• Centre promises ₹1,000 crore package for Assam to develop Karbi areas.
• The insurgent groups signed the peace accord include:
  • People’s Democratic Council of Karbi Longri (PDCK)
  • Karbi Longri North Chachar Hills Liberation Front (KLNLF)
  • Karbi People’s Liberation Tiger (KPLT)
  • Kuki Liberation Front (KLF)
  • United Peoples Liberation Army (UPLA)
• About 1,000 militants belonging to these groups have surrendered along with their arms and have joined the mainstream.

• It would ensure Autonomous Council (KAAC), protection of identity, language, and culture of the Karbi people and focused development of the Council area, without affecting the territorial and administrative integrity of Assam.

• The Assam government will set up a Karbi Welfare Council for focused development of Karbi people living outside the KAAC area.
  • It proposes to give more legislative, executive, administrative and financial powers to KAAC.
• The agreement would promote peace and prosperity in Assam.
• Assam government will notify Karbi as the official language of KAAC.
  • English, Hindi, and Assamese would continue to be used for official purposes.
• Under the agreement, the hill tribes would be entitled to reservation.

• The Karbis are one of the major ethnic communities in Northeast India and especially in the hill areas of Assam.
• The Karbis linguistically belong to the Tibeto-Burman group.
• The original home of these people was in western China near the Yang-Tee-Kiang and the Howang-ho rivers.
• They went down the courses of the Brahmaputra, and entered India and Burma. The Karbis, entered Assam from Central Asia.

• Most of the Karbis still practice their cultural and traditional influences.
• The practitioners of traditional Animism believe in reincarnation and honour the ancestors.
• Many people follow Hinduism. There are Karbi Christians also around (10-15%).

• The Karbis mainly speak their native language, i.e., Karbi language. They are well versed in Assamese.
• They have a patrilineal society which are composed of five major clans or Kur.
• The traditional system of governance is headed by the Lindok, the king.
• They celebrate many festivals like- Hacha-Kekan, Chojun, Rongker, Peng Karkli, Thoi Asor Rit Asor and Botor Kekur. 

DeFi:

• It uses cryptocurrency and blockchain technology to eliminate central authorities and provide peer-to-peer facilities to carry out financial services such as banking, loans, mortgages, etc.
• The primary purpose is to establish an open-source, transparent, and permissionless ecosystem without any central authority owning the power over financial transactions.
• It allows participants to control their assets, efficiently conduct peer-to-peer exchanges and build decentralized applications.

Applications:

1. Decentralized Exchanges (DeX):

• Allow participants to exchange tokens with other assets in their possession without a need of a custodian.
• Enables them to transact peer-to-peer and monitor their funds.
• Reduces the risk of theft as crypto assets are not in the exchange custody itself.

2. Lending and Borrowing platforms:

• The lending and borrowing platforms use smart contracts to eliminate intermediaries such as banks, financial institutions.

3. Payments:

• Individuals can directly transfer their cryptocurrency through a secured channel with DeFi, and faster payments and processes can be ensured.

Advantages of DeFi:

• New financial instruments and digital assets can be built rapidly by taking advantage of highly programmable smart contracts and their automated execution.  
• Blockchain’s decentralized nature offers immutability. It indicates that a record, once stored, cannot be modified or deleted through any form. This provides increased security and audit precision.
• New DeFi applications or products can be built or modified by combining the existing product with another DeFi product.
• DeFi protocols are built with open-source code, allowing individuals to read, modify and use the code to make other DeFi products.
• It enables users to direct smart contract contracts through their crypto wallets without any minimum number of resources.

Challenges:

1. Data feed centralization:

• Blockchain technologies use third-party services that allow access to external information.
• If an external third-party feed corrupted information, then it would disrupt the DeFi protocols.

2. Security risks with smart contracts:

• Smart contracts are the fundamental backbone of any DeFi protocol or application, the security risk related to them can disrupt the entire application or protocol.
• Smart contracts are open-source, enabling users and programmers to review them before investing in the DeFi protocol. This raises the threat of a cyberattack.

• 28% of the 1,38,374 species assessed by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) for its survival watchlist are now at high risk of extinction.
• The major reasons are habitat loss, overexploitation and illegal trade and climate change.
• Indonesia’s Komodo dragons were listed as endangered.
  • The species is increasingly threatened by the impacts of climate change with rising sea levels expected to shrink its tiny habitat by at least 30% over the next 45 years.
• 37% of the 1,200 shark and ray species are directly threatened by extinction.

• Komodo dragon is the largest extant lizard species.
• It occurs on Komodo Island and a few neighboring islands of the Lesser Sunda Islands of Indonesia.
• The lizard’s large size and predatory habits has allowed this endangered species to become an ecotourist attraction.
  • The lizard grows to 3 metres (10 feet) in total length.
• They can run swiftly and occasionally attack and kill human beings.
• IUCN status: Endangered.

• The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species is the global standard for assessing the risk of extinction that individual species of animal, fungus, and plant faces.

• The Green Status of Species was developed in response to Resolution WCC-2012-RES-41.
• IUCN called for the development of ‘Green Lists’ of Species, Ecosystems and Protected Areas.
• In 2012, a Green List of Protected and Conserved Areas was launched, and the development of the Green Status of Species began under the name ‘Green List of Species.

• A species is fully recovered if it is present in all parts of its range, even that are no longer occupied but were occupied prior to major human impacts.
• It is viable in all parts of the range.
• It is performing its ecological functions in all parts of the range.
• These factors contribute towards a “Green Score” ranging from 0–100%, which shows how far a species is from its "fully recovered" state.

• IARI has tied up an agritech start-up called nurture farm to distribute the bio enzyme to farmers in stubble burning states for free.

• The Pusa Decomposer comprises of seven species of fungi.
  • Most of these fungi live in the soil and are known for their ability to decompose paddy straw.
• This is sprayed on the paddy straw after it is harvested, and takes 25 to 30 days to decompose the straw.
• This is a long-term sustainable solution for keeping good soil health and controlling pollution.

• North-western plains (which includes Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh) follow cropping cycle where rice followed by the wheat crop.
• There is not much gap between the period when rice is harvested and wheat is sowed. If the sowing is delayed, the wheat output comes down significantly.
• Therefore, farmers resort to burning paddy stalks and get the fields ready quickly. This happens towards the end of October and the first week of November.
  • This causes major air pollution issue, especially for Delhi in winters.

• Punjab grows rice on 3 million hectares of land and Haryana grows rice in 1.2 million hectares of land.
  • About 15 to 20 million tonnes of paddy biomass is produced on three million hectares of land, which is huge.
• Machine substitutions for baling, happy seeders and super seeders can aid stubble burning.
• Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981 puts ban on stubble burning and action against those burning crop residue.
  • In 2020 around 76,590 cases of farm fire occurrence were reported in Punjab.
• In 2019 there were 52,991 such incidents, while in 2018, 51,766 incidents were recorded.

• This day is celebrated to mark the birth anniversary of India’s first Vice President Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan.

• Dr Radhakrishnan was born to a Brahmin family in Tiruttani of Andhra Pradesh on September 5, 1888.
• A symbol of academics and education, Radhakrishnan was a renowned philosopher, statesman as well as a teacher.
• In his later period of life, he served as a vice chancellor of Andhra University and Banaras Hindu University.
• He was appointed as professor of Philosophy to the King George V Chair of Mental and Moral Science at the University of Calcutta (CU).
• During his tenure at the university, he represented CU at the Congress of the Universities of the British Empire in June 1926 as well as at the International Congress of Philosophy at Harvard University, the USA in September 1926.
• Radhakrishnan was nominated 16 times for the Nobel Prize in Literature, and another 11 times for the Nobel Peace Prize.
• Dr Radhakrishnan was also India's second President from 1962 to 1967.
• During his tenure as the Vice President, Radhakrishnan was in charge of the Rajya Sabha (Upper House) sessions. Whenever a heated conversation would take place during the sessions, Radhakrishnan would quote slokas from Sanskrit classics or quotes from the Bible to calm the agitated audience.
• Leading the Indian delegation to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Dr Radhakrishnan was elected chairman of UNESCO's executive board in 1948.
• He believed that true teachers are those who help us think for ourselves, so they should be the best minds in the nation.
• Dr Radhakrishnan was posthumously awarded the Bharat Ratna, the nation's highest civilian honour.

• The team used one of South Korea’s fastest supercomputers, Aleph for the study.

• Increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide can cause a weakening of future simulated ENSO sea surface temperature variability.
• They note that the intensity of the ENSO temperature cycle can weaken as CO₂ increases.
• The future El Niño events will lose heat to the atmosphere more quickly due to the evaporation of water vapour.
• Also, in the future there will be a reduced temperature difference between the eastern and western tropical Pacific, inhibiting the development of temperature extremes during the ENSO cycle.

• El Nino and La Nina, the two natural climate phenomena occurring across the tropical Pacific Ocean, influence the weather conditions all over the world.
• While the El Nino period is characterised by warming or increased sea surface temperatures in the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean, a La Nina event causes the water in the eastern Pacific Ocean to be colder than usual. Together, they are called ENSO or El Nino-Southern Oscillation.

• During El Niño, trade winds weaken. Warm water is pushed back east, toward the west coast of the Americas.
• El Niño means Little Boy, or Christ Child in Spanish.
• El Niño can affect our weather significantly. The warmer waters cause the Pacific jet stream to move south of its neutral position. With this shift, areas in the northern U.S. and Canada are dryer and warmer than usual.
• But in the U.S. Gulf Coast and Southeast, these periods are wetter than usual and have increased flooding.
• The full name they used was El Niño de Navidad, because El Niño typically peaks around December.
• El Niño has a strong effect on marine life off the Pacific coast. During normal conditions, upwelling brings water from the depths to the surface; this water is cold and nutrient rich. During El Niño, upwelling weakens or stops altogether.
• Without the nutrients from the deep, there are fewer phytoplankton off the coast. This affects fishing.

• La Niña is characterized by the opposite process: the trade winds strengthen, and warm water and rainstorms are pushed to the far western equatorial Pacific over Indonesia.
• La Niña means Little Girl in Spanish.
• This results in cooler surface water in the equatorial Pacific Ocean, dry conditions in Pacific coastal South America, and much wetter conditions in northern Australia and southeast Asia.
• During a La Niña year, winter temperatures are warmer than normal in the South and cooler than normal in the North.
• La Niña can also lead to a more severe hurricane season.
• During La Niña, waters off the Pacific coast are colder and contain more nutrients than usual. This environment supports more marine life and attracts more cold-water species to places like the California coast.