Jan 28, 2025 | Current Affairs for UPSC, State PCS & other Govt. Exams

Jasprit Bumrah has been honored with the Sir Garfield Sobers Award as the ICC Men’s Cricketer of the Year 2024.

The short film Anuja, produced by Priyanka Chopra and Guneet Monga, has been nominated for Best Live Action Short Film at the 97th Academy Awards. Directed by Adam J. Graves, the film portrays the story of a young girl working in a garment factory in Delhi.

The Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings by Subject 2025 have been released. The United States continues to dominate, securing top positions in nine out of eleven subjects.

In the Engineering category, the top three universities are Harvard University, Stanford University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

In Computer Science, the University of Oxford has claimed the top spot.

World Leprosy Day 2025 will be observed on January 26. The theme for this year is "Unite. Act. Eliminate." Leprosy, also known as Hansen's disease, is a chronic bacterial infection that affects the skin, nerves, eyes, and nose.

India is set to launch its first human underwater submersible (Deep-Sea Manned Vehicle) in 2025. The initial submersible will operate at a depth of up to 500 meters, with a subsequent goal of reaching an impressive 6,000 meters under the Deep Ocean Mission (DOM).

Earlier, India launched its first and unique Manned Ocean Mission, Samudrayan, in Chennai for deep-ocean explorations.

The Deep Ocean Mission (DOM) is a flagship program launched in 2021 for a period of five years. The Ministry of Earth Sciences serves as the nodal ministry for this initiative.

This mission has the potential to unlock vast resources, including critical minerals, rare metals, and undiscovered marine biodiversity, all of which are crucial for the country’s economic growth and environmental sustainability.

In 2024, New Zealand's Amelia (Melie) Kerr emerged as the standout player in women's cricket, earning the prestigious Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy (awarded as the ICC Women's Player of the Year) for her exceptional performance throughout the year.

Alexander Lukashenko has been re-elected as Belarus's president for a seventh term, claiming nearly 87% of the vote in an election widely denounced as fraudulent.

Seven more countries have joined the Global Plastic Action Partnership (GPAP) during the World Economic Forum (WEF) 2025 Annual Meeting. As a result, the total number of countries involved in this initiative has increased to 25.

These countries will work on reducing global plastic waste, promoting sustainable materials, and strengthening recycling systems. GPAP was officially launched in September 2018 by the WEF at the Sustainable Development Impact Summit.

On the morning of January 29, 2025, ISRO achieved a historic milestone by successfully conducting its 100th launch from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota.

The GSLV-F15, carrying the NVS-02 satellite, lifted off from the spaceport's second launch pad. Nineteen minutes later, the GSLV-F15, equipped with an indigenous cryogenic stage, successfully placed the NVS-02 satellite into a Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit as intended.

The NVS-02 is the second satellite in the NVS series and forms part of India's Navigation with Indian Constellation (NavIC) system.

NavIC is India's independent regional navigation satellite system designed to provide accurate Position, Velocity, and Timing (PVT) services to users in India and regions extending approximately 1,500 km beyond the Indian landmass, which constitutes its primary service area.

NavIC offers two types of services: Standard Positioning Service (SPS) and Restricted Service (RS). The SPS provides a position accuracy of better than 20 meters (2σ) and a timing accuracy of better than 40 nanoseconds (2σ) within the primary service area.

India has officially joined the multinational Eurodrone program as an observer nation. The announcement was made by the Organisation for Joint Armament Cooperation (OCCAR), which oversees several prominent European defense projects, including the A400M Atlas airlifter, Boxer armored utility vehicle, Tiger attack helicopter, and the Horizon Mid-life Upgrade (MLU)/FREMM multirole frigates.

India’s inclusion in the Eurodrone Medium Altitude Long Endurance (MALE) Remotely Piloted Air System (RPAS) program makes it the second Asia-Pacific country, after Japan, to join as an observer. While observer nations have access to technical data and the ability to place orders for the aircraft, they are not involved in decision-making processes regarding the platform's design, development, or workshare distribution among the participating countries.

The Eurodrone program, valued at approximately €7 billion ($7.3 billion), was launched in 2016 and is led by four European nations: France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. The project is spearheaded by major industry partners such as Airbus, Dassault, and Leonardo, and aims to reduce European reliance on non-European systems like the US-made MQ-9B.

On January 27, 2025, Chinese startup DeepSeek's AI Assistant overtook its rival, ChatGPT, to become the top-rated free application on Apple's App Store in the United States.

AI models, from ChatGPT to DeepSeek, require advanced chips to power their training. Since 2021, the Biden administration has widened the scope of bans aimed at preventing these chips from being exported to China and used to train AI models developed by Chinese firms.

Little is known about the company behind DeepSeek, a small Hangzhou-based startup founded in 2023, the same year that search engine giant Baidu released the first Chinese AI large-language model.

On January 27, 2025, Pune reported nine additional suspected cases of Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS). While fatalities from this disease are rare, an unfortunate case was reported in Solapur, where a patient suspected of having GBS passed away.

GBS is a rare condition characterized by sudden numbness and muscle weakness, with symptoms such as severe limb weakness and loose stools, among others. The syndrome is often triggered by bacterial or viral infections, which compromise the patient's immune system.

Notably, the Campylobacter jejuni bacteria, commonly associated with stomach infections, is known to trigger GBS. Consuming water contaminated with this bacteria can increase the risk of developing this immunological nerve disorder.