World Today

  Neelakantha Bhanu Prakash- “the fastest human calculator” in the world, is the first Indian to win a gold medal at the Mental Calculation World Championship, an event held during Mind Sports Olympiad in London recently. He is just 20-year-old from Hyderabad, studying Mathematics at Delhi St Stephen College and holds four world records and 50 Limca records. “Mental calculation may have been popularized recently by a Bollywood movie Shakuntala Devi. And on Independence Day, I represented India at Mind Sports Olympics” he said. “Beating 29 competitors, up to 57 years of age, from 13 countries, I won the first gold medal with a clear margin of 65 points. The judges were spellbound by my speed; they required me to perform more calculations to confirm my accuracy,” he told.   The Mind Sports Olympics, for those who don’t know what that is, are an annual multidisciplined world competition that prizes feast of mental skill and agility. The first Mind Sports Olympics was held in 1997.

NEP The National Education Policy is a comprehensive framework to guide the development of education in the country. A new NEP usually comes along every few decades. The first came in 1968 and the second in 1986. The third new NEP was released on 29 th July 2020. The NEP provides only a board direction and it is not mandatory to follow. Since education is a concurrent subject (both the center and the state governments can make laws on it), this will not happen immediately. The government has set a target of 2040 to implement the entire policy. In school education the policy focuses on overhauling the curriculum, “easier” board exams, a reduction in the syllabus to retain “core essentials” and thrust on “experimental learning and critical thinking”. Design of NEP 2020: The NEP pitches for a “5+3+3+4” design corresponding to the age group of 3 to 8 years as foundational stage, 8 to 11 as preparatory stage, 11 to 14 as middle stage and 14 to 18 as secondary stage. Foundat