Current Affairs Current Affairs - 11 May 2017

General Affairs

Arvind Panagariya Meets Yogi Adityanath To Prepare UP Blueprint

In yet another indication of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's continued support to the BJP government in Uttar Pradesh, a team from Niti Aayog, the nation's key planning body - met Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath in Lucknow today.

Sources said the issues discussed at the high profile meeting today included a new industrial policy that would create more jobs, an upgraded health system that would arrest the state's absymal maternal mortality rates and making the state's urban areas open defecation free by next year.

It was the first state specific presentation by the body, which lays down the roadmap for the nation. The initiative came after Niti Aayog was mandated by the Prime Minister's Office to prepare a blueprint for the development of the state, which gave the BJP a sweeping mandate in the recently held assembly elections. Prime Minister Modi has made it clear that the new government has to deliver on its promised development plank.

"This is the first time Niti Aayog is going to work with a state government in this manner. We are going to make the state developed with the help of Niti Aayog... Developing Uttar Pradesh is the key towards the development of the entire country," the Chief Minister said after the day-long meeting with Niti Aayog vice-chairman Arvind Panagariya and CEO Amitabh Kant.

The saffron-robed Chief Minister has already embarked on a tough programme to clean up the administration, introducing biometric attendance in government offices, oath of cleanliness and surprise checks.

The Central government, on its part, had shown continued support. Two days ago, five senior IAS officers, who were on deputation to the Central government, had been sent back to Lucknow for postings in key departments.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi To Leave For Two-Day Visit To Sri Lanka Tomorrow

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will embark on a two-day visit to Sri Lanka to attend

the biggest Buddhist festival 'Vesak Day' as its chief guest.

The 'International Day of Vesak' celebrations, to be held in Colombo from May 12 to 14, will include an International Buddhist Conference in which over 400 delegates from more than 100 countries will participate.

Vesak, the most important day in the Buddhist calendar, marks the commemoration of Lord Buddha's birth, enlightenment and passing away.

Briefing reporters on PM Modi's visit, Joint Secretary (Indian Ocean Region) in the External Affairs Ministry, Sanjay Panda said no formal talks have been scheduled, but PM Modi will be interacting with the Sri Lankan leaders.

"We do not envisage any formal talks but he will be interacting with the leaders and review the relationship in its entirety. Nothing is specifically earmarked for discussion during the current visit," he said.

During the two-day trip, his second to Sri Lanka since becoming the Prime Minister, Mr Modi will also visit Kandy in the Central Province, which is famous for production of Ceylon Tea.

Mr Panda said India's ties with Sri Lanka have witnessed qualitative transformation in the last few years and both the countries are willing to strengthen and diversify the relationship further.

"We feel our destinies are intertwined. We hope the Prime Minister's visit will be able to provide further momentum in the ties between the two countries," Mr Panda said.

PM Modi had travelled to Sri Lanka in March, 2015.

His visit to Sri Lanka comes close on the heels of a trip by his counterpart Ranil Wickremesinghe.During that visit, the two countries had signed a pact to boost economic ties as Mr Modi and Mr Wickremesinghe discussed a range of bilateral issues and matters of mutual interest. The pact provided a framework to identify the infrastructure projects where India could invest.

India, Russia Review Bilateral Cooperation

India and Russia today reviewed their bilateral cooperation in a range of sectors, including civil nuclear, trade and investments, ahead of the annual summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin on June 1.

"We decided to take forward our cooperation in civil nuclear, trade and investments among other areas," External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said after talks with Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin.

During the meeting of India-Russia Inter-Governmental Commission on Trade, Economic and Cultural Cooperation (IRIGC-TEC), a key forum to address major issues concerning bilateral ties, both sides also took stock of implementation of various key bilateral initiatives.

Both Ms Swaraj and Mr Rogozin also deliberated on preparation for the annual summit between PM Modi and Russian President Putin to be held next month in Russia.

Insurance Be Considered As Proof Of BS-III 2-Wheelers Sale: High Court

The Delhi High Court has told the city's transport department that while verifying date of sale of BS-III two-wheelers prior to registration, it should take into account the dates of online payment of insurance premium or issuance of insurance certificate.

The direction comes as a relief for the dealers who had sold BS-III two-wheelers before March 31, the deadline set by the Supreme Court for sale and registration of such vehicles, but were not able to get them registered as the department was not accepting documents after the date set by the Supreme Court.

However, the direction would be applicable to only the 'non-self registering dealers', who cannot make online payment of sales tax, the high court has clarified.

Several such dealers had moved the high court saying the department was not considering the documents for registration and claimed that they have made the sale before the deadline.

Around 1000 BS-III fuel two-wheelers and commercial vehicles were awaiting registration.

Justice Sanjeev Sachdeva, before whom the plea was listed, asked the department to register the BS-III vehicles as per the the top court's orders provided that the dealers gave requisite proof that the sale was made before March 31.

The court told the department that while verifying the factum of sale, it "may take into account the online proof of payment of insurance premium or issuance of policy prior to the date of March 31, 2017".

It also said if the above two conditions are not met, then the motor licensing officer, who would verify the date of sale, cannot merely rely on the sale invoice provided by the dealer but would have to consider the tax payment receipts issued by statutory or regulatory bodies.

The court also said the petitioner-dealers be allowed to present their vehicles for physical inspection till May 15. These directions, however, would be applicable on case-to-case basis and only to 'non-self registering dealers', the court clarified in its order.

The order was based on the recommendations of the Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority (EPCA) whose view was sought by the transport department as it was not sure how to verify date of sale of vehicles which were purportedly sold on or before March 31.

The EPCA made a distinction between non-self registering and self registering dealers while laying down guidelines for registration of BS-III vehicles sold on or before March 31.

The self registering dealers are those which have the facility of making online payment of sales taxes. The top court on March 29 had banned the sale and registration of vehicles, which are not BS-IV compliant, in India from April one when the new emission norms came into force.

PM Narendra Modi Launches Supreme Court's Paperless, Digital Management System

Prime Minister Narendra Modi today launched the integrated case management system of the Supreme Court - the first step taken by the top court towards becoming a paperless and digital. The Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar was also present at the inauguration. The new system will help litigants access data and retrieve information online.

In March Chief Justice Jagdish Singh Khehar had said that it will soon end the practice of filing voluminous case records in a bid to reduce bulky paper books - also seen as an eco-friendly initiative. The Supreme Court had decided to collect all such records electronically from lower courts and high Courts so that there is no requirement to file printed copies in Supreme Court.

Speaking at the inauguration, Chief Justice Khehar said he plans to integrate the system with all the 24 high courts and the subordinate courts. "It will help usher transparency, reduce manipulation and help the litigant know about the progress of the case on a real time basis," he said.

"Every central and state government department will know if they have been made party to the case and help them prepare accordingly," the Chief Justice said.

The court fee and process fee will be calculated online, which will help the litigant about the cost involved. Justice Khehar said it will help the bar and not increase its workload.

The function was also attended by Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad and other Supreme Court judges.

Business Affairs

Supreme Court directs Home Ministry to 'secure and ensure' Vijay Mallya's presence on July 10

The Supreme Court has directed the Union Home Ministry to "secure and ensure" the presence of embattled businessman Vijay Mallya, who is currently in the United Kingdom, before it on July 10 for the hearing on the quantam of punishment for contempt of court.

The top court has held Mallya guilty of contempt of court for disobeying its orders by not disclosing full particulars of his assets and also violating the orders of Karnataka High Court by transferring USD 40 million received from British firm Diageo, to his three children.

India had recently asked Britain to ensure early extradition of Mallya, who is an accused in a bank loan default case of over Rs 9,000 crore involving his defunct Kingfisher Airlines.

"We direct the Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India, New Delhi to secure and ensure presence of Vijay Mallya before this court on July 10, 2017. A copy of this judgment be sent to the Ministry of Home Affairs for compliance," a bench of Justices Adarsh Kumar Goel and Uday Umesh Lalit said.

The offence of contempt of court entails a maximum imprisonment of up to six months or a fine of upto Rs 2,000 or both.

The bench observed that Mallya has neither filed a reply to the contempt plea, nor has he appeared in person before it.

Since he has been found guilty of contempt of court, "we deem it necessary to give him one more opportunity and also hear him on the proposed punishment".

"We, therefore, adjourn matter to July 10 for hearing Vijay Mallya in person on matters in issue, including one regarding the proposed punishment to be awarded to him for contempt of court," the court, in its 26-page judgement, said.

The apex court's order came on a plea by the consortium of banks, led by the State Bank of India (SBI), which had said that Mallya had not disclosed full particulars of his assets and violated various judicial orders.

In its verdict, the bench noted that the orders passed by the apex court were "clear and unambiguous" and Mallya was called upon to make complete disclosure of his assets.

"Whether the assets to be so disclosed were covered by the personal guarantee given by Mallya or not was immaterial. He was called upon to make a complete disclosure and was bound to comply with the directions," it said.

The court also termed as "correct" the assertion made by the banks that details of bank account held in Edmond De Rothschild Bank were never disclosed by Mallya.

"In fact, no details of any bank account with overseas banks were given by Mallya. The violation by Mallya could not be termed as a mere infraction. The violation by Mallya regarding non-disclosure becomes more pronounced because it is this very account held in Edmand De Rothschild Bank that was utilised to transmit funds to the tune of USD 40 million," the bench noted.

Referring to the Karnataka High Court order, the apex court said it restrained Mallya and others from transferring, alienating, disposing or creating third-party rights in respect of movable and immovable properties belonging to them till further orders in the proceedings before it.

It said all the properties, whether movable or immovable, were governed by the orders of restraint by the high court.

"There is no ambiguity of any sort and the orders of restraint are quite clear. Consequently, funds amounting to USD 40 million which came to be under the control of and in the hands of Vijay Mallya were completely covered and governed by said orders of restraint," the bench said.

"The explanation that the funds now stand transferred in favour of the trusts over which Mallya has no control at all, in fact aggravates the extent of violation. It is clear that the funds which were in control of Mallya have now been sought to be put beyond the reach of processes of court, which is reflective of the intent," it said.

The bench further said the least that was expected of Mallya was to disclose the relevant facts pertaining to receipt and disbursement of USD 40 million.

"Having considered the entirety of the matter, we find that Vijay Mallya is guilty of having committed contempt of court on both the counts," it said and directed Mallya to keep his affidavit ready to be tendered on July 10 by stating the mitigating circumstances, if any, and any other submissions he chooses to advance.

The banks had alleged that Mallya had concealed the facts and diverted the money to his son Siddharth Mallya and daughters Leanna Mallya and Tanya Mallya in "flagrant violation" of the orders passed by the Karnataka High Court.

Mallya's counsel had said that money which came from Diageo belonged to his children and not him.

Big layoffs in India's IT sector: Techies protest sacking by Cognizant, seek govt intervention

India's software companies like Wipro and Infosys are in the process of laying off employees on a massive scale, the Times of India reported. The move has come after the growth in India's 150-billion dollar IT industry has slowed down more than anticipated.

Earlier in April, country's apex trade body ASSOCHAM had warned about industry's growth prospect and said: "Aggravated by rising rupee leading to lower realizations for software exports, the Indian IT firms may be forced to displace work force. In that case, the chances of layoffs are real."

Barely a week after this warning, India's third largest software services firm Wipro fired hundreds of employees as part of its annual "performance appraisal". Wipro laid off around 600 employees, while many predicted that number to go as high as 2,000.

According to reports, Wipro CEO Abid Ali Neemuchwala, earlier in the month, mentioned in an internal conference call that if revenues don't grow, around 10 per cent of employees would be let go this year.

Last week, Cognizant Technology Solutions offered its top executives - directors, associate VPs and senior VPs - a voluntary separation package , a part of its plan to shift operations to automation and digital technology.

It was reported that at least 1,000 executives are expected to go. The company is expected to eventually cut at least 6,000 jobs, or 2.3 per cent of its total workforce.

However, a forum of IT professionals has protested the move and called it "illegal termination" of employees. According to a report in NDTV, forum of IT Employees or FITE has sought immediate intervention in its petition submitted to Assistant Labour Commissioner Chennai.

To which the IT major responed by saying, "Cognizant has not conducted any layoffs. Each year, as is the best practice across our industry, we conduct performance review to ensure we have the right employee skill sets necessary to meet client needs and achieve our business goals. This process results in changes, including some employees transitioning out of the company. Any actions as the result of this process are performance-based and generally consistent with those we've made in previous years."

After Wipro and Cognizant, now Infosys, if reports are to be believed, has also joined in laying off the employees.

The TOI on Wednesday reported that at Infosys, nearly 1,000 employees in job level 6 and above - group project managers, project managers, senior architects and higher levels - may be asked to leave.

'Managers at these levels have been asked to identify, in terms of performance, the bottom 10 per cent of their reportees, the report said.

The trouble in Indian IT industry started with US president Donald Trump's 'Buy American, Hire American' campaign. The US is in the process of tightening the norms for H-1B visas.

Nearly 86 per cent of the H-1B visas issued for workers in the IT sector go to Indians and this figure is now sure to be scaled down to about 60 per cent or even less, ASSOCHAM had earlier said.

Cautioning against a huge decline in remittances from US, the apex trade body said the US visa move could disturb remittances by 8-10 per cent.

SoftBank suffers $1.4-bn loss in 2016-17 from investments in Snapdeal, Ola and others

Japan's SoftBank Group has recorded loss of $1.4 billion in 2016-17 from investments in Snapdeal, Ola and others.

It wrote off over $1 billion on valuation of its investment in Snapdeal.

SoftBank Group's intermediate holding firm Starfish I Pte Ltd owns preferred shares in Jasper Infotech, who runs 'Snapdeal.com,' an e-commerce site in India.

Softbank in a release said, "Highly competitive e-commerce market in India has made a trend of the company's business performance lower than initially anticipated. This situation caused a material decrease in net asset value of Starfish I Pte as of March 31, 2017, and therefore SoftBank Group impaired the carrying amount of its shares in the company, to the amount equivalent to its net asset value."

For the nine months ended December 2016 too, SoftBank booked an investment loss of 39.28 billion yen (USD 350 million) on its investments in India, including those in cab-hailing firm Ola and e-commerce company Snapdeal.

SoftBank has poured roughly $1 billion into Snapdeal since 2014, but competition in e-commerce has risen dramatically with US giant Amazon cranking up its presence and taking the No. 2 spot from Snapdeal.

SoftBank had led a $210-million investment in Ola and $627 million in Snapdeal in October 2014. It made follow-on investments in both firms.

SoftBank is best-known for its hugely lucrative early stage bet in Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group, in which it is still the single-largest investor.

SoftBank is the biggest investor in India's leading ride-share player Ola, which competes with Uber, and its top hotel aggregator Oyo.

SoftBank founder and CEO Masayoshi Son and other partners have also pledged to pour $20 billion into solar projects in the energy-hungry South Asian nation.

The Japanese firm has so far invested close to $2 billion in India and earlier this year it stated that it is looking to scale up investments to $10 billion in next 5-10 years.

Oracle to set up data centre in India to expand its cloud services

US tech giant Oracle today said it will set up a data centre in India to expand its cloud services here over the next 6-9 months.

The announcement came at a time when Oracle CEO Safra Catz is on a three-day visit to India.

"Over the coming months, Oracle will be reviewing proposals from government and business partners to provide customers with the capability to build and move workloads to an India-based cloud," Oracle said in a statement.

This will enable Oracle to deliver secure services to customers with "significant price advantage", it added.

However, no investment details were divulged by the USD 37 billion firm.

"With this expansion, we will be able to further support customer choice adding to capabilities already available through deployments of 'Oracle Cloud at Customer', as well as other Oracle Cloud data centre regions in Asia Pacific," Oracle President (Product Development) Thomas Kurian said.

Oracle had, last year, announced a USD 400 million investment and expansion plan in Bangalore, in one of its largest real estate ramp-ups ever.

Underlining the potential of the Indian market potential, Catz had praised the country's leadership saying they are focused on leapfrogging into future.

Apple Inc has become first US company to touch $800 billion valuation

Apple Inc has become the first US company to touch the $800-billion valuation. The Cupertino-based company has, according to Bloomberg, reported a surge in the previous fiscal quarter despite a drop in iPhone sales, one of its biggest profit generator.

According to the report, the company's stock rose by 1 per cent on Tuesday to close at $153.99 which yield it a total market capitalization of a massive $803 billion. The shares have registered a rise of 33 per cent from the beginning of this year.

The American company has maintained its profit margins despite a narrow range of products and an acute increment in competition from Asian countries.

"It's just reflective of how powerful a franchise it is. It may be the most powerful franchise in the country today," said Rick Meckler, president of LibertyView Capital Management in Jersey City, New Jersey, whose firm does not own the stock.

"Considering that it has a limited number of products, it has really dominated that market in a way that few companies have, and it's been able to retain margins despite lots of competitors."

Apple had reported a surprise fall in iPhone sales for its second quarter on Tuesday, indicating that customers may have held back purchases in anticipation of the 10th-anniversary edition of the company's most important product later this year.

The company sold 50.76 million iPhones in its fiscal second quarter ended April 1, down from 51.19 million a year earlier.

Analysts on average had estimated iPhone sales of 52.27 million, according to financial data and analytics firm FactSet.

Apple CEO Tim Cook has previously emphasised on the company's new diversification methods for higher profit margins.

General Awareness

Latest Current Affairs - April 2017

Appointments

Achim Steiner has been appointed as new administrator of United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

Ajit Kumar Srivastava and Shabri Bhattasali appointed as members of Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT).

Aleksandar Vucic is appointed as New President of European Nation Serbia.

American Actress and philanthropist Kristin Davis has been appointed as Goodwill Ambassador by UNHCR (UN Refugee Agency).

Anthony Lianzuala took over as Controller General of Accounts (CGA) (Ministry of Finance).

Aruna Sethi appointed as Chief Adviser (Cost) in Department of Expenditure (Ministry of Finance).

B.N.Mohapatra appointed as Financial Commissioner of Railway.

Beverages Firm Coca-Cola appointed T K K Krishnakumar as Chief of Its India and South West Asia business.

Bhimaraya Metri appointed as Director of Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Trichy (IIM Tiruchirappalli).

David R. Syiemlieh took Office as Chairman of Union Public Service Commission (UPSC).

Devendra Kumar Sharma appointed as Chairman of Bhakra Beas Management Board (BBMB) for 3 years.

Diplomat Vipul appointed as new consul General of Dubai.

Geeta Johari appointed as First ever Female Chief of Gujarat Police (Director General of Police).

Gita Mittal has been appointed as acting Chief justice of Delhi High Court.

Government Appointed Anant Narayan Nanda as Secretary in Department of Posts.

Government appointed Girish Shankar as chairman of newly constituted National Board of Electric Mobility (NBEM), that aims to promote electric mobility and manufacturing of electric (and hybrid) vehicles and their components.

Government approved one year service extension to Pradeep Kumar Sinha as Cabinet Secretary of India.

Haryana government appointed Baljit Singh Sandhu as new Director General of Haryana Police.

Indian - origin Person Anuja Ravindra Dhir became first non - white judge of old Bailey Court of London.

Indira Banerjee appointed as Chief Justice of Madras High Court (Tamil Nadu).

Justice Pradeep Nandrajog appointed as Chief Justice of Rajasthan High Court.

Lenin Moreno won 2017 Presidential election of South American Nation Ecuador.

Mahabaleshwara Mavinakudige Subrahmanya has been appointed as new MD and CEO of Private Sector's Karnataka Bank.

Mukulita Vijayawargiya appointed as Whole Time Member in Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India.

RK Pachnanda has been appointed as Director General of ITBP (Indo Tibetan Police Force).

Rajiv Kumar Chander appointed as India’s new Ambassador and permanent representative to United Nations (UN), succeeding Ajit Kumar.

Rajiv Rai Bhatnagar has been appointed as Director General of CRPF (Central Reserve Police Force).

Raman Roy appointed as chairman of National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) for 2017-18.

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) appointed Malvika Sinha as new Executive Director (ED).

Retired Supreme Court Judge Shiva Kirti Singh appointed as Chairman of Telecom Disputes Settlement & Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT).

Saraswat Bank (largest co-operative Bank) appointed Smita Sandhane as its Managing Director.

Sports Ministry approved appointment of Dave Smith (Australia) as coach in race walking and American Galina P Bukharina (USA) as coach in national 400m and 400m relay teams.

Sulkhan Singh appointed as Director General of Police (DGP) of Uttar Pradesh.

Sunaina Singh has been appointed as vice chancellor of Nalanda University (Bihar).

Supreme Court directed Kerala government to reinstate T.P. Senkumar as Director General of Police (DGP) of state.

US Prez Donald Trump nominated Indian-Americans to Key Posts-

Neomi Rao as Administrator of Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (Regulatory czar).

Vishal Amin as Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator (IP czar).

USA appointed Randolph Alles as Chief of Its Secret Service.

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) appointed Syrian refugee and Olympic athlete Yusra Mardini as a Goodwill Ambassador.

Vinay Shah has been appointed as Managing Director (MD) and Chief Executive (CEO) of LIC Housing Finance.

Awards

2017 Pulitzer Prize Winners (Given for achievement in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition in USA) -

Letters, Drama & Music

Fiction - The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

Drama - Sweat by Lynn Nottage

History: Blood in the Water (Heather Ann Thompson).

Biography or Autobiography - The Return: Fathers, Sons and the Land in Between (Hisham Matar)

Poetry: Olio (Tyehimba Jess)

General Nonfiction: Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City (Matthew Desmond)

Music: Angel’s Bone (Du Yun)

Journalism

Public Service - New York Daily News and ProPublica

Breaking News Reporting - Staff of East Bay Times (Oakland)

Investigative Reporting - Eric Eyre of Charleston Gazette-Mail, Charleston

Explanatory Reporting - International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, McClatchy and Miami Herald

Local Reporting - The Salt Lake Tribune Staff

National Reporting - David A. Fahrenthold of The Washington Post

International Reporting - The New York Times Staff

Feature Writing - C. J. Chivers of The New York Times

Commentary - Peggy Noonan of The Wall Street Journal

Criticism - Hilton Als of The New Yorker

Editorial Writing - Art Cullen of The Storm Lake Times, Storm Lake

Breaking News Photography: Daniel Berehulak, freelance photographer

52nd Jnanpith Awardhas been conferred upon Bengali poet Sankha Ghosh.

64th National Film Awards 2016 -

Winners in feature films category were chosen by jury headed by Priyadarshan and winners in non-feature category were chosen by jury headed by Raju Misra.

Best Feature Film - Kasaav (Marathi).

Non-Feature Film - Fireflies in the Abyss.

Best Popular Film Providing Wholesome Entertainment - Sathamanam Bhavathi

Best Environmental film including agriculture: The Tiger who crossed the line

Best Direction - Rajesh (Ventilator)

Best Actor - Akshay Kumar (Rustom)

Best Actress - Surabhi Lakshmi (Minnaminungu)

Best Supporting Actress - Zaira Wasim (Dangal)

Best Child Artist - Adhish Praveen (Kunju Daivam), Saj (Noor Islam), Manohara (Railway Children)

Best Children’s Film: Dhanak (Hindi)

Best Film on social issue: Pink

Best Male Playback Singer: Sundara Iyer (Joker)

Best Female Playback Singer: Thume jaake

Best Music Direction: Babu Padmanabha (Kannada Lama)

Special Jury award - Mohanlal( Pulimurugan), Janatha Garage and Munthirivallikal Thalirkkumbol.

Best feature films in regional languages -

Madipur (Tulu)

Joker (Tamil)

Wrongside Raju (Gujarati)

Pelli Chupulu (Telugu)

Dashakriya (Marathi)

Bisarjan’ (Bengali)

Maheshinte Prathikaram (Malayalam)

Ke Sara Sara (Konkini)

Reservation (Kannada)

Neerja (Hindi).

6th M.S. Swaminathan Award for agriculture has been given to Rayappa Ramappa Hanchinal (Chairperson of Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers’ Rights Authority).

One Part Woman, a translation work of Perumal Murugan’s controversial Tamil novel Maadhorubaagan, by Aniruddhan Vasudevan chosen for 2016 Sahitya Akademi’s award for translation in English.

Actress Moushumi Chatterjee received lifetime achievement award at 80th Bengal Film Journalists' Association (BFJA) awards.

Actress Saira Banu and Actor Jackie Shroff named for Raj Kapoor awards by Maharashtra Government.

Saira Banu awarded with Raj Kapoor Lifetime achievement award.

Jackie Shroff selected for Raj Kapoor Special contribution award.

Andhra Pradesh CM N Chandrababu Naidu selected for US India Business Council Award of ‘Transformative Chief Minister’.

Bhubaneswar (Odisha) became first Indian city to win Pierre L’enfant International Planning excellence award-2017 instituted by the American Planning Association (APA). 5 APA Awards recipients will be honoured in New York in May 2017.

Pierre L’enfant Awards Pierre L’enfant was a French-born American architect and civil engineer and is credited for designing layout of streets of Washington, D.C. American Planning Association (APA) named an award in his honour.

British Computer Scientist Tim Berners Lee won 1 Million USD Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) A.M. Turing Award, Often referred as Nobel Prize of computing.

Central Hindi Institute announced 26 writers for Hindi Sevi Samman Awards 2015 -

Ganga Sharan Singh Award (promotion and training of Hindi) -

S. Shesharatnam, M. Govind Rajan, Harmahendra Singh Bedi, H. Subadani Devi

Ganesh Shankar Vidyarthi Award (Journalism and creative literature)

Baldev Bhai Sharma

Rahul Dev

Atmaram Award (Science and Technology literature and Machinery growth)

Girish Chandra Saxena

Phani Bhushan Das

Subramanyam Bharti Award (Promotion of Hindi in constructive or criticism way)

Surya Prasad Dixit

Chandrakanta

Mahapandit Rahul Sankrityayan Award (field exploration and research as well as for description on its journey)

Chitra Mudgal

Jai Prakash Kardam

Dr. George Grierson Award (Awarded to people of foreign origin for promotion and training of Hindi outside India)

Fujii Takeshi (Japan)

Gabriela Nik Ilieva (New York)

Padmabhushan Dr. Moturi Satyanarayan Award (Awarded to people of Indian origin for promotion and training of Hindi outside India)

Pushpita Avasthi (Netherlands)

Padmesh Gupt (London)

Dadasaheb Phalke Excellence Awards 2017 -

Best Actress - Aishwarya Rai (Sarabjit).

Kala Shree Award - Hema Malini.

Zeenat Aman received Lifetime Achievement Award.

Creative Director - Shoojit Sircar (Pink).

Negative Role - Rohit Roy (Kaabil).

Best Debutant - Saiyami Kher (Mirzya).

Imortant Note -

Candidates please note that Dadasaheb Phalke Excellence Awards are not to be confused with Dadasaheb Phalke Award. These are 2 different entities.

Dadasaheb Phalke Excellence Awards are privately organized while Dadasaheb Phalke Award is Government Instituted (in 1969). Till date, 48 Artists have been honored by Dadasaheb Phalke Award. This year, It was conferred upon Kasinadhuni Viswanath by Government. The Award consists of a Swarn Kamal (Golden Lotus), a cash prize of Rs. 10 lakhs and a shawl.

Dr. Paduru Gururaja Bhat Award 2017 has been conferred upon A.V. Narasimha Murthy of University of Mysore.

Paduru Gururaja Bhat researched history and culture of Tulu Nadu Region (Tulu speaking region in Karnataka and Kerala states). Paduru Gururaja Bhat Award was instituted in 2010 and carries a citation and INR 50000.

Eritrean-Swedish journalist Dawit Isaak awarded with 2017 UNESCO/Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize.

Film Director & Actor Kasinadhuni Viswanath will be honored with 48th Dadasaheb Phalke Award for year 2016. The Award consists of a Swarn Kamal (Golden Lotus), a cash prize of Rs. 10 lakhs and a shawl.

Former Union minister Ashwani Kumar has been selected by Japan for This Year's Spring Imperial Decorations, for his contribution to strengthening of Indo - Japan bilateral ties.

Gujarat Narmada Valley Fertilisers and Chemicals Ltd (GNFC) won Golden Globe Tigers Award for Excellence and Leadership in CSR for 2017 in category of ‘E-Payment Leadership’, for implementation of digital transactions in its township at Bharuch (Gujarat). Awards ceremony was held at Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia).

GNFC has already won the Golden Peacock Award for its cashless innovation as it emerged as first fertiliser company in India to adopt a cashless economy successfully. Recently, PM Narendra Modi launched GNFC’s replicated cashless township model in 81 integrated townships across 12 states.

Hindi film ‘Newton’ won Jury Prize for Best Film at Hong Kong International Film Festival (Asia’s oldest international film festival).

Newton is a political comedy film directed by Amit Masurkar. The story revolves around a clerk on election duty in a conflict-ridden region of Chhattisgarh.

Hyderabad Police’s HYD COP’ app has been awarded Golden Peacock Innovative Product Service Award for 2017, during IOD India's Golden Peacock awards ceremony in Dubai.

India's Srishti Kaur won Miss Teen Universe 2017 Title at Managua (Nicaragua).

Miss Teen Universe pageant was started six years ago for teens aged 15 to 19.

Indian - origin British educationist Asha Khemka has been named Asian Business woman of the year at 5 th annual Asian Business Awards Midlands, That honours outstanding achievements of local Asian business.

Indian Army Chief Bipin Rawat conferred with honorary rank of general of Nepal Army.

Indian Cricketer Kapil Dev and Bollywood Actor Aamir khan will receive 75th Master Dinanath Mangeshkar Awards.

Indian environmental engineer Trupti Jain won 2016’s Cartier Women’s Initiative Award in Singapore for providing women working on farms with water management solutions and protecting them against droughts and flash floods.

Indian sand artist Sudarsan Pattnaik (Odisha) won jury prize gold medal at 10th Moscow Sand art Championship. Theme of championship was The world around us.

India’s youngest ever chancellor (of North East Frontier Technical University), Dileep K. Nair received Dr. B.R. Ambedkar International Foundation Kerala State Award for 2016-17 for his performance in field of education.

Minister of State (IC) for Labour & Employment Bandaru Dattatreya awarded NSCI Safety Awards 2016 to 70 Organisations.

Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare selected Tamil Nadu, Himachal Pradesh and Tripura for Krishi Karman awards 2015-16 (Cash Award 5 Crores).

Apart from these, Meghalaya would get commendation prize for total food grain production and would be given a cash award of Rs 1 crore.

Tamil Nadu has been chosen in large category (production over 10 million tonnes), Himachal Pradesh in medium category (1 to 10 million tonnes) and Tripura in small category (less than 1 million tonnes).

Nobel Laureate and social activist Kailash Satyarthi has been honored by PC Chandra Puraskar for his work against child slavery and child labour.

Noted playback singer Vani Jayaram presented with Ghantasala National Award by Ghantasala National Art Academy in Andhra Pradesh.

President Pranab Mukherjee conferred National Geoscience Awards 2016 on 26 geoscientists in New Delhi.

S.P. Bala Subramanyam awarded with NTR National Film Award for 2012 and actress Hema Malini awarded with same award for year 2013.

Sanjay Pratihar (Tezpur University(Assam)) has been selected for Indian National Science Academy (INSA) medal for Young Scientist Award 2017, for his contribution to multi-metal complexes, theoretical understanding, selective sensing of Hq2+ions and applications in agriculture.

Social activist Prafulla Samantra is among 6 winners of Goldman Environmental Prize 2017.

Prafulla Samantra is honored for his 12-year legal battle that affirmed indigenous Dongria Kondh’s land rights and protected Niyamgiri Hills from a massive, open-pit aluminum ore mine.

Other 5 winners are: Mark Lopez (USA), Uroš Macerl (Slovenia), Rodrigo Tot (Guatemala), Rodrigue Katembo (Congo), Wendy Bowman (Australia).

Goldman Environmental Prize was created in 1990 to honour environmentalists risking their lives for protecting the environment. It is given to 6 persons, one from 6 geographical regions of world - Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, South America. The prize is also called as Green Nobel.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres selected Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai as Messenger of Peace, making her UN’s youngest-ever Messenger of Peace. She also became youngest ever to address Canadian Parliament and 6th person to get honorary Canadian Citizenship.

UNESCO named Giuseppina Nicolini (Mayor of Lampedusa (Italy)) and non-governmental organisation SOS Méditerranée (France) as winners of Felix Houphouet-Boigny Peace Prize 2017, for their work to save lives of refugees and migrants and welcome them with dignity.

Victoria Beckham appointed Officer of Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to fashion industry.

World’s fifth highest Tower - Lotte World Tower opened in Seoul (South Korea). It has height of 1819 feet (555 Metres). World's Highest Tower is Dubai's Burj Khalifa (828 Metres).

Books

Hope in a Challenged Democracy: An Indian Narrative, written by Ashwani Kumar has been released.

Author Arjun Gaind launched his latest book - Punjab: Building the Land Of Five Rivers.

Book Hope in a challenged democracy; An Indian narrative, authored by Ashwini Kumar has been released.

Book Matoshree, authored by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan has been released.

Book written by Congress leader and former Union MinisterVeerappa Moily - The Flaming Tresses of Draupadi, has been released.

Committees

Committee constituted to prepare draft Ganga Act, under Girdhar Malviya has submitted its report. The draft Ganga Act addresses critical issues pertaining to National River Gaga on its Cleanliness (Nirmalta) and uninterrupted flow.

Committee headed by Ashok Lavasa submitted its Report to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, regarding 7th CPC recommendations on Allowances.

Government constituted Inter- Disciplinary Committee chaired by Special Secretary (Economic Affairs) to examine existing framework with related to Virtual Currencies (Bitcoin Etc.).

Shunglu committee submitted its report regarding abuse of power by Delhi government led by Aam Aadmi Party. Committee was formed by former Delhi Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung,to look into decisions taken by AAP government in Delhi.

Uttar Pradesh government constituted committee to implement its decision of waving off farmers’ agricultural loans worth approx 36300 crores, to be headed by Rahul Bhatnagar (UP Chief Secretary).

Days

Apr 1 - Establishment Day of Reserve Bank of India (RBI). It was formed in 1935.

Apr 10 - Public Sector Day. It is organized by SCOPE (Standing Conference of Public Enterprises).

Apr 10 - World Homoeopathy Day. AYUSH Ministry organised International Convention on World Homoeopathy Day with theme Enhancing Quality Research in Homoeopathy through scientific evidence and rich clinical experiences.

Apr 12 - International day of Human Space Flight. Marks First Human Space Flight carried out by Yuri Gagarin on 12 April, 1961.

Apr 14 - Birth anniversary of Dr. Bhim Rao Ambedkar. He was noted Independence activist and principal architect of Constitution of India.

On This occasion, PM Narendra Modi launched Aadhaar-linked Bharat Interface for Money (BHIM) and Felicitated Winners of Lucky Grahak Yojana and Digi-Dhan Vyapar Yojana in Nagpur (Maharashtra).

Mega draw of lots was held at Rashtrapati Bhawan and President Pranab Mukherjee picked up 6 lucky winners.

Consumer - 3 mega Prizes of Rs. 1 crore, Rs.50 lakh and Rs. 25 lakh went to Consumers using Rupay Debit Cards making digital payment of less than Rs 1600.

         Prize

Prize Money

         Bank

First Prize

Rs.1 crore

Shraddha Mohan (Central Bank Of India)

Second Prize

Rs.50 lakh

Hardik Prajapati (Bank Of Baroda)

Third Prize

Rs.25 lakh

Bharat Singh (Punjab National Bank)

Merchants - Rs. 50 lakh, Rs. 25 lakh and Rs. 12 lakh.

         Prize

Prize Money

           Bank

First Prize

Rs.50 lakh

Radha Krishanan (ICICI Bank)

Second Prize

Rs.25 lakh

Ragini Rajendra Uttrekar (Punjab National Bank)

Third Prize

Rs.12 lakh

Saik Rafi (Karur Vyasa Bank)

Apr 17 - World Hemophilia Day. 2017 theme is Hear Their Voices.

Apr 18 - World Heritage Day. 2017 theme is Cultural Heritage & Sustainable Tourism. It is also called International Day for Monuments and Sites.

Apr 2 - World autism Awareness Day. 2017 theme is Toward Autonomy and Self-Determination.

Apr 20 - United Nations Chinese Day 2017.

Apr 21 - Civil Servants Day.

11th Civil Services Day programme was held on this occasion, with awards given to 5 priority schemes - Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana, Deendayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, Start Up India/Stand Up India and e-National Agriculture Market (e-NAM).

Apr 22 - Earth Day, being celebrated since 1970. 2017’s Campaign is Environmental & Climate Literacy.

Apr 23 - UNESCO's World Book and Copyright Day.

Apr 23- UN English Language Day.

Apr 25 - World Malaria Day. 2017 Theme is ending malaria for good.

Apr 26 - International Chernobyl Disaster Remembrance Day. It Marks explosion at Ukraine's Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in 1986.

Apr 26 - World Intellectual Property Day. It is Being is observed by World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) since 2000.

Apr 28 - World Day for Safety and Health at Work. 2017 Theme is Optimize the collection and use of OSH data.

Apr 29 - Day of Remembrance for all Victims of Chemical Warfare.

Apr 30 - International Jazz Day.

Apr 4 - International Day for Mine Awareness and Assistance in Mine Action. 2017 theme is Needs driven. People Centred.

Apr 5 - Birth Anniversary of Noted Indian politician Babu Jagjivan Ram, observed as Samta Diwas.

Apr 5 - National Maritime Day. It commemorates First Jourey of first Indian owned shipSS Loyalty, sailing from Bombay to London on 5th April 1919. 2017 theme is “Connecting India through Shipping”.

Apr 6 - International Day of Sports for Development and Peace. United Nations Office on Sport for Development and Peace (UNOSDP) launched digital campaign #WePlayTogether on this occasion.

Apr 7 - World Health Day.

2017 theme is Depression: Let’s talk.

On This occasion, First NIMCARE World Health Day Summit 2017 held in New Delhi with slogan Unite for a Healthy Mind.

National Panchayati Raj Diwas. It marks passing of Constitution (73rd Amendment) Act 1992 that came into force with effect from 24 April 1993.

Defence

12th Edition of Indo - Mongolian Joint Military Exercise Nomadic Elephant held in Vairengte (Mizoram).

Atu Zumvu became First Nagaland Cop to be awarded coveted military honour - Shaurya Chakra.

Defence Acquisition Council approved procuring fresh batch of Barak surface-to-air missiles (SAM) for Indian Navy from Israel, under Buy Global category at approx cost of 500 crores.

Home Ministry will raise all-woman India Reserve Battalion (IRB) in Jammu and Kashmir, in wake of girl students throwing stones at security forces in Srinagar a while ago.

India signed mega defense deal with Israeli firms, including $1.6 billion deal with Israel Aerospace Industries to provide advanced medium range surface-to-air missiles (MRSAMs) to Indian Army and $400m contract with Rafael Advanced Defense Systems.

India successfully carried out fresh user trial of Agni-III ballistic missile. It is nuclear capable intermediate range (3,000 km to 5,000 km) missile with 2 stages.

Indian Navy Deployed hydrographic survey ship INS Darshak for undertaking hydrographic survey of Weligama Bay (Sri Lanka).

Indian and French Navies Started off their Joint Exercise - Varuna in Mediterranean Sea.

Naval Ship INS Chennai has been dedicated to Chennai City. It is a Kolkata-class stealth Guided missile destroyer ship and is largest-ever destroyer to be built in India. It is third and last Kolkata-class guided missile destroyers built under Project 15A.

Nepal and China will hold their first ever joint military exercise Sagarmatha Friendship 2017 in April 2017.

Economy

2 phased Budget session of Parliament ended with approval of landmark Goods and Services Tax (GST) Bill and passage of Union Budget 2017-18. It has been a successful session as 18 Bills were passed by both Houses during the session, including some key bills.

Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2016

It amends Enemy Property Act 1968 and empowers government to seize properties left behind by those who migrated to Pakistan or China after wars.

Central Goods and Services Tax Bill, 2017

It provides for levy and collection of tax on intra-state supply of goods / services by Central Government.

Integrated Goods and Services Tax Bill 2017

It makes provisions for levy and collection of tax on inter-state supply of goods / services by Central Government.

Goods and Services Tax (Compensation to States) Bill, 2017

-It provides for compensation to the states for loss of revenue arising due to implementation of goods and services tax for 5 years as per section 18 of Constitution (One Hundred and First Amendment) Act 2016.

Union Territory Goods and Services Tax Bill, 2017

Similar to States Goods and Services Tax (SGST) which shall be levied and collected by States/Union Territories on intra-state supply of goods / services.

Taxation Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2017

Seelkd to amend the customs and excise acts to make them compliant with new GST regime.

Finance Bill 2017.

It's a Money Bill and is A bulk bill of 40 amendments to different laws. Key proposed changes are -

Cash Transactions - Maximum amount of cash transaction is capped at 2 Lakh Rupees, Lowered from 3 Lakh rupees as proposed earlier in budget 2017-18.

Tax Evasion - Income tax returns to be filed along with Aadhaar Number.

Electoral Bonds - Incentives for political donations to be paid through digital payments and cheques. Cash donations to political parties have been capped at 2,000 rupees.

Lowering taxes -

Corporate Cut by 5 %to 25 %for small firms with annual turnover of up to 50 crore rupees.

Personal income tax on annual incomes of 250,000 to 500,000 rupees is lowered to 5 %from 10 %. 15 %surcharge will be imposed on tax on annual income of over 1 million rupees.

Start-ups will be exempted from paying income tax for any 3 consecutive years out of initial 7 years after incorporation.

Private Investment - Tax exemptions for real estate developers if they complete their projects in 5 years (up from 3 years earlier).

Specified Bank Notes (Cessation of Liabilities) Bill 2017

Provides for holding, transfer and receiving of old 500 and 1000 rupee notes a criminal offence.

Payment of Wages (Amendment) Bill 2017

Enables employers to pay wages to workers through cheque or directly crediting to their accounts.

Maternity Benefit (Amendment) Bill, 2016

Seeks to amend Maternity Benefit Act 1961 to provide for the following -

Maternity leave available to working women to be increased from 12 weeks to 26 weeks for first two children.

Maternity leave of 12 weeks to be available to mothers adopting a child below age of 3 months.

Employer may permit a woman to work from home if it is possible to do so.

Mental Healthcare Bill, 2016

Provides for healthcare and services to people with mental illness and also decriminalises suicide.

HIV and AIDS (Prevention and Control) Bill 2017 -

Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) (Prevention and Control) Bill is first national HIV law in South Asia. It seeks to safeguard rights of people living with HIV and affected by HIV, by preventing social discrimination against these people.

According to Randstad survey, Fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) industry named as highest paying industry in India with average annual cost to company (CTC) of Rs. 11.3 lakh.

Aditya Birla Idea Payments Bank Ltd became seventh entity to receive final licence from Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to set up a payments bank.

Axis Bank tied up with American Bank Wells Fargo to offer real-time remittances from Indian diaspora in USA to their relatives in India. Similar pact has been signed between South Indian Bank and Flyworld Money, for Inward remittances by Indians in Australia.

Bank Board Bureau (BBB) recommended to bring reforms in compensation process in public sector banks (PSBs), on lines of Central Public Sector Enterprises (CPSEs). It will be important in attracting high-quality talent in PSBs.

Bank Board Bureau is super authority of eminent banking professionals for public sector banks (PSBs). It replaced Banks' Appointments Board of Government.

Bank Boards Bureau (BBB) evolved a Governance, Reward and Accountability Framework (GRAF) for public sector banks to ensure that they have the ability to compete with other banks and non-banking finance companies.

Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approved listing 11 Central Public Sector Enterprises (CPSEs) on stock exchanges, for public offer of shares up to 25 per cent of Government's shareholding. CPSEs are -

Rail Vikas Nigam Limited

IRCON International Limited

Indian Railway Finance Corporation

Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation

RITES Ltd

Bharat Dynamics Limited

Garden Reach Shipbuilders & Engineers

Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited

North Eastern Electric Power Corporation

MSTC Ltd

Mishra Dhatu Nigam Ltd.

Canara Bank signed agreement with BSNL, for upgrading bandwidth at all its branches to 2 Mbps for faster customer services.

Department of Posts signed pact with State Bank of India to promote 'SBI buddy e-wallet' and Point of Sale (POS) machines for cashless transactions at post office counters.

Finance Ministry approved 8.65 % interest proposed In December 2016, on employee provident fund (EPF) for 2016-17 fiscal.

Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management (FRBM) committee Heady by N K Singh has recommended a fiscal deficit target of 3% by 2020.

Flipkart-owned online fashion retailer Myntra acquired Bengaluru-based logistics start-up InLogg.

Government decided to keep education, healthcare and pilgrimages out of service tax under GST regime. GST is targeted to be rolled out from July 2017. It is also to be noted that Max INR 10000 will be deposited on One challan, Under GST.

Government raised 1200 crores by divesting 9.2% of its Stake in National Aluminum Company Ltd. (NALCO), bringing Government’s shareholding in NALCO down to 65.37%.

Government will now issue PAN (Permanent Account Number) and TAN (Tax Deduction Account Number) in electronic format in a day to new corporations.

Hyderabad based Microfinance institution Bharat Financial Inclusion Ltd launched instant loan approval Bassi in Jaipur (Rajasthan), to help rural areas embrace cashless transactions.

ICICI Bank and Axis Bank sold loans worth 1,800 crores to Asset Reconstruction Company Edelweiss. Loans were given to paper maker Ballarpur Industries Ltd.

IDBI Bank reduced interest rates on retail term deposits (RTD), bringing highest interest rate offered by IDBI bank to 6.40% (earlier 6.90%).

Income Tax department launched second phase of Operation Clean Money to investigate over 60,000 individuals with an aim to detect black money generation post demonetisation.

Income tax department asked Banks to get self-certification from account holders by 30 April, 2017 to comply with FATCA (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act) provision and avoid blocking of accounts. It is applicable for accounts opened between July 1, 2014 and August 31, 2015.

India signed $175 million loan agreement with Asian Development Bank (ADB), to help improve Solar Transmission System in Country.

Indian Railways will Issue Global tender for procurement of steel for First time in 30 years. SAIL's Bhilai Plant has been Primary supplier of steel for Railways so far. Demand for Steel by Railways in 2017-18 is 1.35 million tonnes, against SAIL's supply of Only 1.1 million tonnes.

Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) launched web portal isnp.irda.gov.in for insurers, to will allow them to register and sell policies online.

Investment trust sponsored by IRB Infrastructure Developers - IRB InvIT Fund has received SEBI’s approval to raise Rs. 4,300 crore through initial public offering.

Kerala-based NBFC Manappuram Finance launched co-branded prepaid card with YES Bank, that can be pre-loaded up to maximum amount of Rs. 50,000.

Kotak Mahindra Bank launched 811 banking app as part of Bank's vision to double customer base in 18 months. Customers will be able to open an account on 811 banking app with zero balance.

Loans disbursed under Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojana (PMMY) crossed target of INR 1.8 lakh crore in 2016-17. In 2017-18’s budget, Rs 2.44 lakh crore has been set as target for Mudra loans.

Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) launched Micro and Small Enterprises Facilitation Council (MSEFC) portal (http://msefc.msme.gov.in/) and MyMSME Mobile App.

MSEFC portal would facilitate implementation of the delayed payment provisions of the MSMED Act 2006 and also assist in monitoring of delayed payment cases.

MyMSME mobile app will provides information on all schemes implemented by Ministry of MSME at one place.

Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries became most-valued Indian company with market cap of Rs 4.60 Lakh crores. It has put IT major Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) on second spot, that has Market cap of 4.59 Lakh Crore. .

In Government Sector, State Bank of India (SBI) became most valued Company with market cap of 2.35 Lakh Crores. SBI surpassed Oil & Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) as most valued Public sector company.

NITI Aayog unveiled vision document 2031-32 with several features -

Every Indian will have houses with toilets, two-wheelers or cars, air-conditioners, power and digital connectivity by 2032.

Per capita income would go up by three fold to Rs 3.14 lakh in 2031-32 from Rs 1.06 lakh in 2015-16.

Gross domestic product would rise from Rs 137 lakh crore level in 2015-16 to Rs 469 lakh crore in 2031-32.

Expenditure would rise from Rs 38 lakh crore in 2015-16 to Rs 130 lakh crore in 2031-32.

Non Agriculture Credit Given by Banks in 2016-17 has been Lowest in last several decades, with Growth of Just 5.12 %. It has been due to banks restraining from lending amid Increase in NPAs.

Non-banking finance company (NBFC) AU Financiers India has converted itself into a small finance bank - AU Small Finance Bank.

PM Narendra Modi launched 81 cashless / less cash townships across 12 states, Including 56 in Gujarat and 25 in 11 other states. Model has been developed by Gujarat Narmada Valley Fertilizers and Chemicals Ltd (GNFC) and GNFC’s Bharuch (Gujarat) township is India’s first 100% cashless township.

PM Narendra Modi launched BHIM-Aadhaar platform from Nagpur, as merchant interface of BHIM App that has been launched for making digital payments using the Aadhaar platform. BHIM-Aadhaar platform enables citizens to make digital transactions, without access to smart phones / internet / debit/credit cards.

Private Bank Yes Bank won ‘Golden Peacock Innovative Product/Service Award 2017’ (in Financial sector), for its innovative mobile technology product - SIMsePAY. Yes Bank also Partnered with Paisabazaar.com, to offer conditionally approved loans to Paisabazaar’s existing customers.

RBI allowed Aditya Birla Group's Grasim Industries to raise foreign shareholding to 49% from existing limit of 30%.

RBI issued Revised Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) framework for banks from April 2017 Onwards, applicable to all banks operating in India. It was required as bad loans reached USD 80 billion or 15% of system. NPAs of Govt. banks reached Rs 6.3 lakh crore as of September compared to Rs 5.5 lakh crore in June 2016.

Revised framework will be again reviewed after three years.

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) approved introduce banknotes of 200 denomination, from July 2017 Onwards.

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) asked all existing asset reconstruction companies (ARCs) to have minimum net owned fund (NOF) of Rs 100 crore by March 2019.

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) kept key policy rates unchaged, in its first bimonthly monetary policy review of 2017-18. It however increased the reverse repo rate to 6% (from 5.75%). RBI Monetary Policy Rates as on 05-04-2017 -

Repo Rate - 6.25 %

Reverse Repo - 6.00 %

Bank Rate - 6.50 %

Marginal Standing Facility (MSF) Rate - 6.50 %

CRR (Cash Reserve Ratio) - 4 %

SLR(Statutory Liquidity ratio) - 20.50 %

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) slashed clearance time for National Electronic Funds Transfer (NEFT) to 30 minutes (from an hour), as part of Vision 2018 for Payment and Settlement Systems. 11 additional settlement batches will be introduced at 8.30 am onwards, taking total number of half hourly settlement batches during day to 23.

Reserve Bank of India has allowed banks to invest (upto 20% of Net Owned Fund) in Real Estate Investment Trust (REITs) and Infrastructure Investment Trusts (InvITs), to help revive infrastructure sector.

RBI permitted banks to invest up to 10% of unit capital of a Real Estate Investment Trust (REITs) or Infrastructure Investment Trusts (InvITs).

Reserve Bank of India has set up 2 new Offices of Banking Ombudsman for States of Jammu and Kashmir (in Jammu) and Chhattisgarh (in Raipur).

State Bank of India reduced its benchmark lending rate from 9.25% to 9.1%.

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) ordered Reliance Jio Infocomm to withdraw its complimentary ‘Jio Summer Surprise’ that offered 3 months of free services to a user who paid an initial fee.

Jio’s two promotions Welcome Offer and Happy New Year led to a rate war, that had badly affected telecom industry’s finances. It led to a sharp fall in government revenue.

To digitally empower Atal Pension Yojana (APY) and improve quality of service, statement of transaction(e-SOT) and e-PRAN card have been launched by Government. These facilities are available at www.npscra.nsdl.co.in and www.npstrust.org.in. This online tool enables viewing Subscribers' Transaction and pension related details of APY account.

Atal Pension Yojana (APY) is an old age pension scheme for unorganized sector workers (Non Income tax payers) that promises pension between 1 to 5 Thousand after age of 60. Any Indian unorganized sector worker can join it by age of 40 years.

APY Scheme is being implemented through 235 APY Service Providers (Mainly Banks) all over country and has 45 lac subscribers currently.

Under Central GST (CGST) Act, tax evasion of over Rs 5 crore under GST regime will be cognizable and non-bailable offence with police having authority to make an arrest without warrant.

World Bank approved $375 million loan for India’s first inland water transport fairway National Waterway 1 (NW1) project on a 1,360 km stretch of the Ganga river between Varanasi and seaport of Haldia.

This amount will be utilized for capacity augmentation of National Waterway-1 (NW-1) between Haldia in West Bengal and Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh on river Ganga. It will enable commercial navigation of vessels of 1,500-2,000 tonnes capacity along the stretch.

World Bank report Globalization Backlash stated that India’s gross domestic product will rise to 7.2% in 2017-18, from 6.8% the in 2016-17. It expects that India'a GDP growth will rise to 7.7% by 2019 - 20.

e-Commerce Firm Flipkart raised total fund USD 1.4 billion from China’s Tencent, US-based e-commerce firm eBay and Microsoft. Flipkart also acquired eBay’s Indian operations, to counter Amazon.

International

1st India Indonesia Energy Forum held in Jakarta (Indonesia). It was attended by Piyush Goyal (Minister of State with Independent Charge for Power, Coal, New and Renewable Energy and Mines).

2017 A.T. Kearney Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) Confidence Index -

Top 5 - USA, Germany, China, UK and Canada

India has jumped one spot to 8th rank.

2017 BRICS Film Festival will be held in Chengdu (China) in June 2017. Note that First BRICS Film Festival was held in Delhi in September 2016.

2017 Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index (TTCI) by World Economic Forum (WEF) -

India ranked 40th among 136 economies.

Top 5 - Spain (1st), France (2nd), Germany (3rd), Japan (4th), United Kingdom (5th).

Bottom 5 - Mauritania (132), Congo (133), Burundi (134), Burundi (135), Yemen (136).

BRICS - Brazil (27), Russia (43), China (15), South Africa (53)

Neighbours - Nepal (103), Pakistan (124), Bangladesh (125), Sri Lanka (64)

A freight train connecting Russia with China arrived in Ganzhou an inland city in Jiangxi province, carrying goods from Moscow (Russia) and travelling over 7,000 kms.

A global alliance of tech industries and academic organisations launched $14-million initiative with name The News Integrity Initiative, to combat spread of fake news and improve public understanding of journalism and promote news literacy.

A new museum opened in France, to show beauty of Polar Landscapes of Arctic and Antarctic Region. It has been designed by Jean Christopher Victor.

A set of four rare stamps, featuring Mahatma Gandhi has been sold for 5 lakh pounds at an auction in UK. It is highest price ever paid for Indian Stamps.

According to Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri) -

India is now world’s fifth-largest military spender spending at $55.9 billion in 2016.

Top 5 are - US ($611 billion), China ($215 billion), Russia ($69.2 billion), Saudi Arabia ($63.7 billion), India ($55.9 Billion).

Globally, Defence expenditure has been 2.2 % of GDP in 2016.

As per Government, number of centrally sponsored schemes (CSS) has been reduced from 66 to 28, from 2016-17 onwards. Out of these 28 schemes, 6 are Core of the Core, 20 as Core Schemes and 2 are Optional Schemes.

Core schemes - Fund-sharing pattern between Centre and states is 60:40 for general states and 90:10 for Northeastern and 3 Himalayan states,

Core-of-core Schemes - These are fully funded by Centre. Includes MGNREGA, National Social Assistance Plan and National Programme for Persons with Disabilities.

Optional Schemes - These are for social protection and social inclusion, with fund-sharing pattern of 50:50 for general states and 80:20 for Northeastern and hilly states.

As per UN-Food and Agriculture Organisation, Highest ever metric of 2.6 billion metric tonnes of Cereal Crops were cultivated in 2016-17.

Australia abolished 457 Visa Programme used by thousands of temporary foreign workers (Mainly Indians), to address growing unemployment in Australia. It shows Australia wants to adopt ‘Australians first’ approach to skilled migration.

Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull announced changes to Citizenship laws, unveiling tighter requirements for new applicants. New conditions are

Applicants for obtaining citizenship must be permanent residents for at least 4 years(up from 1 year currently).

Applicants must be committed to embrace Australian values and respect Australian laws, which largely focuse on not getting included in any Criminal activity.

Applicants have to pass a standalone English test which will focus heavily on respect for women and children.

An applicant can fail the citizenship test for maximum 3 Times.

This has been announced after recent scrapping of the 457 visa program for foreign workers, which was used majorly by Indians.

Belgium became first country to open an honorary consulate office in Gujarat International Finance Tec-City (GIFT City) in Gandhinagar (Gujarat).

Bengaluru- Based Maini Precision Products (MPP) and Marshall Aerospace and Defence Group (UK) signed multimillion dollar contract for structural machined parts and sub-assemblies for a major aircraft programme.

China and Iran signed first agreement on the reconfiguration of Iran's Arak reactor.

China docked its first cargo spacecraft Tianzhou-1 with Tiangong-2 space lab. It is a major step towards China’s ambition of establishing a permanently manned space station by 2022, meant to stay in orbit for at least 10 years.

China launched its first indigenously built aircraft carrier as Type 001A. It is China’s second aircraft carrier after Liaoning.

Chinese President Xi Jinping announced restructure of People’s Liberation Army (PLA). It is second major restructure by President Xi after September 2015 reforms when he reducted number of military personnel by 300,000. As per new structure, PLA will have 84 units to be placed under 15 agencies. It will place greater emphasis on new capabilities including cyberspace, electronic and information warfare.

Chinese government prohibited parents from choosing baby names like Islam, Medina, Jihad and Quran for their children. It is mainly done to strengthen hold on Muslims living in western China.

Cuba and Morocco signed agreement to re-establish diplomatic ties after huge period of 37 years.

Despite India rolling out National IPR Policy in 2017, US Trade Representative’s (USTR) office has again placed India on ‘priority watch’ list in this year’s Special 301 report. USTR’s view is that India has not made adequate changes in its intellectual property (IP) laws and regulations.

Doping violation report 2015 by World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) -

Top Doping Violation Nations - Russia (176), Italy (129), India (117 Violations).

Dubai (UAE) became first city in world to have its own Microsoft-designed font. The font will have typeface both in Latin and Arabic script and will be made available in 23 languages.

EY Europe, Middle East, India and Africa (EMEIA) Fraud Survey 2017 about corruption in business -

India ranks 9th among 41 surveyed countries in bribery and corrupt practices in businesses.

Top 5 - Ukraine, Cyprus, Greece, Slovakia, Croatia.

FMCG major Britannia Industries signed MoU with Greece’s cakes and confectionery major Chipita, to explore certain business opportunities.

Facebook launched its digital assistant named 'M' for US users of its Messenger application. M uses artificial intelligence and suggests relevant actions to help manage conversations.

Final stage of world’s largest solar plant Noor Ouarzazate has been inaugurated by Mohammed VI, King of Morocco. It is based on photovoltaic (PV) technology and has area over 137 hectares. It is scheduled to start operating in 2018 and it is expected to generate 582 megawatts.

First rail freight service from United Kingdom to China departed from Essex, to travel over 7,500 miles to reach Yiwu (China). It is part of China’s ambitious One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative that aims to revive ancient Silk Road trading routes with West.

Five Madhesi parties in Nepal united to form a new party named - Rastriya Janata Party.

French government announced closing country’s oldest nuclear plant at Fessenheim (near border with Germany).

Germany Government approved package of security measures that aims at preventing extremist attacks. It Included partial ban on full-face burqa, the Islamic veil.

Germany became first North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) member country to launch a self-contained cyber command unit Cyber and Information Space Command, designed to shield IT and weapons systems from growing attacks.

Google launched its new YouTube Go application in India, as a lite version of Video sharing site Youtube. It will give better experience on a slower network. Meanwhile, Micro blogging site Twitter also rolled out Twitter Lite as a lighter version (70% less data usage).

Government approved MOU for Establishment of Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) Grid Interconnection, to be signed among member states of BIMSTEC at the upcoming 3rd BIMSTEC Energy Ministers’ Meeting to be held in Nepal.

MoU provides framework for implementation of grid interconnections for electricity trade to promote rational and optimal power transmission in BIMSTEC region.

BIMSTEC is an international organisation of 7 countries from South and South East Asia - India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Nepal, Thailand and Myanmar.

Government approved Protocol amending Convention between India and Portugal for avoidance of double taxation.

Government approved signing Collaborative Agreement with French National Research Agency (France) for supporting Belmont Forum Secretariat from January 2015 to December 2017, at expenditure of 40,000 Euros.

Belmont Forum is a high level group of the world’s major and emerging funders of global environmental change research and international science councils, established in 2009.

Belmon Secretariat is hosted by one of Belmont forum member on rotational basis. France is hosting it from January 2015 to December 2017.

Government approved signing Framework of Understanding (FoU) on Cooperation in Hydrocarbon Sector with Bangladesh.

Iceland became first country to neutralise gender pay gap, by making it mandatory for public and private businesses to prove they offer equal pay to employees.

India Joined new 9 Members Group - Network for Improving Quality of Care for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health that aims to improve the quality of care for new mothers and babies. Other Members Include - Bangladesh, Cote d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Nigeria, Tanzania and Uganda.

India along with 12 Other nations won elections to 2 subsidiary bodies of United Nations (UN) - Committee for Programme and Coordination (CPC) and International Narcotics Control Board.

India and Australia signed 6 agreements on occasion of Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull visiting India. MOUs are -

Health and Medicine, Environment & Climate & Wildlife, Promotion and Development of Cooperation in Civil Aviation Security, Combatting International Terrorism and Transnational Organized Crime. Implementation arrangement between ISRO and Geoscience Australia on Cooperation in Earth Observation and Satellite Navigation.

Additionally, India-Australia Sports Partnership (IASP) has been launched for cooperation in 4 areas - athlete and coach training and development, sport science, sport governance and integrity, and grassroots participation. Victoria University and University of Canberra will help India establish a Highly Efficient National Sports University.

India and Bangladesh signed 22 agreements during Visit of Bangladesh PM Shiekh Hasina to India -

India announced concessional Line of Credit (LoC) of $4.5 billion to Bangladesh for projects in priority sectors. Moreover, $500 million Credit will also be given to Bangladesh for defence purchases.

MoUs Include areas such as Defence, Judicial Sector, Mass Media, Cyber Security, Aids to Navigation, Peaceful Uses of Outer Space and Nuclear Energy, Information Technology and Electronics, Establishing Border Haats across border, Regulation of Motor Vehicle Passenger Traffic (Khulna-Kolkata route). Scientific Cooperation in Earth Sciences for Research and Development.

Both Nations committed to solve Teesta River Issue -

Teesta River Originates in West Bengal (83 %) and flows into Bangladesh (17 %). Issue with the river is that Bangladesh needs more water of it during December - May but the treaty has been withheld for so long due to Opposition by West Bengal CM Mamta Bannerjee.

India and South Korea signed MoU for Defence Industry Co-operation in Shipbuilding.

India contributed USD 2,50,000 to UN Election Assistance Division to help other countries to hold elections and develop their electoral systems. It is 2nd time (first in 2012) that india has made such a contribution to UN Election Assistance Division.

India has become world’s second largest LPG importer, replacing Japan as 2nd and China being world’s top LNG importer.

LPG imports in India increased 23% during 2016-2017 to about 11 million tonnes, owing to 2 government schemes providing free gas connections. From May 2016, government is providing free cooking gas connections to women from extremely poor households under Ujjawala Yojana.

It is aimed at reducing use of polluting fuels such as wood and dried cow dung that cause 1.3 million premature annual deaths in India.

India has set a target of increasing LPG usage to cover 80% of households by March 2019. Demand for fuel is expected to touch 35 million tonnes by 2031-32 in India.

India- United Arab Emirates (UAE) cultural celebrations festival launched at Abu Dhabi.

Indian Ambassador to Nepal Manjeev Singh Puri inaugurated cultural programme Colours of Northern & Southern States of India in Kathmandu (Nepal).

Indian Person Abdulqadir Rashik won top prize at a global challenge for an open-source tool that enables users to interactively view UN General Assembly resolutions and gain a deeper understanding of voting patterns.

Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will launch its South Asia Satellite on 5 May 2017, to benefit countries in South Asia. It wll be launched onboard GSLV-09.

Earlier, satellite was named SAARC Satellite but its name was changed to South Asia Satellite when Pakistan was dropped from list of nations taking part in project.

International Monetary Fund (IMF) predicted that global economy will grow at 3.5% in 2017, up from 3.1 % in 2016, and 3.6% in 2018.

Israel Government approved first West Bank settlement in 2 decades, to be built near existing settlement of Shilo

Japan officially recognized bitcoin and digital currencies as legal money from April 2017 Onwards. It will help in integration of digital currency into legal banking system through regulatory scrutiny.

Kazakhstan opened its honorary consulate in Chennai, to cover states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala. 2017 marks 25th anniversary of establishment of diplomatic relations between India and Kazakhstan.

Mongolia launched its first satellite - Mongol Sat-I, in partnership with Asia Broadcast Satellite (ABS). It is a 1227 Megahertz satellite.

Myanmar became 7th member of SASEC South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation (SASEC) program of Asian Development Bank (ADB).

Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved total 9 projects costing $2.42 billion as part of Operational Plan (OP) 2016-2025 of South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation (SASEC) program, with ADB financing of $1.43 billion. Out of these, 2 Economic Corridors and 1 Road Bridge worth $1.2 billion are to be in India.

National Aeronautics and Space administration (NASA) launched its football stadium sized and heavy lift Super Pressure Balloon (SPB) from Wanaka (New Zealand). It will float at 33.5 km above ground in Southern Hemisphere’s mid-latitude band, to observe broad swath of Earth’s atmosphere to detect UV fluorescence from deep space cosmic rays.

New MOUs Approved -

Australia - Healthcare and Medicine.

Bangladesh - Audio Visual Co-Production, Mass Media, Passenger cruise services on the coastal and protocol routes, Judicial sector. An MOU for fairway development on two stretches also signed. Stretches are Ashuganj-Zakiganj stretch of Kushiyara river and Sirajganj-Daikhawa stretch of Jamuna river.

France - Technical Cooperation in Civil Aviation

Italy - Technical cooperation in railway sector.

Georgia - Air Services.

Tunisia - Justice Sector.

Russia - Science and Technology Sector.

Pakistan leased operations of its strategic Gwadar port to China Overseas Port Holding Company (COPHC) for 40 years, on a revenue sharing basis(91% share of revenue to go to COPHC) .

Gwadar Port is deep-sea port situated on the Arabian Sea at Gwadar in Balochistan province of Pakistan, located at mouth of Persian Gulf just outside strategically important Strait of Hormuz. It features as southern Pakistan hub of $57 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) plan.

It has several Advantages for China -

It will offer a short route to oil-rich West Asia and Africa. China can use it to transport fuel into north-western China, by transporting oil and gas from port through pipelines to China’s Xinjiang province.

It has several Implications for India as well -

Gwadar provides China a key listening post to observe the Indian naval activities around the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Aden.

Lease of Gwadar port also helps China to encircle India (String of Pearls) and gain strategic advantage in the region.

Gwadar port could be used for military purpose as well.

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte won 2017’s Time Magazine’s Readers Readers Poll of 100 most influential people in world.

RBI signed MoU on Supervisory Cooperation and Exchange of Supervisory Information with Royal Monetary Authority of Bhutan.

Report by World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC), 2016 -

India’s travel and tourism sector ranks 7th in terms of its total contribution to country’s Gross Domestic product (GDP). India's Tourism sector Generated USD 208.9 billion in 2016 (9.6% of India’s GDP).

Top 3 - USA, China and Germany.

Reserve Bank of India signed MoU on Supervisory Cooperation and Exchange of Supervisory Information with Bank of Guyana.

Thailand’s King Maha Vajiralongkorn signed new Constitution of the country into a law, to pave way for elections that would bring country back from military to democratic rule.

Time Magazine released annual list of 100 most influential people of 2017. This year's list includes 2 Indians - PM Narendra Modi and Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan won referendum on granting him more political powers. Features of New constitution are -

Next presidential and parliamentary elections will be held on 3 November 2019.

It provides for a five year tenure and maximum of two terms for the President.

President may appoint top public officials, including ministers, vice-presidents.

Prime minister's Role will be scrapped.

President may intervene in judiciary and will decide whether or not to impose an emergency.

UNESCO will screen Rahul V. Chittella’s short film Azaad during World Press Freedom Day event to be held from May 1-4 in Jakarta (Indonesia). Movie is about the dysfunctional relationship between a father and his son.

World Press Freedom Day is celebrated on May 3 by UNESCO. 2017 Theme is Critical Minds for Critical Times: Media’s role in advancing peaceful, just and inclusive societies.

US President Donald Trump introduced biggest tax reform plan in history of USA. -

Income tax rates have been slashed from 39.6% to 35%. Number of tax brackets is expected to be brought down to 3 from 7.

Proposes 15% corporate tax rate which is a sharp drop from existing 35%.

Move to a territorial tax system that provides relief to both small and large businesses.

It is proposed to repeal estate tax, alternative minimum tax.

However, only Congress is empowered to make major changes to USA tax laws.

US-based travel reviewer TripAdvisor presented 2017 World's Best Destination Award to Indonesia's resort island of Bali. Bali became the first Asian destination to earn the title.

USA Prez Donald Trump signed executive order to Tighten norms of H-1B visa programme, used to bring high-skilled foreign workers to USA. It is aimed at fulfilling his campaign that pledges to put America First.

USA Used GBU-43 (Nicknamed as MOAB (Massive Ordnance Air Blast bomb or Mother of All Bombs )) on an ISIS complex in Afghanistan. GBU-43 is said to be largest non-nuclear bomb ever used in battlefield. MOAB caused huge losses to ISIS in terms of Terrorist Headcount and system of tunnels and caves used by Them.

MOAB is although not the largest Nun Nuclear Bomb ever made. In 2007, Russia Tested Aviation Thermobaric Bomb of Increased Power, nicknamed Father of All Bombs. It had 4 times more impact than MOAB.

USA and China agreed to pursue a ‘100-day plan’ aimed at reducing US trade deficit with China.

World Health Organization (WHO) report Global Analysis and Assessment of Sanitation and Drinking-Water (GLAAS) 2017 stated that approx 2 billion people are currently use water contaminated in any form.

World Health Organization will test first malaria vaccine in real world setting in 2018 in African nations - Kenya, Ghana and Malawi. The RTS,S vaccine (also known as Mosquirix) was produced by GlaxoSmithKline in 1987. In 2015, vaccine received approval from European Medicines Agency (EMA).

This vaccine targets liver phase of malaria parasite’s life cycle as parasite multiplies inside liver after getting introduced.

World Immunization Week 2017 observed across the globe between 24 April - 30 April 2017 with theme VaccinesWork.

World Trade Organization has set up a panel to resolve dispute between Japan and India over imposition of safeguard import duty on iron and steel products.

Japan (second largest steel producer in world) in December 2016 dragged India to WTO against certain measures taken by New Delhi on imports of iron and steel products.

Meetings

136th mega conference of world parliamentarians held in Dhaka (Bangaldesh), Organized by Inter Parliamentary Union (IPU).

19th Commonwealth Forestry Conference held at Forest Research Institute at Dehradun (Uttarakhand). India Hosted It for Second time after 1968.

3rd Global Exhibition on Services (GES-2017) inaugurated at India Expo Mart (Greater Noida). It is aimed at highlighting India’s potential to boost its services exports across sectors.

India’s services exports were $146.5 billion in First 11 Months of 2016-17. IT and softwares accounted for 48% of overall services exports of India.

52nd Annual Meeting of African Development Bank held in New Delhi.

All India Seminar on Economic Reforms With Reference to Electoral Issues organised by Confederation of Indian Bar in New Delhi.

G20 Digital Ministerial Meeting held in Dusseldorf (Germany), attended by Ravi Shankar Prasad (Minister for Electronics & IT and Law and Justice).

Government will organize 4th National Standards Conclave at New Delhi in First Week of May 2017.

International Road federation (IRF) chosen India as host of 18th World Road Meeting, to be held on November 13, 2017. Theme of this year’s WRM is Safe Roads and Smart Mobility: The Engines of Economic Growth.

South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation (SASEC) Finance Ministers’ meeting held in New Delhi.

Special envoys of BRICS Nations Met in Vizag (Andhra Pradesh), to discuss volatile situation in Syria and USA air strikes.

National

Minister for Human Resource and Development, Prakash Javadekar launched Students for soldiers - a nationwide Vidya – Veerta Abhiyan to encourage Universities and educational institutions to display portraits of Param Veer Chakra-decorated soldiers.

2017 National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) Rankings (2nd Edition of NIRF Rankings) by Human Resource Development Ministry (Total 2995 Institutes Participated) -

Overall -

Indian Institute of Science Banglore.

Indian Institute of Technology Madras

Indian Institute of Technology Bombay

Engineering

Indian Institute of Technology (Madras)

Indian Institute of Technology (Bombay)

Indian Institute of Technology (Kharagpur)

Management

Indian Institute of Management (Ahmedabad)

Indian Institute of Management (Banglore)

Indian Institute of Management (Calcutta)

University

Indian Institute of Science (Bangalore)

Jawaharlal Nehru University (New Delhi)

Banaras Hindu University (Varanasi)

Colleges

Miranda House (Delhi)

Loyola College (Chennai)

Shri Ram College of Commerce (Delhi)

Pharmacy

Jamia Hamdard (New Delhi)

National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (Mohali)

Punjab University Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences (Chandigarh)

2017 National conference on Communicating India held in New Delhi.

2nd unit of Kudankulam Nuclear Power plant (KNPP) in Tamil Nadu started commercial generation of power (1000 MW). Now Nuclear power generation capacity in India has gone up to 6,780MW. KNPP is joint Venture of India and Russia.

3rd International Conference and Exhibition on Steel Industry 'India Steel 2017' held in Mumbai.

National Conference on Agriculture for Kharif Campaign - 2017 held at New Delhi.

According to Joint Plant Committee’s annual report on steel sector for 2016-17

India’s import of total finished steel declined 36 % to 7.4 million tonnes (MT) and exports increased 102% to reach 8.2 million tonnes.

Production of crude steel was 97.385 MT in 2016-17 (8.5% increase).

India is third largest producer of crude steel after China and Japan. India has set an ambitious target of becoming second largest by 2030, by enhancing domestic steel production capacity to 300 million tonnes.

Agriculture Ministry signed MOU with ISRO's National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC), for geo-tagging agricultural assets. It will help bring transparency in governance due to real-time monitoring and effective utilisation of agricultural assets such as ponds, crop area, warehouses and laboratories etc.

All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Delhi became India's first public hospital to start plaque brachytherapy facility for treatment of eye tumors.

Andhra Pradesh Government introduced Ammaku Vandanam in Schools, as a unique Programme to pay tribute to mothers. State Government also re-launched Adarana scheme, for improving traditional occupations.

Andhra Pradesh government formulated guidelines to help Red chilli farmers in state, who are in distress due to price crash in market. As per scheme, chilli stocks with farmers will be bought at price fixed by government and each farmer will get additional benefit of Rs 1,500 per quintal (max 20 quintals). Price will not exceed Rs 8,000 per quintal.

As a measure to end VIP Culture, Government has put ban on use of red beacons atop cars of VIPs, from May 2017 Onwards. Only three categories were exempted from ban - President, Vice-President and Chief Justice of India.

Emergency service vehicles like fire brigade, ambulance services, police vehicles will be allowed to use blue beacon.

As per Indian Patent Office, Samsung's R&D Unit filed maximum number of patent applications in IT sector in 2015-16, followed by TCS and Wipro. Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) topped in scientific and research and development organizations category.

As per recods, number of beneficiaries under Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana for providing free of cost LPG (cooking gas) connections to BPL households has crossed 2 crore mark. Tagline for scheme is Swachh Indhan, Behtar Jeevan.

Assam Government will develop birthplace of Srimanta Sankardev Batadrava as an international tourist spot, an ideal place for religious and cultural tourism.

Srimanta Sankardeva Srimanta Sankardeva (1449–1568) was a social and religious reformer, poet, playwright and preacher of vaishnavite cult. He is credited for inspiring Bhakti Movement in Assam.

Assam government had conducted Gunotsav programme to improve quality of school education in state.

Gunotsav originally is Gujarat government’s initiative that has been adopted by Assam government.

Aymanam ward in Kottayam district of Kerala became India’s first digitalised panchayat ward.

BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) emerged winner and largest Party in Strategically Important Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) elections 2017. BJP won 184 Seats, while AAP and INC got 46 and 30 respectively.

BJP government in Manipur will hold People’s Day on 15th of every month.

Bandaru Dattatreya (Minister of State for Labour and Employment) launched Aadhaar Seeding Application, aimed at efficient service delivery and widening reach of Employees Provident Fund (EPF) benefits.

Beginning from May 1, Oil PSUs will change petrol and diesel prices every day, in synchronisation with international rates and rupee-US dollar fluctuations. Initially, Indian Oil Corp. (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corp. (BPCL), and Hindustan Petroleum Corp. (HPCL) will launch this pilot project in 5 cities - Puducherry, Vizag (Andhra Pradesh), Udaipur (Rajasthan), Jamshedpur (Jharkhand) and Chandigarh.

Bengaluru police launched initiative to increase safety of children and women by introducing 51 pink patrol vehicles, along with Suraksha app launched by Karnataka government.

Berhampur Thakurani Yatra festival celebrated in southern Odisha.

Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL) commissioned 2 units of 270 MW at RattanIndia Nasik Power Ltd (Maharashtra).

Bhilar, a tiny hamlet in Satara district of Maharashtra will become India’s first ‘book village’ in First Week of May 2017. It will feature several bookstores and literature festivals.

Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) approved 9.4 % increase in Minimum Support Price (MSP) for raw Jute for 2017-18 season, to INR 3500 per quintal.

Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) approved amendments in Mega Power Policy 2009 to push 31 GW stranded projects entailing an investment of Rs 1.5 lakh crore.

Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) approved extending implementation of Crime and Criminals Tracking Network and Systems (CCTNS) Project for an year beyond 31 March 2017. CCTNS is a mission mode project under National e-Governance Plan of Central Government that aims at creating nationwide networking infrastructure for IT-enabled criminal tracking and crime investigation.

Central Government announced to buy 1 lakh tonnes of potato grown in 2016-17, at 4,870 per tonne from Uttar Pradesh farmers, to protect them against drastic reduction in prices.

Central Government released assistance of 1712 crores from National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF) to Tamil Nadu and 1235 crores to Karnataka.

Central government informed Supreme court about its plan to provide unique identification number for cows as suggested by an expert committee to track cattle and prevent their trafficking. Unique ID will have details like cattle’s age, breed, sex, height, body colour etc. IDs are proposed to be provided in form of a polyurethane tag.

China announced ‘standardised’ names for 6 places in Arunachal Pradesh, as a retaliation against Dalai Lama’s visit to Arunachal Pradesh. China’s announcement is aimed at reaffirming its territorial sovereignty over region.

Names assigned are - Wo’gyainling, Mila Ri, Qoidêngarbo Ri, Mainquka, Bümo La and Namkapub Ri.

Defence Ministry allowed Arunachal Pradesh government to use functional Advance Landing Grounds (ALGs) in state for civilian purpose.

Department of Science and Technology (DST) initiated Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) program that deals with deployment of computer-based systems that do things in physical world such as, self-driven cars by Google and Tesla.

Department of Science and Technology (DST) launched Cyber Physical Systems (CPS) programme, dealing with self-driven cars, autonomous unmanned vehicles and aircraft navigation systems. INR 3000 crores have been has been allotted for it.

Department of Telecommunications launched web portal Tarang Sanchar (tarangsanchar.gov.in) that allows tracking of radiation emitted from mobile towers within a locality and checking compliance with Electromagnetic field (EMF) emission norms defined by government.

As per International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP), permissible tower emission is 4.5 watts/ sq m in popular 900 MHz band. In India, Department of Telecommunication (DoT) has lowered it to be 0.45 W/sq m (10 times stringer than global standard set by ICNIRP).

Finnish mobile maker Nokia signed MoU with Airtel and BSNL to launch 5G technology and connected devices in India.

French nationals in UT of Puducherry casted their votes in first round of French Presidential elections. Note that there are approx 4600 French people parmanently living in Puducherry.

Global e-commerce major Amazon launched Its Fire TV Stick with Voice Remote in India. Fire TV Stick is the powerful streaming media device that plugs into an HD Television and lets customers access thousands of movies, TV shows, apps and games. Amazon also launched Classroom virtual training program to help teach new sellers basics of online selling.

Google launched new food delivery and home services aggregator -Areo, currently operational in Bengaluru and Mumbai.

Google announced Solve for India initiative, aiming to support Indian entrepreneurs and developers by giving them opportunity to learn directly from Google engineers.

Government announced 10 new places under Phase II of Swachh Iconic Places initiative -

Gangotri, Yamunotri. Mahakaleshwar (Ujjain), Char Minar (Hyderabad), Church and Convent of St. Francis of Assissi (Goa), Adi Shankaracharya’s abode Kaladi in Ernakulam, Gomateshwar in Shravanbelgola, Baijnath Dham (Devghar), Gaya Tirth (Bihar) and Somnath temple in Gujarat.

This is in addition to 10 Iconic places already under implementation in Phase I.

Government approved Election Commission’s proposal to buy 16.15 Lakh Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) machines to be used in 2019 General Elections. Approx cost of procurement will be INR 3,173 crores.

In VVPAT system, when a voter presses the button for a candidate of his choice in electronic voting machines (EVM), a paper ballot containing the serial number, name of candidate and poll symbol will be printed. This is expected to ensure free and fair elections.

Government approved INR 98 Crores for development of Tezpur, Majuli and Sivasagar circuit under Swadesh Darshan scheme.

Government approved Setting up Special Purpose Vehicle Government e-Marketplace as National Public Procurement Portal, for providing procurement of goods & services required by Government organizations.

Government approved closure of Mahatma Gandhi Pravasi Suraksha Yojana (MGPSY), that was set up in 2012 to address social security-related issues of the Emigration Check Required (ECR)-category workers going abroad for employment to ECR countries.

Government approved setting up Rail Development Authority as an independent rail regulator, to be based in Delhi. It will be responsible for recommending passenger fares, setting performance standards for rail operations and creating level playing policy for private sector participation.

Government approved setting up Indian Institute of Petroleum and Energy (IIPE) at Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh as an Institute of National Importance.

Government approved signing agreement between Ministry of Rural Development and Centre on Integrated Rural Development for Asia and the Pacific (CIRDAP) for establishment of CIRDAP Centre at National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (Hyderabad).

Government extended ceasefire with 2 Naga armed factions - National Socialist Council of Nagaland-Reformation (NSCN-R) and National Socialist Council of Nagaland-Neakpao-Kithovi (GPRN/NSCN) till April 27, 2018.

Government has set up Committee to monitor UDAN (Ude Desh Ka Aam Naagrik) regional air connectivity scheme which seeks to make flying affordable by connecting unserved and under-served airports.

Government has so far geotagged 1 crore assets, out of total 2.8 Crore assets created under MGNREGA since FY 2006-07.

Geotagging of assets created under MGNREGA started after need for online recording and monitoring of assets to check leakages was felt by government. on June 24, 2016, Ministry of Rural development signed MoU with National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC), ISRO and National Informatics Centre to geotag MGNREGA assets created under each village panchayats.

Government launched Bharat Stage-IV (BS-IV) grade transportation fuels to keep carbon emission in check. This has been done after Supreme Court recently banned sale and registration of BS-III vehicles from April 2017. It sets target of launching BS-VI fuel by April 2020 by skipping BS-V fuel.

Government permitted financially sound State Government firms to borrow directly from International ODA (Official development Assistance) partners for implementing various projects.

As a corollary to this, Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) has been permitted to borrow directly from Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) for Mumbai Trans Harbour Link (MTHL) project.

State government which gets the loan will furnish guarantee for the loan and Central Government will provide counter guarantee. State entities can directly approach bilateral agencies and the funding would not fall under state FRBM target. Eligibility criteria would be revenue of 1000 crores and 5000 crores in case of infrastructure projects.

Government state that 14 scholarship schemes for SC / OBCs / Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-nomadic Tribes (DNTs) students come under Digital Payments Initiatives, to benefit 3.54 crore students.

Government upgraded Grameen Vidyutikaran (GARV) App hasfor monitoring villages and households electrification in country.

Government will restart North Koel Irrigation project, aimed to address water requirements in Bihar and Jharkhand. It was announced by Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti during launch of management information system (MIS), to monitor projects under Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKYS).

Gujarat Governor O P Kohli gave his nod to Gujarat Self Financed School (Regulation of Fees) Bill 2017 that was passed by state’s assembly earlier.

It places upper limit of annual school fees at Rs 15000, 25000 and 27000 for primary/pre-primary, secondary and higher secondary education respectively. Schools breaching these provisions would be subjected to pay fine of 5 lakh for first offence, 10 lakh for second and will lose their affiliation on third breach. Law also includes a provision of tri-monthly fees.

HRD Minister Prakash Javedkar Stated that Government will set up a Central University for Divyangs in Uttar Pradesh. UP Government has also recently launched anti - land mafia task force to check illegal encroachment of Land.

Habibganj station in Bhopal became first Station in Indian Railway history, to be handed over to a private firm for development activities.

Haldia Port Topped First Ever Ranking of Ports on Sanitation Parameters, followed by Vizag Port. It has been compiled by Quality Council of India.

Haryana CM Manohar Lal Khattar launched mobile app Kilkari to spread awareness among pregnant women. He also rename Ballabgarh town in Faridabad as Balramgarh.

Haryana Government will provide one-time grant of INR 21,000 to families whose third girl child was born on or after August 24, 2015 under ‘Aapki Beti, Hamari Beti’ scheme.

Health Minister JP Nadda has launched Test and Treat policy for Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) patients. As per the policy -

Any HIV positive person will get necessary treatment free of cost, including ART (Anti- Retroviral Therapy) irrespective of his CD count. HIV destroys CD4 T cells in human body and weakens immunity levels. A person with CD4 cell count below 200 can develop serious illnesses. Before this new policy, government was providing free treatment to people with a count under 400.

Health and Family Welfare Minsitry finalized India’s comprehensive and multi-sectoral National Action Plan at the ‘Inter-Ministerial Consultation on AMR containment’ held at New Delhi, resulting in signing of Delhi Declaration to contain Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR).

Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has set up a National Anti-Microbial Resistance Research and Surveillance Network (AMRRSN) to enable compilation of data of AMR at national level.

Himachal Pradesh celebrated 70th Himachal Day function in Chamba. HP came into existence by merging 30 odd princely states in 1948.

According to 2005 Transparency International survey, Himachal Pradesh is 2nd least corrupt state in India. At present, State's Per capita income and GDP are Rs 1,47,277 and Rs 1,24,570 crore respectively. Literacy rate is to 82.80% as per Census 2011.

Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL) signed agreement with Rajasthan government to set up a 9 million tonnes per annum Refinery at Barmer with investment of 43000 crores, as a 74:26 joint venture.

Another large investment in Rajasthan Includes 27,000 crores by Cairn India for development of Oil Fields.

Home Minister Rajnath Singh inaugurated web portal namedBharat ke Veer, enabling donors to contribute towards family of a braveheart who sacrificed his/her life in line of duty.

Hyderabad became first ‘Giga-enabled’ city in India after Atria Convergence Technologies Fibrenet launched 1 Gigabit per second (Gbps) wired broadband internet service in city. It is 400 times faster internet speed than average speed of 2.5 mbps in India.

Hyderabad's Rajiv Gandhi International Airport has been given Level 4 (Highest Level) of carbon neutrality status by Airports Council International (ACI) under its Airport Carbon Accreditation programme.

ACI Airport Carbon Accreditation programme was initiated in June 2009 and consists of four levels: ‘mapping’ (level 1), ‘reduction’ (level 2), ‘optimisation’ (level 3) and ‘neutrality’ (level 3+).

IIT Kharagpur will introduce Vastu Shashtra to architecture students from August 2017 Onwards.

In order to give more freedom to farmers to sell their produce, agriculture ministry unveiled The State/UT Agricultural Produce and Livestocks Marketing (promotion and facilitation) Act, 2017. It defines each state/UT as a single unified market area. Other than Bihar, all other states/UTs have agreed to adopt the model Act.

The model act proposes to curb role of APMC mandis. Existing APMC mandis are allowed to enforce regulation only in their market yard and thus encouraging private sector players to set up mandis. Traders would be able to transact in all markets within a state by paying a single fee.

Agricultural marketing is a state subject and is governed by their respective Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC) Acts, the states are free to adopt portions or entire model act.

State governments are required to appoint an independent entity director of agricultural marketing, who would be sole authority to grant licence fo establishment of a new market yard in the state concerned.

India Meteorological Department (IMD) is implementing Agrometeorological Advisory Services (AAS) under Gramin Krishi Mausam Seva (GKMS). GKMS is rendered twice a week to farmers in collaboration with State Agricultural Universities (SAUs) etc.

India Post released Commemorative Postage Stamp on Coffee as a Fragrance Stamp in Bengaluru.

India allowed imports of 500,000 tonnes of duty-free raw sugar till June 2017, following output below consumption levels this year.

India will give INR 35 crore rupees to children of freedom fighters in Bangladesh under new ‘Muktijodha scholarship’ scheme in next 5 years. Under this, students at higher secondary level will get a one-time grant of Tk 20,000 (INR 15,370) and students at undergraduate level will get a grant of Tk 50,000 (INR 38,430).

India's Largest Extra - Dozed (Cable Supported) Bridge will be made in Patna (Bihar), on River Ganga and parellel to Mahatama Gandhi Bridge. It will be 5.5 Km in Length and will have only 26 Pillars (Largely dependent on Cables). It will leave behind Gujarat's 1.4 KM Extra Dozed Bridge.

India's first brand licensing event - India Licensing Expo will be held in August 2017 in Mumbai, organised by License India. It is India’s first licensing media Services Company and supported by Franchise India.

Indian Academy of Highway Engineers signed MOU with University of New South Wales (Australia), to set up a Centre for Advanced Transportation Technology and Systems (CATTS). It was signed during visit of Simon Birmingham, Australian Education Minister to India.

Indian Institute of Information Technology and Management-Kerala (IIITM-K) launched an application Kaapi Soil Health Management and Monitoring (Kshemam) to provide soil nutrient information and fertiliser recommendation for coffee plantation owners. The app will help in proper identification of optimum levels of fertiliser use.

Indian Oil Corporation will build a new oil terminal at Motihari in Bihar to supply fuel to Nepal via planned pipeline up to Amlekganj in Nepal (69 KM). Old terminal functioning at Raxaul in Bihar will be shut down as it does not conform to the current Oil Industry Safety guidelines.

Indian Railways will make use of the radio-frequency identification tags (RFID) for tracking of wagons, coaches and locomotives to ensure the effective and transparent functioning of the system. RFID tags have been designed by Centre for Railway Information System (CRIS) and Railways sanctioned INR 57 crores for first phase of implementation of this project.

India’s first International research centre for Foot and Mouth disease of cattle and buffalos inaugurated at Argul (Bhubaneswar) in Odisha, as collaboration of UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR).

India’s first Micro drama festival held in New Delhi, named as Thespis.

India’s first electric taxi trial will be launched in Nagpur in May 2017, for which Mahindra and Mahindra will provide 200 taxis.

This move is aimed at combating air pollution. Another important step under processing is Approx 11000 crores Eastern Peripheral Expressway project that will be 135 KM in length and will be lit entirely by solar panels. It will pass through Sonipat, Baghpat, Ghaziabad, Gautam Budh Nagar, Faridabad and Palwal.

India’s first sea ropeway will be constructed by Mumbai Port Trust to link Mumbai with famous Elephanta Island in Arabian Sea.

Elephanta Island have global recognition for its famed Elephanta Caves, a UNESCO World Heritage site.

8-km long ropeway will start from Sewri in Mumbai’s east coast and end at Elephanta Island at Raigad district.

International conference on Dara Shikoh: Reclaiming Spiritual Legacy of India held in New Delhi, organised by Indian Council Of Cultural Relations (ICCR).

Dara Sikoh was a messenger of harmonious coexistence of various religions and loved all religions alike. Dara Shikoh dedicated himself to create a bridge of Hindu-Muslim Unity and even translated 50 Upanishads from Sanskrit to Persian for Muslim Scholars. His conclusion was that a common spiritual basis existed between Hinduism and Islam.

Jammu & Kashmir Government banned usage and manufacturing of polythene bags below 50 microns in state.

Jharkhand Police launched Tare Zameen Par programme to enlighten children in Naxal-affected areas in Palamau district of Jharkhand.Post

Karnataka Government launched Awareness Campaign against H1N1 Virus, in high incidence districts of Bengaluru, Mysore and Chitradurga.

Kerala Government decided to provide pension to former circus artists in state.

Lok Sabha passed Constitution 123rd Amendment Bill2017, to give constitutional status to National Commission for Backward Classes.

It will insert a new article 338B in constitution, that provides for NCBC - composition, mandate, functions and various officers.

It will Insert a new article 342-A which empowers president to notify list of socially and educationally backward classes of a State / UT.

Lok Sabha passed Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Bill 2016 by a voice vote to give enhance road safety and control pollution and accidents. Key Provisions are -

National Transportation Policy.

Recall of vehicles if a defects in the vehicle may cause damage to the environment.

Motor Vehicle Accident Fund (MVAF) to be constituted to provide compulsory insurance cover to all road users.

Care for road accident victims scheme for cashless treatment of road accident victims for first hour of serious Injury.

Compensation for death to be increased in hit and run case from from 25,000 to 2 Lakh.

Protection of person who renders emergency medical or non-medical assistance to a victim of an accident.

Offences and penalties to be increased for several offences, like drunken driving, dangerous driving, overloading etc.

Offences committed by Juveniles - Owner or guardian will be deemed guilty.

MOU has been signed between BBNL, Department of Posts and BSNL to provide broadband connectivity of BharatNet to Post Offices in rural areas.

BSNL would provide broadband services, Infrastructure expenses and the operational expenses would be paid by Department of Posts and BBNL would coordinate the entire project.

BharatNet is world’s largest rural broadband connectivity programme using Optical fibre, implemented by Bharat Broadband Network Limited (BBNL).

Madhya Pradesh Government launched Deendayal Antyodaya Rasoi Yojana as a populist subsidised meal scheme for poor in state. Madhya Pradesh is 3rd state after Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan, to launch populist subsidised meal scheme. Deendayal Antyodaya Rasoi Yojana will provide nutritious meal to poor at subsidised rate of Rs. 5. It was proposed in State Government's Budget 2017-18.

Madhya Pradesh government has launched e-nagarpalika mobile application to provide 378 municipal services online.

Madhya Pradesh government signed power purchase agreement (PPA) with Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) to supply 24 % of electricity generated from Rewa ultra mega solar project to be set up in state.

Madhya Pradesh government will ban plastic polythene bags across state from May 2017 Onwards.

Madhya Pradesh government will launch 1 year diploma course on Hindu priesthood ‘Purohityam’ from July 2017, through Maharshi Patanjali Sanskrit Sansthan. It's eligibility will be 10th pass.

Maharashtra Government announced Advanced Farming – Enriched Farmer scheme, aimed at increasing income of farmers by cutting production cost and increasing output.

Maharashtra Government approved Symbiosis Skill and Open University Bill to set up first private skill university in state, overall 2nd.

Maharashtra Government inaugurated state’s first automatic weather station at Dongargaon in Nagpur, to effectively measure wind direction, wind speed, air temperature, relative humidity and rainfall amount. Information gathered by weather stations would be shared with farmers through Mahavedh portal (Maharashtra agriculture weather information network) as well as on Skymet mobile app.

Maharashtra became first state to launch a special awareness drive to ensure that transgenders in state register as voters in greater numbers. State branch of Election Commission launched drive on April 15, celebrated as Third Gender Day.

Malaysian Firm MTN will help in setting up a technology park in Andhra Pradesh, which is expected to attract private sector investment of $100 million in first phase.

Manipur CM N Biren Singh launched 2 web applications to check corruption and keep track of government activities - Anti-Corruption Cell and Digital Application for Review by Public And Nation (DARPAN).

Members of CREDAI (Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Associations of India) launched 352 projects in 53 cities across 17 States with an investment of INR 38,000 crore to build Over 2 lakh affordable houses.

Minister of Human Resource Development Prakash Javadekar launched portal (rusa.nic.in) and mobile app of Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA). RUSA will help improve quality of education by improving research labs infrastructure and creating smart class rooms etc. RUSA is a one-stop for States' Higher Education Plans.

Minister of Law and Justice Ravi Shankar Prasad inaugurated 3 welfare initiatives -

Pro-bono legal services - Lawyers who want to provide legal services free of cost can register themselves on this web-based platform.

Tele-law service - It will connect marginalized communities with lawyers through video conferencing facilities.

Nyaya Mitra Project - It will reduce pendency in lower courts, with a special focus on cases which are more than ten years old.

Ministry of Food Processing will soon launch Scheme for Agro-Marine Produce Processing and Development of Agro-Processing Clusters (SAMPADA).

SAMPADA will integrate current and new schemes (Like mega food parks and cold chain projects) aimed at reducing food wastage and doubling farmers’ income by 2022. It has an outlay of Rs. 6000 crore and will be implemented by 2019-20.

Ministry will also launch 3 new schemes to improve food supply chain - Creation/ Expansion of Food Processing and Preservation Capacities, New Agro-Processing Clusters and Backward and Forward Linkages.

Ministry of Food and Consumer Affairs approved Guidelines on Fair Trade Practices Related to Charging of Service Charge from Consumers by Hotels and Restaurants -

Hotels and restaurants cannot decide on service charge and the column of service charge will be left blank in the bill for customers to fill up before making payment.

Mandatory levy of service charge amounts to unfair trade practice and customers can file a complaint in Consumer Court.

However, presently stringent action cannot be taken against erring hotels as current Consumer Protection Act 1986 does not empower ministry to do so. Therefore, an authority is expected to be set up with powers to take such actions.

Ministry of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises withdrawn subsidy given to mild hybrid vehicles under FAME India (Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid and Electric vehicles in India) scheme.

FAME India scheme was launched in 2015 under National Electric Mobility Mission Plan (NEMMP) with an aim to promote eco-friendly vehicles. It provides incentives for adoption and market creation of both hybrid and electric technologies vehicles.

Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) added over 5400 MW in 2016-17 against target of 4000 MW. leading States in wind power capacity addition during 2016-17 are Andhra Pradesh (2190 MW), Gujarat 1275 MW and Karnataka 882 MW.

Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment launched Rashtriya Vayoshri Yojana in Nellore District of Andhra Pradesh, aimed at providing physical aids and assisted-living devices for senior citizens belonging to Below Poverty Line (BPL) category. It is being implemented by Artificial Limbs Manufacturing Corporation (ALIMCO).

Ministry of Urban Development made several changes in Procurement process of Metro Rail companies, to promote Make In India Campaign -

Minimum 75% of the metro cars to be manufactured In India.

Minimum 25% of repair and maintenanace equipments to be manufactured by Indian Subsidaries of foreign suppliers or Indian manufacturers .

Ministry of Women and Child Development with Ministry of Panchayati Raj has launched a nationwide programme for capacity building of Elected Women Representatives (EWRs) of Panchayats and a training program for Trainers of women panchayat leaders at Ranchi (Jharkhand).

NTPC (National Thermal Power Corporation Limited) crossed 50 Gigawatts power generation capacity, after commissioning 500 Megawatts unit at Unchahar in Uttar Pradesh.

National Children’s Film Festival held in Vishakhapatnam (Andhra Pradesh).

National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) developed initiative of Quality Mark award scheme for dairy cooperatives to promote and encourage enhancement of safety, quality and hygiene of milk and milk products manufactured by dairy cooperatives.

National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) carried out first-of-its-kind State-level mock exercise on forest fire in Uttarakhand, to assess the efficacy of preparedness and response mechanisms of forest department and district administration. This was also first time that drones were used to monitor forest fires in India.

National Green Tribunal ordered immediate closure of all industries located near Bengaluru’s Bellandur Lake (Karnataka).

National conference on innovation (Navonmesh) in school education held at NCERT headquarters in New Delhi.

North Western Railway declared Barmer-Munawab and Pipad Road-Bilara rail routes in Rajasthan as Green Corridors, taking number of Green Corridors to 5.

Northeast’s sixth and largest IT (information technology) Hub has been inaugurated in Agartala (Tripura), at cost of Rs 50 crores.

PM Narendra Modi dedicated 1980 MW of Koradi super-critical thermal power project of Mahagenco near Nagpur in Maharashtra.

PM Narendra Modi felicitated descendants of families associated with Paika Rebellion of 1817 in Odisha, said to be India's first Freedom Struggle.

Paika Rebellion of 1817 is an armed rebellion against British colonialism, in response to tinkering of revenue system by British in 1803. At that juncture, Bakshi Jagabandhu Bidyadhar, military chief of King of Khurda, led the army of Paikas and forced the British to retreat.

PM Narendra Modi flagged off first UDAN (Ude Desh ka Aam Nagrik) flight under RCS (Regional Connectivity Scheme) on Shimla-Delhi, Kadapa - Hyderabad and Nanded - Hyderabad sectors.

Around 45 unserved and under-served airports are set to be connected under UDAN scheme to make flying more affordable.

5 operators will operate flights services on 128 routes that will connect 70 airports. Operators are - Air India subsidiary Airline Allied Services, Air Deccan, Air Odisha, Turbo Megha, and Spice Jet.

Airfare for one-hour journey of 500 km has been capped at INR 2,500. For longer routes and duration, pricing will vary. Only 50% of the seats will be sold at Rs 2500 per seat per hour. The airlines can sell the rest of the tickets at market rates.

PM Narendra Modi inaugurated Chenani-Nashri Tunnel, country’s longest road tunnel that links Kashmir Valley with Jammu, built at cost of Rs 2500 Crores. This 9 km long tunnel passes through lower Himalayan mountain range on Jammu-Srinagar National Highway 44, cutting distance between Jammu and Srinagar to around 250 km (from 350 km) and time reduced by 4 Hours.

PM Narendra Modi inaugurated exhibition Swachhagraha – Bapu Ko Karyanjali – Ek Abhiyan, Ek Pradarshani in New Delhi, to mark 100 years (centenary year) of Champaran Satyagraha.

Champaran Satyagraha was Mahatma Gandhi’s first experiment of Satyagraha, undertaken in erstwhile undivided Champaran district in northern Bihar in April 1917.

On This occasion, Book Gandhi in Champaran has been launched. It has been written by Dinanath Gopal Tendulkar.

PM Narendra Modi inaugurated phase-I (Link-2) pipeline canal of Saurashtra Narmada Avtaran Irrigation (SAUNI) Yojana in Botad district of Gujarat. He also laid foundation stone for the Phase-II (Link-2) of SAUNI Yojana in Saurashtra.

SAUNI is a INR 12,000 crores project to pump Narmada water to Saurashtra region.

PM Narendra Modi laid foundation stone of multi-modal terminal and a four-lane bridge on Ganga river in Jharkhand’s Sahibganj district, as an important component of development of the National Waterway-1 (NW-1) from Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh to Haldia in West Bengal (1,390 km).

PM Narendra Modi unveiled translated volumes of Vachana in 23 Indian languages on occasion of Basava Jayanti.

Basavanna was a 12th-century Kannada poet and social reformer who lived in Karnataka during reign of Kalachuri-dynasty king Bijjala I.

Parliament passed Constitution (SC) Order Bill 2017, seeking to amends Constitution (SC) Order 1950 and Constitution (Pondicherry) SC Order 1964. Key Provisions -

Modify list of SCs for Odisha and Modify name of Pondicherry (to Puducherry).

Parliament passed Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) (Prevention and Control) Bill as first national HIV law in South Asia. It seeks to safeguard rights of people living with HIV and affected by HIV, by preventing social discrimination against these people.

Phoenix India launched India's first bio-gas fuelled bus in Kolkata, keeping flat fare of just Rs 1. Buses have been manufactured by Ashok Leyland.

Postal Department allotted a unique pin code for Income Tax Department’s Central Processing Centre (CPC) based in Bengaluru, to ensure letters sent by taxpayers to CPC are not lost or reach late. New pin code given to CPC is 560500. Earlier, CPC was using pin code 560100 which was marked for entire city area of Bengaluru.

Power Ministry launched URJA MITRA app and website (urjamitra.com) for real time information sharing on power supply with citizens. Through Urja Mitra, State power Distribution utilities may provide power outage information to rural / urban power consumers. Ministry also launched Rural Feeder Monitoring Scheme to monitor quantity and quality of power supply in rural areas, with December 2017 as deadline to achieve 100% rural feeder monitoring.

Prasar Bharati will soon launch new satellite television channel in north-east, named Arun Prabha. It will more specifically focus on Arunachal Pradesh. It will be 2nd North - East Centric channel after DD North East.

President Pranab Mukherjee Inaugurated Kempegowda Festival in New Delhi, dedicated to Legendary Vijayanagar Empire ruler Kempegowda who dated back to 16th Century and is considered to be founder and chief planner of Bengaluru City.

President Pranab Mukherjee accepted recommendation of Committee of Parliament on Official Languages for speeches to be delivered only in Hindi by all dignitaries, if they can read and speak It.

Puducherry Government announced that UT's farmers will be getting free power supply for irrigation purpose.

Pune Based Omkar Modgi’s short film Avyakta has been shortlisted for 2017 Cannes Film Festival. It underlines journey of Modgi’s own relationship with his father.

Punjab government prohibited inclusion of names of government functionaries (including ministers and MLAs) on foundation stones and inaugural plaques so as to build a stronger connect with the people by shedding VIP culture.

Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu flagged off Visakhapatnam-Kirandul passenger train with vistadome coaches (see-through Glass coaches).

Railways will launch One stop App for All Railways services - HindRail, in June 2017.

Real Estate Act came into effect completely, aiming to protect interests of homebuyers by ensuring transparency. Salient Provisions -

Buyers and developers of real estate property can seek relief by approaching Real Estate Regulatory Authorities against violation of the contractual obligations and other provisions of the Act.

Act makes registration of projects and real estate agents mandatory.

Act mandates depositing 70% of funds collected from buyers in a separate bank account for construction of the project.

Project developers are required to disclose the project details on the website of the regulator and need to provide quarterly updates.

Regulatory authorities and Appellate Tribunals are required to dispose complaints in 60 days.

Sex ratio in Haryana state touched 950 mark in March 2017, for first time ever. Several government initiatives have helped achieve this milestone, including Central Government's Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao campaign and Haryana goverment's Aapki Beti, Hamari Beti campaign.

Similar to Uttar Pradesh Government’s anti-romeo squad, Haryana government launched Operation Durga to ensure women safety.

Supreme Court has set 25% of net salary as the maintenance to be paid by a husband to his estranged (separated) wife.

Tata Power has signed agreement with Ajmer Vidyut Vitran Nigam Ltd (AVVNL) for electricity distribution in Ajmer for 20 years, by forming a Special Purpose Company (SPC) - TP Ajmer Distribution Ltd.

Telangana Government passed Bill to raise reservation for backward Muslims (4% to 12% ) and scheduled tribes (6% to 10%). It will take total Reservation in state to 62 %. Bill will require Judicial Review as Supreme court has allowed reservation upto 50 %.

Textiles Ministry launched PowerTex India as a 3 year comprehensive scheme for Powerloom Sector Development, with outlay 487 crores. 2 schemes under it are Pradhan Mantri Credit Scheme (PMCS) for powerloom weavers and solar energy scheme (SEC) for powerlooms.

To expand green cover, Maharashtra government signed MoU with Indian Railways, under which trees will be planted on land adjacent to railway tracks.

Transport and Roads Minister Nitin Gadkari announced to develop First express highway project in northeast region, at approx cost of 40000 crores along Brahmaputra river in Assam.

USA based Tech security Firm CISCO launched its 5th global range lab in Gurugram (Haryana), to train Indian firms on real-world cyber attacks.

Uttar Pradesh Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya flagged off 5 Gauvansh Chikitsa Mobile Vans that would cater to needs of cows, covering Lucknow, Gorakhpur, Varanasi, Mathura and Allahabad. A toll Free number was also issued to enable common people to help cows.

Uttar Pradesh Goverment will establish 40 Yoga wellness centres in 40 districts, in 2017-18.

State government will also establish first herbal garden of the state would be set up soon near the Government national Homeopathic college and hospital, Lucknow to encourage the farmers to cultivate herbal plants across the state.

Uttar Pradesh Government approved building a music village named Bismillah Khan Sangeet Gram to honour legendary Shehnai player Bismillah Khan.

Uttar Pradesh government cancelled 15 public holidays marking birth / death anniversaries of eminent personalities.

Uttar Pradesh government changed name of Gorakhpur Airport as Mahayogi Goraknath Airport and Agra airport as Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyay airporT.

Uttar Pradesh government signed Power for All pact with Centre to provide 24×7 power supply to all households by 2019. Uttar Pradesh was only state to not have joined Power for All Initiative, has finally joined in. Central PSU EESL will distribute 10,000 energy efficiency solar- panel pumps as part of it. UP government also launched 1912 toll-free helpline in rural areas for grievance redressal related to electricity.

Web portal Nakshe launched by Harsh Vardhan (Minister for Science & Technology and Earth Sciences), on occasion of 250th anniversary of Survey of India(SoI). Apr 10 is also marked as National Survey day. SOI proposed a Joint Mission with nepal Government, to re-measure Height of Mount Everest.

West Bengal Government declared Jhargram as 22nd district of State.

West Bengal government introduced Social Security Yojana by combining 5 separate beneficiary schemes for workers in unorganised sectors and self-employed people. 5 earlier schemes -

Assistance Scheme for Provident Fund for Unorganised Sector

Unorganised Sector Workers’ Health Security Scheme

Social Security scheme for Construction Workers

Transport Workers Social Security Scheme

Bidi Workers Welfare Scheme.

WhatsApp moved into digital payments in India, keeping in view Large userbase of over 20 Crore WhatsApp users in India. WhatsApp is working to launch person-to-person payments in India in the next six months.

Persons

Harjit Singh Sajjan, Defence Minister of Canada Visited India.

Hindu Youth Raj Kumar from Pakistan is among 10 people from across the world to have been selected for 2nd edition of 'Emerging Young Leaders Award' given by USA.

A Pakistani Military Court announced death sentence to Indian Person Kulbhushan Jadhav, who was arrested last year on spying charges.

American singer and song writer Bob Dylan accepted 2016 Nobel Prize for literature that he was awarded by in December 2016. He is first song writer to win this award and first American to win Nobel literature prize since Toni Morrison in 1993.

Astronaut Peggy Whitson has set a new space record for most days in space by a US astronaut, breaking previous record set by Jeff Williams who had spent total 534 days in space.

British Finance Minister Philip Hammond (Also called Chancellor of the Exchequer) visited India -

Participated in 9th UK-India Economic and Financial Dialogue in New Delhi.

India and UK launched joint UK-India Fund, namely a Green Growth Equity Fund which aims to leverage private sector investments from London in green infrastructure projects in India. Both governments will invest up to £120 million each (i.e. totally £ 240 million) in joint fund which will be established under NIIF framework.

FIFA (International Federation of Association Football) Banned Guatemala’s former football Chief Brayan Jimenez for life time over corruption.

Famous Sufi singer Begum Yaman K. Khan Passed Away. She was daughter of legendary Sitar Maestro Ustad Vilayat Ali Khan.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley visited USA.

He Participated in Spring Meetings of World Bank, IMF.

He also participated in Sessions of International Monetary and Finance Committee (IMFC) and of World Economic Leaders (IMFC Plenary).

Finance Minister of Georgia, Giorgi Gakharia visited India. India and Georgia launched Joint Feasibility Study on Free Trade Agreement between both countries.

Former Governor of Jammu and Kashmir Girish Chandra Saxena Passed Away.

Google paid tribute to noted Kannada actor Rajkumar with a special doodle on His 88th birthday on 24 April 2017.

Hindustani classical vocalist Kishori Amonkar passed away.

Indian Cricketer MS Dhoni has been appointed as CEO of Gulf Oil India for a Single day.

Indian Navy Chief Sunil Lanba visited Malaysia.

Italy's Emma Morano, known as world’s oldest woman has passed away at age of 117 years. The title now comes to Jamaica's Violet Brown (Age 117 Years).

Japanese pioneer of digital music Ikutaro Kakehashi passed away. He was best known for founding Roland Corporation in 1972 and role in development of Roland drum machines and MIDI standard (Musical Instrument Digital Interface).

Jonathan Demme, Oscar-winning American director of The Silence of the Lambs, passed away.

K Prithika Yashini became India’s first-ever transgender person to become a police official, after becoming sub-inspector in Tamil Nadu Police.

Mohd. Najib Bin Tun Abdul Razak, Prime Minister of Malaysia visited India. MOUs signed include -

Air Services Agreement.

Development of a Urea and Ammonia Manufacturing Plant in Malaysia.

Cooperation in field of Sports, Mutual Recognition of Educational Qualifications.

Indian and Malaysian firms signed 31 pacts with investments of USD 36 billion in sectors including construction, pharma and education, Hydrocarbons.

Nicos Anastasiades, President of Cyprus Visited India.

Cyprus awarded its highest civilian honour, Grand Collar of the Order of Makarios III on President Pranab Mukherjee.

MOU signed included -

Executive programme on culture, education and scientific cooperation for the years 2017 to 2020.

Work plan under a programme of cooperation in agriculture for 2017-2018.

Cooperation in merchant shipping and boost air services.

Nita Ambani has been made member of 2 commissions of IOC’s governing body - Olympic channel and Olympic education Commission. She already holds title of being India’s first woman International Olympic Committee member.

Noted American Pop Artist James Rosenquist passed away.

Noted Bollywood Actor Vinod Khanna Passed Away.

Noted journalist Nora Chopra passed away.

PM Narendra Modi has became most followed world leader on photo-sharing app Instagram (7 million followers), surpassing US President Donald Trump.

President of Nepal, Bidya Devi Bhandari visited India. No MOU were signed as it was a Goodwill Visit.

Prime Minister of Sri Lanka, Ranil Wickremesinghe visited India.

Sri Lanka Agreed to Let India construct a Large Oil Reservoir on Its western Coast, at cost of approx 2500 Crores. It will be finalized during PM Modi's Upcoming Visit to Sri Lanka.

Several other Agreements were signed including construction of a regasified liquefied natural gas (LNG) fired 500-mega watt (MW) capacity power plant, LNG terminal and floating storage regasification unit (FSRU) in Colombo.

Sagar Baheti became first visually impaired Indian to complete historic Boston Marathon, covering distance of 42.16 km distance in Little over 4 hours. He finished 121st in 30000 Runners.

Telangana Minister KT Rama Rao has been invited to address World Environment and Water Resources Congress to organised in California in May 2017.

US National Security Advisor HR McMaster Visited India.

USA's Modern Computing and Internet Pioneer, Robert Taylor passed away.

United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Executive Secretary Patricia Espinosa Visited India.

Vedanta Resources Chairman Anil Agarwal became second largest shareholder (11.44 %) in a British mining group Anglo American, after he invested USD 2.4 billion (2.2 billion euros) in It.

Vice President Hamid Ansari Visited European Nations Armenia & Poland.

India and Armenia signed 3 agreements - peaceful uses of outer space, Cooperation in youth matters and a programme of cultural cooperation for 2017-2020.

Poland assured its support for India’s bid for membership in Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) and a permanent seat in UN Security Council.

Yousuf bin Alawi bin Abdullah, Foreign Minister of Oman visited India.

Science

Deep depression in Bay of Bengal has intensified into a tropical cyclone named Maarutha, expected to hit Myanmar. It is first named storm of 2017 Northern Hemisphere tropical cyclone season.

Government directed ISRO'S Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre to share battery technology for mass production of Lithium-Ion batteries for electric vehicles. This Indigenous technology will push India’s electric vehicles (EV) industry.

Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech’s killed Zika virus vaccine has shown 100% in cure of disease in animal studies. A ‘killed virus vaccine’ or ‘inactivated vaccine’ contains virus that has been grown in culture and then killed using physical or chemical processes.

IIT Roorkee Scientists used Indian summer fruit Jamun to create low cost and more efficient solar cells. Researchers used naturally occurring pigment present in jamun as an inexpensive photosensitizer for Dye Sensitised Solar Cells (DSSCs) or Gratzel cells.

ISRO launched solar calculator app created by Space Application Center (SAC). It can calculate solar energy potential (in kWh/m2) in different regions of country, making the app handy for installation of Photovoltaic (PV) for tapping solar energy. The app uses data from Indian Geostationary Satellites (Kalpana-1, INSAT-3D and INSAT-3DR).

ISRO will test launch GSLV-Mk III-D1 launching vehicle, that will have capacity to launch 4 tonne class of satellites. Upto now, ISRO only had launchers able to launch loads upto 2.2 Tons, therefore ISRO had to rely on foreign agencies for lauching heavy satellites.

GSAT-19 will be first payload for GSLV-Mk III-D1 launcher, with mass of 3.5 Tons (3200 KG) and would carry Ka and Ku band payload along with a Geostationary Radiation Spectrometer Payload (GRASP).

NASA announced that Saturn’s moon Enceladus and Jupiter’s moon Europa may be habitable as they have necessary ingredients required to sustain life.

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft completed its final close flyby of Saturn’s moon Titan and has now started its final set of 22 orbits before plunging into Saturn on September 15, 2017; completing its 20-year long journey.

Cassini has dived successfully through space between Saturn and its rings, a region no spacecraft has been in before. It will perform another 21 dives through the same gap and will send more detailed information about Saturn and its rings.

NASA’s Kepler space telescope discovered Venus-like planet orbiting a dim star called Kepler-1649. Newly found planet is one-fifth the diameter of our Sun and is 219 light years away from Earth.

North India will get its first DNA (Deoxyribonucleic acid) bank for wildlife at Indian Veterinary Research Institute (IVRI) in Bareilly (Uttar Pradesh).

Researchers created fluid-filled transparent container called Biobag to simulate how foetuses float in amniotic fluid inside mother's uterus. Researchers tested five lambs with a biological age corresponding to 23-week human premature babies in the artificially created womb like device. Artificial wombs can facilitate development of premature babies in a uterus-like environment.

Scientists at CSIR National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) developed robotic platform Seabed Resident Event Profiler (SREP), capable of being stationed under water upto depth of 200 metres. It can regularly record water column information at every 10 to 25 cm during every profile four times a day. SREP will carry out studies related to monsoon, global climate and upwelling.

Scientists discovered planet GJ 1132b which possesses an earth like atmosphere and orbits dwarf star GJ 1132. The planet is 39 Light years away from earth and is approx 1.5 times of Earth's size.

Scientists found second Great Spot in Jupiter which is cold and high up (24,000 km across and 12,000 km wide). Unlike Great Red Spot identified in 1830, newly discovered Great Spot is continuously changing its shape and size.

Scientists from Boston University (USA) discovered a protein (PorB ), that could help make vaccinations more effective and provide protection from diseases such as cancer. They purified a protein found on exterior of neisseria meningitis bacteria and used it as an accessory to provide a better vaccination response.

Scientists from Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) identified a soil fungus Aspergillus tubingensis that uses enzymes to rapidly break down plastic materials, paving way for solving environmental problems caused by plastic materials.

Scientists from University of Kerala discovered a new species of long-legged, tree-dwelling crabs named Kani maranjandu. It has been named after Kani tribe in Kerala.

Tata Motors' subsidiary TAL Manufacturing Solutions launched India’s first conceptualized, designed and manufactured articulated industrial robot BRABO (Bravo Robot).

Wax worm (larvae of insect Galleria mellonella) posseses ability to biodegrade polyethylene much faster than several recent discoveries. Wax worms were found to transform polyethylene into ethylene glycol.

It is significant in getting rid of increasing Polyethylene plastic waste that degrades the environment, as approx a trillion plastic bags are used every year.

Sports

101 Year old Indian sprinter Man Kaur won Gold in 100 metres sprint at World Masters Games in Auckland (New Zealand). She was lone contender in 100-years-and-over event, That she completed in a minute and 14 seconds. She also competed in 200m race and Javelin Throw. She became oldest person to sky walk around Auckland’s famous landmark Sky Tower.

18th Asian Games will be Organized in Jakarta and Palembang in Indonesia.

2017 Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters Men's Tennis -

Singles - Rafael Nadal (Spain). He won it for record 10th time.

Doubles - Rohan Bopanna (India ) and Pablo Cuevas (Uruguay)

2nd Golf Industry Association (GIA) Awards 2017 -

Outstanding Achievement - Aditi Ashok.

Men's Player of the Year (2016) - SSP Chawrasia

Outstanding playing career - Ali Sher

Aizawl FC became First Football Club from Northeast Region to win I-League, after it defeated Shillong Lajong in final held at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Shillong.

Barcelona Open Men's Tennis 2017 -

Men's singles - Rafael Nadal (Spain), defeating Dominic Thiem of Austria

Men's doubles - Florin Mergea (Romania) and Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi (Pakistan)

China's Lv Haotian won Asian Snooker Championship in Doha (Qatar), Defeating Indian Pankaj Advani in Final.

Chris Gayle Became First Cricketer to Score 10000 T20 Runs. He achieved this during an IPL game against Royal Challengers Bangalore.

During Test Match against West Indies, Younis Khan became first Pakistani to score 10,000 Test runs.

Eight cricketers including India's Harbhajan Singh have been appointed ambassadors for ICC Champions Trophy 2017 to be held in June 2017 in UK. Former cricketers Saurav Ganguly has been named among commentators for Champions Trophy.

England's Marylebone Cricket Club offered honorary life membership to Sandhya Agarwal (former captain of Indian women’s Test Team).

Ferrari Racer Sebastian Vettel (Germany) won 2017 Bahrain Grand Prix.

2017 Formula 1 Season -

Round Grand Prix Winner Date

1 Australian Grand Prix Sebastian Vettel (Germany) 26 March

2 Chinese Grand Prix Lewis Hamilton (Britain) 9 April

3 Bahrain Grand Prix Sebastian Vettel (Germany) 16 April

4 Russian Grand Prix 30 April

5 Spanish Grand Prix 14 May

6 Monaco Grand Prix 28 May

7 Canadian Grand Prix 11 June

8 Azerbaijan Grand Prix 25 June

9 Austrian Grand Prix 9 July

10 British Grand Prix 16 July

11 Hungarian Grand Prix 30 July

12 Belgian Grand Prix 27 August

13 Italian Grand Prix 3 September

14 Singapore Grand Prix 17 September

15 Malaysian Grand Prix 1 October

16 Japanese Grand Prix 8 October

17 United States Grand Prix 22 October

18 Mexican Grand Prix 29 October

19 Brazilian Grand Prix 12 November

20 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix 26 November

Filmmaker Tigmanshu Dhulia will make biopic on Dalit Cricketer Baloo Palwankar who played significant role in 1990.

Finland's Valtteri Bottas (Mercedes Racer) won first Formula One victory after he won Russian Grand Prix -

2017 Formula 1 Season -

Round Grand Prix Winner Date

1 Australian Grand Prix Sebastian Vettel (Germany) 26 March

2 Chinese Grand Prix Lewis Hamilton (Britain) 9 April

3 Bahrain Grand Prix Sebastian Vettel (Germany) 16 April

4 Russian Grand Prix Valtteri Bottas (Finland) 30 April

5 Spanish Grand Prix 14 May

6 Monaco Grand Prix 28 May

7 Canadian Grand Prix 11 June

8 Azerbaijan Grand Prix 25 June

9 Austrian Grand Prix 9 July

10 British Grand Prix 16 July

11 Hungarian Grand Prix 30 July

12 Belgian Grand Prix 27 August

13 Italian Grand Prix 3 September

14 Singapore Grand Prix 17 September

15 Malaysian Grand Prix 1 October

16 Japanese Grand Prix 8 October

17 United States Grand Prix 22 October

18 Mexican Grand Prix 29 October

19 Brazilian Grand Prix 12 November

20 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix 26 November

Gayatri Gopichand won singles and Pair of Gayatri Gopichand and Samiya Farooqui won doubles Title at Pembangunan Jaya Raya Junior Grand Prix in Jakarta. Gayatri is daughter of National Badminton coach Pullela Gopichand.

Haryana emerged champion beating Kerala at National Youth Athletics Meet held in Hyderabad (Telangana).

In view of hosting FIFA Under – 19 World Cup in October 2017, Government will organize Oorja Under-19 Football Talent Hunt Tournament in several states, to be organized by various CAPFs.

India finished with 16 Medals (3 gold, 2 silver and 11 bronze) at US Open Karate Championships held in Las Vegas.

India won 7 medals in Asian Grand Prix Jinhua (China) 2017 -

Gold (1) - Manpreet Kaur (Shot Put). She also broke her own 2015 national record and qualified for World Championships to be held in London in August 2017.

Silver (4) - Tintu Lukka (Racer), Jinson Johnson (Racer), Neeraj Chopra (Javelin Throw), Neena Varakil (Long Jump).

Bronze (2) - Om Prakash (Shot put), Dutee Chand (Racer).

Indian Olympic Association (IOA) granted affiliation to Boxing Federation of India (BFI), making BFI as fully recognised body for Indian boxing.

Indian Open Badminton 2017 -

Men's Singles - Viktor Axelsen (Denmark)

Women's Singles - P. V. Sindhu (India), after defeating Carolina Marin of Spain .

Men's Doubles - Indonesian Pair of Marcus Fernaldi Gideon and Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo.

Women's Doubles - Japan's Shiho Tanaka and Koharu Yonemoto

Mixed Doubles - China's Lu Kai and Huang Yaqiong.

Indian Women Cricketer Harmanpreet Kaur named as Sydney Thunder’s Women’s player of year, for her performance in second season of Big Bash League.

Indian boxer K Shyam Kumar won gold medal at Thailand International Tournament in the 49 kilogram category held in Bangkok.

Indian boxer K Shyam Kumar won gold medal in 49- kilogram category at Thailand International Tournament in Bangkok.

Indian cricketer Virat Kohli honoured as Wisden’s Leading Cricketer in World for 2016 and Wisden India Almanack’s Cricketer of Year for second time in its 2017 edition. Besides, Ellyse Perry from Australia named as Wisden Leading Woman Cricketer in World for 2016.

Wisden Leading Cricketer in World is an annual cricket award selected by Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack.

Indo-American pair of Leander Paes and Scott Lipsky won Tallahassee (USA) Challenger title's men’s doubles Event.

Jehan Daruvala became first Indian to take pole in F3 European series, securing top spot on starting grid for championship in Monza (Italy).

Joshna Chinappa became first Indian to clinch Asian Squash title, defeating compatriot Dipika Pallikal Karthik.

Kenya's Joyciline Jepkosgei broken world half marathon records in 10km and 15km catgeories, during Prague Half Marathon.

Kerala conducted India’s first-ever transgender one-day athletic meet in Thiruvananthapuram.

Melbourne CMG Gold medalist boxer Akhil Kumar and Olympian Jitender Kumar turned professional after signing deal with IOS Boxing.

Mercedes Racer Lewis Hamilton (Britain) won Chinese Grand Prix 2017 -

2017 Formula 1 Season -

Round Grand Prix Winner Date

1 Australian Grand Prix Sebastian Vettel (Germany) 26 March

2 Chinese Grand Prix Lewis Hamilton (Britain) 9 April

3 Bahrain Grand Prix 16 April

4 Russian Grand Prix 30 April

5 Spanish Grand Prix 14 May

6 Monaco Grand Prix 28 May

7 Canadian Grand Prix 11 June

8 Azerbaijan Grand Prix 25 June

9 Austrian Grand Prix 9 July

10 British Grand Prix 16 July

11 Hungarian Grand Prix 30 July

12 Belgian Grand Prix 27 August

13 Italian Grand Prix 3 September

14 Singapore Grand Prix 17 September

15 Malaysian Grand Prix 1 October

16 Japanese Grand Prix 8 October

17 United States Grand Prix 22 October

18 Mexican Grand Prix 29 October

19 Brazilian Grand Prix 12 November

20 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix 26 November

Miami Open Tennis 2017 -

Men's Singles - Roger Federer (Switzerland)

Women's Singles Johanna Konta (United Kingdom)

Men's Doubles - Łukasz Kubot (Poland) / Marcelo Melo (Brazil)

Women's Doubles - Gabriela Dabrowski (Canada) / Xu Yifan (China)

Mukta Dutta Tomar has been appointed as India’s Ambassador to Germany.

Muttiah Muralitharan became Sri Lankan cricketer to be Included into ICC Hall of Fame.

New Zealand's Grant Elliott announced his retirement from all forms of Cricket.

Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) will include Video gaming as a full sport at 2022 Asian Games to be held at Hangzhou, China.

Pankaj Advani defeated Sourav Kothari to win his 7th Asian Billiards Championship final held in Chandigarh.

Singapore Open Badminton 2017 -

Men's singles - B. Sai Praneeth (India)

Women's singles - Tai Tzu-ying (Chinese Taipei)

Men's doubles - Denmark's Mathias Boe and Carsten Mogensen

Women's doubles - Denmark's Kamilla Rytter Juhl and Christinna Pedersen

Mixed doubles - China's Lu Kai and Huang Yaqiong

US based National Basketball Association (NBA) launched its first basketball school in India in Mumbai (Maharashtra), as part of a multi-year agreement with India On Track (IOT).

USA, Canada and Mexico made a joint bid to host 2026 FIFA World Cup, making it first time that World Cup would be shared by three hosts. It will also be first tournament that would see 48 teams participating instead of the earlier 32.

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Current Affairs - 11 May 2017

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Prize	Prize Money	Bank
First Prize	Rs.1 crore	Shraddha Mohan (Central Bank Of India)
Second Prize	Rs.50 lakh	Hardik Prajapati (Bank Of Baroda)
Third Prize	Rs.25 lakh	Bharat Singh (Punjab National Bank)

Round	Grand Prix	Winner	Date
1	Australian Grand Prix	Sebastian Vettel (Germany)	26 March
2	Chinese Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (Britain)	9 April
3	Bahrain Grand Prix	Sebastian Vettel (Germany)	16 April
4	Russian Grand Prix		30 April
5	Spanish Grand Prix		14 May
6	Monaco Grand Prix		28 May
7	Canadian Grand Prix		11 June
8	Azerbaijan Grand Prix		25 June
9	Austrian Grand Prix		9 July
10	British Grand Prix		16 July
11	Hungarian Grand Prix		30 July
12	Belgian Grand Prix		27 August
13	Italian Grand Prix		3 September
14	Singapore Grand Prix		17 September
15	Malaysian Grand Prix		1 October
16	Japanese Grand Prix		8 October
17	United States Grand Prix		22 October
18	Mexican Grand Prix		29 October
19	Brazilian Grand Prix		12 November
20	Abu Dhabi Grand Prix		26 November