Notes:
Gopal Bose (71), the former Bengal cricket captain, has passed away in Birmingham, England on August 26, 2018. He was the first cricketer from Bengal to play an ODI against England in 1974, which was incidentally only the 2nd ODI that India played. He had scored 3,757 runs in 78 first-class games with 8 hundreds and 17 fifties. He also took 72 wickets, including one five-for, with his handy off-breaks. Bose was the head coach of Kolkata’s Cricket Club of Dhakuria(CCD). Interestingly, Bose was the manager of the Virat Kohli-led India U-19 team that won the World Cup in Kuala Lumpur in 2008.

Notes:
The committee, chaired by Corporate Affairs Secretary Injeti Srinivas, has recently submitted final report on review of penal provisions of Company Act 2013 to the Union Minister for Finance & Corporate Affairs, Arun Jaitley. The Committee recommended that the existing rigour of the law should continue for serious offences, covering six categories, whereas for lapses that are essentially technical or procedural in nature, mainly falling under two categories may be shifted to in-house adjudication process. The report makes recommendations for de-clogging the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) through significant reduction in compounding cases before the Tribunal. The Committee was constituted by the Union government in July 2018 to review the existing framework dealing with offences under the Companies Act, 2013 and related matters and make recommendations to promote better corporate compliance.

Notes:
On 24 August, the Japan Women’s National Team has won the 9th edition of 2018 FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup tournament by beating the Spanish team 3-1 at the final in France. In Japanese football history, it’s their first-ever FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup title. The FIFA Fair Play Award was goes to Japanese team. It must be noted that France will also host the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup, which is schedule to take place between June-July.

Notes:
IIT-Kharagpur has recently conducted study on River Ganga that indicates that river is drying up in summers due to groundwater depletion. The study, published recently in Scientific Reports magazine by Nature Publishing Group, used a combination of satellite images of groundwater levels of Ganga, numerical simulations and chemical analyses to draw the conclusion. The study asserted that the decline of groundwater inflow (base flow) is also impacting the health of the river. The study also observed that in the forthcoming summers, for the next 30 years, groundwater contribution to river Ganga will continue decreasing. The trend can lead to disastrous effect on the riverine ecology and lead to food scarcity for 115 million people in the Ganga basin. Abhijit Mukherjee, associate professor of Geology in IIT-Kharapur, along with researchers Soumendra Nath Bhanja from Canada and Yoshihide Wada from IIASA Austria has conducted the study. The research was carried out under IIT-KGP Science and Heritage Initiative (SANDHI) Initiative, which focuses on river systems and its relationship with settlement system.

Notes:
The Government of India (GoI) has constituted a 21-member committee to advise Prime Minister Narendra Modi on policy matters related to science, technology and innovation. The committee, dubbed as Prime Minister’s Science Technology and Innovation Council (PM-STIAC), will be headed by K Vijay Raghavan, the principal scientific adviser to the GoI. It will facilitate the formulation and implementation of policies and decisions, provide action-oriented and future preparedness advise and assist in directing S&T to solve the socio economic problems in the country. It will also have a large focus on driving innovation in education, research, industry etc.

Notes:
Emmerson Mnangagwa was officially sworn-in as the new President of Zimbabwe on August 26, after narrowly winning the 2018 Zimbabwean general election. It was the country’s first election since the ousting of strongman Robert Mugabe. The President of Zimbabwe is the head of state of Zimbabwe, elected by direct universal suffrage using a two-round system. The President is also the head of government, as the office of Prime Minister was abolished in 1987. Zimbabwe is a landlocked country and its capital is Harare.

Notes:
The first-ever SAARC Agriculture Cooperative Business Forum has started in Kathmandu, Nepal on August 29, 2018. It is co-organized by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and Asian Farmers’ Association (AFA) with the support from the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). The aim of the forum is to bring together representatives both from the government and non-governmental entities from the Member States of SAARC as well as from regional and international organizations. The theme of 3-day Forum is the ‘Organizing and Strengthening Family Farmers’ Cooperatives to attain the Sustainable-Development-Goals-1 and 2 in South Asia.

Notes:
Despite competing with a severe toothache, Swapna Barman from West Bengal clinched gold in the women’s heptathlon with 6026 points at the 18th Asian Games 2018 in Jakarta on August 29. With this, she created history by becoming the first Indian heptathlete to win an Asian Games gold. Before Barman, only Bengal’s Soma Biswas and Karnataka’s JJ Shobha and Pramila Aiyappa had returned with a medal from the Asian Games. Soma and Shobha had finished two-three at both Busan Asian Games (2002) and the Doha Games (2006), while Pramila had won a bronze at the 2010 Guangzhou edition.

Notes:
The Madhya Pradesh government has organized an interactive programme “Mil -Banche” in government schools of state on August 31, 2018. It is a first of its kind initiative i.e. being organized for multi-dimensional development of children through language skill up-gradation, reading other books in addition to textbooks, developing interest in understanding and other co-curricular activities. Over 2 lakh volunteers who have registered for the programme include 820 engineers, 843 doctors, 36 thousand employees of private sector, 19 thousand public representatives and around 45 thousand government employees and officers. Volunteers will read out one chapter of any book from either the school library or the Hindi textbook during the programme. After the reading session, the students present in the class will be asked interesting questions and will be introduced to the art of conversation and reading after group discussion.

Notes:
In New Delhi, Indian Railways has recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with GAIL India Ltd for use of environment-friendly fuel ‘Natural Gas’ in Railway workshops and production units. The purpose of the pact is to replace Industrial gases like Dissolved Acetylene, LPG, Bharat Metal Cutting Gas (BMCG) and Furnace Oil / High Speed Diesel (HSD) oil with Natural Gas. The use of natural gas has a potential to replace fuel worth Rs 70 crore per annum. This historic partnership will pave the way for supply of Natural Gas to Railway workshops, integral coach factories, loco workshops, DEMU sheds, etc. located along the existing and upcoming pipeline networks of GAIL. This endeavour shall reduce carbon foot-prints of IR and contribute positively towards achieving COP21 commitments.