• UNESCO members include 195 member states and 10 associate members.
• Three UNESCO member states are not UN member states: Cook Islands, Niue, and Palestine (Palestine is a non-member observer State of the United Nations General Assembly since 29 November 2012), while one UN member state (Liechtenstein) is not a UNESCO member.
• USA and Israel will cede to be a member from 2018. At present they are the member of UNESCO

The highlights of this scheme are as under:

• There will be a uniform premium of only 2% to be paid by farmers for all Kharif crops and 1.5% for all Rabi crops. In case of annual commercial and horticultural crops, the premium to be paid by farmers will be only 5%. The premium rates to be paid by farmers are very low and balance premium will be paid by the Government to provide full insured amount to the farmers against crop loss on account of natural calamities.
• There is no upper limit on Government subsidy. Even if balance premium is 90%, it will be borne by the Government.
• Earlier, there was a provision of capping the premium rate which resulted in low claims being paid to farmers. This capping was done to limit Government outgo on the premium subsidy. This capping has now been removed and farmers will get claim against full sum insured without any reduction.
• The use of technology will be encouraged to a great extent. Smart phones will be used to capture and upload data of crop cutting to reduce the delays in claim payment to farmers. Remote sensing will be used to reduce the number of crop cutting experiments.

Larger kingdoms were formed during the later Vedic period.

Many jana or tribes were amalgamated to form janapadas or rashtras in the later Vedic period. Hence the royal power had increased along with the increase in the size of kingdom. The king

performed various rituals and sacrifices to strengthen his position.

They include Rajasuya (consecration ceremony), Asvamedha (horse sacrifice) and Vajpeya (chariot race). "