UTTARAKHAND

The central government has released Rs 4 crore for construction of individual and community toilets in urban areas of Uttarakhand under Swachh Bharat Mission.
Sources in the state government said that approximately Rs 2 crore have been sanctioned for 500 community toilets and Rs 2 crore for 10,000 individual toilets.

According to official sources, the state government has set a target of constructing 27,640 individual toilets and 2,500 community toilets till 2019.

Dehradun nagar nigam has received approximately 2,200 applications for construction of toilets and will release Rs 12,000 to each applicant. Of the 12,000, Rs 5,333 will be given by the state government, Rs 4,000 by the nigam and the rest will be through CSR of various banks.

INTERNATIONAL

· Angola Swears in its First New President After 38 Years

Angola swore in Joao Lourenco as the country’s President making him the first new President of the country in 38 years.
He served as Angola’s Defence Minister earlier, vowed to attract more foreign investment.
The People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA)governed since Angola’s hard-fought independence from Portugal in 1975 with Dos Santos taking power in 1979.

NATIONAL

Veteran film, television and theatre actor and Padma Shri Tom Alter died at aged 67. Alter acted in over 300 movies apart from numerous TV shows, most famously as the gangster Keshav Kalsi in the hit soap opera Junoon which ran for a record five years during the 1990s.

In addition to acting, Alter also ventured into direction and was a sports journalist in the 80s and 90s. Alter has written three books, one non-fiction, and two fiction, and in 2008 was awarded the prestigious Padma Shri by the Indian government in recognition for his services to the field of arts and cinema.

· Union Government finalising Electoral Bonds Scheme

The Union Government is finalizing electoral bonds schemein order to bring greater transparency in the funding of political parties.
The scheme was announced in 2017-18.
According to Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), most political parties use lax regime on donations to accept cash donations from anonymous sources.
Nearly 70% of Rs.11,300 crore in party funding over an 11-year period came from unknown sources.

The Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC) notified new Wetland (Conservation and Management) Rules 2017 to prohibit range of activities in wetlands.
Wetland is transitional land between terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems where the water table is usually at or near the surface or it may be land covered by shallow water.
There are 115 wetlandsofficially identified by Central Government and of those 26 are identified as wetlands of international importance under Ramsar Convention (an international intergovernmental treaty for the conservation of wetlands to which India is a party).

President Ram Nath Kovind appointed five new Governors for the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, Assam, and Meghalaya.
(Dr) BD Mishra (Retd) as the Governor of Arunachal Pradesh.
Satya Pal Malik as the Governor of Bihar.
Banwarilal Purohit as the Governor of Tamil Nadu.
Prof Jagdish Mukhi as the Governor of Assam.
Ganga Prasad as the Governor of Meghalaya.
Devendra Kumar Joshi as the Governor of Andaman & Nicobar islands.

The Small Saving Schemes like PPF, Kisan Vikas Patra and Sukanya Samriddhi for October-December quarter. Investments in the Public Provident Fund (PPF) scheme will fetch annual rate of 7.8 percent while Kisan Vikas Patra (KVP)investments will yield 7.5 percent and mature in 115 months.
The one for girl child savings, Sukanya Samriddhi Account Scheme will offer 8.3 percent annually.
Similarly, the investment on 5-year Senior Citizens Savings Scheme will yield 8.3 percent.