Weekly Update: February 15, 2021 - February 19, 2021

When we are open to new possibilities, we find them.
Be open and skeptical of everything.
-Todd Kashdan
(Public speaker and professor of psychology)

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Let's start!

Here is a Fun Fact that may not, or may, know: The only animal that blushes is a human. According to Charles Darwin, blushing is the most human of all expressions.

Image Credit: https://freepngimg.com/

It is also believed that a human is the only animal that feels embarrassment.

February 15, 2021 (Monday)
:::The number of Corona Cases were as follows:
Confirmed - 1,09,16,589
Recovered - 1,06,21,220
Deceased - 1,55,732

:::Seven West Media - Australian broadcast television, print & online publishing company - joined Google News Showcase. Google News Showcase is Google's model wherein it pays all the media companies for publishing their content. The deal between Seven West Media and Google is reportedly worth $23 million a year. Kerry Stokes, the Chairman of Seven West Media, issued a statement saying that the negotiations with Google are to recognize the value of quality & original journalism throughout the country and, in particular, in regional areas. Mel Silva, the Regional Director at Google, responded to the statement saying that the company was always proud to support original, trusted & quality journalism, and was excited to welcome Seven West Media as a major Australian publishing partner to join Google News Showcase.

Image Credit: https://www.sevenwestmedia.com.au/

Google News Showcase was launched in October 2020. Since then, 450 publications all over the globe have joined the model.

:::Elizabeth Astete, the Foreign Minister of Peru, presented her resignation letter to Francisco Sagasti. the President of Peru. Elizabeth Astete acknowledged that she received her first dose of Sinopharm outside of clinical trials. Sinopharm is China's Covid-19 vaccine that was scheduled to be given to healthcare workers of the country under its immunization program before being given to someone else. She wrote about her resignation on Twitter saying that she was aware of the serious mistake that she made and hence, decided to not receive the second dose.

In Pic: Elizabeth Astete; Image Credit: Elizabeth Astete | Twitter

Peru, a country in South America, is currently facing the second wave of Covid-19 with an acute shortage of medical equipment and hospitals that are almost entirely occupied.

February 16, 2021 (Tuesday)
:::The number of Corona Cases as reported on Aarogya Setu App were as follows:
Confirmed - 1,09,25,710
Recovered - 1,06,33,025
Deceased - 1,55,813

:::Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India launched CB350 RS (Road Sailing), the price of which starts from ₹1.96 lakhs. CB350 RS comes with a 350-cc, air-cooled, 4-stroke fuel-injected OHC single-cylinder engine that is paired with a 5-speed gearbox. The engine generates a maximum horsepower of 20.8 hp and a peak torque of 30 Nm. It is loaded with features like a semi-digital instrument console, dual-tone fuel tank tuck, dual-channel ABS, selectable torque control, and assist & slipper clutch.

Image Credit: https://www.financialexpress.com/

Honda has begun the mass production of CB350 RD and customers can book it at their nearest dealer's showroom.

:::The Israel-based Dan David Foundation awarded the Dan David prize to Anthony Fauci in the Present Category of Public Health. The prize is worth $1 million. He has been recognized for his leadership in HIV research & AIDS relief, and for advocating new methods to develop Covid-19 vaccines. He is also credited for courageously defending science in the face of an uninformed opposition during the Covid-19 pandemic. Anthony Fauci has earlier worked as a director of the National Institute of Allergy & Infectious Diseases (NIAID). He is 80-years young and has also served seven presidents of the United States of America (USA). He is currently serving as a Chief Medical Advisor to Joe Biden, President of the USA.

In Pic: Anthony Fauci; Image Credit: NIAID

Other candidates who won the prize are Professors Alison Bashford, Katharine Park & Keith Wailoo for working in the field of history & health medicine (Past Category); and, Professor Zelig Eshhar, Dr. Carl June & Dr. Steven Rosenberg for serving as the pioneers of anti-cancer immunotherapy (Future Category).

February 17, 2021 (Wednesday)
:::The number of Corona Cases were as follows:
Confirmed - 1,09,37,320
Recovered - 1,06,44,858
Deceased - 1,55,913

:::GUVI, an ed-tech start-up incubated by I.I.T Madras, signed an MoU with Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, the Union Education Minister. The courses offered by the start-up will now be incorporated into the National Education Alliance for Technology (NEAT) - a public-private partnership between the government and all the ed-tech companies. GUVI is an online platform that offers an opportunity to its students to learn, practice, and assess coding skills. It also offers specialized courses that are taught by prominent industry mentors and professors from I.I.T Madras.

Image Credit: GUVI

The platform has a presence in over twelve hundred colleges and offers its courses in English, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Hindi, and Bengali. It also works to arrange, prepare and deliver interview opportunities to its students.

:::Zolve raised $15 million in seed funding that was led by Accel Partners and Lightspeed Venture Partners. Zolve is a 2-month young cross-border digital banking start-up by Raghunandan G who co-founded TaxiForSure, a company that was bought by Ola in 2015 for $200 million. After the conclusion of the seed funding process, the fintech start-up issued a statement saying that it aims to offer front-end banking solutions to migrants moving from India to the United States of America and vice-versa. The services that it will offer are remittances, loyalty-based solutions, cryptocurrency, insurance, and credit through partnership. For this purpose, it will tie-up with various American and domestic banks.

Image Credit: Zolve | Twitter

Zolve is now backed by some of the most reputed investors like Kunal Shah (founder of Cred), Greg Kidd (angel investor in Twitter), and Founder Collective (an investor in Airtable & Uber Technologies Inc), to name a few.

February 18, 2021 (Thursday)
:::The number of Corona Cases as reported on Aarogya Setu App were as follows:
Confirmed - 1,09,50,201
Recovered - 1,06,56,845
Deceased - 1,56,014

:::Facebook blocked sharing of news in Australia as retribution to proposed laws that would force social media companies to pay the news company for the content that they share on their websites. While a spokesperson from Facebook has assured that no official government pages would be affected, Paul Fletcher - Minister of Communications, Urban Infrastructure, Cities & the Arts - asked Facebook to reconsider its decision about blocking the pages of organizations that employ professional journalists with editorial policies and fact-checking processes in place. Elaine Pearson, a director at Human Rights Watch Australia, reacted to this incident by saying that cutting off access to vital information to an entire country in the dead of the night was unconscionable.

Image Credit: Reuters

According to Australia's competition watchdog, Google gets $53 & Facebook gets $28 for every $100 spent on online advertising and this deprives media outlets of revenue needed to support journalism.

:::Reuters reviewed the internal documents of Amazon.com Inc (Amazon). These documents were dated between 2012 and 2019. As per a report released by Reuters after reviewing the internal documents of the company, Amazon has for years given preferential treatment to a small group of sellers on its Indian platform, publicly misrepresented its ties with the sellers, and used them to get around foreign investment rules that affect e-commerce companies. Amazon responded to the statement by saying that it treats all its sellers in a fair, transparent, and non-discriminatory manner.

Image Credit: https://www.reuters.com/

The report also mentioned that Amazon adjusted its corporate structures each time the government imposed some new restriction that was aimed to protect small traders. Amazon responded to this statement too by saying that as government policies continue to evolve, the company consistently makes the necessary changes to ensure compliance at all times.

February 19, 2021 (Friday)
:::The number of Corona Cases were as follows:
Confirmed - 1,09,63,394
Recovered - 1,06,67,741
Deceased - 1,56,111

:::Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) successfully launched HELINA anti-tank missiles. HELINA stands for HELIcopter-launched-NAg. It is a third-generation lock-on before launch (LOBL) fire & forget anti-tank guided missile with both TOP attach and direct attack capability. It has a maximum range of seven kilometers. It was launched from Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH), Dhruv, in Rajasthan sector during the joint user trials by the Indian Army and Indian Air Force. The same was confirmed by DRDO officials in a statement saying that all the mission objectives were met in the final (4th) mission that was carried out with a warhead missile against a derelict tank.

Image Credit: https://www.drdo.gov.in/

Dhruvastra, a variant of the HELINA Weapon System, has already been inducted into the Indian Air Force.

:::Indian Air Force (IAF) helped students to reach their schools and colleges by airlifting them from Padam Zanskar Valley to Leh. IAF, in a tweet, said that air bridging by IAF aircraft from Padam Zanskar Valley to Leh was undertaken to fly in students as the academic session for the year recommenced.

Image Credit: Indian Air Force | Twitter

The airlift was organized at the request of the administration of the union territory of Ladakh.

In this week's Special Section, let's have a look at some of the famous battles fought by Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj.

Image Courtesy: Twitter

The Battle of Pratapgad was fought on November 10, 1659, after Afzal Khan destroyed temples to entice Shivaji Maharaj. Shivaji Maharaj, instead, sent a message saying that he did not want war and that he was ready to make peace. Both of them agreed to meet unarmed but with ten bodyguards each. During the meeting, Afzal Khan made a sudden move and tried to strangle Shivaji Maharaj; however, Shivaji Maharaj fought back. Afzal Khan sustained injuries during the fight and he later lost his life.

Image Credit: https://swarajyamag.com/

The Battle of Poona was fought in April 1663 after Shaista Khan, a maternal uncle of Aurangazeb, seized Pune to establish his residence at Lal Mahal. Shivaji Maharaj entered the quarter of Shaista Khan with two hundred Marathas by using a wedding procession as a cover. He succeeded in killing the son and family members of Shaista Khan. Shaista Khan, however, was able to escape with embarrassment.

Image Credit: https://www.reddit.com/

The Battle of Mysore Plateau was fought on November 26, 1677, between Shivaji Maharaj and Vankoji, his step-brother. Shivaji Maharaj won the battle and seized most of the Mysore territory. He respectfully agreed to return the seized territory after Dipa Bai, his sister-in-law, put forth several negotiations.

Image Credit: https://www.freepressjournal.in/

That is all for this week.

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I hope that the blog was useful and it helped you in catching up with what happened this week. If you have anything to contribute, then please feel free to comment. Do share this blog with everyone you know and help them too.

*Disclaimer: The information has been presented in this blog after reviewing various news articles. In case you find any article, or if you have any article, that states some facts differently, then share them in the comment section. Please keep the publishing date of the article in mind as it may be an update on the article which was published previously, or it may contain outdated information if it was published before the date mentioned in this blog. The blogger is not responsible for any transaction that happens between the reader and the brand.