NATIONAL

MIS Portal of MSP for forest produce launched

• Union Minister of Tribal Affairs Arjun Munda and TRIFED have launched Management Information Portal of Minimum Support Price for Minor Forest Produce.
• The Portal will have data which is available on real time basis, and applicable to the list of procurement centres and their locations.
• It is launched to ensure ready and online availability of procurement related data for analysis and fast and effective decision making and will go a long way to ensure transparency in the procurement activities and give a reflection on the performance and efficiency of the different states and districts.
• The Tribal Minister along with TRIFED has also launched TRIFED Van Dhan Chronicle which documents the work done for the promotion of tribal enterprises in the country and the achievements of tribal entrepreneurs under the Van Dhan Vikas Yojana.
• 14 Honey Farmer Producer Organizations alongside NAFED and NDDB have also been launched by the Tribal Ministry in the states of Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Odisha and Gujarat.
• A MoU between UNICEF and TRIFED on Tribal Samvaad Network was also signed which acts as a  tribal network for Social and Behaviour.

DRDO successfully tests Indigenous Aerial Target

The Defence Research and Development Organization has successfully conducted the flight test of Indigenously developed High-speed Expendable Aerial Target (HEAT) Abhyas.

The Unmanned High-speed Expendable Aerial Target was designed and developed by Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE), Bengaluru based DRDO laboratory along with other DRDO laboratories to meet the requirement of aerial targets of Indian Armed Forces.

The aircraft is controlled from a ground based controller and an indigenously developed MEMS based Inertial Navigation System along with the Flight Control Computer which helps it to follow the pre-designated path in a fully autonomous mode.

During the flight trial, High subsonic speed trajectory at a very low altitude with high endurance was demonstrated.

Two boosters provided initial acceleration during launch and a small turbo jet engine is used to sustain high subsonic speed with long endurance.

Indian Army launches Contemporary messaging app

• The Indian Army has launched a contemporary messaging application named Army Secure Indigeneous Messaging Application (ASIGMA).
• It is a new generation, state of the art, web based application developed entirely in-house by team of officers of the Corps of Signals of the Army.
• The application is being deployed on the Army’s internal network as a replacement of Army Wide Area Network (AWAN) messaging application which has been in service for past 15 years.
• The application has been fielded on Army owned hardware and lends itself to lifetime support with future upgrades.
• The bespoke messaging application meets all futuristic user requirements and boasts of an enhanced user experience.
• It has a variety of contemporary features including multi-level security, message prioritization and tracking, dynamic global address book and various options to meet the Army’s requirements.

New National Internet Exchanges inaugurated

• Minister of State Electronics and Information Technology, Skill Development & Entrepreneurship Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Minister of State (Law & Justice) SP Singh Baghel, and CEO of National Internet Exchanges of India(NIXI) has inaugurated Seven new internet exchanges of NIXI in India.
• The seven new NIXI’s is situated at Agra, Lucknow, Kanpur, Prayagraj, Varanasi, Gorakhpur and Meerut, which will enhance and improve the quality of Internet and Broadband services in Uttar Pradesh.
• This development will set up a robust foundation for Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning & IoT in Uttar Pradesh. Accessibility & convenience will increase for citizens in terms of availing government benefits, improving quality of life. Everyone in the state will benefit from the opening of seven Internet exchanges.
• NIXI is planning to launch many small nodes like these in Tier-2 & Tier-3 cities in the near future so as to improvise the entire internet ecosystem in India and enable the netizens to access the internet at low cost with high speed.

Additional Fact-

1. National Internet Exchange of India (NIXI)-It is a non-profit Organization incorporated under section 8 of the India Companies Act 2013.
2. It has 8 Network Operations centre’s- Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkatta, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Guwahati and Ahmedabad.
3. CEO of NIXI-Anil Kumar Jain

Main Functions of NIXI include-

1. Internet Exchanges through which the internet data is exchanged amongst Internet Service provider’s(ISP) and between ISPand Content Delivery network(CDN),
2. Its primary purpose is to facilitate exchange of domestic internet traffic between the peering ISPs, Content players and any other organizations with their own AS number.

BANKING, FINANCE AND ECONOMICS

Loan contract for Agra Metro Rail Project inked

• The Government of India and European Investment Bank has signed a Finance contract for first portion loan of 250 Million Euro’s for the Agra Metro Rail Project.
• The European Investment Bank had approved a total loan of 450 million euros to fund the Agra Metro Rail Project.
• The project aims to provide safe, reliable, affordable and environment friendly public Mass Rapid Transit System for Agra city and improve the mobility for planned urban development in Agra.
• The financing from Europe Investment Bank will help to fund construction of 29.4 km metro corridor. The project will also enhance economic productivity of the city and enhance job creation.

CEPA negotiations with Australia held

• The Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal has held talks with Australian Minister of Trade, Tourism and Investment Dan Tehan to develop Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement (CECA) negotiations between the countries
• The talks were conducted virtually, and held talks on bilateral trade and talks have decided to deepen the engagement , they also directed the officials to speed up the negotiations to make the way for a comprehensive agreement.

Loan approval accorded for Renewable energy projects

• The REC limited of India has made an agreement with KfW development bank of Germany for availing Official Development assistance(ODA) loan of USD 169.5 million under Indo-German Bilateral Partnership.
• Department of Economic Affairs and Ministry of Finance have granted the approval for the loan amount.
• Proceeds of ODA loan will be deployed for part financing of innovative Solar PV Technology based generation Projects in India at competitive interest rates.
• This is the fifth credit line signed between REC Limited and KfW for financing of Power Sector Projects and third credit line for financing of Renewable Energy Projects.

RBI extends Tokenization Deadline

• The Reserve Bank of India has decided to extend the implementation of the Tokenization of debit and creditcards for online transactions.
• The extension was provided for 6 months till June 30.2022, this was done following the representations of the stakeholders.

SPORTS

U19 Women’s Championship

• Bangladesh has won the Under 19 South Asian football Federation Women’s Football Championship held at Shaheed Sepoy Mohammad Mostafa Kamal Stadium, Dhaka.
• Bangladesh won the championship by defeating India at the finals with a goal score of 1-0, Anai Mogini scored the winning goal at the 81^st minute of the game.
• Shaheda Akter Ripa of Bangladesh was given the ‘most valuable player’ of the game award for scoring maximum number of goals in the tournament.

Indian Skier wins Bronze in Skiing

• Indian skier Aanchal Thakur has won Bronze medal at the FIS Alpine Skiing Competition held in Montenegro.
• She finished 3rd with an overall timing of 1:54:30. Georgia Epiphaniou, who won Silver medal was just 2 seconds ahead of Anchal.
• She has previously won a bronze medal in the 2018 FIS Alpine 3200 Cup held in Turkey.
• Aanchal Thakur has become the first Indian Ski athlete to win two medals at international level.

World Anti-Doping Agency accreditation

• Youth Affairs and Sports Minister Anurag Thakur has informed that The National Anti-Doping Laboratory has regained the World Anti-Doping Agency accreditation.
• NDTL has made rapid strides, and now its facilities are fully geared to be at par with the peer-WADA accredited labs across the globe. In its continuous efforts to excel.
• NDTL has been collaborating with the National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (NIPER) Guwahati and the CSIR-IIIM Jammu for research in Anti-Doping Science.

MISCELLANEOUS

• Dec 24^th is observed as the National Consumer Rights Day.