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Demi-Leigh Nel-Peters, who represented South Africa, has been crowned the Miss Universe 2017 at The AXIS at Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. The runner-up was Miss Colombia Laura Gonzalez, while the second runner-up was Miss Jamaica Davina Bennett. Nel-Peters is the second titleholder from South Africa, and the first since Margaret Gardiner won Miss Universe 1978. Contestants from 92 countries and territories participated in the decades-old competition. This year’s edition had the most contestants ever, including the first ever representatives of Cambodia, Laos and Nepal.

Notes:
Sathiyan Gnanasekaran, an Indian table tennis player from Tamil Nadu, has clinched the men’s singles gold medal at the 2017 ITTF Challenge Spanish Open in Almeria, Spain. Sathiyan beat Japan’s Kazuhiro Yoshimura 11-7 3-11 11-6 6-11 13-11 11-7 in the men singles final on November 26, 2017. He is currently being supported by the Go Sports Foundation through the Rahul Dravid Athlete Mentorship Programme.

Notes:
Maneka Sanjay Gandhi, the Minister of Women and Child Development, has launched an intensive training program for Elected Women Representatives (EWRs) of Panchayati Raj Institutions and Master Trainers in New Delhi on November 27, 2017. This capacity building program is being organized by National Institute of Public Cooperation and Child Development (NIPCCD) of the WCD Ministry which will ultimately train approximately twenty thousand EWRs covering nearly 50 EWRs from each district by March, 2018. The training program will include simple engineering skills will give EWRs an insight into women’s issues as well as focus on education and financial matters. The Capacity building of EWRs is critical to empower women to participate effectively in the governance processes. This will help them assume the leadership roles expected of them and guide their villages towards a more prosperous future.

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Private sector lender Axis Bank has recently launched instant international payment services using Ripple’s enterprise blockchain technology solution for retail and corporate customers. The bank has launched a service for its retail customers in India to receive payments from RAKBANK in UAE and for its corporate customers in India to receive payments from Standard Chartered Bank in Singapore. Ripple makes international remittances faster and transparent for customers while ensuring security and improving efficiencies. The transactions reach their destination account in minutes, with the certainty of settlement, and with end-to-end visibility over the journey of the payment.

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Gopi Thonakal from Kerala has become the first Indian man to win Asian Marathon Championship. He achieved the feat in the 16th edition of the prestigious event, at Dongguan in China on November 26, 2017. Gopi clocked 2 hours 15 minutes and 48 seconds to clinch gold. He, thus, became the first Indian man to win the title after the formation of separate Asian Marathon championships. Andrey Petrov of Uzbekistan bagged silver while Byambalev Tseveenravdan of Mongolia won bronze. Earlier, Asha Agarwal won the women’s title when it was part of the biennial Asian Track and Field Championships.

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The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will launch the India’s first mission to the Sun “Aditya-L1 mission” from Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh on the PSLV- XL launch vehicle in 2019. The Aditya-1 mission was conceived as a 400kg class satellite carrying one payload, the Visible Emission Line Coronagraph (VELC) and was planned to launch in 800 km low earth orbit. It will be launched into the halo orbit around the Lagrangian point 1 (L1) of the Sun-Earth system. This orbit has the advantage of allowing continuous monitoring of the sun. The main aim of the solar mission is to improve the understanding of dynamical processes of the sun and help resolve some outstanding questions in solar physics.

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The Adichunchanagiri Wildlife Sanctuary (AWLS) is located in Nagamangala Taluk of Mandya district of Karnataka and is spread over 0.88 square kilometres. This was created mainly for the conservation of peacocks. It also houses nearly 250 species of birds.

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The scientists from New Zealand have developed the world’s first artificial intelligence politician “SAM” that can answer a person’s queries regarding local issues such as policies around housing, education and immigration. It was created by Nick Gerritsen, an entrepreneur in New Zealand. It constantly learns to respond to people through Facebook Messenger as well as a survey on its homepage. It may help to bridge the growing political and cultural divide in many countries.

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World no. 1 Tai Tzu Ying of Chinese Taipei has won the women’s singles title at the Hong Kong Super Series badminton tournament by defeating P V Sindhu in the final at Kowloon on November 26, 2017. This was Tai’s 8th win against Sindhu in 11 meetings and fourth on the trot. This is also Sindhu’s second loss in the four finals that she reached this season. She had lost to Japan’s Nozomi Okuhara at the World Championship final, while clinched two titles at India and Korea this year.

Notes:
The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) is the apex body in India for the formulation, coordination and promotion of biomedical research. It funded by the Government of India through the Department of Health Research, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, who is the Director General (DG) of ICMR, is a globally recognised researcher on tuberculosis and HIV. Currently, Dr. Swaminathan is in news because she will assume the charge of Deputy Director General of Programmes (DDP) at the World Health Organisation (WHO) in Geneva in December 2017. It is the second-highest position in the WHO. Dr. Swaminathan is the daughter of agriculture scientist M S Swaminathan who is hailed as the father of the ‘Green Revolution’ in India.