BharatGPT group unveils ‘Hanooman’: Everything you need to know about the Indic AI model

About Hanooman:

• It is a series of large language models (LLMs) that can respond in 11 Indian languages like Hindi, Tamil, and Marathi, with plans to expand to more than 20 languages.
• Capabilities: It is a multimodal AI tool, which can generate text, speech, videos and more in multiple Indian languages.
• The size of these AI models ranges from 1.5 billion to a whopping 40 billion parameters.
• Applications: It has been designed to work in four fields, including health care, governance, financial services, and education.

What is the BharatGPT ecosystem?

• It is a research consortium led by IIT Bombay with seven other IITs. It is backed by the Department of Science and Technology, SML and Reliance Jio.

Key facts about Large language models

• Large language models use deep learning techniques to process large amounts of text.
• They work by processing vast amounts of text, understanding the structure and meaning, and learning from it.
• LLMs are ‘trained’ to identify meanings and relationships between words.
• The greater the amount of training data a model is fed, the smarter it gets at understanding and producing text.
• The training data is usually large datasets, such as Wikipedia, OpenWebText, and the Common Crawl Corpus.
• These contain large amounts of text data, which the models use to understand and generate natural language.

After a 11-year gap, Centre discloses key consumption expenditure survey data

About Household Consumption Expenditure Survey:

• It is usually conducted by the National Statistical Office (NSO) every five years.
• This survey aims at generating estimates of household Monthly Per Capita Consumption Expenditure (MPCE) and its distribution separately for the rural and urban sectors of the country, for States and Union Territories, and for different socio-economic groups. 
• Highlights of the survey
• The average monthly per capita consumption expenditure (MPCE) in Indian households rose by 33.5% since 2011-12 in urban households to ₹3,510, with rural India’s MPCE seeing a 40.42% increase over the same period to hit ₹2,008.
• The proportion of spending on food has dropped to 46.4% for rural households from 52.9% in 2011-12, while their urban peers spent just 39.2% of their overall monthly outgoes on food compared with 42.6% incurred 11 years earlier.
• This reduction could translate into a lower weightage for food prices in the country’s retail inflation calculations.
• Among the States, the MPCE is the highest in Sikkim for both rural (₹7,731) and urban areas (₹12,105).
• It is the lowest in Chhattisgarh, where it was ₹2,466 for rural households and ₹4,483 for urban household members.
• Significance: The data will play a key role in reviewing critical economic indicators, including the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), poverty levels, and the Consumer Price Inflation (CPI).

Armenia freezes participation in Russia-led security bloc - Prime Minister

About Collective Security Treaty Organisation:

• It is an intergovernmental military alliance in Eurasia, which was established in 2002.
• Members of the organization at present are: Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan.
• Background
• The Collective Security Treaty (CST) was signed on May 15, 1992 in Tashkent by the Heads of six countries: Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Subsequently, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Belarus joined it.
• The treaty came into force on April 20, 1994.
• On May 14, 2002, in Moscow, the Collective Security Council made a decision to grant the status of an international regional organization to the Collective Security Treaty.
• In 2004 the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution granting the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) an observer status in the UN General Assembly.
• The statutory bodies of the Organization are: the Collective Security Council (CSC), the Council of Foreign Ministers (COM), the Council of Ministers of Defense (CIO), the Committee of Secretaries of Security Council (CSSC).
• The key objectives of the CSTO include
• The provision of national and collective security, intensive politico-military cooperation, foreign policy coordination on international and regional security issues, the establishment of multilateral cooperation mechanisms, including a military component, the development of cooperation in the counteraction to modern challenges and security threats.
• Headquarter: Moscow, Russia

MakhaBucha Ceremony organized at SanamLuang Pavilion where Holy Relics from India are Enshrined

About MakhaBucha:

• MakhaBucha Day (Magha Puja) is a religious celebration marking Lord Buddha’s teachings to his disciples.
• It is celebrated according to the traditional lunar calendar, on the day of full moon of the third lunar month.
• The term makha comes from the word “Magha” in Pali and it refers to the third lunar month, while bucha can translate as “to worship,” both of which are derived from the Pali language used in Buddhist scripture.
• The term MakhaBucha refers to a day intended for worshiping on the third lunar month.
• The aim of this day is to purify one''s mind and do only good. Some celebrate by offering food to monks and also attend candle light processions in the evening.
• It is the first important religious festival in the Buddhist calendar, takes place in nations including Thailand, Laos and Cambodia, where the majority of Buddhists practice Theravada Buddhism, also known as “Buddhism of the south”.

Wearable "PSiFI" AI tech device interprets emotions of any human nearby

About PSiFI System:

• The system, known as the personalized skin-integrated facial interface (PSiFI), features a first-of-its-kind bidirectional triboelectric strain and vibration sensor that enables the simultaneous sensing and integration of verbal and non-verbal expression data.
• The PSiFI system is self-powered, facile, stretchable, and transparent.
• Coupled with a sophisticated data processing circuit, the system facilitates seamless wireless data transfer, enabling the instantaneous recognition of emotions.
• Empowered by machine learning algorithms, the technology showcases remarkable efficiency in recognizing human emotions accurately and promptly, even in scenarios where individuals wear masks.
• Its practical application has already been demonstrated in a digital concierge service within a virtual reality (VR) environment, where customised services based on users’ emotions were provided.
• Science behind the PSiFI technology:
• The technology is based on the phenomenon of "friction charging," where objects separate into positive and negative charges upon friction.
• Notably, the system is self-generating, requiring no external power source or complex measuring devices for data recognition.
• This innovative technology is poised to revolutionize various industries, including next-generation wearable systems that provide services based on emotions.

Thawing Arctic permafrost could release radioactive, cancer-causing radon

About Permafrost:

• Permafrost is any ground—from soil to sediment to rock—that has been frozen continuously for a minimum of two years and as many as hundreds of thousands of years. 
• It can extend down beneath the earth’s surface from a few feet to more than a mile, covering entire regions, such as the Arctic tundra, or a single, isolated spot, such as a mountaintop of alpine permafrost.
• Although the ground is frozen, permafrost regions are not always covered in snow.
• Global Distribution: 
• They can be found on land and below the ocean floor. 
• It is found in areas where temperatures rarely rise above freezing point.
• They are most common in regions with high mountains and in Earth’s higher latitudes—near the North and South Poles.
• Permafrost is found almost exclusively in the far northern reaches and high elevations of the Northern Hemisphere, in places like Siberia, Alaska, the Canadian Arctic, Greenland, and the Tibetan Plateau.
• Composition: 
• Permafrost is made of a combination of soil, rocks, and sand that are held together by ice. The soil and ice in permafrost stay frozen all year. 
• Near the surface, permafrost soils also contain large quantities of organic carbon—a material leftover from dead plants that couldn’t decompose or rot away due to the cold.
• Lower permafrost layers contain soils made mostly of minerals. 
• A layer of soil on top of the permafrost does not stay frozen all year. This layer, called the active layer, thaws during the warm summer months and freezes again in the fall.

Key Facts about Radon:

• It is a radioactive gas that forms naturally when uranium, thorium, or radium, which are radioactive metals, break down in rocks, soil, and groundwater. 
• It is an inert, colourless, and odourless gas.
• Radon gas usually exists at very low levels outdoors, but the gas can accumulate in areas without adequate ventilation, such as underground mines.
• Radon can get into homes and buildings through small cracks or holes and build up in the air.
• Radon levels may be higher in homes that are well insulated, tightly sealed, and/or built on soil rich in the element’s uranium, thorium, and radium.
• As we breathe, these particles are deposited on the cells lining the airways, where they can damage DNA and potentially cause lung cancer.
• It is the second-most important cause of lung cancer after smoking and the leading cause of lung cancer among non-smokers.

India Halts Flow Of Ravi River To Pakistan, Say Reports: Here''s What We Know So Far

About Shahpur Kandi Dam Project:

• It is located on the Ravi River in Pathankot district, Punjab, downstream from the existing Ranjit Sagar Dam.
• The water released by Ranjit Sagar Dam is utilized for generating power from this project. 
• The main purpose behind the construction of this dam is power generation and irrigation in Punjab and J&K States.
• It is constructed by the irrigation department of the Government of Punjab.
• The project consists of a 55.5 m high concrete gravity dam, a 7.70 km long hydel channel, two head regulators, and two powerhouses.
• The total output capacity of the project is 206 MW.

Key Facts about Ravi River:

• It is a trans-boundary river of India and Pakistan.
• It is one of the five tributaries of the Indus River that give the Punjab (meaning “Five Rivers”) its name.
• Origin: It originates in the western Himalayas in the Multhan tehsil of the Kangra district of Himachal Pradesh.
• It then flows through the Indian state of Punjab and enters Pakistan, where it eventually joins the Chenab River in the province of Punjab.
• Length: The total length of the Ravi River is approximately 720 kilometers(447 miles). Around 158 kilometers (98 miles) of the river''s course lie in India, and the remaining 562 kilometers (349 miles) flow through Pakistan.
• It is also called ''The River of Lahore'' since that city is situated on its eastern bank.
• Tributaries: The Ravi River is fed by several tributaries, including the Bhadal, the Ujh, the Tarnah, and the Basantar rivers in India, and the Aik, the Bara, and the Beas rivers in Pakistan.
• Indus Water Treaty of Ravi River: The water of the rivers Ravi, Beas, and Sutlej is allocated to India under the Indus Water Treaty between India and Pakistan.