1.Union Minister Giriraj Singh has demanded the Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian award, for Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and former Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik. Speaking to the media in Begusarai, Singh highlighted the transformative contributions of both leaders to their respective states.

2.An Embraer passenger jet fl ying from Azerbaijan to Russia crashed near the city of Aktau in Kazakhstan Wednesday, killing 38 people while 29 survivors received hospital treat.

3.Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi Wednesday announced that the second instalment of fi nancial assistance under Subhadra Yojana will be credited to the accounts of benefi ciary women in March 2025.

4.The state government has asked all urban local bodies (ULBs) across the state to initiate a process to receive applications under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban) 2.0, an offi cial statement said Wednesday.

5.Apprehending that the marauding tigress ‘Zeenat’ may stray into the Rahamada village, fl anked by Raikia and Bharadi hills, the Forest department of West Bengal has set up nylon nets on three sides of the village.

6.To honour the birth anniversary of former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee Wednesday, the Central government has launched the 'Rashtraparv Website' along with its mobile application, the Ministry of Defence said in a statement.

7.Actor Allu Arjun and makers of the fi lm ‘Pushpa’ Wednesday announced fi nancial assistance of `2 crore for the family of the woman who died in a stampede during the fi lm's screening at a theatre here December 4.

8.Ousted Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s son and adviser Tuesday described allegations of corruption involving the family in the 2015 awarding of a $12.65 billion nuclear power contract as “completely bogus” and a “smear campaign”

9. Russia attacked Ukraine’s energy system and some cities with cruise and ballistic missiles plus drones Wednesday in an “inhuman” Christmas Day assault, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said.

10.Retirement fund body EPFO has registered 13.41 lakh net new members addition in October 2024, according to showed latest payroll data.

11.The government will continue its focus on improving quality spending, strengthening the social security net and bring down the fi scal defi cit to 4.5 per cent of the GDP in FY26, a finance ministry document said.

12.India's economy is likely to grow by 6.5 per cent in the current and the next fi nancial year, an EY report said, attributing lower than anticipated expansion in the September quarter to fall in private consumption expenditure and gross fixed capital formation.

13.Retirement fund body EPFO has registered 13.41 lakh net new members addition in October 2024, according to showed latest payroll data.

14.Senior bureaucrat Arunish Chawla has been appointed the revenue secretary as part of a top-level bureaucratic reshuffle effected by the Centre Wednesday. Chawla, a 1992 batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) offi cer of the Bihar cadre, is currently the pharmaceuticals secretary.

15.Bombardment by the Pakistani army in Afghanistan’s eastern Paktika province Tuesday killed at least 46 people, most of whom were children and women, said the Afghan Taliban, vowing to retaliate against their neighbour.