Konkani writer Mahabaleshwar Sail receives 2016 Saraswati Samman

Konkani writer Mahabaleshwar Sail won the award for “Hawthan”, which captures the lives of the potter community in Goa. 

He was presented the award, comprising plaque and a cash purse of Rs.15 lakh by Union minister for commerce and industry Nirmala Sitharaman at event held in New Delhi.

Mahabaleshwar Sail was born on 4 August 1943 in Shejebag, Majali, Karnataka village of Uttara Kannada district of Karnataka. He was born in a family of agriculturalists. Sail's father was in the Army. 

Sail initially wrote in Marathi language but later started writing in Konkani language too. His first story appeared in Pralhad Keshav Atre's Sāptāhik Navyug weekly. 

Sail has written stories, novels and children's literature in Konkani language. He has authored novels, stories and plays in Marathi language.His first Konkani novel was Kaali Ganga (काळी गंगा) in 1996. 

He has written four Marathi dramas and seven Konkani novels. He has also written five short stories and novel in Marathi. He is best known for his work ‘Paltadcho Munis’, which had inspired film by same name. Most of his short stories and novels are translated into English and Hindi. 

His work ‘Hawtham’ was published in 2009. He has received Sahitya Akadami Award in Konkani language for his short story collection ‘Taranga’ in 1993. ;

Core sector records 2.4% growth in July

Core sector growth in July on a year-on-year (YoY) basis was just 2.4% due to a low base in sectors including steel and electricity.

The performance of eight core industries – which comprise 40.27 % of the weight of items included in the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) – in July 2017 was higher than 0.8% in June 2017, but lower than 3.1% recorded in July 2016. Its cumulative growth during April to July, 2017-18 was 2.5%.

The modest uptick in core sector growth in July 2017 relative to the previous month was driven by a favourable base effect for steel, cement, fertilizers and electricity. Nevertheless, half of the eight constituents recorded a YoY contraction in July 2017, namely, refinery products, crude oil, cement and fertilisers.

India, Switzerland ink two MoUs in the field of Railways

 

Two MoUs have been signed in the course of the visit of President of the Swiss Confederation, Mrs. Doris Leuthard to India on today i.e.31.8.2017 between Ministry of Railways and Swiss Confederation.

·         The first MoU is between Ministry of Railways and Federal Department of the Environment, Transport and Communications of the Swiss Confederation for technical cooperation in Rail Sector.  This was signed in the presence of Hon’ble Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi and President of the Swiss Confederation, Mrs. Doris Leuthard by Shri Ashwani Lohani, Chairman Railway Board and Dr. Andreas Baum, Swiss Ambassador to India.

The MoU is a follow up on bilateral cooperation in Rail sector discussed in the meeting held between Minister of Railways Mr. Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu and Swiss Ambassador in July 2016.

The MoU aims at cooperation in the areas of:

a.      Traction Rolling stock

b.      EMU and Train sets

c.       Traction Propulsion Equipments

d.     Freight and Passenger Cars

e.      Tilting Trains

f.        Railway Electrification Equipments

g.      Train scheduling and operation improvement

h.      Railway Station modernization

i.        Multimodal transport

j.        Tunneling technology

·         The second MoU is between Konkan Railway Corporation Limited (KRCL) and Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich. This was signed by  Shri Sanjay Gupta, CMD/KRCL and Prof. Sarah Springman, Rector, ETH Zurich.   This will help Konkan Railway in establishing the George Fernandes Institute of Tunnel Technology (GFITT) at Goa especially for assimilation and dissemination of knowledge in the field of tunneling. GFITT aims to not only train KRCL’s own manpower for its Tunneling Projects but also wishes to generate qualified and trained personnel for the benefit of other Government organisations, private sector and even foreign organisations to bridge the huge gap in levels of knowledge and qualified manpower required to meet the key segment of infrastructure development in India.

Sunil Arora to be new Election Commissioner, Rajiv Mehrishi appointed Comptroller and Auditor General

Government on Thursday appointed IAS officer Sunil Arora as Election Commissioner and former Home Secretary Rajiv Mehrishias Comptroller and Auditor General of India. 

Arora (61) had been the Information and Broadcasting Secretary, and Secretary in the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship.

He also served as Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Civil Aviation during 1999-2002 and CMD, Indian Airlines for five years (two years as additional charge and three years as full charge).

Election commission is multi member body and currently has three members including Chief Election Commissioner (CEC). They all are appointed by the President for a term which is fixed by the President.

The CEC and election commissioners have equal power and receive equal salary, allowances and other perquisites, which are similar to judge of Supreme Court. In case of difference of opinion amongst the Chief Election Commissioner and Election Commissioner, the matter is decided by the Commission by majority.

ઈસરોના નેવિગેશન સેટેલાઇટ IRNSS-1Hનું લોન્ચિંગ નિષ્ફળ

·       ઈન્ડિયન રિજનલ નેવિગેશન સેટેલાઈટ સિસ્ટમ (IRNSS)નો ભાગ બનવાનો હતો.

·   ક્ષતિગ્રસ્ત ઉપગ્રહ 'આઈઆરએનએસ-૧એ'નું સ્થાન લેવા જઈ રહેલો ઉપગ્રહ પોતે જ ક્ષતિનો ભોગ બન્યો.

 ઈન્ડિયન સ્પેસ રિસર્સ ઓર્ગેનાઈઝેશન (ઈસરો)એ આજે નેવિગેશન ઉપગ્રહ 'આઈઆરએનએસએસ-૧એચ'નું લોન્ચિંગ નિષ્ફળ રહ્યું હતું. 'પીએસએલવી-સી૩૯' રોકેટમાં સવાર થઈને આ ઉપગ્રહને સાંતે સાત વાગ્યે શ્રીહરિકોટા લોન્ચિંગ મથકેથી રવાના કરવામાં આવ્યો હતો. ચોથા સ્ટેજ વખતે ઉપગ્રહનું હિટ-શીલ્ડ તેનાથી અલગ પડી શક્યું ન હતું. માટે ઉપગ્રહ પણ કાર્યરત થઈ શક્યો ન હતો. લોન્ચિંગની થોડી મિનિટો પછી ઈસરોએ અભિયાન નિષ્ફળ રહ્યું હોવાની માહિતી આપી હતી. ઈસરોના ચેરમેન એ.એસ.કિરણકુમારે કહ્યું હતું કે પ્રાથમિક ધોરણે મળેલી માહિતી પ્રમાણે હિટ-શીલ્ડને કારણે નિષ્ફળતા મળી છે. તેની વધુ તપાસ હવે કરવામાં આવશે.