CPEC

The CPEC is one of the One Belt, One Road’s (OBOR) largest investments.
It was formally launched in 2015 during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s two-day state visit to Pakistan.
China set up the ‘Silk Road Fund’ to invest in CPEC projects planned till 2030.
The main project was to establish a corridor connecting Pakistan’s Gwadar port in Balochistan to China’s Kashgar in the south-western Xinjiang region.
The Silk Road Fund is being financed by a consortium of Chinese banks.

PERUMAL MURUGAN WINS JCB PRIZE FOR LITERATURE

Tamil writer Perumal Murugan has won the JCB Prize for Literature for his novel, Fire Bird.
It is an English translation of his Tamil novel Aalanda Patchi.
The book was translated by Janani Kannan and published by Penguin.

Aalanda Patchi is about the forced migration of an agrarian family that happened six decades ago.
The tragedy of being alienated from one’s native place, land and family, new town, new landscapes, new people, new environment.

About JCB Prize for Literature:

The JCB prize aims to celebrate Indian writing and to help readers across the world discover the very best of contemporary Indian literature.
It makes significant awards also to translators.
The award carries a ₹25 lakh cash prize.

Kadalundi is a village on the southwest coast in Kozhikode district of Kerala.
It had about 8 hectares of nutrient-rich inter-tidal mudflats in the early 2000s.
The mudflats in the estuary of the Kadalundi river has reduced to just about 1 hectare.
This is gradually being covered with sand.
It is depriving prey to thousands of shorebirds that migrate from colder climes in winter to the village.

Migratory shore birds flock to mudflats of Point Calimere

Point Calimere is also known as Kodiyakkarai.
It is a protected wetland and designated as one of the Wetlands of International Importance under the Ramsar Convention along with the Great Vedaranyam Swamp.
It is situated on the eastern coast of Tamil Nadu in Nagapattinam district.
The Point Calimere Wildlife and Bird Sanctuary is a tropical dry evergreen forest known for the conservation of the Indian antelope(also known as blackbuck).
Plenty of migratory bird species arrive at the sanctuary every year during October and November because of the large extent of sand bars and mudflats.
Over 60 species of shore birds from various parts of Eurasia including Greater flamingo, Caspian tern, Little tern, Gull-billed tern, Whiskered tern, and Curlew sandpiper visits the sanctuary.
These migratory birds arrive at Point Calimere to forage and feed on larvae, insects, fish, crabs, and phytoplanktons on the mudflats.

3,00,000 people are estimated to be killed on the road in India, according to the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO).
It is equivalent to more than 34 people every hour of every day. In India, road crashes are estimated to cost between 5% and 7% of national GDP.
Road safety is a global problem.
3 million people are killed in road crashes every year.
But almost one in every four road deaths around the world takes place in India.

The World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims is commemorated on November 19.
It is to provide a platform for road traffic victims and their families to remember, support and act.
Wearing a seatbelt reduces the risk of death among drivers and front-seat occupants by 45% to 50%, and the risk of death and serious injuries among rear-seat occupants by 25%.
Correct helmet use can lead to a 42% reduction in the risk of fatal injuries.
A report by the Government revealed that speeding led to 70% of India’s road crash deaths.
The Sustainable Development Goals includes a target (3.6).
It targets to lower the number of global deaths and injuries from road crashes by 50%.

The UP government has ordered a statewide ban on products being sold with halal certificates with immediate effect.

Halal is an Arabic word that loosely translates to ‘permissible’ in English.
In the Quran, the term ‘halal’ is contrasted with the term ‘haram’ which means ‘forbidden’.
The term is particularly associated with Islamic dietary laws to refer to food that is procured, processed, and traded in compliance with Islamic belief.
It is similarly to the ‘kashrut’ dietary rules followed by orthodox Jews, who only consume food that is ‘kosher’, i.e. permitted in Jewish law.