Download : 17th July, 2017 – Current Affairs PDF
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National Current Affairs
Matunga becomes India’s first railway station run by women
- Central Railway has appointed all women staff at suburban Matunga railway station, thereby making it India’s first railway station run by women.
- A total of 30 women staffers, including 11 booking clerks, five Railway Protection Force (RPF) personnel, seven ticket checkers are working since last two weeks.
- Matunga railway station, which is located in central Mumbai, gets a huge number of student population as a lot of colleges are located in the area.
Govt launches GST training program
- The government has launched a GST training program to skill around two lakh youths in six months and to handle tax compliance issues like invoice making.
- The people would be trained under the Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY).
- The new GST training program helps businesses in areas such as registration and calculation of tax liability under the new tax regime.
- The ministry also launched a national portal for assessors and trainers besides 51 new PMKVY centres.
One passport centre in every 50km distance
- The government is working on a vision to set up one passport centre in every 50 km range in the country in future.
- In West Bengal POPSK had come up first in Asansol and then in Raiganj, the government would now set up similar offices in Siliguri and Darjeeling.
- Tatkaal, On-hold files, walk-in and PCC applications will not be accepted and processed in these POPSKs.
- Applicants in Normal category (Fresh/Re-issue) only will be entertained in these new POPSKs.
India celebrates Falun Gong
- Falun Gong is the ancient Chinese holistic system that is banned in China.
- Falun Gong is a Chinese spiritual practice that combines meditation and qigong exercises with a moral philosophy.
- On this occasion over 200 practitioners of Falun Dafa from India and other countries will participate in a Peace Parade and Human Word Formation at Connaught Place.
- Its main aim is to spread the message of Truth, Compassion and Tolerance which are the basic principles of Falun Dafa.
- It also aimed to create awareness of the severe persecution being suffered by Falun Dafa practitioners in China for over several years.
- Falun Gong practitioners in China are reportedly subject to a wide range of human rights abuses, hundreds of thousands are estimated to have been imprisoned ,psychiatric abuse, torture.
International Current Affairs
Mexican city named World’s best, Udaipur among top 15
- Udaipur in Rajasthan has featured in the ‘The World’s Top 15 Cities’ list compiled by famous magazine ‘Travel + Leisure’ (T+L). The list has been topped by a Mexican City, San Miguel de Allende.
World’s Top 5 Cities:
| 1 | San Miguel de Allende, Mexico |
| 2 | Charleston, South Carolina, USA |
| 3 | Chiang Mai, Thailand |
| 4 | Kyoto, Japan |
| 5 | Florence, Italy |
Indonesia renaming part of South China Sea as North Natuna Sea
- The part of the renamed area falls in China’s “nine-dash line” waters extending hundreds of miles to the south and east of China’s island province Hainan.
- In 2011, the Philippines renamed the waters as the “West Philippine Sea”and two years later took the territorial dispute before an international tribunal at The Hague.
- Indonesia insists it is a non-claimant state in the South China Sea dispute but has clashed with China over fishing rights around the Natuna Islands.
Business & Economy
MobiKwik, Samsung Pay to enable one-tap payment solution for e-wallet users
- According to the digital payments firm MobiKwik wallet is now integrated with Samsung Pay Mini to enable one-tap paymentsat more than 1.4 million MobiKwik-powered merchants across the country.
- The government has also introduced a number of schemes to promote adoption of e-payment methods like mobile wallets, debit/credit cards and Unified Payment Interface (UPI).
- Samsung Pay, the mobile payments service of the world’s largest handset maker was launched in India in March 2017.
- It allows users to just tap and pay using the debit/credit cards and wallets stored on their mobile devices.
- More than 55 million and 1.4 million merchants will benefit from this association.
People in News
Four new members appointed in CBEC
- The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has approved appointment of Sushant Kumar Panda, Ameeta Suri, Pranab Kumar Das and Joseph as the new members.
- Joseph was recently appointed as chief of Directorate General of Goods and Services Tax Intelligence.
- They are working in different departments of the CBEC. It is the apex policy-making body for indirect taxes.
18-year-old ragpicker Bilal Dar to be Srinagar’s civic ambassador
- Bilal Daran 18-year-old ragpicker has been appointed brand ambassador of the Srinagar Municipal Corporation
- Bilal Dar earned his living by picking up waste from the Wular Lake in Bandipora district of north Kashmir.
- As a brand ambassador of the SMC, Dar will be given a special uniform and a vehicle to go and meet people in commercial and residential areas.
- Dar is a resident of Laharwarpora of Bandipora district, has been removing plastic trash from the lake and selling it for around Rs 150-200 per day.
- He has been earning his livelihood by cleaning the Wular Lake and removing garbage, used bottles and shoes.
Awards
IIFA Awards 2017
- Alia Bhatt won the Best Actress Award for playing the role of a migrant girl trapped in a drug lord’s house in film ‘Udta Punjab’.
- Shahid Kapoor won the Best Actor Award for playing Tommy Singh, a Punjabi rockstar struggling with a drug addiction in the film ‘Udta Punjab’.
- ‘Neerja’ won the Best Film Award, while ‘Pink’ director Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury won the award for Best Director.
Environment and Ecology
New unique species of hermit crab discovered
- The newly discovered crustacean is called Paragiopagurus atkinsonae or the Green-eyed hermit crab.
- It measures merely 70 millimeters in length and sports a colouration of mottled orange nuanced with cream to white.
- The new species was discovered during a three-week survey back in 2013, conducted by the Department of Forestry and Fisheries and the South African Environmental Observation Network in the shallower deep waters (199 metres to 277 metres) off the West Coast of South Africa
Sports Current Affairs
BCCI appoints committee to revisit support staff appointments
- The four member committee includes President CK Khanna, acting Secretary Amitabh Choudhary, CEO Rahul Johri and Committee of Administrators member Diana Edulji
- The four-member committee of BCCI will take the final call in appointing the support staff of the Indian team and then decide on the contracts that will be handed to the coaches.
- The four-member panel will look into the whole aspect of appointing the support staff and then also decide the financial terms of their appointment.
- The Cricket Advisory Committee’s decision to appoint Rahul Dravid as batting consultant and Zaheer Khan as bowling consultant for overseas tour will be revisited.
- The CAC comprising of Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and VVS Laxman had informed the COA that the decision to appoint Dravid and Zaheer was taken after consulting chief coach Shastri.
Harinder Pal Sandhu wins Victorian Open squash title
- Harindar won a second title in two weeks and beat Rex Hedrick of Australia 12-14, 11-3, 11-4, 11-7 in a 77-minute final.
- He had beaten Piedro Schweertman of the Netherlands to reach the final.
Lakshmanan wins gold in 5000m, three meet records broken
- Asian champion Govindan Lakshmanan has won a gold medal in men’s 5000m race on the opening day of the National Inter-State Athletics Championships.
- He bagged a gold medal at the Asian Athletics Championships 2017 held in Bhubaneswar.
- He has also qualified for the World Championships to be held in London next month.
- Anu Raghavan of Kerala brokethe meet record in women’s 400m hurdles.
- The men’s 400m hurdles Jabir M P and M Ramachandran of Andhra Pradesh securing the top two positions. Tamil Nadu’s Santosh Kumar came in third place.
- Sarita Singh also created a new meet record in women’s hammer throwwith a best throw of 63.22m.
- Anathlete from Uttar Pradesh, Gunjan Singh came second while Punjab’s Sarabjeet Kaur was third.