News in Short

• India’s real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the current fiscal year is estimated to grow by 8.3%, the World Bank said as it released a South Asia economic focus report.
• This growth estimate is supported by an increase in public investment to bolster domestic demand and schemes, like the production-linked incentive to boost manufacturing.
• Despite being ravaged by a second COVID-19 wave earlier this year, the economic impact of the pandemic this year has been “relatively small” compared to the impact in 2020.

• Uttar Pradesh is the largest emitter of PM2.5, the class of particulate matter considered most harmful to health, according to an analysis by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water ( CEEW).
• The Council, a research body, looked at five of the most reliable data sourcesthat have tracked and measured the quantum and sources of air pollution in India.
• The high emissions from U.P. were largely due to a significant share of PM2.5 emissions from solid-fuel use in households.
• Maharashtra, Gujarat, Odisha, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, and Rajasthan too feature in the list of top polluters but are differently ranked by the five sources.

• Reliance Retail Ventures Limited (RRVL) has entered into a master franchise agreement with 7-Eleven Inc (SEI) for the launch of 7-Eleven convenience stores in India. The first 7-Eleven store is set to open onOctober 9, 2021, in Andheri East, Mumbai.
• This will be followed by a rapid rollout in key neighbourhoods and commercial areas, across the Greater Mumbai cluster to start with.
• The move comes just a few days after Future Group’s firm Future Retail terminated its franchise agreement with the US-based convenience stores brand to operate the stores.
• Future Retail had entered into an agreement with 7-Eleven Inc for operating stores under the brand name in India in February 2019.

• A new study has identified important elephant connectivity areas and found that the trunked animals prefer areas close to forests with low human population densities.
• Elephants range widely, sometimes across hundreds of kilometres, to meet their immense food and water requirements.
• This is particularly true in the fragmented landscapes of the tropics, especially India where the average size of protected areas is less than 300 sq. km, comparable to the average home range of a single elephant herd.
• Connectivity conservation was also important for other species, and identifying corridors for species such as the Asian elephant could potentially aid the movement of tigers, hog deer and other animals as well.

• The 2021 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to German scientist Benjamin List and Scotland-born scientist David WC MacMillan “for the development of asymmetric organocatalysis.”
• Researchers long believed that there were just two types of catalysts available: metals and enzymes.
• Using these reactions, researchers can now more efficiently construct anything from new pharmaceuticals to molecules that can capture light in solar cells.