Sikkim Chief Minister Pawan Kumar Chamling on January 12 launched the 'One Family One Job' scheme which entitles one government job for every family in the state.

Chamling had announced the scheme last year during the winter session of the state Legislative Assembly.

At a "Rojgar Mela" (employment fair) organised at the Paljor stadium in Gangtok, over 12,000 unemployed youths were handed out appointment letters on January 12.

However, the letters were awarded only to members of those families which do not have a government job at present.

The task of providing employment was entrusted to the Department of Personnel.

Chamling also announced that over 25,000 already employed but unregularised government employees would also be subsequently regularised within 2019 according to their seniority.

"Sikkim has become the first state in the country to carry out such an exclusive programme for the people who would now be entitled to state government employee benifits," Chamling said.

He also said that Sikkim was the only state that earmarks 70 per cent of its revenues towards salaries for state government employees.

As of now, the state government has over 1 lakh regularised employees on its rolls from a population of just 6.4 lakh.

At the Khelo India Youth Games in Pune today, ten year old Abhinav Shaw became the youngest gold medallist in shooting.  

He teamed up with Mehuli Ghosh to help West Bengal win the 10m air rifle mixed team event. Delhi's Devanshi Rana bagged gold in Under-21 girls  25m pistol event. 
  
Maharashtra once again dominated the gymnastics arena at the Games to wrap up the Under-21 category with a whopping nine medals on the last day of gymnastics events. 

With 18 medals comprising nine gold, six silver and three bronze in gymnastics,  Maharashtra were also crowned champions.

In Hockey under -21 category,  Odisha beat Uttar Pradesh in the first semi-final 2-1 while Haryana proved better than Punjab with a 3-1 win. Odisha and Haryana will now play for gold on Tuesday.  

In overall medals tally, Maharashtra completed its half century of gold medals. Delhi follows with 36 gold and Haryana 31 golds so far. 

Bengaluru Raptors edged the Mumbai Rockets 4-3 to win their maiden Premier Badminton League title on Sunday.

World No. 18 Anders Antonsen lost narrowly to the Bengaluru skipper Srikanth when the two faced off in that battle at the beginning of this week.

Any hope of a turnaround was dashed by a superb Srikanth who grabbed a 15-7, 15-10 victory.

The Bengaluru talisman rode on his smashes to open up a 5-1 lead and extended it to 10-4 in a completely one-sided display.

Antonsen used his tight spinning net game to trouble Srikanth in the first half of the second game and made it 5-5. But that was all he could do against a determined Srikanth who went up to 12-9 and closed out the match for his eighth win on the trot.

Hendra Setiawan and Mohammad Ahsan showed that age is just a number. With the entire stadium cheering vociferously for the Raptors pair, the former world champions never put their foot wrong and finished off a 15-13, 15-10 win.

The World No. 9 pair’s reflexes were too much for Mumbai’s Lee Yong Dae and Kim GI Jung and it was only a matter of time before the men in yellow grabbed the much-coveted win.

All arrangements have been put in place for the Kumbh Mela, that begins at Prayagraj in Uttar Pradesh from tomorrow. The Kumbh, world's largest congregation of humanity at one place, will commence with the Shahi Snan of Akharas. 

The administration has already banned entry of vehicles into the Mela area since last night. The event will be broadcast and telecast live by All India Radio and Doordarshan. AIR has set up a separate one kilowatt FM transmitter - Kumbhvani. The broadcast from Kumbhvani can be heard between 5:55 AM and 10:05 PM everyday in a radius of 35 kilometers.

AIR, for the first time, has also made arrangements for live streaming on YouTube of all programs broadcast from Kumbhvani. Doordarshan will start its telecast of special programs on Kumbh Mela from tomorrow. It will telecast about three hours programs each day.

The Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment has drafted a five-year action plan for addressing the problem of drug and substance abuse in the country, dumping a long-pending draft policy on the matter.

The National Action Plan for Drug Demand Reduction (2018-2023) aims to employ a multi-pronged strategy -- involving education, de-addiction and rehabilitation of affected individuals and their families -- to address the issue, a government official said.

The move comes after the ministry withdrew the draft National Drug Demand Reduction Policy from the Cabinet.

It had been pending for more than five-and-half years and was redrafted twice during the period.

"Instead of the policy, the ministry has now prepared a national action plan," the official said. The plan focuses on preventive education, awareness generation, counselling, treatment and rehabilitation of drug-dependent people, besides training and capacity-building of service providers through collaborative efforts of the Centre, state and NGOs, he said.

Gujarat is set to become the first state to provide 10 per cent reservation in jobs and educational institutions to the economically weaker sections in the general category. Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani on Sunday said the state would implement the Constitution (103 Amendment) Act, 2019, from Monday, ANI reported.

The development comes a day after President Ram Nath Kovind gave his assent to the 10 per cent reservation bill, which will be in addition to the existing cap of 50 per cent reservation for the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Classes. The Constitution (124 Amendment) Bill, 2019 was passed in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday and the Rajya Sabha a day later.

It may be recalled that way back in 2016, the Gujarat government under Anandiben Patel, had announced a similar 10 per cent reservation for the economically backward among upper castes, a move aimed at placating the influential Patidars who had launched a violent agitation seeking quota benefits.

However, the same year the Gujarat High Court quashed a government ordinance, holding that no quota could be granted on the basis of economic criteria because it was not provided for in the Constitution. In 1993, the apex court ruled that a state cannot provide more than 50 per cent reservation, and that reservation could only be allowed on “ground of social and educational backwardness and not poverty per se.”

According to the law, those who do not have land more than 5 acres, do not own residential plot more than 1,000 square feet and earn less than Rs 8 lakh per annum will be eligible for the reservation.

India and the five Central Asia nations have backed an inclusive peace process in Afghanistan that is Afghan-owned and Afghan-led. The understanding was reached at the first ever India-Central Asia Dialogue in Uzbekistan capital Samarkand yesterday. 

The Dialogue was chaired by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and her Uzbek counterpart Abdulaziz Kamilov. It was attended by the Foreign Ministers of Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan and the First Deputy Foreign Minister of Kazakhstan.

After the meeting, Ms Swaraj reiterated India's commitment to the economic reconstruction of war-torn Afghanistan. She pointed out that no business development, no investment can take place in a country suffering from terrorism. The External Affairs Minister said, to promote business development in the region, India agreed to fight the scourge of terrorism together. She offered to extend this partnership to Central Asia as well.

A joint statement issued at the end of the Dialogue said, India and the Central Asian countries, along with Afghanistan, condemned terrorism in all its forms and manifestations.

Heads of state of Denmark, Czech Republic, Uzbekistan, Rwanda and Republic of Malta are expected to arrive in Gandhinagar for the 9th edition of the Vibrant Gujarat Summit on January 18. Prime Minister Narendra Modi who will inaugurate the event will hold one-on-one meetings with the leaders on the sidelines of the summit along with hosting them on a dinner.

“Uzbekistan president Shavkat Mirziyoyev, Rwandan president Paul Kagame, Denmark’s prime minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen, Prime Minister of Czech Republic Andrej Babis and Prime Minister of Malta Joseph Muscat will be coming for the inauguration of the summit on January 18. PM Modi will be holding one-on-one meetings with them later in the day. The Ministry of External Affairs is organising the meetings at the Prime Minister’s lounge at Mahatma Mandir,” said JN Singh, Chief Secretary of Gujarat government while briefing mediapersons about the final phase of preparations for the summit.

Later in the evening, PM Modi will meet the head of Sovereign and Wealth Funds who will be coming for the “global investors round table” at the same venue. This meeting with PM is expected to last for 60 minutes. According to the state government official, PM Modi might stay back in Gujarat on January 18.

Kerala now has the tallest Shiva lingam in the country after the India Book of Records certified the 111.2-feet structure of Maheshwaram Sri Shiva Parvathy Temple at Chenkal in Thiruvananthapuram district.

The cylindrical structure has eight floors, six of which represent chakras or energy centres of the human body. Temple authorities are now hoping the shiva lingam will enter the Limca and Guinness Book of Records.

Pilgrims would be able to see a ‘kailasam’, a replica of Himalayas, and idols of Shiva and Parvati from the top of the shiva lingam. The pathway is adorned with murals and statues with 108 shiva lingams on the base floor.

It is the only temple in the world, where devotees can worship 12 Jyothirlingam of Lord Shiva and 32 forms of Lord Ganesha at one place.

The Odisha government on Friday launched a scheme to distribute free LED bulbs among the poor, with an aim to reduce household expenditure on electricity.

“The Chief Minister has started Ama Ghare LED Bulb programme. Through this scheme, existing 95 lakh beneficiaries enrolled in either NFSA (National Food Security Act) or SFS (State Food Security scheme) will receive four (9 watt) LED bulbs per family so that household electricity charges come down,” said state Energy Secretary Hemant Sharma in a press statement.

The scheme goes a step ahead of the Centre’s zero subsidy scheme, Unnat Jyoti by Affordable LEDs for All (UJALA), whose primary aim is to promote energy efficiency. In this scheme, the central government distributes LED bulbs through a state-run company, Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL). EESL procures the appliances and provides them to consumers at the rate of Rs 70 per LED bulb, Rs 220 per LED tube light and Rs 1,110 per fan. EESL’s website claims the rates are “much below the market price”.

“We have distributed 1.85 crore bulbs across Odisha since 2016. Sometimes, we have also distributed bulbs at a subsidised cost of Rs 50-60 in Gram Swaraj Abhiyaan programmes,” said Anil Sahoo, DGM, EESL Odisha.