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The West Bengal government has won the prestigious UN Public Service Award for year 2017 for its initiative to combat child marriage and ensure education to the girl child in the state. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee received the prestigious award at a ceremony held in The Hague, Netherlands on behalf of her government for the ‘Kanyashree Prakalpa’ initiative that sought to reduce the high child marriage rates and low female education rates in the state. Through the initiative, cash was deposited into the bank account of girls for every year they remained in school and were unmarried. The UN Public Service Awards are given by the world body to institutions from across the world for their innovation and excellence in providing public services. It highlights the pivotal role of public services in the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

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The Maharashtra government will launch a mobile app ‘My Plant’ on July 1, 2017, which would help in recording data about tree plantations in the state. Using this app, people and organizations can feed the data about the saplings they have planted with the Forest Department, which would help it in creating a database of trees. The Forest Department has set a target of planting 4 crore saplings through public participation between July 1 and 7. After downloading this mobile app, people and organizations can record the data about tree plantation with the Forest Department and information on this app will be automatically recorded on the department’s website.

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Imran Khawaja, the Chairman of Associates counties and an administrator from Singapore, has been unanimously elected as the new Deputy Chairman of the International Cricket Council (ICC) board. He will deputize in ICC meetings in case the chairman Shashank Manohar is absent. Khawaja is a senior lawyer and serving in the ICC Board for several years. The post of deputy chairman is recently created by the ICC Full Council following the constitutional change on June 22, 2017.

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The International Widows day (IWD) is observed every year on June 23 as an opportunity for action towards achieving full rights and recognition for widows that are too long invisible, uncounted and ignored. The day addresses the poverty and injustice faced by millions of widows and their dependents in many countries. The 2017 theme is “Empowering Women for Greater Achievements”.

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Kavita Devi, the former Indian powerlifter and South Asian Games gold medal winner, will become the first Indian woman to compete in the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) when she takes part in the first ever Mae Young Classic tournament for women from July 2017. She will be among the 32 participants who will compete at the tournament. The event is set to take place on July 13 -14 in Full Sail Live in Orlando, Florida.

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The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has successfully launched the world’s smallest and lightest satellite “Kalamsat” built by Indian students into the space from its facility in Wallops Island on June 23, 2017. The satellite is named after the former President APJ Abdul Kalam and was designed and built by Tamil Nadu student Rifath Sharook along with six other teammates. The tiny satellite weighs around 64 grams and its structure is fully 3D-printed with reinforced carbon fiber polymer. It is equipped with a nano Geiger Muller counter which will measure radiation in space. The satellite has been designed in a way which will have a 240-minute mission in space and will operate for 12 minutes in a micro-gravity environment of space. With this launch, Rifath Sharook has become the first Indian student to have his experiment launched by NASA.

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The 6th edition of International Federation of Sport Climbing (IFSC) World Cup was held at the CIDCO Exhibition Centre in Navi Mumbai, Maharashtra on June 24 – 25, 2017. Over 150 athletes from across the globe will participate at the World Cup including the top talent from India. The tournament will be hosted by the City Industrial Development Corporation of Maharashtra (CIDCO). The Italy-based IFSC has 86 member federations across five continents.

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The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has recently expanded the Oversight Committee (OC) from 2 to 5 for faster bad loan resolution in the banking sector. The three new members are M.B.N. Rao, Y.M. Deosthalee and S. Raman. According to the reconstituted structure, the 5-member OC will be led by a chairman and work through multiple benches to approve various cases of restructuring referred by banks. Pradeep Kumar has been appointed as the chairman of the OC. With the expanded mandate, the OC will be responsible for approving cases of restructuring under the central bank’s S4A (Scheme for Sustainable Structuring of Stressed Assets) as well as for resolving stressed cases where the aggregate exposure of the banking industry is above Rs 500 crore.

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The World Bank (WB) has approved a loan assistance of $44 million for the Assam State Public Finance Institutional Reforms (ASPIRe) Project. The ASPIRe project is based on three important components that act as pillars for institutional reforms – strengthening public finance institutional capacity, strengthening expenditure and revenue information systems and on project management, monitoring and evaluation, and coordination. The purpose of the project is to improve predictability and transparency in budget execution and efficiency in tax administration in Assam. The project is for 5 years and is expected to be completed by March 31, 2022.

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Manu S Pillai has won the 2017 Sahitya Academy Yuva Puraskar in English Language for his book titled “The Ivory Throne – Chronicles of the House of Travancore”, the biography of the last queen of Travancore. The book unfolds the rise and fall of Maharani Sethu Lakshmi Bai, who ruled Travancore between 1924 -193. The book discusses the unheard life and rare customs of the royal family. The book also unravels some of the interesting and rare practice of matrilineal system existed in the Travancore kingdom, where king emerges from the sons of sisters of the king and not of the king, unlike other Indian kingdoms. It is also interesting to find that queen is not the wife of the king, but is the mother, sister or niece of the king. The Yuva Puraskar is awarded annually for the first book or best book by an author of age 35 and below. It consists of a cash prize of Rs 50,000 and a copper plaque.