# Cyclone yaas devastations

• Sunderbans area is devastated by multiple cyclones in recent years.

• Over the past three year, the sunderbans, which is home to close to five million people, has been battered by four tropical cyclones – Fani(may 2019), Bulbul (november 2019), Amphan (may 2020) and yass (may 2021).

• These regular cyclones have severely damaged the flora and fauna of the sunderbans.

# GST on covid essentials

• The finance ministry on saturday constituted a group of ministers (GOMs) to examine possible waivers of GST levied on essential covid relief materials.

• Meghalaya CM Conrad sangma has been designated as the governor of eight member GOM.

• The GOM is tasked to submit its report to the GST council by june 8.

# Covid cases

• India recorded 1,60,857 new covid-19 cases and 3482 new deaths on saturday.

• Around 20.8 lakh samples were tested in the country on friday, with the test positivity rate of 8.4%.

• Over 30.6 lakh vaccines doses were administered in the country in last 24 hours.

# Corpus fund for orphans

• The central government on saturday announced a special “PM-CARES for children” scheme for all those orphaned due to covid-19.

• It will include a corpus of 10 lakh rupees for each child till he/she reaches the age of 18.

• Chidren in the age group of 11-18 will have the option to study in a residential school under the central government, such as Sainik school and Navodaya vidyalaya.

# Citizenship process

• The Ministry of home affairs has empowered 13 more district collectors in Gujarat, Chattisgarh, Rajasthan, haryana and Punjab to grant citizenship certificates to applicants belonging to six minority communities from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.

• The latest notification is a reiteration of similar orders issued in 2016 and 2018 and is not related to CAA.

• The CAA, passed in 2019, seeks to grant Indian citizenship to six undocumented communities that came to India till December 31, 2014.