To facilitate a robust digital payment ecosystem across the country, the Union Cabinet approved an incentive scheme worth Rs 2,600 to promote RuPay debit cards and low-value BHIM-UPI transactions (person-to-merchant) for a year starting April 2022.

• In a statement on January 11, 2023, the cabinet notified that under the scheme, “acquiring banks will be provided financial incentive, for promoting Point-of-Sale (PoS) and e-commerce transactions using RuPay Debit Cards and low-value BHIM-UPI transactions (P2M) for the financial year FY2022-23.”
• Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced the government’s intent to continue supporting digital payments to promote payment platforms that are economical and user-friendly.

Research and Development Organization (DRDO) has developed an unmanned aerial vehicle with the aim of targeting logistics operations on the Himalayan border.

• This aircraft has been displayed by DRDO at the 108th Indian Science Congress held in Nagpur, Maharashtra.

• This UAV can fly with a load of 5 to 25 kg. and is also capable of dropping bombs in enemy territory.

• The UAV, a tethered multi-copter will be used for logistics operations in the Himalayan border region. 

• The aircraft can conduct autonomous missions within a radius of five kilometres and automatically return to the origin after delivering the cargo to the designated location.

The Indian High Commission signed a memorandum of understanding to establish a Hindi Chair at the Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka.

• High Commissioner Gopal Baglay and Vice Chancellor of Sabaragamuwa University Prof. Udaya Rathnayake signed the MoU to establish the Hindi Chair as part of India’s cultural connect through the Indian Council for Cultural Relations.
• The Hindi chair will help in familiarizing students with India, its history, and culture as well as pave way for popularising Hindi by deputing Indian faculties. Mr. Baglay also gave away prizes to the winners of the Hindi Kavita competition held at the university.

The Russian space agency Roscosmos says it will launch the next scheduled Soyuz – an uncrewed mission – one month early.

• That’s so it can replace the leaking Soyuz capsule MS-22, currently docked at the International Space Station (ISS). That capsule carried three crew members to the ISS last September.
• But on December 15, 2022, a micrometeoroid – a tiny bit of rock in space – struck the MS-22. The particle pierced the capsule’s radiator, causing it to leak. So, the Soyuz capsule MS-22 has been out of action, its crew technically stranded until the replacement MS-23 arrives.
• The stranded crew members are: Russian cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev and Demitri Petelin, and American astronaut Frank Rubio.
• MS-23 is scheduled to liftoff on February 20, 2023.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will on January 13 flag off the 51-day luxury Ganga cruise from Varanasi to Dibrugarh, via Bangladesh, a 3,200-km river voyage being pitched as the world’s longest.

The Centre has named the new Integrated Food Security Scheme as Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Ann Yojana, PMGKAY.

• Implementation of the new scheme has started from 1st of January this year, benefiting more than 80 crore poor and poorest of poor.
• The integrated scheme will strengthen the provisions of National Food Security Act in terms of accessibility, affordability, and availability of foodgrains for the poor. Necessary steps have already been taken for smooth implementation of the PMGKAY in the field.
• The Central Government will spend more than two lakh crore rupees in 2023 as food subsidies under NFSA and other welfare schemes, to remove the financial burden of the poor and the poorest of the poor.

The Union Cabinet has approved the setting up of three national-level multi-State cooperative societies to act as an apex body for procurement, processing, marketing and distribution of seeds.

• Union Home and Cooperation Minister Amit Shah said on Wednesday that the societies would help the “protection of indigenous natural seeds which are becoming extinct”.
• In a tweet, he said the cooperatives were the only sector that touched crores of people, but had remained ignored for many years till the Narendra Modi government decided to strengthen them.

The Integrated Test Range, Chandipur, off the coast of Odisha, successfully conducted a training launch of the Short-Range Ballistic Missile Prithvi-II .

• The missile “hit its target with remarkable accuracy,” according to the defence ministry.
• “A well-established system, Prithvi-II missile has been an integral part of India’s nuclear deterrence. 
• The Indian Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) created the short-range, surface-to-surface Prithvi II missile. It is a member of India’s Prithvi missile family, which also consists of the Dhanush, Prithvi-I, Prithvi-II, and Prithvi-III.

Every year on January 12, India observes National Youth Day to commemorate the birthday of Swami Vivekananda, one of the country’s most influential leaders.

• This national event honors the country’s youth and encourages them to embrace Vivekananda’s ideas and philosophies.
• This year Theme - This year, the National Youth Day 2023 theme is “Viksit Yuva-Viksit Bharat.
• The Indian government first declared Swami Vivekananda’s birthday, January 12, as National Youth Day in 1984. Since then, the day has been observed as National Youth Day throughout the country.

NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) mission has discovered a second Earth-sized, rocky planet within the habitable zone of its star – the range of distances where liquid water could occur on a planet’s surface.

• The planet, named TOI 700 e, is one of only a few systems with multiple, small, habitable-zone planets that we know of.
• The discovery was made by a team led by Emily Gilbert, a postdoctoral fellow at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California.
• The discovery of TOI 700 e expands the known sample of potentially habitable rocky planets, and opens the door to future studies to understand the habitability of these worlds and search for signs of life on them.