Savitribai Phule
Context : Birth anniversary of Indian Social Reformer Savitribai Phule. She was born on January 3, 1831.
Savitribai Phule :
Savitribai Phule Savitribai is considered as the first female teacher of India. She played vital role in improving women rights in the country. She is also regarded as “Mother of Indian Feminism”. She along with her husband Jyotirao Phule founded the first India’s girls’ school in Pune in 1848.
She worked hard to abolish gender discrimination and caste discrimination. She was a prolific Marathi writer. Some of her literary works include Bavan Kashi Subodh Ratnakar, Kavya Phule, Go Get Education.
Establishments :
Savitribai Phule set up “Balhatya Pratibandhak Griha”. That works to prevent female infanticides, killing of pregnant rape victims and widows. She along with her husband also founded Satyashodhak Samaj that supported inter-caste marriages.
Indian Science Congress
Context : 107th Indian Science Congress is being held at the University of Agricultural Sciences (UAS) in Bengaluru, Karnataka.
Theme : “Science & Technology: Rural Development”.
Background :
Indian Science Congress is organised by the Indian Science Congress Association every year in the first week of January.
About Indian Science Congress Association :
The Indian Science Congress Association was started in the year 1914 in Kolkata and has a membership of more than 30,000 scientists.
Origin: It owes its origin to the foresight and initiative of two British chemists, namely, Professor J. L. Simonsen and Professor P. S. MacMahon. It occurred to them that scientific research in India might be stimulated if an annual meeting of research workers somewhat on the lines of the British Association for the Advancement of Science could be arranged.
Objectives :
- To advance and promote the cause of science in India.
- To hold an annual congress at a suitable place in India.
- To publish such proceedings, journals, transactions and other publications as may be considered desirable.
- To secure and manage funds and endowments for the promotion of Science including the rights of disposing of or selling all or any portion of the properties of the Association.
- To do and perform any or all other acts, matters and things as are conductive to, or incidental to, or necessary for, the above objects.
Sources: the Hindu.
DRDO Young Scientists Laboratories (DYSL)
In News :
- Five defence laboratories led by under-35 directors and young military scientists were formally launched by Government
- Objective: To drive the country’s war technologies of the future under the Defence Research & Development Organisation.
- The labs operating in Bengaluru, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata and Hyderabad will each pursue a key technology necessary for developing the nation’s next generation of defence systems.
- There would be no fund constraints for the new labs and the new leaders enjoy the same administrative and financial powers as the directors of existing defence labs
First National Conference on Intersex Human Rights
Context : Recently, the first national conference on intersex human rights was organised by Srishti Madurai in partnership with Intersex Asia in New Delhi.
- The conference sought a national ban on unnecessary medical surgeries conducted on children with intersex traits and appealed to the Union government to protect their human rights.
- This demand follows Tamil Nadu’s ban on normative surgeries on infants and children, except in life-threatening situations in August 2019.
- If the ban will be adopted nationally, India will become the third country to protect the rights of intersex children after Malta and Taiwan.
Key Points :
- The term intersex is often confused with transgender but the two in-fact have very different meanings.
- Transgender: Individuals who identify as transgender or transexual have a gender that is different from the one traditionally associated with the sex they were assigned at birth.
- Intersex: It refers to people born with biological or physical characteristics that are more diverse than stereotypical male or female bodies.
- The World Health Organisation (WHO) and the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) have called upon the Member States to end invasive and irreversible medical surgeries and other medical treatment on intersex children.