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Gujarat’s Garba included in UNESCO’s list of Intangible Cultural Heritage

Garba, the traditional dance form of Gujarat, has been recognized at the 18th session of the UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Committee for Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage held in Botswana.

The word comes from the Sanskrit word garbha, meaning “womb.” Traditionally, the dance is performed by women in a circle, wearing colourful costumes and accessories, around a clay lantern with a light inside, called a garbha deep (“womb lamp”).

The dance is accompanied by rhythmic clapping and singing of devotional songs, and sometimes by musical instruments such as dhol, tabla, and harmonium. Garba is a symbol of joy, devotion, and unity, as people from different communities and backgrounds come together to celebrate the divine feminine energy.

KnowALLedge Plus:

Garba of Gujarat joined 14 other elements from the country that have been inscribed on this prestigious list of UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage.

Here’s the other entries in the list, ranked chronologically:

2008: Kutiyattam (Sanskrit theatre),
Tradition of Vedic chanting,
Ramlila (the traditional performance of the Ramayana)

2009: Ramman (religious festival and ritual theatre of the Garhwal Himalayas)

2010: Chhau dance, Kalbelia (folk songs and dances of Rajasthan), Mudiyettu (ritual theatre and dance drama of Kerala)

2012: Buddhist chanting of Ladakh: recitation of sacred Buddhist texts in the trans-Himalayan Ladakh region, Jammu and Kashmir

2013: Sankirtana, ritual singing, drumming and dancing of Manipur

2014: Traditional brass and copper craft of utensil making among the Thatheras of Jandiala Guru, Punjab

2016: Nowruz, Yoga

2017: Kumbh Mela

2021: Durga Puja in Kolkata

Taylor Swift is Time Magazine’s Person of the Year 2023

Be it her record-shattering “The Eras” global tour or her becoming the world’s most-streamed musical artist, 2023 has truly been Taylor Swift’s year. And now to top it all, the mega pop-star has been named “Person of the Year” by Time Magazine.

2023 has been the year of “The Taylor Effect”. Wherever she has had a new concert, a mini economic boom took place locally as hotels and restaurants saw a surge of visitors. Time has noted how “politicians from Thailand, Hungary, and Chile implored her to play their countries. Cities, stadiums, and streets were renamed for her.” There are college classes dedicated to her, including one at Harvard.

The 33-year-old has recently turned a billionaire, joining the ranks of Rihanna, Beyonce and Jay-Z and the only entrant in the list to have accumulated her wealth from music alone. By a margin, she has been the most influential personality on this planet for this year and fittingly chosen by Time for its annual accolade.

KnowALLedge Plus:

The Time Person of the Year is an annual issue of Time magazine that features a person, group, idea, or object that “for better or for worse, has done the most to influence the events of the year.” The tradition began in 1927 when the magazine’s editors decided to highlight a prominent figure on the cover of its year-end issue. Although initially called “Man or Woman of the Year”, in 1999, the title was changed to the gender-neutral “Person of the Year”.

Here is a brief overview of the history of the Time Person of the Year:

First Selection (1927): The first Time Person of the Year was Charles Lindbergh, an American aviator who made the first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean.

Notable Early Selections: In 1930, Mahatma Gandhi was chosen as the first non-American to be its Man of the Year. Franklin D. Roosevelt  was chosen thrice (1932, 1934, and 1941), and Winston Churchill twice (1940 and 1949).

Groups and Ideas: Time has also chosen groups of people and even ideas as the Person of the Year. For example, in 1950, “The American Fighting-Man” was chosen, representing the U.S. forces involved in the Korean War. In 1960, it was “U.S. Scientists,” in 1966, it was “The Inheritor” and in 1975, it was “American Women”.

Controversial Selections: The Person of the Year has sometimes been a controversial figure. In 1938, Adolf Hitler was chosen, and in 1979, it was Ayatollah Khomeini. Even the choice of having Donald Trump as its Person of the Year in 2016 courted controversies. Time’s selection is not necessarily an endorsement but an acknowledgment of impact.

Recent Selections: In recent years, Time’s selections include Volodymyr Zelenskyy and “The Spirit of Ukraine” (2022), Elon Musk (2021), Joe Biden and Kamala Harris (2020), and Greta Thunberg (2019).

Oxford University Press names ‘Rizz’ as Word of the Year 2023

A common buzzword among the younger generation mostly used as a slag is now recognized by the Oxford University Press (OUP). ‘Rizz’, considered to be derived from the word ‘charisma’, is OUP’s Word of the Year 2023.  The word essentially means the ability to attract a romantic partner.

Rizz beat out words like “Swiftie” (an enthusiastic fan of Taylor Swift), or “prompt” (an instruction given to an artificial intelligence program), all chosen to reflect the general mood of 2023, in the annual decision by lexicographers at the publisher of the Oxford English Dictionary.

KnowALLedge Plus:

Here’s a lookback at the OUP Word of the Year in the last ten years:

2022: Goblin Mode– ‘a type of behaviour which is unapologetically self-indulgent, lazy, slovenly, or greedy, typically in a way that rejects social norms or expectations.’

2021: Vax– short form of ‘vaccination’, ultimately deriving from the word ‘vacca’, Latin for cow.

2020: No single word was chosen in an unprecedented year.

2019: Climate Emergency

2018: Toxic

2017: Youthquake– ‘a significant cultural, political, or social change arising from the actions or influence of young people’.

2016: Post-truth– ‘relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief’.

2015: ‘Face with Tears of Joy’ emoji– For the first time ever, the Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year is a pictograph.

2014: Vape– the act of using an e-cigarette.

2013: Selfie

UK Biobank opens world’s largest dataset of human genome sequences

5 years, £230 million, over 350,000 hours – that is the scale of work involved in UK Biobank’s project of genome sequencing of its half a million volunteers. The UK Biobank aims to improve the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of a wide range of diseases by providing researchers with access to its rich and diverse data. The final set of whole exome sequencing data was released for 470,000 participants in 2022.

Whole genome sequencing (WGS) is a technique that reads the entire DNA code of an individual, which consists of about 3 billion letters. The genome is the set of genetic material present in the cells of an organism, which contains the instructions for building and maintaining that organism. In genome sequencing, the DNA is analyzed to identify the order of its nucleotide bases (adenine, thymine, cytosine, and guanine, abbreviated as A, T, C, and G).

WGS can help researchers to discover rare and novel genetic variants that are associated with diseases, traits, and drug responses. This unique and powerful resource will advance the understanding of human biology and improve the health and well-being of millions of people.

KnowALLedge Plus:

>The UK Biobank WGS project was funded by a public-private partnership involving the UK government, the Wellcome Trust, and four pharmaceutical companies: Amgen, AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, and Johnson & Johnson.

>The sequencing was carried out by two leading genomics institutes: deCODE Genetics in Iceland and the Wellcome Sanger Institute in the UK. The project started in 2018 and was completed in 2023, generating 27.5 petabytes of data.

>The UK Biobank WGS data is now available to approved researchers through the UK Biobank Research Analysis Platform, which is a secure cloud-based platform that allows researchers to access and analyse the data online.

>The UK Biobank WGS data is expected to have a huge impact on biomedical research and innovation. It will enable researchers to identify new genetic risk factors, biomarkers, and drug targets for a wide range of diseases, such as cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and cardiovascular diseases.

Chess has its first ever Grandmaster brother-sister pair in history

Vaishali Rameshbabu has joined her brother Praggnanandhaa as the only pair of siblings to achieve the title of Grandmaster in chess. This unique feat came as she surpassed 2500 ELO rating during the 2023 IV Elllobregat Open. She also became the third female Grandmaster from India, after Koneru Humpy and Harika Dronavalli. Her brother Praggnanandhaa was already a Grandmaster in 2018, when at the age of 12, he became the second youngest in the world to be so.

The siblings are from Chennai and train at the Bloom Chess Academy. They are supported by their parents, Ramesh Babu and Nagalakshmi, who have sacrificed a lot for their children’s chess careers. Praggnanandha has been a guiding light for his sister, encouraging her to aim for the Candidates and giving her tips and advice. They are both inspired by the legendary Viswanathan Anand, who is also from Chennai and has been the World Chess Champion five times.

KnowALLedge Plus:

>Both the siblings have also made it for the Candidates tournament, the qualifying event for the World championship match.

>Among her recent laurels in Indian soil include the individual bronze in the Chess Olympiad at Mamallapuram in 2022. She played a key role in India winning the bronze medals in the same women’s event. She followed it up with a superb win for the blitz title at the Tata Steel Chess India tournament in Kolkata.

>One of their earliest international wins came in 2012, when Vaishali and Praggnanandhaa won the nationals and qualified for the Asian youth championships in Hikkaduwa, Sri Lanka. Despite the family struggling to put together their travel expenses, both returned champions – Vaishali in the under-12 girls, and Praggnanandhaa in the under-8 boys.

>Praggnanandhaa is only the second Indian after Viswanathan Anand to make a World Cup final and qualify for the Candidates tournament. He is also the only other Indian apart from Anand to have defeated Magnus Carlsen, that too multiple times.

World’s saddest elephant dies in captivity

Mali, the “world’s saddest elephant” passed away on November 28, 2023. A resident of the Manila Zoo, she was the sole captive elephant in the Philippines. News of her living alone raised concerns among conservationists and many prominent people and organizations campaigned for her release. In the last days, she suffered from cancer and was in agonizing pain.

KnowALLedge Plus:

>Originally from Sri Lanka, she was given as a gift to the Philippine First Lady Imelda Marcos by the Government of Sri Lanka in 1977. She has been in the Manila Zoo since then.

>Mali caught the attention of Paul McCartney (of the Beatles) in 2013. The singer-songwriter worked with PETA to raise awareness about the elephant. He even penned a letter to the then Philippine President Benigno Aquino III urging the transfer of Mali to an elephant sanctuary in neighbouring Thailand.

>Other celebrities, including actress Pamela Anderson and reputed conservationist Jane Goodall joined the effort to “free Mali.”

>It is said Asian elephants, who are usually smaller than their African cousins, have an average lifespan of about 70 years in the wild. In captivity, it’s about 80 years.

>The oldest Asian elephant in captivity was Chengalloor Dakshayani, a female Asian elephant owned by Travancore Devaswom Board. She died in 2019 at 88 years old.

With the inauguration of NIMSR, every Indian state now has a medical college

In September 2023, Nagaland Institute of Medical Sciences and Research (NIMSR) opened its doors to 100 students. The next month, with a visit from Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare, Dr Mansukh Mandviya, the institution based in Phriebagie, about 20 minutes from Kohima, was formally inaugurated. Until now, Nagaland was the only state in Indian without a medical college.

KnowALLedge Plus:

>Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram were the last to get their medical colleges in 2018, leaving Nagaland with this dubious distinction. This comes after 60 years of statehood, and is especially relevant given it is the second oldest state in the Northeast after Assam

>The oldest such institution in the northeast — Assam Medical College and Hospital in Dibrugarh — came up in 1900 after a donation by Dr John Berry White, a British surgeon considered to be the pioneer of modern healthcare in Assam.

Who is Arnold Dix, the Australian expert who helped rescue our 41 men trapped in a Uttarakhand tunnel?

On November 20, 2023, a bearded Australian arrived in India and conducted an inspection at the Silkyara tunnel site, where, following a landslide, 41 workers had been stuck inside the tunnel since November 12. After carefully judging the situation, he finally tasted success as the trapped workers were rescued, spending 17 days in that fragile environment. The rescue mission was lauded by many leaders all over the world, with a special message from Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese who was elated that the man who caused this miracle was an Australian.

KnowALLedge Plus:

>The mastermind behind this operation was Arnold Dix, president of the International Tunnelling and Underground Space Association, a barrister of the High Court of Australia, a scientist and a professor of engineering.

>A man with extensive experience and expertise in underground and transportation infrastructure, risk mitigation, disaster response and fire safety, he has also received several awards and recognition for his contributions to tunnelling and underground space.

Five additional sports officially included by IOC as part of LA28

As part of the 141st Session of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) held in Mumbai, Baseball/softball, cricket (T20), flag football, lacrosse (sixes) and squash have been officially added in the roster of events for the Los Angeles Olympics 2028.

Niccolo Campriani, director of LA Local Organising Committee, acknowledged Virat Kohli’s popularity as a driving force behind cricket’s inclusion. Campriani, himself a three time Olympic gold medallist in shooting for Italy, noted, “He’s the third-most followed athlete in the world on social media with 314 million followers. That’s more than LeBron James, Tom Brady and Tiger Woods combined. This is the ultimate win-win for LA 28.”

Out of these five, baseball/softball, cricket and lacrosse have already been a part of Summer Olympics before, while flag football and squash will be making their Olympic debut in LA.

KnowALLedge Plus:

>During the inauguration of the Mumbai session of the IOC, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, “India will leave no stone unturned in our efforts to organise the 2036 Olympics.”

>The only time cricket was played in the Summer Olympics in 1900 Paris, Great Britain (comprising the Devon and Somerset Wanderers Club) had clinched the gold medal by defeating France (consisting of staffers from the British embassy in Paris) in a one-match showdown. Lacrosse was included at St. Louis 1904 and London 1908. Baseball and softball have shown up in multiple Olympics, most recently in 2021 for the Tokyo 2020 Games.

>Squash officials have been lobbying for decades for its inclusion in the Olympics. The World Squash Federation had launched Back the Bid 2020 to tap into the huge support players, fans and corporate organisations are showing towards Squash’s campaign to get the sport into the Olympic Games. They even roped in tennis Roger Federer who pledged his support towards the bid.

Air Chief Marshal Chaudhari unveils new ensign of IAF at Air Force Day parade

At the 91st IAF Day celebrations in Uttar Pradesh’s Prayagraj, Chief of Air Staff Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhari unveiled a new ensign of the Indian Air Force (IAF), replacing the existing one that was adopted more than seven decades back.

The new lAF ensign has been created to better reflect the values of the Indian Air Force.

The unveiling of the new ensign by the IAF came over a year after the Navy made changes in its ensign shedding its colonial past.

The existing ensign was adopted in 1950, replacing the Royal Indian Air Force ensign that featured the Union Jack and the RIAF roundel (red, white and blue).

KnowALLedge Plus

> The Indian Air Force was officially established on 8 October, 1932.

> In view of its professional efficiency and achievements during World War II, the force was bestowed with the prefix “Royal” in March 1945. So, it became the Royal Indian Air Force (RIAF).

> In 1950, the IAF dropped its “Royal” prefix and amended the ensign as India became a Republic. The RIAF ensign consisted of the Union Jack in the upper left canton and the RIAF roundel (red, white and blue) on the fly side.

> Post-Independence, the IAF ensign was created by replacing the Union Jack with the Indian tricolour and the RAF roundels with the IAF tricolour roundel in the lower right canton.

> The IAF crest has the national symbol, the Ashoka lion on the top with the words ‘Satyameva Jayate’ in Devanagari below it. Below the Ashoka lion is a Himalayan eagle with its wings spread, denoting the fighting qualities of the IAF. A ring in light blue colour encircles the Himalayan eagle with the words ‘Bhartiya Vayu Sena. The motto of the IAF — ‘touch the sky with the glory’ is inscribed below Himalayan eagle in Devanagari.

> The IAF motto has been taken from verse 24, Chapter 11 of the Bhagavad Gita and means “Radiant Thou Touchest Heaven” or in other words “touching the sky with glory”.

> The parade was traditionally held at the Hindon airbase near Delhi till 2021 before the event was taken outside the national capital. It was held in Chandigarh last year and in Prayagraj this year.

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