial location to encounter the seismic waves.

Tsunami:

Tsunamis, characterized by exceptionally long waves, result from significant and sudden shifts in the ocean caused by events such as earthquakes or volcanic eruptions. Also known as seismic sea waves, tsunamis stand as formidable and devastating natural phenomena.

Causes:

Tsunamis result from the vertical movement of the seafloor, primarily triggered by various natural events. While earthquakes are the most common cause, other factors include volcanic eruptions, underwater explosions, landslides, and meteorite impacts.

Earthquake:

Tsunamis are frequently generated by earthquakes that disturb the seafloor, especially along subduction boundaries of tectonic plates near ocean trenches. The magnitude of the tsunami is directly related to the scale of the earthquake.

Underwater Explosion:

Certain human activities, like nuclear testing, can also generate tsunamis. For instance, nuclear testing by the US in the 1940s and 1950s in the Marshall Islands led to tsunami formation.

Volcanic Eruption:

Volcanic eruptions occurring in coastal waters have the potential to induce tsunamis, as the associated effects can disrupt the water and generate powerful waves.

Landslides:

Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions often trigger landslides, and when these landslides occur underwater, particularly in oceans, bays, or lakes, they can produce tsunamis.

Meteorite Impacts:

While there is no documented historic example of a meteorite impact causing a tsunami, an apparent meteorite impact around 5 million years ago left deposits along the Gulf Coast of Mexico and the United States, suggesting the potential for tsunami generation.

Recently Union government announced the Swachh Survekshan Awards 2023.

• An annual cleanliness ranking for urban areas since 2016.
• Released by – Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs.
• Coverage – Originally 73 cities in 2016, now has increased along with 4,416 urban local bodies, 61 cantonments and 88 Ganga towns.
• About 1.58 crore online citizen feedback and 19.82 lakh face-to-face views were received as a part of the ranking.
•  Criteria
  • Door-to-door collection of waste
  • Segregation at source
  • cleanliness of public areas
  • Clean water bodies
  • Citizens’ feedback regarding the cleanliness of their cities

2023 Awards

• Among Cities with >1 lakh population – Indore and Surat were named the joint winners with 100% door-to-door collection of waste & remediation of dumpsites and 98% segregation at source.

2023 was the 7^th year in a row that Indore was named the cleanest city in the Swachh Survekshan Awards. Surat won the top award for the 1^st time. Of the 8 rounds of annual awards since 2016, this was the 1^st time that 2 cities shared the top prize.

• Among States – Maharashtra bagged the top spot with 89.24% door-to-door collection and 67.76% source segregation followed by Madhya Pradesh.
• Sasvad in Maharashtra was named the cleanest city among those with population below 1 lakh.
• Chandigarh won the award for the city having the best safety standards for sanitation workers, Safaimitra Surakshit Shehar.
• Varanasi was named the cleanest ‘Ganga town’.
• Mhow Cantonment was the cleanest cantonment in the country.
• Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Rajasthan, Nagaland and Tripura were ranked the bottom five states.

Scientific processing of waste had increased from 15-16% in 2014 to almost 76% by Jan 2024.

PM presents sacred Chadar to be placed during the Urs of Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti at Ajmer Sharif Dargah

Khwaja Chishti is also known by different names as, Khawaja Gharib Nawaz, ‘Sultan-Ul-Hind’ (Benefactor of the Poor).

• Birth – Sijistan (modern-day Sistan) in Iran in 1141-42 CE.

Visit to India – He started living and preaching in Ajmer after 2^nd Battle of Tarain (1192), where Mohammed of Ghori defeated Prithviraj Chauhan.

• His Mission – To establish the kingdom of God on Earth.
• Popularity – He was popular among the locals, kings, nobles, and peasants for his instructive discourses full of spiritual insights.
• He established the Chishti order of 'fakirs' in India.

Doctrines – It emphasised the unity of being with God (wa?dat al-wuj?d) and members of the order were also pacifists.

• They rejected all material goods as distractions from the contemplation of God.
• They abstained from connection with the secular state.
• Recitation of the names of God, both aloud and silently (dhikr jahr?, dhikr khaf?), formed the cornerstone of Chisht? practice.

Urs festival is an annual festival held at Ajmer in Rajasthan to commemorate his death anniversary.

Indian government is set to roll out a human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination campaign for girls in the 9-14 years age group.

Cervavac is an indigenously developed quadrivalent vaccine by the Serum Institute of India (SII) in Pune, is already available commercially.

• Immunisation drive – It will be conducted through schools and existing vaccination points, planned in 3 phases over 3 years and is likely to start from the 2^nd quarter of 2024 for free.
• Currently, the 2-dose HPV vaccine is available commercially for about Rs 2,000 per dose.

None of the HPV vaccines available globally recommend a single-dose schedule

• Target – Nearly 8 crore children between the ages of 9 and 14 years will be eligible and when divided over 3 years.
• Benefits – It offers protection against the HPV strains that cause cancer of the anus, vagina and oropharynx and genital warts.

Cervical Cancer

• It is the 4th most common cancer in women which develops in a woman's cervix (the entrance to the uterus from the vagina). 
• Cause – Almost all (99%) are linked to infection with high-risk human papillomaviruses (HPV), an extremely common virus transmitted through sexual contact.

At least 14 HPV types have been identified as oncogenic and among these, HPV types 16 and 18 considered to be the most oncogenic.

• Treatment – When diagnosed, it is a treatable form of cancer, as long as it is detected early and managed effectively.
• Prevention – Effective primary (HPV vaccination) and secondary prevention approaches will prevent most cases.
• With a comprehensive approach to prevent, screen and treat, it can be eliminated as a public health problem within a generation.

Classical Language

Criteria evolved by Government of India to determine declaration of a language as a Classical language is as under:-

• High antiquity of its early texts/recorded history over a period of 1500-2000 years;
• A body of ancient literature/texts, which is considered a valuable heritage by generations of speakers;
• The literary tradition be original and not borrowed from another speech community;
• The classical language and literature being distinct from modern, there may also be a discontinuity between the classical language and its later forms or its offshoots.

Currently, six languages enjoy the ‘Classical’ status: Tamil (declared in 2004), Sanskrit (2005), Kannada (2008), Telugu (2008), Malayalam (2013), and Odia (2014).

• The benefits it provides once a language is notified as a Classical language:
  • Two major annual international awards for scholars of eminence in classical Indian languages.
  •  Centre of Excellence for studies in Classical Languages is set up.
  • The University Grants Commission is requested to create, to start with at least in the Central Universities, a certain number of Professional Chairs for the Classical Languages so declared.”

Benefits of Recognition – 2 major annual international awards for scholars of eminence in classical Indian languages

• A Centre of Excellence for studies in Classical Languages is set up
• The UGC is requested to create, to start with at least in the Central Universities, a certain number of Professional Chairs for the Classical Languages so declared.

Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL) is in Mysuru and Central Institute of Classical Tamil (CICT) is in Chennai.

NEWS:Recently, West Bengal Chief Minister has called for inclusion of ‘Bangla’ as a classical language.

Bengali Language

• It is an official language of West Bengal.
• It is the second most spoken language in India and the seventh most spoken language in the world.
• The Bengali people have a rich heritage and culture dating back to prehistoric times.
• Bengali is written from left to right

• World Braille Day is celebrated on January 4^th to commemorate the birthday of Louis Braille, the inventor of braille.
• The day recognizes the importance of braille as a means of communication and the roale it plays in the lives of blind and visually impaired people.

Braille is a tactile representation of alphabetic and numerical symbols using 6 dots to represent each letter and number, and even musical, mathematical and scientific symbols.

• Supreme Court judge Justice BR Gavai has been nominated as the Chairman of the Supreme Court Legal Services Committee (SCLSC) recently.
• The SCLSC is a statutory body constituted under Section 3A of the Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987.

It gives free legal services to the poor, marginalized, and unprivileged.