News in Short

• Social network firm Reddit would buy short-video platform Dubsmash, becoming the latest company to expand in a space dominated by Chinese-owned TikTok.
• The success of ByteDance's TikTok has prompted many social media companies to add short-video services to their platforms, with Snapchat Inc rolling out "Spotlight" in November and Facebook Inc launching "Instagram Reels" earlier this year.
• The deal would give its users, who can already upload and stream videos, access to Dubsmash's editing and short-video creation tools. Dubsmash would maintain its own platform and brand.

• David Cornwell, better known as John le Carre, whose career in intelligence gave him many inputs for his popular novels, died aged 89.
• Among his most popular works are: ‘The Spy Who Came in From the Cold’ and ‘Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy’. He worked for the British intelligence services in the 1950s and 1960s.
• He wrote 25 novels and one memoir, The Pigeon Tunnel (2016), selling more than 60 million copies worldwide.
• His dramatic launch onto the global scene began with the publication of his third novel in 1963, ‘The Spy Who Came in from the Cold’, and the public revelation of his secret life working with the British Intelligence Services”.

• Renowned Sanskrit scholar Vidyavachaspati Bannanje Govindacharya passed in Udupi due to age-related illness. He was 85.
• A propagator of 'Madhwa' ideology and a great orator, Govindacharya had been conferred the Padma Shree in 2009.
• He was well-versed in Veda Bhashya, Upanishad Bhashya, Mahabharata, Ramayana, and Puranas and has written commentaries on Veda Suktas, Upanishads, Shata Rudriya, Brahma Sutra Bhashya, and Gita Bhashya.
• Some of his translated works are Bana Bhatta's novel 'Bana Bhattana Kadambari', Kalidasa's 'Shakuntala', and Shudraka's ‘Mrichakatika’.
• Govindacharya was the brand ambassador of India in World Conference on Religion and Peace held in Princeton, USA in 1979.

• Bhutan and Israel have established formal ties, with a formal ceremony in New Delhi where the Ambassadors of these countries to India exchanged agreements.
• Bhutan, which does not have ties with any permanent United Nations Security Council (UNSC) member, has taken the restricted number of diplomatic relations to 54 countries and the European Union.
• The accord between the majority-Jewish Israel and the majority-Buddhist Bhutan follows several years of secret talks with the aim of establishing an alliance.

• Well-known Malayalam writer UA Khader passed away in Kozhikodeat the age of 85.
• Khader’s novels and stories are considered among the finest published works in the language. In a career spanning decades, he worked in various government capacities and headed the Purogamana Kala Sahitya Sangham, a progressive body of artists and writers.
• In 1983, his novel Thrikkottur Peruma won him the Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award. He also received the Kendriya Sahitya Akademi Award in 2009 for his novella Thrikkotlur Novellukar.