Daily Current Affairs: February 18, 2022

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National News

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman virtually participates in the first G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors meeting under G20 Indonesia Presidency

• Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman virtually attended the first G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors meeting, which was held under Indonesia’s presidency of the G20.
• Nirmala Sitharaman spoke about the global economic outlook and threats, including inflation, supply disruptions and new coronavirus types, in the first session.
• She shared insights on India’s policy response to the COVID-19 pandemic and suggested recovery measures have to be built around a long-term vision.

Union Government approves a new scheme of adult education for FY 2022–27 named the ‘New India Literacy Programme’

• The Union Government approved a new scheme called the ‘New India Literacy Programme’ to cover all elements of adult education and to align with the National Education Policy 2020.
• The aim of this literacy programme is to teach not only core literacy and numeracy, but also other abilities that a citizen of the twenty-first century needs, such as key life skills (including financial literacy, digital literacy, commercial skills, healthcare and awareness, child care, education and family welfare).
• This scheme will be implemented through the online mode.
• It will cover non-literates of the age of 15 years and above in all states/union territories in India.

Narcotics Control Bureau organises the Darkathon 2022’ to find solutions to counter drug trafficking

• The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) organised the Darkathon 2022 in New Delhi to identify ideas to combat drug trafficking on the darknet around the world.
• This initiative aims at involving students, youth and technical experts to find effective solutions to unravel the anonymity of darknet markets.

State News

Union Shipping Minister inaugurates India’s first water taxi service in Mumbai

• Union Shipping Minister Sarbananda Sonowal inaugurated India’s first water taxi service connecting the twin cities of Mumbai and Navi Mumbai.
• This service will commence the Domestic Cruise Terminal (DCT) and will connect the nearby locations at Nerul, Belapur, Elephanta Island and Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT).
• The first railway service in India was also started between Mumbai and Thane.
• This water taxi service guarantees relaxing, stress-free travel that is both time-saving and eco-friendly. These services are also expected to help the tourism industry, particularly trips to the famous Elephanta Caves from Navi Mumbai.

Maharashtra    

• Capital: Mumbai
• Chief Minister: Uddhav Thackeray
• Governor: Bhagat Singh Koshyari
• National Parks: Chandoli National Park, Gugamal National Park, Nawegaon National Park, Pench (Jawaharlal Nehru) National Park, Sanjay Gandhi (Borivilli) National Park, Tadoba National Park 

International News

Nepal becomes the first country to adopt India’s UPI platform

• The international arm of the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), NPCI International Payments, is set to launch India’s flagship payment platform, Unified Payments Interface (UPI), in Nepal to support interoperable real-time person-to-person (P2P) and merchant payment transactions.
• The NPCI International Payments Limited (NIPL) has joined hands with Gateway Payments Service (GPS) and Manam Infotech to provide UPI services in Nepal.
• Nepal will be the first country outside of India to embrace UPI as a payments platform, enabling the digitalisation of cash transactions and advancing the Nepal Government’s and Nepal Rastra Bank’s goals and objectives.

Nepal

• Capital: Kathmandu
• Currency: Nepalese Rupee
• Prime Minister: Sher Bahadur Deuba
• President: Bidhya Devi Bhandari

Banking & Economy

SIDBI launches ‘Waste to Wealth Creation’ programme in West Bengal

• The Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) launched the Waste to Wealth Creation programme in West Bengal in which women will make ornaments and showpieces out of fish scale.
• SIDBI will provide benefits to 50 women who will be able to directly generate income through alternative livelihoods as a result of this programme. Each of them will be expected to become a trainer, later on, to replicate and disseminate the knowledge to other applicants.

Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI)

• Headquarters: Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh
• Chairman & Managing Director (CMD): S. Ramann

Uniphore raises $ 400 million Series E funding at $ 2.5 billion valuation

• Uniphore Technologies became as the ninth unicorn of India in 2022 with a Series E Funding of $ 400 million at a valuation of $ 2.5 billion.
• Uniphore Technologies was founded by Ravi Saraogi and Umesh Sachdev in 2008 and has offices in Chennai, Bengaluru, Singapore and Palo Alto.
• This firm handles billions of conversations per year across a variety of industries, including customer service, sales, HR and education.
• Uniphore had acquired Emotion Research Lab for added capabilities in emotion Artificial Intelligence and Jacada for enhanced low-code or no-code capabilities in 2021.

JusPay launches a software stack named OpenPPI for interoperability of prepaid instruments

• JusPay Technologies has launched a software stack named OpenPPI aimed at assisting Prepaid Payment Instruments (PPI), such as digital wallets, in complying with the RBI’s PPI interoperability regulation.
• With the launch of Juspay’s OpenPPI, existing and potential PPI players can use an end-to-end secure cloud solution to comply with the new regulation.
• The OpenPPI solution will enable interoperability for PPIs through the Unified Payments Interface (UPI).

GDP Projections

State Bank of India revises India’s GDP growth rate at 8.8 per cent for FY22

• The Economic Research Department (ERD) of the State Bank of India (SBI) has reduced India’s GDP growth downwards to 8 per cent from a previous estimate of 9.3 per cent for FY22.
• The real GDP will be around ₹ 2.35 lakh crores or 1.6 per cent more than the pre-pandemic FY20 real GDP of ₹ 145.69 lakh crores.

Appointments

Tamil Nadu State Commission for Women appoints A. S. Kumari as its Chairperson

• The newly reconstituted Tamil Nadu State Commission for Women has appointed S. Kumari as its Chairperson.
• This panel consists of seven members apart from the chairperson.
• The Chairperson and members of the commission will have a three-year term of office. There is no change in the official members of this Commission.
• The Chairperson and members’ honorarium and allowances, as well as other terms and conditions of service, shall be governed by the Tamil Nadu State Commission for Women (Honorarium, Allowances and Conditions of Service of Chairperson and Members) Rules, 2013.

Awards and Recognitions

South Indian Bank bags six IBA Awards including the Best Technology Bank of the Year

• The South Indian Bank bagged six awards at the seventeenth annual IBA Banking Technology awards including ‘Best Technology Bank of the Year.’
• The South Indian Bank has secured six out of seven coveted awards in the categories.

Agreements and MoUs signed

Union Ministry of Tourism signs an MoU with Alliance Air Aviation Limited to boost tourism in India

• Union Ministry of Tourism has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Alliance Air Aviation Limited (AAAL) to strengthen collaboration in the promotion and marketing of domestic tourism across India.
• This MoU was signed with the goal of achieving a common goal of cooperative domestic promotion and taking into account the necessity to coordinate MoT and AAAL’s actions in the tourism markets.
• Alliance Air is the front runner in promoting the Government of India’s Regional Connectivity Scheme (RCS), which is part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s UDAN (Ude Desh ka Aam Naagrik) initiative. 

Twitter partners with Paytm to boost ‘Tips’ feature in India

• Twitter has partnered with Paytm Payments Services Limited to ramp up the support for its ‘Tips’ feature in India.
• The users can use any Paytm payment instrument, such as Paytm UPI, Paytm wallet, Paytm Postpaid (buy-now-pay-later), debit and credit cards and net banking, to support their favourite creators or small business owners on Twitter through the ‘Tips’ feature.
• The Tips feature on Twitter is available in Bengali, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Marathi and
• In India, all individuals above the age of 18 have access to Tips on iOS and Android. It’s a new way to make money on Twitter that allows users to send and receive money as a gift of appreciation.

Defence News

Bangladesh and the United States air forces are set to conduct a joint exercise

• The air forces of Bangladesh and the United States is set to conduct a joint air exercise named ‘Cope South 22’ from 20 February to 25 February.
• This six-day bilateral tactical airlift exercise will be held at BAF Kurmitola Cantonment in Dhaka and Operating Location-Alpha in Sylhet, Bangladesh and is sponsored by the Pacific Air Forces.
• The aim of this exercise is to increase interoperability with Bangladesh’s air force and to assist Bangladesh’s armed forces in their long-term modernisation efforts in order to maintain regional security.
• The flight operations such as aircraft generation and recovery, low-level daytime navigation, tactical airdrop and air-land missions will be carried out throughout this exercise.

Sports News

Chelsea wins its first FIFA Club World Cup trophy in 2021 against Brazil’s Palmeiras

• Chelsea has won the FIFA Club World Cup 2021 trophy for the first time after defeating Palmeiras of Brazil in extra time in the final in Abu Dhabi.
• Chelsea has won the FIFA Club World Cup trophy for the first time, and as a result, they have earned the gold badge that was established in 2007. AC Milan was the first team to obtain the FIFA Club World Cup winners badge in 2007, followed by Manchester United, Barcelona – three times – Inter, Corinthians, Bayern Munich (2013 & 2020), Real Madrid (2014, 2016–2018) and Liverpool (2019).

Banking Terminologies

• Prepaid Payment Instruments

Prepaid Payment Instruments (PPIs) are payment instruments that permit the purchase of goods and services, including the transfer of funds, financial services and remittances, against the value stored within or on the instrument, as specified by the Reserve Bank of India under the Payment and Settlement Act, 2005.

• Unified Payments Interface

A Unified Payment Interface (UPI) is a smartphone application which allows users to transfer money between bank accounts.

• Gross Domestic Product

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the monetary value of all finished goods and services made within a country during a specific period.

Abbreviations

• BOE – Bill Of Exchange
• CBLO – Collateralised Bank Lending Obligations
• ANBC – Adjusted Net Bank Credit
• NPCI – National Payments Corporation of India
• DBT – Direct Benefit Transfer

Daily CA 21 February oneliner:

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