* Sojat Mehndi (Henna) from Rajasthan has been awarded geographical indication (GI) tag.

* Sojat tehsil of Pali district, Rajasthan has suitable geological structure, topography and drainage system, climate, and soil for naturally cultivating the mehndi leave crop.

* RBI has set the limit for Ways and Means Advances (WMA) for the second half of financial year 2021-22 (October 2021 to March 2022) at Rs. 50,000 crores.

* RBI may trigger fresh floatation of market loans when the Government of India utilizes 75% of the WMA limit.

* interest rate on WMA/overdraft will be:

* For WMA: Repo Rate

* For Overdraft: Two percent above the Repo Rate

* WMAs are short-term advances given by central bank to help states tide over temporary mismatches in their cash flow.

* Russia is planning to launch manned spacecraft as well as cargo spacecraft to the Internation Space Station (ISS) in the year 2022.

* The information was obtained from the flight program.

* The program hints that Russia is planning to launch the Soyuz MS-21 spacecraft with astronauts Oleg Artemyev, Denis Matveyev and Sergey Korsakov on March 18, 2022. The Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft is scheduled to launch in September 21 with astronauts Sergey Prokopyev, Anna Kikina and Dmitry Petelin.

* Ratings agency ICRA has revised up its 2021-22 real GDP growth estimate for India to 9 per cent from the earlier 8.5 per cent.

* It can be noted that after the 7.3 per cent contraction in 2020-21, there were expectations of a higher growth number in 2021-22.

* However, the second wave of COVID-19 infections early into the fiscal year, which spread even in the hinterland, made analysts more circumspect.

* The RBI expects the economy to grow at 9.5 per cent.

* The robust kharif harvest is likely to sustain the consumption demand from the farm sector while the expected acceleration in the central government spending after the withdrawal of the earlier cash management guidelines will recharge this key driver of aggregate demand.

* The National Commission for Women (NCW) has launched a countrywide training and capacity building programme for women in dairy farming?

* NCW is collaborating with agricultural universities all across India to identify and train women associated with dairy farming and allied activities in different aspects such as value addition, quality enhancement, packaging and marketing of dairy products among others.

* the first programme under the project was organised on ''Value Added Dairy products'' for women self help groups at the Lala Lajpat Rai University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, Hisar, in association with the Haryana State Rural Livelihood Mission.

* International Day for the Universal Access to Information (Access to Information Day) is observed every year on 28 September

* Universal access to information: everyone has the right to seek, receive and impart information for healthy and inclusive knowledge societies.

* Initially, it was designated by UNESCO in November 2015 and was first held on 28 September 2016.

* It was later proclaimed on 15 October 2019 at 74th UN General Assembly.

* Theme 2021: The Right to Know – Building Back Better with Access to Information.

* World Rabies Day is being observed annually on September 28 to raise awareness about the impact of rabies on humans and animals, provide information and advice on how to prevent the disease and take efforts to control rabies.

* 2021 is the 15th edition of World Rabies Day.

* Theme of WRD 2021: Rabies: Facts, not Fear.

* The day marks the death anniversary of the French chemist and microbiologist, Louis Pasteur’, who developed the first rabies vaccine.

* Highest-rated chess player of all time, Magnus Carlsen has been appointed as the global brand ambassador of Mastercard Inc.

* This step is part of move by Mastercard for adding chess in its coveted list of sports sponsorship.

* It has joined Meltwater Champions Chess Tour as an official partner, in its first sponsorship move into chess.

* Norwegian chess Grandmaster Magnus Carlsen joins like of other competitive players lineup of ambassador like Lionel Messi, Naomi Osaka, Crystal Dunn and Dan Carter.

* Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) has successfully conducted maiden test flight of new version of Akash Missile named as ‘Akash Prime’ from Integrated Test Range (ITR), Chandipur, Odisha

* Akash Prime is equipped with an indigenous active Radio Frequency (RF) seeker for improved accuracy, as compared to the existing Akash System.

* Improved version of the missile will also ensure more reliable performance under low temperature environments at higher altitudes

* Chairman DRDO: G Satheesh Reddy.

* The Indian Navy and the Royal Navy of Oman signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on the exchange of white shipping information.

* The MoU was signed at the Maritime Security Center (MSC) in Muscat during the Indian Chief of the Naval Staff Admiral Karambir Singh’s ongoing three-day visit to Oman.

* The signing of the MoU between the Royal Navy of Oman and the Indian Navy will facilitate information exchange on merchant shipping traffic through the Information Fusion Centre-Indian Ocean Region, the dedicated centre in Gurugram for undertaking collation, fusion, and dissemination of data with partner countries, and the Muscat-headquartered MSC.

* The MoU on exchange of white shipping information is expected to contribute to enhanced maritime safety and security, mutual collaboration, exchange of information and understanding the concerns and threats which are prevalent in the entire region.

* The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi has established a ‘Centre of Excellence (CoE) on Quantum Technologies’ to conduct research activities in the related field.

* It will bring synergy and coherence in the activities being carried out at IIT Delhi and support the principal investigators to pitch in for more significant projects from the DST and other funding agencies, claims the institute.

* The centre will focus on select thrust areas, such as quantum computing, quantum communication, quantum sensing, and metrology, and quantum materials and devices.

* Centre would undertake the design and development of new quantum materials. It would also undertake research activities related to the quantum processor & cryogenic controller, modelling and technology development of semiconducting qubits such as CMOS and 2D materials, quantum biophotonics, quantum sensing & metrology, development of single-photon detectors etc.

* Switzerland has agreed to legalise marriage for same-sex couples by a nearly two-thirds majority in a referendum.

* According to results provided by the Swiss federal chancellery, 64.1 percent of voters voted in favour of same-sex marriage in Sunday’s nationwide referendum.

* Switzerland is the world’s 30th country to adopt same-sex marriages, and one of the last remaining western European nations to do so.

* The Netherlands was the first in 2001.

* 99th Military Engineering Services Raising Day was observed on September 26, 2021.

* On this occasion Lt Gen Harpal Singh Engineer-in-Chief, urged all the Military Engineer Services personnel to continue dedicating themselves to the Military Engineering Services.

* MES is a premier construction agency and an important pillar of Corps of Engineers of the Indian Army.

* It provides rear line engineering support to the Armed Forces and other associated organisations of the Ministry of Defence (MoD). MES is the largest construction and maintenance agencies in India having an annual workload of about Rs 30000 crore.

* The 45th Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council meeting in Lucknow held earlier this month had announced the formation of two groups of ministers (GoM) that would be constituted to review various aspects of the indirect tax regime.

* A GoM led by Karnataka chief minister Basavaraj S. Bommai has been tasked to propose rationalisation of tax rates and considering the merger of different tax slabs within two months.

* This marks the first steps taken by the government towards a complete overhaul of the indirect tax regime to augment revenue.

* The GoM’s terms of reference on rate rationalization said that it would be reviewing inverted duty structure in all items except where the Council has already announced its decision to fix the inverted structure.

* The panel would also have to recommend suitable rates to eliminate the inverted duty structure to bring down instances of refunds as well as undertake a review of the current tax slab rates to propose changes that would be needed to garner required resources.

* The seven-member group includes West Bengal finance minister Amit Mitra, Kerala's finance minister K N Balagopal and GST Council members from Bihar, Rajasthan, Goa, and Uttar Pradesh. The group would have to suggest immediate changes, as well as come up with a roadmap for short- and medium-term changes to the GST rate structure.

• The book has titled “The Battle of Rezang La” authored by ex-naval officer and author Kulpreet Yadav has been released recently.

• The book was published under Penguin Random House’s ”Veer” imprint,

• A new book tells the story of 120 Indian soldiers who put up a valiant fight against the 5,000-strong Chinese military troops in the 1962 Indo-China war, preventing a possible occupation of the entire Ladakh region.

• The book titled “My Life in Full: Work, Family and our Future” is a memoir of former CEO of PepsiCo Indira Nooyi.

• In her book Indra Nooyi focusses on the importance that organisational support plays in working women’s lives.

• She tells that how did a middle-class girl from Chennai who went to business school “with men, was taught by men and studied the work of men to enter industries dominated by men” become the global chief executive of PepsiCo in 2006 and only the 11th woman to lead a Fortune 500 company.

• In the book, Nooyi focuses on the importance that organisational support plays in working women’s lives.

• E-commerce major Amazon India announced the launch of Amazon Future Engineer, its global computer science education programme, in India.

• According to the company, the programme will enable access to quality computer science education and career opportunities for students from underrepresented and underserved communities.

• In the first year of its launch, Amazon aims to enable and deliver learning opportunities to more than 1 lakh students from 900 government and aided schools across seven states in India.

• The national Mid-Day Meal Scheme in government and aided schools popularly will now be known as PM POSHAN Scheme and will also cover students of balvatikas or pre primary classes.

• The Union Cabinet approved the roll-out of the 'PM POSHAN in Schools' scheme that will provide hot cooked meal to students of elementary classes in government and government-aided schools across the country.

• CCEA cleared the PM POSHAN (POshan SHakti Nirman) Scheme for providing one hot cooked meal in government and government-aided schools from 2021-22 to 2025-26, earlier known as 'National Programme for Mid-Day Meal in Schools popularly known as Mid-Day Meal Scheme.

• This is a centrally-sponsored scheme which covers all school children studying in classes 1 to 8 in government, government-aided schools.

* RBI has issued guidelines regarding Securitization of Standard Assets and loan transfer that will be applicable to all scheduled commercial banks, excluding RRBs, all-India term financial institutions, small finance banks and NBFCs

* As per the guidelines of RBI, minimum ticket size for issuance of securitization notes will be Rs.1 crore

* Minimum holding period for different categories of loans after which they shall become eligible for transfer has been prescribed in it.

* As part of Azaadi ka Amrit Mahotsav and on the occasion of Antyodaya Diwas that marks the birth anniversary of Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyaya on 25th September 2021, the National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (NIRD&PR), Hyderabad under the auspices of the Ministry of Rural Development presented Hunarbaaz Awards to 75 diyangjan candidates from 15 states.

* The virtual award ceremony was organised by NIRDPR with MoRD, in association with State Rural Livelihood Missions (SRLMs) and Rural Self-employment Training Institutes.

* CEOs of SRLMs and Directors of RSETIs handed over the awards at the respective states to the specially-abled achievers.