59th Jnanpith Award

• Hindi writer Vinod Kumar Shukla (88 age, from Chhattisgarh) was the recipient of the 59th Jnanpith Award, India’s highest literary honour.
• Novels ; “Naukar ki Kameez”, about a clerk forced to submit to professional hierarchies, and “Khilega Toh Dekhenge”, about a teacher who arrives in a village with eccentric residents
• He is the 12th Hindi writer to win the award and the first from Chhattisgarh.

ISRO’s SpaDex Mission

• Docking and Undocking Capability demonstrated mission
• India became the fourth country after the United State of America,Russia and China to acquire docking and undocking capabilities.
• Space Docking is a process by which two fast moving spacecraft are put into the same orbit, progressively brought closer and finally joined together.
• Two 220 kg satellites SDX01 (Chaser) and SDX02 (Target) were put in a 470 km circular orbit with a small relative velocity between the two.
• They used a stop and go approach to bring the two satellites closer. When they are too near then using the extended docking mechanism, pulled closer together, and locked in place.