1. India Ranks 81st In Global Corruption Perception Index.
India has been ranked 81st in the global corruption perception index for 2017, released by Transparency International, which named the country among the "worst offenders" in terms of graft and press freedom in the Asia Pacific region.
The index, which ranks 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption, placed India at the 81st place. In the 2016 India was in the 79th place among 176 countries.
The index uses a scale of 0 to 100, where 0 is highly corrupt and 100 is very clean.
India`s score in the latest ranking, however, remained unchanged at 40. In 2015, the score was 38.
Transparency International further said, "in some countries across the region (Asia Pacific), journalists, activists, opposition leaders and even staff of law enforcement or watchdog agencies are threatened, and in the worst cases, even murdered".
"Philippines, India and the Maldives are among the worst regional offenders in this respect. These countries score high for corruption and have fewer press freedoms and higher numbers of journalist deaths," it added.
In the last six years, 15 journalists working on corruption stories in these countries were murdered, as reported by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).
In the latest ranking New Zealand and Denmark were placed the highest, with scores of 89 and 88, respectively. On the other hand, Syria, South Sudan and Somalia were ranked lowest with scores of 14, 12 and 9, respectively.
Meanwhile, China with a score of 41 was ranked 77th on the list, while Brazil was placed at 96th with a score of 37 and Russia was at the 135th place with a score of 29.
Further analysis of the results indicates that countries with the least protection for press and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) also tend to have the worst rates of corruption.
The analysis, which incorporates data from CPJ, showed that in the last six years, 9 out of 10 journalists were killed in countries that score 45 or less on the index.
2. India Signs MoU With Canadas International Development Research Centre (IDRC).
The government today signed a pact with Canada`s International Development Research Centre (IDRC) for research collaboration in various fields, according to an official statement.
A memorandum of understanding (MoU) between India and Canada`s IDRC to usher the `programme based research support` in addressing current and future global and local developmental challenges was signed, it said.
During the signing ceremony, the Indian side appreciated the contribution of IDRC in supporting quality research in various fields, including finance, agriculture, industry and health in India, the statement said today.
Since 1972, IDRC has funded 551 research activities worth CAD 159 million in India through institutions, researchers and NGOs.
During the last five years (2012-17), 96 research projects worth CAD 51 million were funded by the IDRC in India.