Kerala state government urged the Centre to speed up measures for building a new dam at a meeting with the Central Water Commission(CWC).

• CWC is a premier technical organisation in India in the field of water resources.
• It is presently functioning as an attached office of the Ministry of Jal Shakti, Department of Water Resources, River Development, and Ganga Rejuvenation, Government of India.

      Functions:

• The Commission is entrusted with the general responsibilities of initiating, coordinating, and furthering, in consultation with the State Governments concerned, schemes for control, conservation, and utilisation of water resources throughout the country for the purposes of Flood Control, Irrigation, Navigation, Drinking Water Supply, and Water Power Development.
• It also undertakes the investigation, construction, and execution of any such schemes as required.
• It is headed by a Chairman, with the status of Ex-Officio Secretary to the Government of India.
• The work of the Commission is divided among three wings namely, the Designs and Research (D&R) Wing, the River Management (RM) Wing and the Water Planning and Projects (WP&P) Wing.
• Each wing is placed under the charge of a full-time member with the status of Ex-Officio Additional Secretary to the Government of India.
• Headquarters: New Delhi

       Key Facts about Mullaperiyar Dam:

• It is a masonry gravity dam situated on the Periyar River in Thekkady, Idukki district, in Kerala.
• It is located 881 m above sea level, on the Cardamom Hills of the Western Ghats.
• The dam is built at the confluence of the Mullayar and Periyar rivers.
• Its construction began in 1887 and was completed in 1895. The construction was carried out by the British Corps of Royal Engineers under the leadership of Pennycuick.
• The dam was constructed with limestone and “Surkhi" (burnt brick powder and a mixture of sugar and calcium oxide).
• The dam''s purpose was to divert the waters of the west-flowing River Periyar eastward to the arid rain shadow regions of the Theni, Madurai, Sivaganga, and Ramanathapuram districts of Tamil Nadu.
• The Periyar National Park is located around the dam''s reservoir.
• Although the dam is located in Kerala, it is operated and maintained by the neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu. It was according to a 999-year lease agreement made during British rule, that the operational rights were handed over to Tamil Nadu.

Black-necked Grebe sighted at Hokersar wetland for the first time.

• The black-necked grebe, or eared grebe, is a member of the grebe family of water birds.
• Scientific Name: Podiceps nigricollis
• Distribution: It has a widespread breeding area, with migratory populations covering an extensive range of Eurasia and North America, while a resident population is also found in subtropical Africa.

       Features:

• It usually measures between 28 and 34 centimetres in length and weighs 265 to 450 grams.
• It has a wingspan range of 20.5-21.6 in (52-55 cm).
• Its breeding plumage features a distinctive ochre-coloured plumage that extends behind its eye and over its ear coverts.
• The rest of the upper parts, including the head, neck, and breast, are coloured black to blackish brown.
• When in its non-breeding plumage, this bird has greyish-black upper parts.
• The legs are a dark greenish grey. The sexes are similar.
• It uses multiple foraging techniques. Insects, which make up the majority of this bird''s diet, are caught either on the surface of the water or when they are in flight.
• Although it generally avoids flight, the black-necked grebe travels as far as 6,000 kilometres (3,700 mi) during migration.
• Conservation Status:
• IUCN: Least Concern

       Key Facts about Hokersar Wetland:

• Known as the ‘Queen Wetland of Kashmir’, Hokersar (also known as Hokera) is a designated Ramsar site is located in Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir.
• It is spread over an area of 13.75 sq. km (1375 ha) in the northwest Himalayan Biogeographic province of Kashmir, in the backyard the snow draped Pir Panjal range with an altitude of 1584 m.
• It is a natural perennial wetland contiguous to the Jhelum basin.
• It gets water from the Doodhganga River (Tributary of Jhelum).
• It is the only site with remaining reed beds of Jammu and Kashmir.
• It is the abode of 68 waterfowl species like Large Egret, Great Crested Grebe, Little Cormorant, Common Shelduck, Tufted Duck and endangered White-eyed Pochard, coming from Siberia, China, Central Asia, and Northern Europe.

New ‘zombie deer disease’ alert for humans! Scientists sound alarm as virus spreads in US.

• Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD), also known as Zombie deer disease, is a neurological disorder affecting deer and other cervids (members of the deer family) caused by the abnormal growth of a misfolded protein called a prion.
• This prion causes healthy brain proteins to become abnormal, leading to a range of symptoms.
• CWD is contagious; it can be transmitted freely within and among cervid populations.
• Transmission: CWD is transmitted directly through animal-to-animal contact and indirectly through contact with objects or environments contaminated with infectious material (including saliva, urine, faeces, and carcasses of CWD-infected animals).
• Symptoms: It may take over a year before an infected animal develops symptoms, which can include drastic weight loss (wasting), stumbling, listlessness, and other neurologic symptoms.
• CWD is particularly concerning because it has the potential to affect both animals and humans, with the possibility of transmission through the consumption of infected meat.
• CWD can affect animals of all ages, and some infected animals may die without ever developing the disease.
• CWD is fatal to animals, and there are no treatments or vaccines.

Ionospheric secrets traced in the White continent can help satellite-based navigation.

• A team of scientists from the Indian Institute of Geomagnetism (IIG) have examined the long-term seasonal ionospheric observations at Indian Antarctica station Bharati between 2010 and 2022 and also with solar activity following the Sun''s 11-year cycle.
• Ionosphere is part of Earth’s upper atmosphere, which is partially ionised, extending from 100-1000 km.
• The ionosphere at polar regions is highly dynamic and acts as a major energy sink for space weather events, and related processes in magnetosphere-ionosphere systems as the magnetic field lines are vertical in this region.
• It is an interesting layer which overlaps the mesosphere, thermosphere, and exosphere.
• It’s a very active part of the atmosphere, and it grows and shrinks depending on the energy it absorbs from the sun.
• The ionospheric observations in Antarctica are few compared to the Arctic region due to geographic limitations and limited number of stations.

      Key points:

• Decade-long ionospheric observations at Bharati station, Antarctica, found a substantial seasonal variation with maximum total electron count (TEC) in equinoctial months followed by the summer and winter.
• The scientists attributed the peak ionisation to particle precipitation and transportation of convectional plasma from high latitudes.
• Also, the maximum ionospheric density in the summer months where 24 hours sunlight is present (polar days), was about twice more than that of polar nights at the Bharati region.
• Significance of the study: Such long-term studies can help understand effects of the ionosphere on satellite-based navigation and communication systems and to mitigate them.

Tokenisation: RBI expands the scope of CoFT to debit cards issuing banks.

• In order to make digital payments more secure, safe and sound the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has now enabled card-on-file tokenization (CoFT) through card issuing banks and institutions.
• Tokenization refers to replacement of actual credit and debit card details with an alternate code called the “token”.
• It is a combination of card, token requestor and device.
• The card detail when stored with a merchant is known as card-on-file (CoF).
• This token is a randomly generated string of characters that has no intrinsic value and is meaningless outside of the context of a specific transaction.
• The token is used as a surrogate for the actual card details, making it more secure to store and transmit.

      Requirements for enabling CoFT through card issuers:

• Generation of CoFT tokens for a card can be enabled through mobile banking and internet banking channels.
• The token can be generated only on explicit customer consent and with AFA (additional factor authentication) validation.
• The cardholder may tokenize the card at any time of their convenience, either on receipt of the new card or at a later stage.
• The cardholder can select the merchants with whom he/she wishes to maintain tokens.
• The card token so issued may be either by the card network or the issuer or both.

      Advantage:

• Tokenization replaces a debit or credit card’s 16-digit number with a unique token that is specific to just your card and is valid for one merchant at a time.
• The token masks the true details of your card, so in case there is a data leak from the merchant website, the fraudster cannot misuse the card.

Navy’s IFC-IOR played key role in the backend in tackling vessel hijacking.

• Indian Navy’s Information Fusion Centre for Indian Ocean Region was established by the Government of India at Information Management and Analysis Centre (IMAC) Gurugram in 2018.
• The centre aims at strengthening maritime security in the region by building a common coherent maritime situation picture and acting as a maritime security information sharing hub.
• The Centre also hosts International Liaison Officers (ILOs) from partner nations.
• The Centre hosts ILOs from 12 partner nations, Australia, France, Italy, Japan, Maldives, Mauritius, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Seychelles, Singapore, United Kingdom and United States of America.
• The Centre monitors the Indian Ocean and adjoining seas to understand each region and generates various periodic reports, Weekly Maritime Security Updates (WMSU), Monthly Maritime Security Updates (MMSU), Half Yearly Overviews and Annual Reports.

      What is IMAC?

• It is a National Maritime Domain Awareness (NDMA) centre.
• It was set up for connecting all the operational Centres and lower rungs of the Indian Navy and the Coast Guard located along the huge coastline and the island territories.
• It is jointly operated by the Navy and Coast Guard.
• This is the main centre of the National Command Control Communication and Intelligence System (NC3I).
• And it tracks vessels on the high seas and gets data from the coastal radars.
• It is important to note that IMAC tracks only non-military or commercial ships, known as white shipping.
• Military ships, or grey hull ships, are tracked by the Directorate of Naval Operations, as this is on a classified network.