BackNews in numbers | Drought declared in 12,000 Vidarbha villages
Maharashtra is one of the worst drought-hit states and reported the highest number of farmer suicides in 14 years in 2015
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12
What is it? The number of cities in which India’s integrated disease surveillance programme would be launched.
Why is it important? It will help authorities spot epidemic outbreaks fast. (The programme was restricted to rural areas earlier.) In 2015, India faced 1,935 outbreaks with acute diarrheal disease, food poisoning and measles accounting for over half of them.
Tell me more: The programme would cover Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, Kolkata, Surat, Lucknow, Jaipur, Kanpur and Ahmedabad and cost ₹ 640 crore.
$5,000
What is it? The likely cost of a round trip from New York to London on a supersonic jet being developed by Boom Technology, a start-up based in Denver.
Why is it important? It will cut transatlantic travel time by 3.5 hours or 50%, and might reopen the market for supersonic planes. It comes at the same price as business class. Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Group has signed a deal with Boom to buy the first 10 supersonic planes.
Tell me more: Boom’s plane would fly at Mach 2.2 (or 2.2 times the speed of sound), faster than the Concorde, which flew at a top speed of Mach 2.04. Boom is planning to build and test a prototype plane by the end of next year.
12,000
What is it? The number of villages in Vidarbha, the eastern region of Maharashtra, that have been declared drought-hit.
Why is it important? This would allow farmers cultivating cotton, soyabean and paddy to claim a special drought assistance package under National Disaster Relief Fund (NDRF). NDRF guidelines allow an area to be declared drought-hit based on the amount of rainfall and crop losses. These villages qualified only under the latter.
Tell me more: Maharashtra is one of the worst drought-hit states and reported the highest number of farmer suicides in 14 years in 2015.
27
What is it? The number of years it took the Swedish Academy, which selects the winners of the Nobel prize in literature, to condemn the fatwa by Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini against British writer Salman Rushdie for his novel ‘The Satanic Verses’.
Why is it important? When the ‘fatwa’ was issued in 1989, the Academy refused to condemn it saying it was against its code to get into any political involvement. It issued a statement defending free expression, without any specific mention of Rushdie or his book. Two members of the academy quit the academy when it refused to denounce the ‘fatwa’.
Tell me more: The academy said the ‘fatwa’ and the prize money for Rushdie’s death are “flagrant breaches of international law" and “implies a serious violation of free speech". As many as 40 media outlets in Iran recently raised $600,000 to add to the ‘fatwa’ against the author.
1
What is it? The number of companies listed on Myanmar’s Yangon Stock Exchange that begins trading today.
Why is it important? The trading starts on the first-ever modern stock exchange in the country, three months after its launch. Five more companies are expected to list their shares on the bourses. The stock exchange, owned by Myanma Economic Bank, Japan Exchange Group and Daiwa Institute of Research, is expected to boost Myanmar’s economy, which was expected to grow 8.3% in 2015, according to the Asian Development Bank.
Tell me more: The only listed company is First Myanmar Investment, which has diverse interests in financial services, real estate and healthcare.
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