Bihar Affairs
Bagless’ Saturday in all govt schools in Bihar
Children studying in government-run schools inBiharwill now have to carry school bags only five days a week, as the introduced ‘Bagless Safe Saturday’ scheme on the occasion of ‘Shiksha Diwas’, which is observed since 2007 on the birth anniversary of the country’s first Education minister Maulana Abul Kalam Azad.
CM Nitish Kumar formally launched the ‘Bagless Safe Saturday’ scheme and also unveiled a book of its guidelines at an event on the occasion. He also launched a ‘Best Plus App’ which will be used by education department officials for real-time monitoring and tracking of activities and presence of teachers in over 80,000 primary and upper primary schools across the state. The CM also transferred the amount of incentives in the bank account of students through DBT under different schemes of the education department for FY 2022-23.
National and International Affairs
FinMin finalises framework for sovereign green bonds
The Finance Ministry has finalised the framework to issue sovereign green in line with global standards, according to sources. The government intends to mobilise Rs 16,000 crore from the issuance of green bonds during the second half of the current financial year. It is a part of the borrowing programme for the second half of this fiscal.
These rupee-denominated papers will have long tenure to suit the requirement of green Infrastructure projects.
The government is planning a total borrowing of Rs 5.92 lakh crore during the October-March period of the current fiscal.
The government had in the Budget for 2022-23 projected a gross market borrowing of Rs 14.31 lakh crore.
MoHUA launches the Transport 4 All Challenge Stage-2 and Citizen Perception Survey-2022
The Transport4All Challenge is an initiative of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, Government of India, that aims at enhancing the mobility experience of citizens. The Challenge focuses on digital innovation and invites cities, citizens, and innovators to join hands to develop contextual digital solutions to improve formal as well as informal public transport to better serve the mobility needs of all citizens.
Three Stages of the Challenge
The Transport4All through Digital Innovation Challenge comprises three stages:
Stage I PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION: Cities, with the support of NGOs, identify key recurring problems that citizens and public transport operators face
Stage II SOLUTION GENERATION: Startups develop prototypes of solutions to improve public transport with inputs from cities and NGOs
Stage III PILOT TESTING: Cities engage Startups for large-scale pilots and refine the solutions based on citizen feedback.
MoHUA launched the Urban Outcomes Framework 2022 in April, 2022 as an initiative to undertake a transparent and comprehensive assessment of cities based on cross-city outcomes across major sectors. The Framework also includes the third round of Ease of Living Index. The Ease of Living Index, as a 360-degree assessment, aims to evaluate cities across India based on the Quality Of Life, Economic Ability, and Sustainability.
Methane Alert and Response System
Recently theUnited Nations(UN)has decided to set up asatellite-basedmonitoring systemMARS: Methane Alert and Response Systemfor trackingmethane emissionsand alerting governments and corporations to respond.