• The Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation (DDWS), Ministry of Jal Shakti, GoI launched the 10 Year Rural Sanitation Strategy (2019-2029), which focus on sustaining the sanitation behavior change that has been achieved under the Swachh Bharat Mission Grameen (SBM-G), ensuring that no one is left behind, and increasing access to solid and liquid waste management.
• Since the launch of the SBM-G in 2014, over 10 crore toilets have been built in rural areas; over 5.9 lakh villages, 699 districts, and 35 States/UTs have declared themselves Open Defecation Free (ODF).
• This strategy has been prepared by DDWS, in consultation with State Governments and other stakeholders, and it lays down a framework to guide local governments, policymakers, implementers and other relevant stakeholders in their planning for ODF Plus, where everyone uses a toilet, and every village has access to solid and liquid waste management.
• The 10 year strategy focuses on the need for States/UTs to continue their efforts to sustain the gains of the mission through capacity strengthening, IEC (Information, education and communication), organic waste management, plastic waste management, grey water management and black water management.

Thanu Padmanabhan

Jamaican sprint legend Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce won a gold medal in 100m race of 2019 IAAF World Championships held in Doha. This was her 4th women’s 100 meters world title. She defeated Britain’s European champion Dina Asher-Smith who took silver medal while Marie-Josee Ta Lou finished 3rd.

Astronomers have discovered a gas giant Jupiter-like planet which has been named as “GJ 3512 b” which orbits around a dwarf star that is located about 30 light-years from the sun. The planet completes one orbit around the star every 7 months (204 days) and has a mass about half that of Jupiter. A Spanish-German research consortium called CARMENES detected the GJ 3512 b planet.

Overall performance for large and Small states & UT Large states category: As per the Index , Kerala has emerged at the top with 76.6 percent points in overall performance in large states category in 2016-17. Uttar Pradesh ranked at the bottom with 36.4 % points. Small states category: Among Small States , Manipur has claimed the top spot with 68.8% & Arunachal Pradesh ranked at the bottom with 24.6 percent points.

The nation is celebrating the 150th birth anniversary of Father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi on 02 October 2019. On the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, many programs will be held across the country and the world.

Clarivate Analytics has announced the seventh edition of the India Research Excellence-Citation Awards for 2019. The awards were announced at New Delhi. Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (IIT-R), Institutions Established over 15 Years.

On September 28, 2019 the Midnapore railway station of West Bengal became the 5000th railway station to be enabled with Wi-fi. The project for providing Wi-fi was started by RailTel in 2016, with Mumbai central railway station being the first for wifi implementation.

The governments of Pakistan, Turkey and Malaysia is to launch a BBC type English television channel. The launching of the channel aims to highlight the issues of Muslims and fight Islamophobia in the West.

Twenty countries have committed to promoting credible news only after taking action against fake news. Fake news has become a challenge for the world. It is largely misused during elections. In Malaysia, fake news can lead to 6 years in jail.