Headlines

Khelo India Youth Games - Page No.1 , GS 2

North Eastern Council (NEC) - Page No.4 , GS 2
The problem with India’s science management - Page No.6 , GS 3
Gearing up for change - Page No.6 , GS 3
Great Indian Bustard - Page No.10 , GS 3

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Pg no. 1 GS 2
• Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday cited the various reforms
undertaken by the Union government and the support it provided to
the athletes in the past 10 years as key reasons for the country’s
success in international sporting events such as the Tokyo
Olympics, Asian Games, and Paralympics.

• Inaugurating the sixth edition of the Khelo India Youth Games here,
he said though the sportspersons in the country were hardworking
and passionate even before, they gained new confidence and
support from the government at every step in the last 10 years.

• “The government reformed, the athletes performed, and the entire

sports system transformed in India,” he said.
• India has the largest youth population in the world, with
approximately 65% of its population being under the age of 35.

• The youth, aged between 15-29 years, make up 27.5% of the

population and represent a dynamic and vibrant segment.

• Khelo India is a scheme envisioned by Prime Minister Modi in 2017-

18 to give a platform to grassroots athletes and build sports
infrastructure across India, resulting in turning India into a sporting
nation.

• The Khelo India Scheme is the flagship Central Sector Scheme of the
Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports.
• Creating Elite Sportspersons: There are several Khelo India athletes who
have been inducted in the elite Target Olympic Podium Scheme (TOPS)
over the years based on their performance and are today making the
country proud in multiple international competitions.

• Financial Assistance to Players: Talented players identified in priority

sports disciplines at various levels by the High-Powered Committee will be
provided annual financial assistance of INR 5 lakh per annum for 8 years.

• Spillover Effect/Psychological Effect: The programme has impacted Sports

Authorities and schools in India through annual National Sports
competitions and support for Sports training facilities.

• Promotion to Indigenous Sports: Khelo India initiative focuses on

promoting indigenous sports in every district of India. Some of them are
Gatka, Kalaripayattu, Thang-Ta, and Mallakhamba.
 •Kalaripayattu, also known simply as Kalari, is an Indian
•Gatka originates from the State of Punjab and
martial art that originated in modern-day Kerala.
this traditional fighting style of the Nihang Sikh
•Kalaripayattu is held in high regard by martial artists due
Warriors is used both as self-defense as well as
to its long-standing history within Indian martial arts. It is
a sport.
believed to be the oldest surviving martial art in India.
•Gatka is believed to have originated when
•It is also considered to be among the oldest martial arts
the 6 Sikh Guru Hargobind adopted ‘Kirpan’ for
th
still in existence, with its origin in the martial arts timeline
self-defence during the Mughal era.
dating back to at least the 3 century BCE.
rd
 •The name Mallakhamb derives from the
terms malla, meaning wrestler, and khamb,
which means a pole. Literally
meaning "wrestling pole", the term refers to a
traditional training implement used by wrestlers.
•Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra have been
the hotspots of this sport.
•Huyen langlon is an Indian martial art from Manipur.
•In the Meitei language, huyen means war while langlon or langlong can mean net,
knowledge or art.
•Huyen langlon consists of two main components:

• Thang-ta (armed combat)

• sarit sarak (unarmed fighting).
•The primary weapons of huyen langlon are the thang (sword) and ta (spear). Other
weapons include the shield and the axe.
Pg no. 4 GS 2
• Zonal Councils are the statutory (and not the constitutional) bodies.

• They are established by an Act of the Parliament, that is, States

Reorganisation Act of 1956.

• The act divided the country into five zones- Northern, Central, Eastern,
Western and Southern and provided a zonal council for each zone.

• In addition to the above-mentioned Zonal Councils, a North-Eastern

Council was created by a separate Act of Parliament, the North-Eastern
Council Act of 1971.

• Its members include Assam, Manipur, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh,

Nagaland, Meghalaya, Tripura and Sikkim.
• Chairman: The union home minister is the Chairman of each of
these Councils.

• Vice Chairman: The Chief Ministers of the States included in each

zone act as Vice-Chairman of the Zonal Council for that zone by
rotation, each holding office for a period of one year at a time.

• Members: Chief Minister and two other Ministers as nominated

by the Governor from each of the States and two members from
Union Territories included in the zone.
Pg no. 6 GS 3
• Sustained economic progress which can satisfy national ambition is
invariably fuelled by scientific advances translated into deployable
technologies. This has been the inevitable global experience since the
onset of the Industrial Revolution.

• Alive to this reality, the government is overhauling India’s science

establishment, which includes setting up the new National Research
Foundation (NRF) and restructuring the Defence Research and
Development Organisation (DRDO).

• India’s low overall expenditure on research and development (around 0.7%

of GDP, compared to 3.5% for the United States and 2.4% for China) is but
one aspect constraining its scientific outcomes. Considering such low
expenditure, it is pivotal to allocate money wisely and focus on high-
impact projects.
• In 2022, the Indian Space Research Organisation stood a distant eighth on launch
numbers, with foreign startups racing ahead on key technologies such as
reusable rockets.

• On critical science and technology themes such as genomics, robotics, and

artificial intelligence, the situation is even more alarming.

• India’s science is dominated by the public sector.

• The basic assumption behind the outsized role played by scientists in Indian
science administration is that a good scientist will also be a good science
administrator.

• The argument goes that only scientists can appropriately run scientific
institutions, considering the importance and technical rigours of the science that
is supposed to go on in these places. The actual performance of these institutions
is proof enough that this paradigm is faulty.
• The separation of administrators and scientists is something
which most robust science establishments generally embrace.
Even the U.S., with labs being embedded in the university
ecosystem and run by scientists, selects scientists for an
administrative role quite early on in their careers.

• Such selected science administrators, by and large, only carry out

administrative tasks thereon, and are groomed for the task, with
very few of them ever going back to active science.

• At some point, India has to come to the same conclusion that the
world of business did in 1908 when the Master of Business
Administration (MBA) course was established at Harvard.
Administration is something which has to be taught and practised
separately from the subject matter being administered.
National Research Foundation (NRF)?
• NRF is a proposed entity that will replace the Science and Engineering Research
Board of India (SERB) and catalyse and channel interdisciplinary research for
accelerating India’s ambitious development agenda, through impactful
knowledge creation and translation.

The NRF's Goals:

• Promote interdisciplinary research that will address India's most pressing
development challenges.
• Minimize duplication of research efforts.
• Promote the translation of research into policy and practice.

Features of NRF:
• The NRF will be presided by the Prime Minister and consist of 10 major
directorates, focusing on different domains of science, arts, humanities,
innovation and entrepreneurship.
• The NRF will have an 18-member board with eminent Indian and international
scientists, senior government functionaries and industry leaders.
• The NRF will be registered as a society and have an independent secretariat.
Pg no. 6 GS 3
• Earlier this week, the India Meteorological Department (IMD), entered
the 150th year of its existence.

• researchers at the Council on Energy, Environment and Water

(CEEW) examines monsoon trends at the sub-divisional (tehsil)
level, from 1982-2022.This finds that monsoon rainfall is increasing
in more than half, or 55%, of India’s roughly 4,400 tehsils.

• About 11% of them saw decreasing rainfall. In those tehsils, about

68% experienced reduced rainfall in all four monsoon months, while
87% showed a decline during the June and July -- crucial for the
sowing of kharif crops.

• Prioritising regional and sub-district forecasts over national ones,

would be a commendable step forward by the government.
• India Meteorological Department (IMD) with the mandate of providing
public weather services will completed 150 years of presence on 15th
January, 2025.

• It is the National Meteorological Service of the country and the principal

government agency in all matters relating to meteorology and allied
subjects.

• It is an agency of the Ministry of Earth Sciences, Government of India.

• In 1864, two devastating cyclones hit Kolkata and the Andhra coast,
causing significant loss of life.
• The severity of these calamities highlighted the absence of a system to
monitor atmospheric parameters, leading to the establishment of the India
Meteorological Department (IMD) in 1875.
Pg no. 10 GS 3
• The Great Indian Bustard (Ardeotis nigriceps), the State bird of
Rajasthan, is considered India’s most critically endangered bird.

• It is considered the flagship grassland species, representing the

health of the grassland ecology.

• Its population is confined mostly to Rajasthan and Gujarat. Small

populations occur in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra
Pradesh.

• The bird is under constant threats due to collision/electrocution

with power transmission lines, hunting (still prevalent in
Pakistan), habitat loss and alteration as a result of widespread
agricultural expansion, etc.
Protection Status:
• IUCN red List: Critically Endangered
• Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild
Fauna and Flora (CITES): Appendix1
• Convention on Migratory Species (CMS): Appendix I
• Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972: Schedule I

Species Recovery Programme:

• It is kept under the species recovery programme under the
Integrated evelopment of Wildlife Habitats of the Ministry of
Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC).

National Bustard Recovery Plans:

• It is currently being implemented by conservation agencies.
Conservation Breeding Facility:
• MoEF&CC, Rajasthan government and Wildlife Institute of India
(WII) have also established a conservation breeding facility in
Desert National Park at Jaisalmer in June 2019.

Project Great Indian Bustard:

• It has been launched by the Rajasthan government with an aim
of constructing breeding enclosures for the species and
developing infrastructure to reduce human pressure on its
habitats.
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