Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu and Prime Minister Narendra Modi today paid tributes to former Prime Minister Pamulaparthi Venkata Narasimha Rao on his birth anniversary. In a tweet, Mr. Naidu said, a visionary statesman and a towering intellectual, P V Narasimha Rao ushered in major economic reforms.

In a tweet, Mr. Modi said, India is grateful to him for his rich contribution to national progress. He added that the former Prime Minister also made a mark as a great scholar and intellectual.

Union Minister of Tribal Affairs Arjun Munda today launched the second phase of the Going Online As Leaders (GOAL) Programme in New Delhi. Mr. Munda also felicitated leaders of the first phase of the programme.

Speaking on the occasion, Mr. Munda highlighted that the first phase of GOAL has seen changing the lives of tribal youth through the digital mentorship programme. He emphasized that the second phase will reach out to ten lakh women and youth entrepreneurs. Mr. Munda said, this programme will also create a platform for more than fifty thousand Self-Help Groups and ten lakh families associated with TRIFED to take their products global.

Mr. Munda stressed that digitally empowering tribal communities would contribute significantly to the socio-economic development of the country and an important step toward creating a flourishing community of tribal leaders.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Bhimavaram  town in West Godavari District of Andhra Pradesh on July 4th to participate in the 125 th birth anniversary of freedom fighter Alluri Seetharama Raju. Prime Minister will unveil the statue of Seetharama Raju on the occasion.

Alluri Seetharama Raju  was an Indian revolutionary who waged an armed campaign against British colonial rule in India. Born in Andhra Pradesh,  he became involved in opposing the British in response to the 1882 Madras Forest Act, which effectively restricted the free  movement of tribals in their forest habitats and prevented them from practicing their traditional form of agriculture known as Podu. 

In Kerala, noted lyricist, author and journalist, Chowalloor Krishnankutty passed away at a private Medical College Hospital in Thrissur last night. He was 86.

A former Staff Artist with AIR, Krishnankutty penned over 3000 devotional songs and authored more than 200 books. He retired as an Assistant Editor with the Malayala Manorama daily.

He won several awards including the Kerala Sahithya Academy Award for satire, Poonthanam Jnanapana and Revathy Pattathanam Awards among others.

Chowalloor Krishanankutty also made his mark as a screen writer in Malayalam movies and produced documentaries on some well-known Kathakali artists.  He also served as the Vice-Chairman of the Kerala Kalamandalam.

The US Embassy in India has announced an important update for students. The embassy said that the interview slots are now open for students having I-20 who need to apply for visa categories F, M and J at the Embassy and Consulates for interviews taking place after August 14.

The Embassy said if anyone need to arrive at school by mid-August they should book an appointment now. The US had opened the first tranche of interview slots, for dates in June and the first half of July 2022 in May. Many students who were planning to attend US universities and who had already received their student I-20 documents from US universities were waiting for their interviews.
The Ministry of External Affairs held discussions with foreign countries including Australia, Canada, the Czech Republic, Germany, New Zealand, Poland, the UK and the USA to streamline the visa appointments for Indian students.

Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari today inaugurated and laid the foundation stone of nine National Highway Projects in Rajasthan costing 1,357 crore rupees. Addressing the event virtually, Mr Gadkari said that 11 hundred crore rupees have been sanctioned for the repair of Delhi-Jaipur-Kishangarh highway. This will remove the shortcomings of this highway. 

The Minister said, an allocation of nine hundred crores in CRIF for Rajasthan and 700 crore rupees for Setu Bandhan Scheme has been approved by the Central Government. He said that projects would also be run to repair the roads in the marginal districts of the state like Sri Ganganagar, Bikaner, Jaisalmer and Barmer. 

Union Minister of State for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship and Electronics and Information Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar has inaugurated the newly set up incubation facility at Nirma University in Ahmedabad today. Speaking on this occasion, he said that this new incubation facility of Nirma University will boost the startup ecosystem. He said that India has shown its capabilities to the world in recent years. He said that we have been on the backfoot since the last 65 years, but now we are on the front foot and building our economy through empowering the youth. He also felicitates & honours the Rising Change makers and Startups at Nirma University. Mr. Chandrasekhar is scheduled to visit Mehsana, Anand and Vadodara and interact with students and start-ups during his two day visit to Gujarat. This visit is a follow up to the earlier visit to Ahmedabad last month, where he interacted with over 100 Startups and 1000 students

Prime Minister Narendra Modi reached Munich yesterday on a two-day visit to Germany during which he will attend the G7 summit. Mr Modi is expected to particpate in two sessions today that will focus on issues concerning environment, energy, climate, food security, counter-terrorism, health, gender equality and democracy. 

The 47th meeting of the GST Council will be convened from tomorrow in Chandigarh. The meeting will be chaired by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. The two-day meeting of the GST Council will be attended by Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary, Finance Ministers of States and Union Territories and Senior officers from Union Government and States.

Last GST Council’s meeting which was held in New Delhi had recommended to defer the decision to change the rates on textiles. The GST council had decided to retain the status quo on GST rate on textile to five per cent.

The dates for the conduct of the University Grants Commission National Eligibility Test (UGC-NET) 2022 have been announced. The UGC NET December 2021 and June 2022 Exam dates have been merged this year. The UGC NET 2022 Exam will begins on July 8 and conclude on August 14. In a tweet, UGC Chairperson M Jagadesh Kumar said, the detailed notice regarding dates will be announced on
nta.nic.in
, the official website of the National Testing Agency (NTA).