NATIONAL AFFAIRS
No new tax proposals in Rajasthan
Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje presented a Rs. 1,66,000-crore budget in the State Assembly, while announcing a slew of measures and financial allocations for infrastructure development, transport, agriculture, higher education and water resources. Except a 15% increase in the value added tax on tobacco products, no new tax proposal was made in the Budget.
The budget projected an estimated fiscal deficit for 2017-18 at ₹24,753 crore, which is 2.99% of the GSDP.
Aadhaar must for BPL women for free LPG
The government has made having an Aadhaar card must for poor women to avail of free cooking gas (LPG) connection under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana. While the government in October last year made the unique identification number mandatory for everyone to get LPG subsidies, it has now extended the same for free cooking gas connections to women of BPL households.
2 more tiger reserves soon in Uttarakhand
Uttarakhand now has two tiger reserves – the Corbett Tiger Reserve and the Rajaji Tiger Reserve. According to the tiger census data released in 2015, Uttarakhand has 340 tigers making it a State with the second highest tiger population in the country after Karnataka.
With the two new tiger reserves, Uttarakhand would become the first State in North India to get four tiger reserves. The Nandhaur Wildlife Sanctuary, which falls under the Terai Arc Landscape spanning across India and Nepal, and the Surai Range in the Terai East division of the Uttarakhand forest department are the two proposed tiger reserves.
Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah launches “Pratibimba” to project achievements
Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah launched a comprehensive web-based platform showcasing the government’s performance and achievements to the citizens.
Developed as the Chief Minister’s dash board, ‘Pratibimba’, which means reflection, will serve as a tool to improve efficiency in governance and allow citizens to track government’s progress. The dash board is available both in English and Kannada.
Toll-free women’s helpline launched
As many government and non-government organisations organised many events to mark International Women’s Day across Odisha, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik launched a toll-free helpline number 181 for women in distress.
The 24×7 helpline, which will be available in all the 30 districts of the State, will extend prompt response to women affected by violence and provide information about women-related schemes and a range of other services.
Mega tulip festival in Srinagar from April 1
As part of its efforts to revive tourism in the Kashmir Valley, the Jammu and Kashmir government will organise a first-of-its-kind 15-day festival from April 1 to showcase the treasures of Asia’s largest tulip garden. At the festival site, decorated kiosks and stalls will showcase rich handicrafts and cuisine of the Valley with traditional, ethnic touch.
Over 100 districts now open defecation free: PM Narendra Modi
Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that his dream project of Clean India mission has virtually turned into a mass movement and over 100 districts all over the country have become open defecation free (ODF).
Airport Service quality Survey Hyderabad airport ranked 1st
GMR’s Hyderabad International Airport Limited (GHAIL) released a statement in which Rajiv Gandhi Hyderabad International airport steadily improved its score from 4.4 in 2009 to 4.9 in 2016 and ranks first in the world in airport service quality. Indira Gandhi International airport in Delhi ranked world’s second best airport in the category of passenger handling capacity of more than 40 million passengers annually.
India announces new policy to boost oil output
India announced an Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP) for conducting oil and gas exploration in India a bidder can carve out areas where they want to drill on their own this will allow pricing and marketing freedom to operators.
Smart tribal village in Jammu and Kashmir
Jammu and Kashmir minister of food, civil supplies and consumer affairs minister Chowdhary Zulfkar Ali inaugurated “Habbi” the first smart tribal village in Jammu and Kashmir.
IIT –M wins IEEE spectrum technology in the service of society award
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers spectrum Technology in the service of society award was awarded to Indian Institute of Technology Madras for the year 2017 for its solar direct current inverter system.
Digital Life certificate submission through Jeevan pramaan Patra of EPFO has been extended
The Employee’s Provident Fund Organisation has extended the date of submission of digital life certificate through Jeevan Pramaan patra to March 31st 2017 from 28th February 2017.
Jaipur Airport – ‘Best Airport in the world’ in 2 to 5 million passengers category
With the efforts to improve airport services and passenger facilities Airport Authority of India has achieved the target of placing Jaipur airport as the best airport in the world in the category of 2 to 5 million passengers per annum across the world.
BANKING & BUSINESS
Kotak sells Rs.2,255 cr. bank stake to Canadian funds
Billionaire Uday Kotak sold 2.76 crore shares, or 1.5% of his personal stake, in Kotak Mahindra Bank for Rs.2,255 crore to two Canadian pension fund managers in an open market transaction. The move will help the bank comply with a Reserve Bank of India (RBI) directive on promoter shareholding.
Karur Vysya Bank to leverage on technology
Karur Vysya Bank, which has invested about Rs.80 crore a year on technology for the last two years, will leverage on technology for its next phase of growth. K. Venkataraman, MD and CEO of Karur Vysya Bank.
The bank launched three technology services – FASTag in association with Indian Highways Management Company, United Payment Interface mobile app, and Bharat Bill Payment System.
Oil India Limited signs MoU with University of Houston for augmenting reserves base
Oil India Limited (OIL) has signed an MoU with the University of Houston (UH), with the “intent” of augmenting its reserves base and maximising recovery from its ageing oilfields. The MoU was inked in the presence of Petroleum & Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan. MOU was signed by Utpal Bora, CMD, OIL and University of Houston, represented at the signing ceremony by UH Chancellor and President Renu Khator.
The major focus of the MoU is collaboration in the areas of Improved Oil Recovery and Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR).
Google acquires Kaggle in boost to data play
Technology giant Google has announced the acquisition of Kaggle, a start—up that hosts a number of data scientists, for an undisclosed amount at the Cloud Next 2017 conference.
Kaggle is going to maintain independent brand said by Chief Scientist Google Cloud (artificial intelligence and machine learning) Fei Fei Li.
‘Social Banking Excellence Award’ bagged by Canara Bank
Canara Bank has been declared as the winner of ‘Social Banking Excellence Award’ by ASSOCHAM. The award was presented under 3 categories. P.V. Bharathi Executive Director for Agriculture, Banking and Priority Sector Lending, received the award from Arjun Ram Meghwal, Minister of State for Finance.
Aishwarya Rai Bachchan wins best actress IFFAA awards
Aishwarya Rai Bachchan played a character of Sarabjit Singh’s sister Dalbir Kaur won the best actress award at the International Film Festival and Awards of Australia.
Artist of the year Award to viola Davis
“Harvard foundation” Artist of the year was awarded to Viola Davis of South Carolina. Davis is the only African – American actress to win the triple crown of acting The Academy award, Emmy award and the Tony Award.
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
IBM Researchers Store Data on World’s Smallest Magnet — a Single Atom
IBM announced it has created the world’s smallest magnet using a single atom and stored one bit of data on it. Currently, hard disk drives use about 100,000 atoms to store a single bit.
The team used IBM’s Nobel Prize-winning scanning tunnelling microscope (STM) to create and monitor the magnets using holmium atoms. Then, they used an electrical current to write and read binary data (1s and 0s) on the atom. The ability to read and write one bit on one atom creates new possibilities for developing significantly smaller and denser storage devices.
APPOINTMENTS
Harm ohlmeyer appointed as CFO of Adidas
Harm ohlmeyer is appointed as the new Chief Financial Officer of German Multinational corporation Adidas. He is succeeding Robin Stalker.
Mumbai takes new mayor Vishwanath Mahadeshwar
Vishwanath Mahadeshwar, Shiv Sena’s candidate has been elected as 76th mayor of Mumbai. He took over the charge from Snehal Ambedkar of the same party. He defeated the counterpart of the Congress Vithal Lokare.
SPORTS
ICC Announced Sachin Tendulkar as ambassador of ICC Womens World Cup 2017
The International Cricket Council (ICC) appointed Indian cricketing legend Sachin Tendulkar as the UNICEF and Cricket for Good Ambassador for the ICC Women’s World Cup 2017, scheduled to start from June 24.
Hijab for Muslim women launched by Nike
Nike Inc headquartered in Beaverton, Oregon will launch a Hijab for Muslim women athlete. Hijab is used by Muslim women to cover their face traditionally. Hijab designed by Nike Inc will hit stores on early 2018.
OBITUARY
Veteran journalist Arvind Padmanabhan dead
Veteran journalist Arvind Padmanabhan, an executive editor at IANS, died of cardiac arrest. Padmanabhan, who would have turned 50 next month, breathed his last at the Holy Family Hospital.
