The India Open Badminton Tournament started at the Indira Gandhi (IG) Stadium in New Delhi on 17 January, 2023. On the Day One of the nation’s biggest badminton tournament, shuttler Lakshya Sen defeated compatriot H.S. Prannoy in straight games, while India’s Saina Nehwal defeated Danish badminton player, Mia Blichfeldt, to qualify for the second round.
Pradeep Kumar Rath, from Odisha, decided to dedicate his time to nurturing environment, when he retired in 2017. Hence, he founded an NGO named ‘Paribesh Suraksha Abhijan’, to plant more trees. With the help of nearly 40,000 rural women, Pradeep has planted over 60,000 trees in the rural parts of Odisha and has conducted many awareness programs and rallies.
When she was 17, Janak Palta McGilligan made a promise to protect the environment. Now, as a 74-year-old, she has kept her promise and transformed her home in Indore into a zero-waste household, powdered by windmills. Fondly known as ‘Janak didi’, the Padma Shri recipient has trained more than 1,50,000 youths in solar cooking and guided them on sustainable living.
The 17-year-old Anaya Jethanandani, from Bengaluru, Karnataka, founded FINWIN, a not-for-profit initiative in July, 2021, to spread awareness about the importance of financial literacy, especially among women from marginalised backgrounds, such as domestic helpers, factory workers, and others. So far, the Grade 11 student has helped over 400 women to gain more information on financial literacy and to set up their own bank accounts.
Shrey Arora got an idea for a food startup, when he tasted his wife’s grandmother’s traditional snacks, during their visit to Lucknow. Inspired by these recipes, the MBA-graduate co-founded ‘Trick or Treat Foods’ with his wife, Urvashi Srivastava. The aim of the venture is to provide chemical-free, healthy snacks with no refined sugar and artificial flavours, especially for kids.
Did you know that Wrestler Khashaba Dadasaheb Jadhav won the first individual Olympic medal for India in the 1952 Helsinki Olympics? Google honoured the wrestler, popularly known as ‘Pocket Dynamo’, with a doodle on his 97th birth anniversary, on 15 January, 2023. Jadhav was posthumously awarded the Chhatrapati Puraskar by the Government of Maharashtra, in 1992-1993.
The festival of Lohri marks the end of severe winter and is celebrated a day ahead of Makar Sankranti. People in north India celebrate Lohri by singing folk songs, dancing and eating jaggery and groundnuts around a bonfire. Happy Lohri!
Makar Sankranti, the festival dedicated to the sun god, is celebrated annually in India to mark the occasion of sun entering the Makara Rashi or Capricorn sign. This year, the festival falls on 14 January. Makar Sankranti is celebrated in different regions with different names, such as Maghi in Punjab, Magh in Assam and Pongal in Tamil Nadu. Happy Makar Sankranti!
The Indian cricket team defeated Sri Lanka by four wickets in the second ODI match at the Eden Gardens, Kolkata, on 12 January, 2023. With this win, the Indian team secured the three-match series win and a 2-0 lead. Chasing a target of 216, the incredible performance of Indian batsmen, K.L. Rahul and Hardik Pandya, helped the team to reach 219 in 43.2 overs.
At the 80th Golden Globe Awards in Beverly Hills, California, ‘Naatu Naatu’, a song from the Indian film, RRR, has won the Best Original Song Award at the ceremony. The composer of the film, M.M. Keeravani, received the award. In addition to the historic win, RRR was also nominated in the Best Non-English Language Film category.
