🔆 Major Calendars Used in India & World

📍 Vikram Samvat
✅ Started in 57 BC (zero year: 57 BC)
✅ Attributed to King Vikramaditya of Ujjain (victory over Sakas)
✅ Lunar calendar – 354 days, 12 months
✅ Used across most of India (except Bengal)
✅ Two phases each month: Shuklapaksha & Krishnapaksha

📍 Saka Samvat
✅ Initiated by King Shalivahan
✅ Zero year: 78 AD
✅ Lunisolar calendar (solar year + lunar months)
✅ Official National Calendar of India (since 1957)
✅ Begins on 22 March (21 March in leap years)
✅ 365 days per year

📍 Hijri (Islamic) Calendar
✅ Zero year: 622 AD (Hijrat)
✅ Purely lunar calendar – 354 days
✅ Used in Islamic countries
✅ Months move across seasons (no solar adjustment)
✅ Sacred months: 1st, 7th, 11th & 12th
✅ Ramadan (9th month), Hajj in Dhu al-Hijjah

📍 Gregorian Calendar
✅ Solar calendar based on birth of Jesus Christ
✅ 365 days (+ leap year adjustment)
✅ Civil calendar used worldwide
✅ Leap year: 1 extra day in February every 4 years

📍 Zoroastrian (Parsi) Calendar
✅ Era begins 632 AD
✅ Parsis in India follow Shahenshahi Calendar
✅ Nowruz falls around 20–22 March (Vernal Equinox)

📍 National Calendar of India
✅ Based on Saka Samvat
✅ Adopted in 1957 by Calendar Reforms Committee
✅ Used in AIR news, Govt. documents & official calendars
✅ Introduced to harmonise multiple calendars in India

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Timeline of Major reforms movements

🔆 CURRENT AFFAIRS — 23 DEC 2025

🔆 BANKING & FINANCE

📍 Digital Payments
✅ UPI transactions jump 33.5% YoY to 59.33 billion in Q3 2025 (Worldline Report)
➡ Scan-and-Pay becomes default mode across Bharat

📍 Cyber & Telecom Security
✅ 1000+ banks & financial entities onboarded on DoT’s Digital Intelligence Platform (DIP)
✅ Financial Fraud Risk Indicator (FRI) classifies numbers as medium/high/very high risk
✅ Sanchar Saathi emerges as India’s largest crowdsourced cyber-intelligence platform

🔆 ECONOMY

📍 Core Industries
✅ Index of Eight Core Industries (ICI) grows 1.8% in Nov 2025
✅ Cumulative growth (Apr–Nov FY26): 2.4%
✅ Positive growth: Coal, Steel, Cement, Fertilisers
✅ Core sectors carry 40.27% weight in IIP

🔆 NATIONAL

📍 Tribal Governance
✅ Two-day PESA Mahotsav begins in Visakhapatnam (23–24 Dec)
✅ Organised by Ministry of Panchayati Raj
✅ Launches:
→ PESA Portal
→ PESA Indicators
→ Training modules in tribal languages

📍 Urban & Corporate Real Estate
✅ 62% of GCC bases operate from green-certified Grade-A flex centres
✅ India hosts 1,750+ GCC companies
✅ GCCs drive 40% of office demand

🔆 ENVIRONMENT

📍 Aravalli Hills Protection
✅ Supreme Court finalises uniform definition of Aravalli Hills & Ranges
✅ Mining banned in core areas except critical/strategic/atomic minerals
✅ Recognised as barrier against desertification, groundwater recharge zone

🔆 AYUSH / HEALTH

📍 Traditional Medicine
✅ PM releases commemorative postal stamp on Ashwagandha
✅ Issued during 2nd WHO Global Summit on Traditional Medicine
✅ Highlights India’s AYUSH heritage globally

📍 Women & Research
✅ NCW launches ‘SHAKTI Scholars’ Fellowship
✅ Research grant: ₹1 lakh | Duration: 6 months
✅ Focus: women’s safety, health, cyber safety, economic empowerment

🔆 DEFENCE

📍 Indian Navy
✅ Navy receives INS Anjadip — 3rd ASW Shallow Water Craft
✅ Built by GRSE + L&T (PPP model)
✅ Equipped with indigenous torpedoes, sonar & rockets

🔆 MoUs

📍 Biotechnology
✅ LoI signed to establish Centre of Excellence for CRISPR Innovation & Translation (CoE-CIT)
✅ Partners: JNCASR (DST) & CRISPRBITS Pvt Ltd

📍 Maritime Heritage
✅ India–Netherlands MoU for National Maritime Heritage Complex, Lothal

📍 Defence Manufacturing
✅ India Optel Ltd + Safran sign ToP agreement
✅ Systems: SIGMA 30N INS, CM3-MR firing sight

🔆 STATES

📍 Assam
✅ PM lays foundation stone of ₹10,601-cr fertiliser plant in Dibrugarh
✅ Brownfield ammonia-urea project

📍 Ladakh
✅ Losar Festival celebrated on 20 December (Ladakhi New Year)

📍 Bihar
✅ Cabinet approves Saat Nishchay-3 (2025–30)
✅ Focus: employment, education, healthcare, industries

🔆 SCHEMES

📍 Maternal Health
✅ PMSMA completes 9 years
✅ Free quality ANC services on 9th of every month
✅ Focus: high-risk pregnancy detection

🔆 IMPORTANT DAYS

📍 22 December
✅ National Mathematics Day (Srinivasa Ramanujan)

📍 21 December
✅ World Meditation Day
✅ World Basketball Day
✅ Winter Solstice (shortest day of the year)

🔆 AWARDS

📍 Leadership
✅ Jay Shah receives Transformational Leader of the Year
✅ Awarded at NDTV Indian of the Year 2025

🔆 SPORTS

📍 Cricket
✅ Smriti Mandhana becomes 1st Indian woman to cross 4,000 T20I runs
✅ Fastest globally (3,227 balls)
✅ Achieved vs Sri Lanka at Visakhapatnam

📍 Golf
✅ Sukhman Singh wins IGU 124th Amateur Golf Championship
✅ Venue: Tollygunge Club, Kolkata (world’s oldest amateur matchplay event)

#CurrentAffairs

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🔆 Literature under the Mauryas

📍 Language & Script
✅ Prakrit – Language of Ashokan Edicts, written in Brahmi script
✅ Pali – Buddhist canonical texts (Tripitakas)
✅ Sanskrit – Statecraft texts like Arthashastra

📍 Ashokan Edicts – Significance
✅ Primary source: First-person proclamations of Emperor Ashoka
✅ Administrative insight: Dhamma, welfare measures, Dhamma Mahamattas
✅ Ethical core: Ahimsa, tolerance, social responsibility
✅ Epigraphic value: Earliest datable inscriptions; deciphered by James Prinsep

📍 Key Literary Sources
✅ Pali Literature: Tripitakas – Vinaya, Sutta, Abhidhamma
✅ Statecraft: Arthashastra by Kautilya
✅ Greek Accounts: Indica by Megasthenes
✅ Chinese Travellers: Faxian – Buddhism & stupas

#history #prelims #mains

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🔆 30 Years of PESA Act, 1996 (1996–2025)

📍 What is PESA?
✅ Extends Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) to Fifth Schedule Areas (Article 244)
✅ Ensures tribal self-governance in Scheduled Areas
✅ Applicable to 10 States: Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Odisha, Rajasthan & Telangana

📍 Constitutional Background
✅ PRIs granted constitutional status by 73rd Constitutional Amendment (1993)
✅ Scheduled Areas initially excluded → addressed through PESA Act, 1996

📍 Salient Features of PESA
✅ Gram Sabha Empowerment: Mandatory consent for land acquisition, development projects, minor forest produce & minor minerals
✅ Regulatory Powers: Control over intoxicants, land alienation, village markets & money-lending
✅ Cultural Protection: Safeguards customary laws, traditional institutions & tribal identity
✅ Legal Supremacy: Overrides conflicting State laws in Scheduled Areas

📍 Why PESA Remains Under-Realised?
✅ Absence of mandatory timelines for framing rules
✅ Bureaucratic dominance over Gram Sabhas
✅ Inadequate devolution of Funds, Functions & Functionaries (3Fs)

📍 Recent Initiatives to Strengthen PESA
✅ PESA–GPDP Portal (2024) for planning & monitoring
✅ Dedicated PESA Cell under Ministry of Panchayati Raj
✅ Centres of Excellence in universities (e.g. IGNTU)
✅ Training manuals translated into regional & tribal languages (Santhali, Gondi, Bhili, Mundari)

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🔆 Superkilonova (First Possible Observation)

📍 What is a Superkilonova?
✅ A proposed cosmic explosion combining features of a supernova + kilonova
✅ Brighter, bluer, and longer-lasting than a normal kilonova
✅ Observed using telescope + gravitational-wave data

📍 What is a Kilonova?
✅ Occurs when two neutron stars merge
✅ Produces heavy elements like gold, platinum, neodymium
✅ Emits light mainly in optical & infrared wavelengths

📍 Formation Process (Simplified)
✅ Massive fast-spinning star undergoes core-collapse supernova
✅ Core splits/fragment into two neutron stars
✅ Neutron stars spiral inward due to gravitational waves
✅ Merger triggers kilonova
✅ Supernova + kilonova together = Superkilonova

📍 Significance
✅ Heavy element factory (gold, platinum, uranium)
✅ May explain formation of very massive black holes

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#prelims
#science_technology
#science_and_technology

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BPSC ASO PT Result

Combined Medical Services Examination, 2025