Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology has launched “Swadeshi Microprocessor Challenge– Innovate Solutions for #Aatmanirbhar Bharat” to provide momentum to the strong ecosystem of Start-up & innovation in India.

Chhattisgarh has won the award of “Cleanest state with more than 100 cities” in Swachh Survekshan 2020 awards.

The World Senior Citizen Day is observed globally on 21st August every year to raise awareness about issues affecting older people.

Atal Innovation Mission (AIM), NITI Aayog has signed a virtual Statement of Intent (SoI) with Business Sweden to expand the culture of innovation in the country.

A game on COVID-19 titled as “The Corona Fighters” has been launched to influence the players’ actions in the real world, reminding them to take the right precautions and escape infection.

Google has launched an android app called “Kormo Jobs” for job seekers in India, which aims to provide entry-level jobs and helps job seekers find and apply for positions across India. It was launched in Bangladesh in 2018 and subsequently in Indonesia.

World Senior Citizen’s Day is observed annually on August 21 to raise awareness about the various issues including age deterioration and elder abuse that affect senior citizens. The day also acknowledges and appreciates their achievements, dedication, accomplishments, and services they contribute throughout their lives to the society.

United Nations(UN)’s International Day of Remembrance and Tribute to the Victims of Terrorism is annually observed on 21st August to commemorate and pay tribute to the victims and survivors of Terrorism across the globe. The first International Day of Remembrance and Tribute to the Victims of Terrorism was observed on 21st August 2018.

On the 70th birthday of award-winning author SudhaMurty, publishing house Penguin Random House India on Wednesday announced her latest collection of short stories, Grandparents’ Bag of Stories. The book, scheduled to be released in November, is a sequel to Murty’s last release Grandma’s Bag of Stories and will feature 20 stories.

A Book Titled ‘One Arranged Murder’ authored by ChetanBhagat will be released worldwide on September 28, 2020. The fiction book portrays a murder mystery in the backdrop of an arranged marriage. The book will be published by Westland Publications Ltd. It is the author’s 9th novel and 11th book overall. The essence of the book- The book not only has an intense suspense but also is filled with humor, love, and relatable Indian characters.

English Professional Snooker Player Ronnie O’Sullivan won the World Snooker Championship for the 6th time by winning the 2020 World Snooker Championship at Crucible Theatre, Sheffield, England. He defeated England’s Kyren Wilson 18-8 in the final of the Betfred World Snooker Championship.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has been working on a spacecraft that will be sent to explore the asteroid 16 Psyche, one of the most massive asteroids in the asteroid belt. It is thought to be almost pure metal in its composition. As per the space agency, one of the key targets of the Psyche spacecraft is to study the asteroid.NASA said that the Psyche spacecraft is targeted to launch in August 2022, and would arrive at the asteroid in early 2026.

The 27-meter-long Interceptor Boat(IB) ‘ICGS C-454’, built by Larsen and Toubro Ltd(L&T) was launched into the service of the Indian Coast Guard(ICG) by DrHiral Patel, wife of Surat district Collector, Dhaval Patel during a ceremony in Surat.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has approved a proposal of the National Cadet Corps(NCC) for a major expansion scheme in 173 border and coastal districts, where one lakh new cadets will be inducted and one-third of them will be girls. A total of 83 NCC units will be upgraded (Army 53, Navy 20, Air Force 10) to provide training to the cadets.

The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has approved 100% proposed acquisition of the share capital of the Indian Operations of C&S Electric Limited (C&S) by Siemens Limited (Siemens India). For this purpose, Siemens Ltd has signed an agreement with C&S in January 2020.

Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA), Hardeep Singh Puri, Minister of State (MoS)-Independent Charge (I/C) MoHUA announced the 5th edition of the annual cleanliness urban survey of India i.e.” SwachhSurvekshan 2020 (SS2020)” conducted by MoHUA. A total of 129 awards were given by the minister in which Madhya Pradesh’s Indore Creates record as India’s cleanest city for the 4th consecutive time while Gujarat’s Surat and Maharashtra’s Navi Mumbai grabbed 2nd and 3rd positions respectively.
India’s Cleanest Mega-City– Amdavad, Gujarat (>40 Lakh population). The India’s Cleanest Big City– Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh (10-40 Lakh Population). India’s Cleanest Medium City– Mysuru, Karnataka (3-10 Lakh Population). India’s Cleanest Small City– Ambikapur, Chhattisgarh (1-3 Lakh population) & India’s Cleanest Capital– New Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC), Delhi.

Two-day 5th World Conference of Speakers of Parliament (5WCSP) was inaugurated virtually. It was organized jointly by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), Geneva, and the Parliament of Austria with the support of the United Nations (UN). This is the first time that an International Parliamentary Conference is being held in Virtual mode. Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla attended the inaugural ceremony. The theme of the 5WCSP Conference is ‘Parliamentary leadership for more effective multilateralism that delivers peace and sustainable development for the people and planet’.The second part will be held in physical mode at Vienna, Austria in 2021.

Billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries has jumped 10 places to break into the world’s top 100 companies on the Fortune Global 500 list. The oil-to-telecom conglomerate is ranked 96th in the 2020 ranking released by Fortune. This is the highest any Indian company has been ranked on the Fortune Global 500 list.

The government of Uttar Pradesh (UP) signed an agreement with the Israel’s Water Resource Minister for water resource management in the Bundelkhand region in Uttar Pradesh. Ron Malka, Israel’s Ambassador to India and Alok Sinha, Agriculture Production Commissioner of Uttar Pradesh signed the ‘plan of cooperation’ on behalf of Israel and India respectively. The ‘plan of cooperation’ is initially signed for 2 years, with the interest of the project, this will be extended in the future. The project was developed by the MASHAV — Israel’s Agency for International Development Cooperation under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This cooperation will help with the Indo-Israel Bundelkhand water project undertaken in this region for long term reforms in water management.

As part of the implementation of the YSR Cheyutha scheme, Andhra Pradesh(AP) government has signed a Memorandum of Understanding(MoU) with Reliance Retail, Reliance JioInfocomm and Allana Group to empower women and help women Self-Help Groups(SHGs) in the state to market their products.

Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoTA) and Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD) inked a Joint Communication to promote sustainable livelihood opportunities among tribal women Self Help Groups (SHGs) under National Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM). The joint communication was inked by Deepak Khandekar, Secretary MoTA, and Nagendra Nath Sinha, Secretary, MoRD under which A series of activities will be carried out by both the Ministries to improve the economic opportunities available to tribal women.

Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode (IIM-K) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Switzerland based HELP Logistics to engage in a collaborative partnership to provide consulting services and logistics training for the humanitarian community in South Asia.

A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between the Ministry of Shipping (MoS) and the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship(MSDE) for skilling, re-skilling, and upskilling of manpower in Port, Maritime sectors.

IBM (International Business Machines Corporation) announced its collaboration with National Skill Development Corporation(NSDC) to offer a free digital education platform on emerging technologies and professional skill development and to equip the next generation with digital skills.IBM will manage an online course from the Open P-Tech platform and will offer it to the users through eSkill India Portal of NSCD.

On the lines of the review of progress made under the first National Strategy for Financial Education (NSFE: 2013-2018), the revised NSFE (2020-2025) has been prepared and the document for the same was released by Mahesh Kumar Jain, Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on August 20, 2020. There are the Strategic Objectives laid down in NSFE 2020-2025 and in order to achieve them, the document recommends the adoption of a ‘5 C’ approach viz. Content, Capacity, Community, Communication, and Collaboration. There should be development of a financial literacy mobile app, and leverage social media. The Strategy also suggests the adoption of a robust ‘Monitoring and Evaluation Framework’ to assess the progress made under the Strategy.

HSBC India becomes 1st Foreign Bank in India to launch a ‘Green Deposit Programme’ exclusively for corporate clients to finance green initiatives and eco-friendly projects like renewable energy, clean transportation, and pollution prevention among others, that promote the transition to a low-carbon, climate-resilient and sustainable economy. This will enable companies to support environmentally-beneficial projects.

On August 12, 2020, during the observance of World Elephant Day 2020, World Animal Protection released the third edition of the report ‘Elephants. Not commodities’ which highlighted that over 200 Elephants in India are kept in ‘Severely Inadequate Conditions’. The report comprises research spanning over a decade in elephant tourism and assessed the entertainment venues across Thailand, India, Laos, Cambodia, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Malaysia.

In the state of Madhya Pradesh, a unique campaign ‘EkSankalp – Bujurgokenaam’ (a commitment for elders) is being run by the Chhatarpur Police in the midst of Pandemic.

Harsh Vardhan, Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare launched FSSAI’s ‘Eat Right India’ Handbook, a referral guide for officials of different jurisdictions to adopt and scale up the ‘Eat Right India’(ERI) initiatives in their jurisdictions during the online orientation workshop organized by Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) as part of its “Eat Right Challenge”.

Arjun Munda, Union Minister of Tribal Affairs(MoTA) virtually launched the tertiary processing centers of the “Trifood Project” in Raigad, Maharashtra, and Jagdalpur, Chhattisgarh. The Trifood project was carried by the MoTA in association with the Ministry of Food Processing Industries(MoFPI) and implemented by the Tribal Cooperative Marketing Development Federation of India (TRIFED).