30 May 2016

Discus thrower Seema Punia qualifies for 2016 Rio Olympics

Discus thrower Seema Punia has qualified for the 2016 Rio Olympics scheduled to be held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in August 2016.
 She is the 19th Indian track and field athlete to qualify for Rio Olympics. Seema was able to qualify after throwing discus at 62.62 meters at the Pat Young’s Throwers Classic 2016 event held at Salinas (California) in the United States. She crossed the Rio Games qualification standard of 61meters with her season’s best effort of 62.62 meters and winning gold medal in the event. This will be Seema’s third Olympic Games appearance having taken part in 2004 and 2012 where she failed to get past the qualification round on both the occasions.

NASA successfully deploys BEAM, first inflatable room attached to International Space Station

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has successfully deployed the first experimental inflatable room attached to the International Space Station (ISS). The experimental inflatable room dubbed as BEAM (Bigelow Expandable Activity Module) was deployed after it was successfully expanded and pressurized.
Key facts :
The inflatable room BEAM has been built by Nevada Company Bigelow Aerospace. It will be attached to the ISS for a two-year test and is the first such habitat to hold humans in orbit. It is made up of aluminium and soft fabric which expands in space. It is light weight and also takes minimal space. It creates place for astronauts to live and work. It is 4 metres long and 3.2 metres in diameter with 16 cubic metres of interior volume when fully expanded. Its 2 year orbital test is intended to pave the way towards the use of such habitable rooms for long space trips, including to Mars and Moon.

Sunrisers Hyderabad win 2016 Indian Premier League title

Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) has won the ninth edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL). It is their maiden IPL title. In the final match played at Chinnaswamy stadium in Bangalore (Karnataka), SRH defeated Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) by eight runs. 

SRH had won the toss in final summit and had chosen to bat first. Batting first, SRH had set the target of 209 runs to their opponent team. However the RCB failed to reach the target score. It should be noted that RCB has lost 3 finals after they were defeated in finals of 2009 and 2011 editions. 

Brief score: Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) 208-7 in 20.0 Overs (David Warner 69, Yuvraj Singh 38, Ben Cutting 39*, Sreenath Arvind 2-30, Chris Jordan 3-45) beat Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) 200-7 in 20.0 Overs (Chris Gayle 76, Virat Kohli 54, Ben Cutting 2-35) by 8 runs.

 Man of the Match:  Ben Cutting (SRH).

Indian Railways, PEC sign MoU to set up Kalpana Chawla Chair on geospatial technology

Union Ministry of Railways and PEC University of Technology have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for setting up of Kalpana Chawla Chair on Geospatial Technology for Indian Railways at the University. The MoU was signed in the backdrop of Union Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu’s Budget announcement in this regard. 

Key facts 

The academic chair is being instituted in memory of Indo–American Astronaut and Alumnus of PEC Late Kalpana Chawla. 

She was the first woman of Indian origin in space. The objective of the chair is to encourage research activities of Indian Railways in Geo-spatial Technology. It will also help to strengthen Railway projects where use of remote sensing data, 

Geographical information System (GIS) and global positioning system (GPS) is predominant. This will immensely help Indian Railways to develop in house solutions to the problems which are often outsourced to western countries. 

The Chair will be headed as Chairman by V.K.Gupta, Member Engineering, Railway Board and Manoj Arora, Director, PEC University of Technology, Chandigarh as Co-chairman. The Chair will function through a Chair Core Committee (CCC) and shall have members from Railways and PEC.

HINDI JOURNALISM DAY: May 30th

·  30 May is celebrated as the Hindi Journalism Day in India’s journalism every year.

·  On 30 May 1826, the first Hindi newspaper of India called UdantMartand was edited and published. With this, the Hindi Journalism completed its 187 years in India.

· First Hindi newspaper was initiated by JugalKishorShukla. Hindi daily publishing took place in Braj and Khari languages.

·  JugalKishorShukla helped in creating journalism as the fourth pillar of the Indian democracy.

Sachin launches his clothing brand 'True Blue'

• ·The brand, in collaboration with 'Arvind Fashion Brands', has opened its flagship store in Mumbai.
•  Cricketer Sachin Tendulkar launched his clothing brand 'True Blue' with actor RiteishDeshmukh as a showstopper for the fashion event. "I... (wanted to) give them (people) the opportunity to wear something which is of my taste, what I like," said Sachin.