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National News
Constitution (Schedule Caste) Order (Amendment) Bill, 2016 passed
- Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order (Amendment) Bill, 2016 amends the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order, 1950.
- Indian Constitution authorizes the President to state the Scheduled Castes in various states and union territories.
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Mongolia Visit to India
- Hosts the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Mongolia Lundeg Purevsuren on a three day visit.
- India extended 1 billion dollar line of Credit to Mongolia
- Mongolia confers highest honor to two Indians – Lokesh Chandra and Mansura Haider
Kohima declared Smoke-free City
- Capital of Nagaland Kohima city was declared a smoke-free area
- School children from 22 educational institutes organized a campaign to promote awareness about the ill effects of smoking.
Gujarat clears 10% quota for poor in a bid to pacify Patels
- New category would cover all upper castes, including Patidars, whose family income does not exceed Rs 6 lakh per annum.
- 10% quota for economically backward classes (EBC) in higher education and government jobs.
- State government will come out with an ordinance on May 1, celebrated as the foundation day of Gujarat.
NPPA caps prices of another 50 drugs
- Part of the new drug pricing control order, notified on March 14, which effectively brings 200 more drug formulations under regulation.
- Also planning to cap the prices of 40 other drugs, for which it has asked all the companies to provide requisite information by May 10.
Food Act implemented without proper preparation: CAG
- Controller and Auditor General has rapped the Centre for delay in implementation of the National Food Security Act (NFSA) and extending its rollout thrice without Parliament approval.
- NFSA aims to provide foodgrains to 81.34 crore beneficiaries at highly subsidised rate of Rs 1-3 per kg. The law seeks to bring about changes in PDS that suffered from several deficiencies.
1% of highways project cost for road safety
- India witnesses as high as 5 lakh road accidents per annum and another 3 lakh are crippled across the country.
- Policy for setting aside 1% of the total project cost of any highway project for road safety issues.
- Government is committed to reducing the number of road accidents and fatalities by half in following two to three years.
- Indian road accidents cause an annual loss equivalent to 3 per cent of the GDP.
J&K Cabinet approved 5% interest subsidy for flood-hit traders
- Grant of 5% interest subvention with the effect from 1st April, 2016 with a limit of Rs 5 Lac per unit for a period of four years.
- Move is to give relief to September -2014 flood affected traders and business units,
Rahuri in Ahmednagar becomes first to have digi-locker
- move gives fillip to Digital India Programme
- Rahuri Municipal Council of Ahmednagar district in Maharashtra first municipality to attain the status of integrated with digital locker for the issuance of all essential Documents.
DoNER to invest Rs. 33,000 crores in NE states for skill development
- Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) Ministry will earmark Rs 33,000 crores for development of the north-eastern states during the present fiscal.
- Special emphasis on skill development and increased its budget by fivefold from Rs 11 crores to Rs 55 crores in the present fiscal in skill development sector.
- To overcome the hurdle of loan problem for first generation entrepreneurs DoNER is opening a new scheme under the brand name of Venture Fund and Start Up Centre
International
President embarks on two nation tour to Papua New Guinea and New Zealand
- 5 day visit on two nation-tour to Papua New Guinea and New Zealand accompanied by Minister of State for Agriculture Sanjeev Kumar Balyan and Parliamentary Delegates
- First ever state visit of the President of India to Papua New Guinea and New Zealand
- Papua New Guinea and New Zealand expected to sign bilateral relations with India
Indian Air Force (IAF) for the first time took part in Exercise Red Flag
- Air Force team currently in the United States for the Exercise Red Flag to have completed the Work-up Phase at Eielson Air force base Alaska
- Indian side taking part including four Sukhois, four Jaguars, two IL-78 tankers and two C-17s strategic airlift platforms
- Exercise Red Flag is to demonstrate aerial exercise that features the best pilots and aircrafts across the globe.
Business and Economy
BlackBerry launches payments service in India
- App named BBM Money which integrates directly with a customer’s BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) account and permits users to pay for goods using the BBM platform
- App is available for Black Berry 10, Android and iOS platform and enables users to transfer cash to BBM contacts instantly and securely.
I-T department publishes direct taxes related data for first time
- Hard data on the total number of taxpayers in the country.
- The first time the board released such details
- Data shows the income disclosed in IT returns by various category of taxpayers and number of PAN holders in the country for a chosen period of time.
- Move to publish these statistics was to encourage wider use and analysis of Income Tax data by departmental personnel and academicians.
- board made available a set data between 2000-01 and 2014-15 financial years
pact with Korea Exchange to list Sensex-based derivatives
- MoU is expected boost the sharing of information, and foster new opportunities for the exchanges and their respective issuers.
- Two exchanges will work for investor relations activities of cross-listed products and assist with cross-border supervision and enforcement.
- Joint research in the area of derivatives markets and to support the development of new products experience sharing and cooperation on IT system.
People in News
Senior IPS officer Surender Kumar Bhagat appointed as DG of RPF
- Appointment was approved by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet
- Will serve the Railway Board till the date of his superannuation that is on 30 June 2017.
- 1982 batch IPS officer presently working as Special Director General in Central Reserve Police Force at Jammu & Kashmir.
Science and Technology
EC launches mobile app e-voter for Kerala assembly polls
- App developed by the state IT Mission which provides great transparency and conduct of free and fair elections
Indian Naval Ships Veer, Nipat decommissioned
- Both naval carriers that are of 1241 RE class missile vessels have completed 29 and 28 years of commissioned service respectively.
- The ships have contributed in many operations and successfully completed so many deployments.
- Have been forward deployed to safeguard security of valuable assets off Gujarat coast and International Maritime Borderline on various occasions.
Japan Space agency leaves costly X-ray satellite lost in space
- Connection was lost with the satellite, named Hitomi in that two solar arrays had broken off at their bases
- Was used to probe the black holes using X-Ray Telescopes.
- Satellite was sent on partnered with the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and also with eight nations, including Canada and the Netherlands.
Awards
Politician NK Singh gets Japan’s prestigious national Award
- Japan’s Second Highest national award for his contribution towards Indo-Japan economic relations over 10 years more.
- Conferred for the honor in recognition of the “Catalytic role” played by him in the maintenance of Indo-Japanese economic relations for the years.
Sudarsan Pattnaik wins gold in sand art contest in Russia
- Ninth Moscow Sand Sculpture Championship “The magical world of sand- 2016”
- He produced the sand art of 15 feet high Mahatma Gandhi sculpture for non-violence and peace in the sand art contest.
- 20 sculptors from across the globe took part in the contest.
Sports
Sanath Jayasuriya Returns as Sri Lanka Cricket’s Chief Selector
- Former Sri Lankan opener Sanath Jayasuriya has come back as the chief selector and will serve a two-year term for the Sri Lanka Cricket.
- Has already held the post of the selection committee chief two years, from January 2013 to March 2015, before stepping down in April.
- will lead the committee that will include Kaluwitharana, his former opening partner in ODIs, Ranjith Madurusinghe and Eric Upashanta
Kane Williamson named New Zealand’s captain in all three formats
- Succeeds Brendon McCullum who retired in February, the new captain was determined to continue McCullum`s legacy in the sport.
- 34th player to skipper the New Zealand team in full internationals, he will also become the country`s 29th Test skipper for the side.
- Williamson has played 48 Tests so far to mount up 4037 runs at an average of 49.23.
- Ranked by the ICC as the third best batsman in the world.
Allan Donald appointed Australia’s bowling coach
- Appointment comes after Australian bowling coach Adam Griffith was announced as the bowling coach of the West Indies tour in June.
- Has previously coached with England, New Zealand and South Africa.
Garima wins gold at Commonwealth Judo Championship & Two Indian Judokas in race for Rio Qualification
- Avatar Singh and Thoudam Kalpana Devi are the front runners of qualifying for the Rio Olympics after their impressive performances in Asian Championship in Tashkent.
- In the same contest Rajwinder Kaur won a silver in the below 78Kg category.