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Daily Current Capsules 28th April 2022


Government Policies and Interventions/GSII
Digital India RISC-V (DIR-V) program

What's the NEWS

 

  • To achieve commercial silicon and design wins for the next generation microprocessors by December 2023, the government of India announced the launch of Digital India RISC-V (DIR-V) program.
  • RISC-V is a free and open ISA enabling a new era of processor innovation through open standard collaboration.
  • DIR-V will see partnerships between Startups, Academia & Multinationals, to make India not only a RISC-V Talent Hub for the World but also supplier of RISC-V SoC (System on Chips) for Servers, Mobile devices, Automotive, IoT & Microcontrollers across the globe.
  • India announces its ambitious roadmap with Ministry of Electronics and IT planning to join the RISC-V International as Premiere Board Member to collaborate, contribute and advocate India's expertise with other global RISC-V leaders.
  • The roadmap of design & implementation of the DIR-V Program with - SHAKTI Processor by IIT Madras and VEGA Processor by C-DAC
Know! about DIR-V Program (under RISC-V domain)
  • RISC-V ISA, being available in Open-Source
  • RISC-V will pave the way for next decade of computing design and innovations and adoption in future-generation of processors.
  • DIR-V Program will catalyze the design innovation in the country and will encourage the several domestic startups working in RISC-V domains like- micro architecture design, verification and security aspects.
Know! about RISC - V
  • RISC-V International is a global nonprofit association based in Switzerland.
  • Founded in 2015 as the RISC-V Foundation with 29 members
  • RISC-V is a free and open ISA enabling a new era of processor innovation through open standard collaboration.
  • RISC-V has broken down barriers in the semiconductor industry, bringing together different companies, industries, and geographies for open collaboration.
  • RISC-V combines a modular technical approach with an open license business model, meaning that anyone, anywhere can leverage the IP contributed and produced by RISC-V International.
  • RISC-V is an open standard instruction set architecture (ISA) based on established reduced instruction set computer (RISC) principles.
  • Unlike most other ISA designs, RISC-V is provided under open source licenses that do not require fees to use.

 


Governance/GSII
National Good Governance Webinar Series 2022-2023

What's the NEWS

  • The Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG), Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions is organizing the National Good Governance Webinar Series over the year from April, 2022 to March, 2023.
  • The mandate to hold virtual conferences/Webinars with District Collectors and other Officers over the next 12 months on a specific theme / Sector, in which past award winners since the inception of the Prime Minister's Awards for Excellence in Public Administration under that sector be invited to present their experiences given to DARPG, is being taken forward by conducting 13 National Good Governance Webinars over the year.
  • The first webinar in the series is commencing on 28th April, 2022 on the theme ‘Improving Service Delivery' under which two awarded initiatives will be presented.
  • "SAKALA" the initiative conferred with PM's Award in the year 2012-13 to the Department of Personnel & Administrative Reforms, Government of Karnataka and the initiative "e-Seva" conferred with PM's Award in the year 2006-2007 to the Government of Andhra Pradesh will be presenting under the theme of "Improving Service Delivery".
  • SAKALA
  • Sakala, made possible through the Karnataka Guarantee of Services to Citizens Act 2011 (amended in 2014), has been an example of success in time-bound service delivery to citizens.
  • e-SEVA
  • e-Seva is a good governance initiative that incorporates the vision of National e-Gov plan "Public Services Closer to Home" and its objective is to provide smart, citizen centric, ethical, efficient and effective governance facilitated by technology.

 

 

Prelims Factoids
Azadi se Antyodaya Tak

What's the NEWS

  • Azadi Se Antyodaya Tak, a 90-day campaign with a mission to saturate 75 Districts across 28 States/UTs with beneficiary schemes of 09 central ministries will be launched by Union Minister for Rural Development & Panchayati Ra
  • The identified districts are aligned with the birth place of 99 Freedom Fighters, who made the ultimate sacrifice for the nation during its struggle for independence.
  • The goal of the campaign is to take up 17 select schemes with direct assistance to beneficiaries in saturation mode, reaching out to the person at the bottom of the pyramid in rural areas by each of the participating ministries/departments.
  • The 75 districts, marginally lagging behind in the development parameters, have been shortlisted through MPCE (Monthly per Capita Indicators) and D5/D7 SECC-2011 (Socio-Economic Caste Census) data.
  • Azadi Se Antyodaya Tak campaign
  • It is a concerted effort of Ministry of Rural Development, Department of Social Justice & Empowerment-Divyangjan, Ministry of Women & Child Development, Department of Financial Services, Ministry of Skill Development & Entrepreneurship, Department of Agriculture & farmers Welfare, Department of Health & Family Welfare, Department of Animal Husbandry & Dairying and Ministry of Labour & Employment.
  • The campaign is to be implemented in a celebratory mode involving all rural stakeholders including families of selected freedom fighters (FF), Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs), women networks, youth groups and students highlighting the achievements of the schemes.

 

Prelims Factoids
PBW1Chapati

 

WHAT'S the NEWS

  • Researchers have developed a wheat variety, with excellent baking quality having soft and sweet chapatis.
  • The wheat variety called ‘PBW1Chapati' has been released at state level in Punjab for cultivation under timely sown irrigated conditions.
Earlier varieties of wheat
  • Tall traditional wheat variety C 306 has been the golden standard for chapati quality.
  • Later, PBW 175 variety was developed by PAU and had good chapati quality.
  • However, both these have become susceptible to stripe and brown rusts.
  • The challenge now is to combine high yield potential and disease resistance and retains the actual chapati quality.
PBW1Chapati
  • Taking up the challenge, the wheat breeding team from Punjab Agricultural University have developed a new variety using marker assisted selection for a linked stripe rust and leaf rust gene Lr57/Yr40 in the PBW175 background.
  • Until the release of this new variety, C306, released in 1965 had become a brand in itself and the farmers depended on this variety for quality in spite of it being susceptible to foliar rusts and lodging.
  • No other wheat variety before ‘PBW1Chapati' has matched that quality standard of C306
  • The variety ‘PBW1Chapati' aims to fill this void at commercial level owing to good chapati quality, sweet in taste and soft in texture.
Other related terminologies

  • Supported by the Promotion of University Research and Scientific Excellence(PURSE) grant, the thermocycler machine was used to monitor the presence of a linked stripe rust and leaf rust resistant gene --- ‘Lr57/Yr40' in the segregating generations and the final selected progenies.
  • Equipment like rheometer (determine the flour viscosity) and doughLAB (determines water absorption of flour, dough development time and other dough mixing parameters) purchased under the PURSE funding helped carry out post-harvest quality analysis of the selected progenies.

 

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