1st January, 2018 ................................................................................................................................................................................................... 1 HISTORY AND CULTURE ................................................................................................................................................... 1

Makar Sankranthi ................................................................................................................................................................. 1

SOCIAL SECTOR ................................................................................................................................................................... 2 Punyam Poonkavanam programme ..................................................................................................................................... 2

Cleanliness Survey 2018 ....................................................................................................................................................... 2

ECONOMY .............................................................................................................................................................................. 3 Global Housing Construction Technology Challenge (GHCTC) ..................................................................................... 3

Value Capture Finance (VCF) Policy Framework ............................................................................................................... 3

SPARK & PARAS ................................................................................................................................................................ 4

SPARK ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 4

PARAS ................................................................................................................................................................................................ 5

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY .......................................................................................................................................... 5 Sophia Robot ........................................................................................................................................................................ 5

Eliza effect ........................................................................................................................................................................................... 5

Humanoid Robots in India................................................................................................................................................................ 5

NASA missions in News recently ......................................................................................................................................... 5

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HISTORY AND CULTURE

Makar Sankranthi

Why in News?

• Mentioned in Man Ki Bat radio address by the Prime Minister

What is it?

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TPS 18 DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS Date: 01-01-2018

• Makar Sankranti is a Hindu festival in reference to deity Surya (sun) that is observed in January

every year.

• It marks the first day of the northward movement of the Earth on the celestial orbit around sun

into the Makara (Capricorn), marking the end of the month with the winter solstice and the start

of longer days.

Unique features

• Makar Sankranthi is one of the few ancient Hindu festivals that has been observed according to

solar cycles, while most festivals are set by the lunar cycle of the luni-solar Hindu calendar

• Since it’s based on Solar cycle, it almost falls on the same Gregorian calendar date of January

14th every year (January 14), with rare exceptions.

• The day is regarded as important for spiritual practices and accordingly people take a holy dip in

rivers, especially Ganga, Yamuna, Godavari, Krishna and Cauvery. It’s also the beginning of

Khumb Mela and end of Sabarimala Pilgrimage.

• It’s also referred to as the beginning of the end of winter and harvest festival following Rabi

season.

• This is a festival linked with nature and cultural diversity of India and is celebrated in different

names around the country:

Festival Region

Lohdi, Maghi Punjab and North-India

Khichdi and Til-Sankranti UP-Bihar

Sankrant Rajasthan

Uttarayan Gujarat

Magh-bihu Assam

Pongal Tamil Nadu

Makara Villaku Sabarimala temple, Kerala

• All of these festivals are usually celebrated between 13th and 17thJanuary.

SOCIAL SECTOR

Punyam Poonkavanam programme

Why in News?

• Mentioned in Man Ki Bat radio address by the Prime Minister

What is it?

• It’s a voluntary campaign of creating awareness on cleanliness near the Sabarimala temple

initiated by an IPS Officer P. Vijayan in Kerala.

• Every day at 9 in the morning, devotes are to clean the surrounding of the temple for one-hour.

• It became a tradition that the yatra and worship of devotees will remain incomplete if they do

not contribute by performing some physical labour or the other in the cleanliness programme.

Cleanliness Survey 2018

Why in News?

• Mentioned in Man Ki Bat radio address by the Prime Minister and is set to begin in the month of

January.

What is it?

• It’s the world’s largest-ever exercise to rank cities on cleanliness parameters

• It will be conducted from the 4th of January to 10th of March, 2018 by the Ministry of

Housing and Urban Affairs under Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban (SBM-U).

• This is the third edition of annual cleanliness survey which began in 2016. In 2017, it ranked

434 cities (with a population of 1 lakh and above) and in 2018, it’s proposed to survey 4041

cities.

Implementation

• Sources of data

1. Data by Municipal body and interactions with officials – 45% Weightage

2. Citizen Feedback- 30%

3. Direct Observation by the survey agency – 25%

• Areas of Evaluation (in the order of decreasing weightage)

1. Door to door Collection, Sweeping, Collection & Transportation

2. Processing and Disposal Public & Community Toilet Provision

3. Individual Toilet

4. Strategy for Open Defecation Free town (ODF) and Integrated Solid Waste Management

(SWM)

5. Information, Education and Behavior Change Communication (IEBC)

• If the city has a population of more than one lakh, ranking will be done on the national level

and if the population of your city is less than one lakh than it will be ranked on regional level.

ECONOMY

Global Housing Construction Technology Challenge (GHCTC)

Why in News?

• Recently, the idea was proposed in the national Workshop on National Consultation on

Accelerating Implementation of Urban Missions-PMAY(Urban)

What is it?

• The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs has proposed to launch the Global Housing

Construction Technology Challenge (GHCTC) to globally identify best technologies which

are suitable for mass housing programmes.

Objectives

• Co-opt internationally acclaimed rapid mass housing construction technologies

• Help States/UTs to construct sanctioned houses under PM Awas Yojana (Urban) to address

housing shortage in the urban areas by 2022.

Activities

• Institutions, academia and other stakeholders across the globe are proposed to be invited.

• Region/ State wide demonstration of technologies to explore and identify appropriate

technologies as a way forward

Value Capture Finance (VCF) Policy Framework

Why in news?

• Value Capture Finance Policy Framework was mentioned in the context of Smart Cities Mission

and in the yearend review of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs.

What is it?

• Value Capture Finance Policy Framework is a tool for generating finances required by the States

/ Cities for funding the infrastructural investments.

• It is based on the principle that people benefiting from public investments in infrastructure

should pay for it.

• Currently when governments invest in roads, airports and industries in an area, private property

owners in that area benefit from it. However, governments recover only a limited value from

such investments, constraining their ability to make further public investments elsewhere.

• VCF helps in capturing a part of the increment in the value of land due to such investments,

and use it to fund new infrastructure projects.

Different methods under VCF

• Land value tax

• Fee for changing land use from agricultural to non-agricultural use.

• Betterment levy: one time upfront charge on land that has gained in value because of public

infrastructure investments

• Development charges: area based linking of charges to the market value of land by carrying out

periodic revisions.

• Transfer of development rights

• Land pooling systems.

Examples

• Karnataka to fund its mass transit projects.

• The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) and City and Industrial

Development Corporation Limited (CIDCO) in Maharashtra have used betterment levy to finance

infrastructure projects

SPARK & PARAS

Why in news?

• Recently mentioned in yearend review of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs in the PIB.

What is it?

• SPARK and PARAS are measures taken under Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana-National Urban

Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NULM) of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs.

SPARK

• Systematic Progressive Analytical Real-time Ranking (SPARK) is a system of ranking of

states and cities to infuse competitive spirit amongst the States and cities in the

implementation of DAY-NULM

• It provides real time ranking by capturing data from the NULM MIS entered by the Urban

Local Bodies.

• It’s based on parameters like

o Social Mobilisation of Institution Development – 10% weightage

o Employment through Skill Training and Placement – 10%

o Support for Urban Street Vendors – 10%

o Scheme of Shelters for Urban Homeless- 10%

o Self-Employment Programme (SEP) – 10%

o Financial performance - 30%

o ADHAAR seeding- 20%

• In the 2017 ranking, Madhya Pradesh and Punjab are in the first two spots.

PARAS

• Personalised After-training Rapid Assessment System (PARAS) is a system seeking

direct feedback from the beneficiaries who attends the skill training of DAY NULM.

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Sophia Robot

Why in News?

• The first ever robot to be granted citizenship of a country, made its first appearance in India at

Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IIT-B).

What are its features?

• It’s a humanoid robot developed by Hong Kong-based Hanson Robotics and activated in 2015.

• Using artificial intelligence, it imitates human gestures and facial expressions, and is able to make

conversation on predefined topics

• It was given citizenship by Saudi Arabia.

Eliza effect

• ELIZA effect refers to the tendency of people to read far more understanding from robots who

actually are delivering a strings of symbols.

• ELIZA is an early natural language processing computer program created in 1966 at the MIT, USA.

Humanoid Robots in India

• Manav : India’s first 3-D printed humanoid robot.

• AcYut : India’s first humanoid robot. It was developed by the students of BITS Pilani.

• INDIRO : India’s tallest humanoid robot.

NASA missions in News recently

Mission Name Target Unique features

Parker Solar Probe Sun’s outer atmosphere It will be closest to Sun- studying corona,

solar wind

InSight lander Mars It will study interior and subsurface of Mars

OSIRIS Rex Asteroid Benu The first ever mission collecting sample

from an asteroid. It will reach Asteroid

Benu on August 2018 and return by 2023.

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