UPSC Daily Current Affairs| Prelimbits 09-08-2025

BHUVAN Platform

Why in News?

Recently, access logs of Bhuvan portal show that Jharkhand have accessed the Land Use Land Cover (LULC) data that was hosted on Bhuvan Panchayat portal.

• It is the Indian Geo-portal of ISRO.
• Objectives – To provide a platform to visualize remote sensing data and to download satellite data free of cost.
• To allow government departments to host customized applications to enable effective governance.
• Working – It incorporates Natural Language Processing methods, facilitating searches through both audio and text inputs.
• It integrates location intelligence into their applications for mapping, visualization, analysis, and more.
• Role – It can store, process, manage, visualize, monitoring and generating data products originating from different data sources.

• Know Your Resources (KYR) – It provides for accessing detailed information about India's natural and man-made resources.
• Bhuvan Store – It serves as a vibrant catalouge for geospatial products, services, and applications, catering to diverse user needs and fostering innovation in the geospatial community.
• Application – Users can explore thematic data, such as 'waterbodies in Hyderabad,' 'builtup areas in Guntur,' 'forests in Pali,' and more.
• Significance – Planning and development, monitoring & evaluation, asset mapping and inventory creations, decision making, reporting & advisory, and resource management.

Reference

PIB| BHUVAN GIS Platform

Related News – Bhuvan Panchayat Portal

Global Centre for Nuclear Energy Partnership

Why in News?

Recently, Global Centre for Nuclear Energy Partnership (GCNEP) established as 6^th Research & Development Unit under the aegis of Department of Atomic Energy (DAE).

• Established in - 2010, in Haryana.
• Aim – To encourage international collaboration with countries and agencies like International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

The International Atomic Energy Agency is the world's central intergovernmental forum for scientific and technical cooperation in the nuclear field.

• Vision – To promote safe, secure and sustainable nuclear energy research & development, and capacity-building.
• Mission - To conduct research, design and development of nuclear systems that are intrinsically safe, secure, proliferation resistant and sustainable.
• To organize training, seminars, lectures and workshops on topical issues by Indian and International experts.
• To promotes collaborative Research and Training Programs.sh

• Global collaborations – It has MoUs with 17 international agencies/ countries including IAEA.
• It has been conducting several on-campus international programs since 2017.
• Importance – It will help in capacity building, in association with the interested countries and the IAEA, involving technology, human resource development, education & training and giving a momentum to R&D in enlisted areas.

Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) was set up under the direct charge of the Prime Minister through a Presidential Order in 1954.

References

1. PIB| Global Centre for Nuclear Energy
2. Department of Atomic Energy| Vision of GCNP

Community Forest Resource Rights (CFRR)

Why in News?

Recently, the Chhattisgarh forest department issued a letter designating itself as the nodal agency for implementing community forest resource rights which was withdrawn after protests.

• CFRR - Community forest resource rights is a transformative provision of the Forest Rights Act (FRA), 2006.

The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006, commonly called the FRA recognize the community’s rights to protect, regenerate, conserve and manage forest.

• Aim – To recognise the right of gram sabhas to manage their customary forests.
• Need – To rectify the injustices of colonial forest consolidation which dispossessed local communities and supplanted their traditional management institutions with centralised state control.
• Implementation – Over 10,000 gram sabhas have received CFRR titles in India.
• CFR management plans – Once communities have received such CFR rights, they are supposed to make a plan for managing such areas.
• Challenges - Less than 1,000 have prepared their CFR management plans and their implementation is constrained by the refusal of forest departments to recognise their legitimacy and support gram sabhas.

Dharti Aaba Janjatiya Gram Utkarsh Abhiyan

• Launched in – 2024, by the Ministry of Tribal Affairs.
• Objective - To transform the socio-economic landscape of around 63,000 villages of tribal residents.
• Focus – To attain a saturation of critical gaps in infrastructure, health, education, livelihood through 25 interventions implemented through 17 different ministries and departments.
• Role – It introduced an indicative framework for CFR management plans.

Reference

The Hindu| Community Forest Reserve Rights

Multi-fungal Tolerant Pineapple

Why in News?

Recently, Scientists from Bose Institute have identified a gene in pineapple that can provide defence to the fruit against devastating fungal attacks.

Bose Institute is an autonomous institute of the Department of Science and Technology (DST) under Ministry of Science and Technology

• Pineapple - It is the most economically significant fruit of the Bromeliaceae family.
  • Scientific name - Ananas comosus L. Merr.
• Uses - It provides various health benefits alongside a delicious juicy flavour, resulting in a nutritious diet including all vital components.
• Threats to pineapple farming – Fusariosis infection, caused by the aggressive fungus Fusarium moniliforme.
• It warps the plant’s stem, blackens the leaves and rots the fruit from the inside out.
• Self defence mechanism – A newly identified gene ‘AcSERK3’ can activate host defences against plant diseases.
• AcSERK3 gene, which is a part of the pineapple’s genetic code is known for helping plants both reproduce and survive stress.
• This gene is behind the Somatic Embryogenesis Receptor Kinase (SERK) which induces the self defence mechanism in Pineapple.

Somatic embryogenesis (SE) is defined as a process in which embryos that can develop into whole plants are produced from somatic cells (body cells) instead of through gamete fusion.

• Research work - AcSERK3 gene was enhanced or overexpressed which enhanced the plant’s natural defences, allowing it to fight off the Fusarium fungus than ordinary varieties.
• Significance of the study – AcSERK3-overexpressed pineapple lines were more resilient to Fusarium infection due to increased stress-associated metabolites and scavenging enzyme activity.

Reference