UPSC made important changes in the exam pattern of Civil Services Exam in 2013. Since then current affairs have become very important to score high marks in UPSC CSE exam.
Current Affairs dominates both the Prelims as well as Mains stage of the exam. Even in current affairs questions from government schemes have become quiet frequent.
In the last few years’direct questions have been asked from government schemes in IASPrelims. So awareness about government schemes is bound to improve your chances of qualifying prelims.
In the Mains Stage, though direct questions from schemes are rare but if you can add government schemes to substantiate your answer it will boost your score in UPSC Mains exam.
To help you boost your current affairs we are proving 10 most important Government Schemes for IAS preparation for UPSC Prelims 2019
1. SHREYAS(Scheme for Higher Education Youth in Apprenticeship and Skills)
The HRD ministry launched the Scheme for Higher Education Youth in Apprenticeship and Skills (SHREYAS) for providing industry apprenticeship opportunities to the general graduates exiting in April 2019 through the National Apprenticeship Promotional Scheme (NAPS).
•The program aims to enhance the employability of Indian youth by providing ‘on the job work exposure’ and earning of scholarship.
•SHREYAS will be a major effort in this direction to make our degree students more skilled, capable, employable and aligned to the needs of our economy so that they contribute to country’s progress and also obtain gainful employment.
•SHREYAS portal will enable educational institutions and industry to log in and provide their respective demand and supply of apparent
•The scheme will be implemented by the Sector Skill Councils (SSCs).
•Three Tracks in Implementation in SHREYA
Add-on apprenticeship (Degree apprenticeship)
Embedded Apprenticeshi
Linking National Career Service with Colleges
2. Operation Digital Board
The Ministry of Human Resource Development launched Operation Digital Board to leverage technology in order to boost quality education in the country.
•Operation Digital Board is a revolutionary step which will make the learning as well as the teaching process interactive and popularize flipped learning as a pedagogical approach.
•The digital board will be introduced all over the country in government and government aided schools from class 9th onwards as well as in higher education institutions.
•The process will begin from the coming session of 2019 .
•Implementation in Higher Education Institutions(HEIs)
UGC will be the implementing agency for ODB in HEIs.
•Implementation in Schools
Digital / SMART board will be provided in all Government and Government – aided schools having Secondary and Sr. Secondary classes.
3. Smart India Hackath 2019
Smart India Hackathon 2019 is a nationwide initiative to provide students a platform to solve some of pressing problems we face in our daily lives, and thus inculcate a culture of product innovation and a mindset of problem solving.
•An initiative by Ministry of HRD, AICTE, Persistent Systems, i4c and Rambhau Mhalgi Prabodhini
•World's biggest Software and Hardware hackathon
•3rd edition of highly successful Smart India Hackathon initiative
•Technology Students across India compete to creatively solve problems and offer technical solutions
•To harness expertise of students from IISc, IITs, NITs and AICTE/UGC approved institutes.
4. Pariksha Pe Charcha 2.0
Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi interacted with Students, Teachers and Parents from India and abroad in this year’s edition of Pariksha Pe Charcha 2.0 held at Talkatora Stadium, New Delhi today.
•The Ministry of Human Resource Development of Government of India organized the Pariksha Pe Charcha 2.0 programme.
•The interaction lasted for over ninety minutes and the Prime Minister took questions from 18 participants including students, teachers and parents.
•Arrangements were made for live telecast of the programme in all Government and CBSE Schools and Higher Education Institutions/Colleges of the Country and abroad.
•For the first time, Indian students residing abroad from countries like Bangladesh, Ethiopia, etc were connected to the programme live.
5. Menstrual Hygiene for Adolescentgirls Schemes
To address the need of menstrual hygiene among adolescent girls residing primarily in rural areas, Government of India is supporting the Menstrual Hygiene Scheme, under which, funds are provided to States/UTs through National Health Mission for decentralized procurement of sanitary napkins packs for provision primarily to rural adolescent girls.
This scheme encompasses the following:
• Increasing awareness among adolescent girls on Menstrual Hygiene
• Improving access to use of high quality sanitary napkins by adolescent girls in rural areas.
• Ensuring safe disposal of Sanitary Napkins in an environmentally friendly manner.
• Provision of funds to ASHAs to hold monthly meeting with adolescents to discuss issues related to menstrual hygiene.
A range of IEC material has been developed around Menstrual hygiene Scheme, using a 360 degree approach to create awareness among adolescent girls about safe & hygienic menstrual health.
6. Ayushman Bharat –Pradhan Mantri Jan AarogyaYojana (AB-PMJAY)
Ayushman Bharat – Pradhan Mantri Jan AarogyaYojana (AB-PMJAY) by the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi on 23rd September, 2018 at Ranchi, Jharkhand. This is the “world’s largest government funded healthcare program” targeting more than 50 crore beneficiaries.
BENEFITS UNDER THE SCHEME
•Ayushman Bharat- Pradhan Mantri Jan ArogyaYojana (PMJAY) will provide a cover of up to Rs. 5 lakhs per family per year, for secondary and tertiary care hospitalization.
•Over 10.74 crore vulnerable entitled families (approximately 50 crore beneficiaries) will be eligible for these benefits. . There is no cap on family size and age as well as restriction on pre-existing conditions.
•PMJAY will provide cashless and paperless access to services for the beneficiary at the point of service.
•PMJAY will help reduce catastrophic expenditure for hospitalizations, which impoverishes people and will help mitigate the financial risk arising out of catastrophic health episodes.
•When fully implemented, PMJAY will become the world’s largest fully government-financed health protection scheme. It is a visionary step towards advancing the agenda of Universal Health Coverage (UHC).
•PMJAY primarily targets the poor, deprived rural families and identified occupational category of urban workers’ families as per the latest Socio-Economic Caste Census (SECC) data for both rural and urban areas as well as the active families under the RashtriyaSwasthyaBimaYojana (RSBY).
Pradhan MantriAarogyaMitra (PMAM)
The scheme is creating a cadre of certified frontline health service professionals called Pradhan MantriAarogyaMitras (PMAMs) who will be primary point of facilitation for the beneficiaries to avail treatment at the hospital.
7.Paint Your Toilet
In an effort to promote ownership and sustained usage of toilets and also provide a facelift to the crores of toilets built under the Swachh Bharat Mission, the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation has launched a month-long campaign, “Swachh Sundar Shauchalaya” that commenced on 1st January.
•Unique Countrywide Exercise by Swachh Bharat Mission
• The campaign comprises a unique Contest, under which, households are being mobilised to paint and decorate their toilet.
•It will be spearheaded by Gram Panchayats and coordinated by district administrations. The campaign will involve rural communities in the 2.5 lakh Gram Panchayats across the country. their work.
8.POSHAN Abhiyaan
•Poshan abhiyaanis India’s flagship programme to improve nutritional outcomes forchildren, adolescents, pregnant women and lactating mothers by leveraging technology a targeted approach and convergence.
•POSHAN Abhiyaan was launched by the Prime Minister in Jhunjhunu on 8th March 2018.
•POSHAN Abhiyan also The National Nutrition Mission (NNM) has been set up with a three-year budget of Rs. 9046.17 crore commencing from 2017 - 18. The scheme would be under Women and Child Development Ministry.
•POSHAN stands for PM’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment
•It would comprise mapping of various Schemes contributing towards addressing malnutrition,
•Others Targets of NNM targets to reduce stunting, under-nutrition, anemia (among young children, women and adolescent girls) and reduce low birth weight
9.India hosts ‘4th Global Digital Health Partnership Summit’
The global intergovernmental meeting on digital health is being hosted by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in collaboration with World Health Organization (WHO) and the Global Digital Health Partnership (GDHP).
•India is committed to reaching the last man in the line through digital health interventions and digital inclusion. “Digital governance is good governance and bridging a digital divide must be achieved through technology that is low cost”.
•Ministry is in the process of establishing an Integrated Health Information Platform for interoperability amongst various health IT systems and a pan-India exchange of Electronic Health Records of citizens ensuring privacy, security, and confidentiality of data.
•The Global Digital Health Partnership (GDHP) is an international collaboration of governments, government agencies and multinational organisations dedicated to improving the health and well-being of their citizens through the best use of evidence-based digital technologies.
10. E-AUSHADHI portal
AYUSH Ministry launched the e-AUSHADHI portal, for online licensing of Ayurveda, Siddha, Unani and Homoeopathy drugs and related matters.
•This e-AUSHADHI portal is intended for increased transparency, improved information management facility, improved data usability and increased accountability.
•The timelines will be fixed for processing of application through this portal with SMS and e-mail status updates at each step of the process.
•This new e-portal is an acronym for Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy Automated Drug Help Initiative.
•This portal will aid the licensing authority,manufactures and consumers, as it will provide real time information of the licensed manufactures and their products, cancelled and spurious drugs, contact details of the concerned authority for specific grievances.
Current Affairs dominates both the Prelims as well as Mains stage of the exam. Even in current affairs questions from government schemes have become quiet frequent.
In the last few years’direct questions have been asked from government schemes in IASPrelims. So awareness about government schemes is bound to improve your chances of qualifying prelims.
To help you boost your current affairs we are proving 10 most important Government Schemes for IAS preparation for UPSC Prelims 2019
1. SHREYAS(Scheme for Higher Education Youth in Apprenticeship and Skills)
The HRD ministry launched the Scheme for Higher Education Youth in Apprenticeship and Skills (SHREYAS) for providing industry apprenticeship opportunities to the general graduates exiting in April 2019 through the National Apprenticeship Promotional Scheme (NAPS).
•The program aims to enhance the employability of Indian youth by providing ‘on the job work exposure’ and earning of scholarship.
•SHREYAS will be a major effort in this direction to make our degree students more skilled, capable, employable and aligned to the needs of our economy so that they contribute to country’s progress and also obtain gainful employment.
•SHREYAS portal will enable educational institutions and industry to log in and provide their respective demand and supply of apparent
•The scheme will be implemented by the Sector Skill Councils (SSCs).
•Three Tracks in Implementation in SHREYA
Add-on apprenticeship (Degree apprenticeship)
Embedded Apprenticeshi
Linking National Career Service with Colleges
2. Operation Digital Board
The Ministry of Human Resource Development launched Operation Digital Board to leverage technology in order to boost quality education in the country.
•Operation Digital Board is a revolutionary step which will make the learning as well as the teaching process interactive and popularize flipped learning as a pedagogical approach.
•The digital board will be introduced all over the country in government and government aided schools from class 9th onwards as well as in higher education institutions.
•The process will begin from the coming session of 2019 .
•Implementation in Higher Education Institutions(HEIs)
UGC will be the implementing agency for ODB in HEIs.
•Implementation in Schools
Digital / SMART board will be provided in all Government and Government – aided schools having Secondary and Sr. Secondary classes.
3. Smart India Hackath 2019
Smart India Hackathon 2019 is a nationwide initiative to provide students a platform to solve some of pressing problems we face in our daily lives, and thus inculcate a culture of product innovation and a mindset of problem solving.
•An initiative by Ministry of HRD, AICTE, Persistent Systems, i4c and Rambhau Mhalgi Prabodhini
•World's biggest Software and Hardware hackathon
•3rd edition of highly successful Smart India Hackathon initiative
•Technology Students across India compete to creatively solve problems and offer technical solutions
•To harness expertise of students from IISc, IITs, NITs and AICTE/UGC approved institutes.
4. Pariksha Pe Charcha 2.0
Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi interacted with Students, Teachers and Parents from India and abroad in this year’s edition of Pariksha Pe Charcha 2.0 held at Talkatora Stadium, New Delhi today.
•The Ministry of Human Resource Development of Government of India organized the Pariksha Pe Charcha 2.0 programme.
•The interaction lasted for over ninety minutes and the Prime Minister took questions from 18 participants including students, teachers and parents.
•Arrangements were made for live telecast of the programme in all Government and CBSE Schools and Higher Education Institutions/Colleges of the Country and abroad.
•For the first time, Indian students residing abroad from countries like Bangladesh, Ethiopia, etc were connected to the programme live.
5. Menstrual Hygiene for Adolescentgirls Schemes
To address the need of menstrual hygiene among adolescent girls residing primarily in rural areas, Government of India is supporting the Menstrual Hygiene Scheme, under which, funds are provided to States/UTs through National Health Mission for decentralized procurement of sanitary napkins packs for provision primarily to rural adolescent girls.
This scheme encompasses the following:
• Increasing awareness among adolescent girls on Menstrual Hygiene
• Improving access to use of high quality sanitary napkins by adolescent girls in rural areas.
• Ensuring safe disposal of Sanitary Napkins in an environmentally friendly manner.
• Provision of funds to ASHAs to hold monthly meeting with adolescents to discuss issues related to menstrual hygiene.
A range of IEC material has been developed around Menstrual hygiene Scheme, using a 360 degree approach to create awareness among adolescent girls about safe & hygienic menstrual health.
6. Ayushman Bharat –Pradhan Mantri Jan AarogyaYojana (AB-PMJAY)
Ayushman Bharat – Pradhan Mantri Jan AarogyaYojana (AB-PMJAY) by the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi on 23rd September, 2018 at Ranchi, Jharkhand. This is the “world’s largest government funded healthcare program” targeting more than 50 crore beneficiaries.
BENEFITS UNDER THE SCHEME
•Ayushman Bharat- Pradhan Mantri Jan ArogyaYojana (PMJAY) will provide a cover of up to Rs. 5 lakhs per family per year, for secondary and tertiary care hospitalization.
•Over 10.74 crore vulnerable entitled families (approximately 50 crore beneficiaries) will be eligible for these benefits. . There is no cap on family size and age as well as restriction on pre-existing conditions.
•PMJAY will provide cashless and paperless access to services for the beneficiary at the point of service.
•PMJAY will help reduce catastrophic expenditure for hospitalizations, which impoverishes people and will help mitigate the financial risk arising out of catastrophic health episodes.
•When fully implemented, PMJAY will become the world’s largest fully government-financed health protection scheme. It is a visionary step towards advancing the agenda of Universal Health Coverage (UHC).
•PMJAY primarily targets the poor, deprived rural families and identified occupational category of urban workers’ families as per the latest Socio-Economic Caste Census (SECC) data for both rural and urban areas as well as the active families under the RashtriyaSwasthyaBimaYojana (RSBY).
Pradhan MantriAarogyaMitra (PMAM)
The scheme is creating a cadre of certified frontline health service professionals called Pradhan MantriAarogyaMitras (PMAMs) who will be primary point of facilitation for the beneficiaries to avail treatment at the hospital.
7.Paint Your Toilet
In an effort to promote ownership and sustained usage of toilets and also provide a facelift to the crores of toilets built under the Swachh Bharat Mission, the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation has launched a month-long campaign, “Swachh Sundar Shauchalaya” that commenced on 1st January.
•Unique Countrywide Exercise by Swachh Bharat Mission
• The campaign comprises a unique Contest, under which, households are being mobilised to paint and decorate their toilet.
•It will be spearheaded by Gram Panchayats and coordinated by district administrations. The campaign will involve rural communities in the 2.5 lakh Gram Panchayats across the country. their work.
8.POSHAN Abhiyaan
•Poshan abhiyaanis India’s flagship programme to improve nutritional outcomes forchildren, adolescents, pregnant women and lactating mothers by leveraging technology a targeted approach and convergence.
•POSHAN Abhiyaan was launched by the Prime Minister in Jhunjhunu on 8th March 2018.
•POSHAN Abhiyan also The National Nutrition Mission (NNM) has been set up with a three-year budget of Rs. 9046.17 crore commencing from 2017 - 18. The scheme would be under Women and Child Development Ministry.
•POSHAN stands for PM’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment
•It would comprise mapping of various Schemes contributing towards addressing malnutrition,
•Others Targets of NNM targets to reduce stunting, under-nutrition, anemia (among young children, women and adolescent girls) and reduce low birth weight
9.India hosts ‘4th Global Digital Health Partnership Summit’
The global intergovernmental meeting on digital health is being hosted by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in collaboration with World Health Organization (WHO) and the Global Digital Health Partnership (GDHP).
•India is committed to reaching the last man in the line through digital health interventions and digital inclusion. “Digital governance is good governance and bridging a digital divide must be achieved through technology that is low cost”.
•Ministry is in the process of establishing an Integrated Health Information Platform for interoperability amongst various health IT systems and a pan-India exchange of Electronic Health Records of citizens ensuring privacy, security, and confidentiality of data.
•The Global Digital Health Partnership (GDHP) is an international collaboration of governments, government agencies and multinational organisations dedicated to improving the health and well-being of their citizens through the best use of evidence-based digital technologies.
10. E-AUSHADHI portal
AYUSH Ministry launched the e-AUSHADHI portal, for online licensing of Ayurveda, Siddha, Unani and Homoeopathy drugs and related matters.
•This e-AUSHADHI portal is intended for increased transparency, improved information management facility, improved data usability and increased accountability.
•The timelines will be fixed for processing of application through this portal with SMS and e-mail status updates at each step of the process.
•This new e-portal is an acronym for Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy Automated Drug Help Initiative.
•This portal will aid the licensing authority,manufactures and consumers, as it will provide real time information of the licensed manufactures and their products, cancelled and spurious drugs, contact details of the concerned authority for specific grievances.
ABOUT ANISH PASSI
Anish Passi, is the Director at Neostencil which
is a unique platform for Test Preparation where you can access live classrooms
of the best teachers in India, from the comfort of your home. He is an Engineer
from McMaster University, Canada and an MBA from IIM, Ahmedabad. He previously
founded Testcafe and has extensive experience in the Education industry.
