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Important Current Affairs of 24th April

NATIONAL:

Money Loji launches App that offers loans for salaried professionals.

• A modern money lending platform named Money Loji launched an application which offers loan to salaried professionals within 5 minutes with flexible repayment options starting from 7 days to a maximum of 90 days.

• It follows a three-step process which are an application, approval, and disbursement and the app requires the users to upload an identity proof, an address proof, last 3 months bank statement alongside the salary slips.

• The eligibility criteria to avail this benefit are the minimum in-hand salary of Rs 20,000 per month and a minimum age of 23 years.

• It not only ensures security but also reduces the chances of data misuse backed by world-class security protocols to encrypt all the data.

INTERNATIONAL:

Arab League pledged USD 100 million per month to Palestinian Authority.

• The Arab League has pledged $100 million per month to the Palestinian Authority (PA) to make up for funds withheld by Israel because of payments made to the families of Palestinian attackers and prisoners.

• Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas addressed the Arab League in Cairo, as part of a diplomatic effort to rebuff the Trump administration’s Middle East peace plan.

Israel collects taxes on behalf of the PA but withheld $138m in transfers in February over Palestinian payments to political prisoners jailed for attacks against Israelis.

In 1967, Israel illegally occupied the eastern half of Jerusalem, as well as the West Bank and the Gaza Strip - and in 1980, passed a law declaring Jerusalem as the eternal and undivided capital of Israel. The Palestinians seek those territories for a future state.

New community in Golan heights to be named after President Trump.

• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced that he would name a new community in theGolan Heights after US President Donald Trump. President Trump has officially recognised the disputed area as Israeli territory.

Israel has also stated that in appreciation of the U.S. president, it intends to name a proposed train station near Jerusalem’s Western Wall after him. Israel captured the Golan from Syria in a 1967 war and annexed it, in a move not recognized internationally.

AGREEMENTS AND MOUS:

FIEO joins hands with Welingkar Institute of Management to support startups in exports.

• Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO) inked an agreement with Mumbai-based Prin. L N Welingkar Institute of Management Development and Research in order to support startups engaged in the export sector.

Under the memorandum of understanding (MoU), FIEO launched a post graduate programme in foreign trade management (PGP-FTM) at Mumbai.

• The main aim of this industry-academia partnership is to attract new entrepreneurs in exports to bridge the gap of availability of qualified skilled manpower in Exim trade.

The programme consist of general management principles, export-import procedures, and international marketing concepts and the duration of the programme will be 11 months.

• The programme will be offered in 2 batches.

Ministry of AYUSH signs MoU with CSIR for research and modern science.

• The Ministry of AYUSH signed MoU with the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) for cooperation in research and education in areas of traditional systems of medicine and its integration with modern science. The aim is to bring both Ministry of Ayush and CSIR together to pursue focused R&D efforts in the domain. Under the MoU, both organizations shall jointly endeavor to pursue:

• R&D covering Fundamental research

• AYUSH specific diagnostic tools, linking microbiome, gene expression and Prakriti, multi- ingredient herbal formulations, including their standardization

• Exploring modern scientific methods for integration with traditional Indian Systems of Medicine (ISM)

• Linking disease signatures

• Furthering the collaboration in preserving and protecting traditional knowledge related to the Indian systems of healthcare, through the existing TKDL platform

• Development of international standardized terminologies (disease-morbidity codes) in Ayurveda, Siddha and Unani (ASU), Database on Medicinal plants, Foods, etc.

• Enhancing the collaboration through joint R&D efforts ranging from fundamental science to validation and thereafter product development, will significantly help in the growth of the Indian contributions to the traditional medicines sector, not only nationally but internationally as well. The MOU also includes the pursuit of Data mining & analytics and Artificial Intelligence to enable and facilitate concepts such as Traditional knowledge inspired drug discovery and development and Food as Medicine.

BANKS AND ECONOMICS:

BofAML in report notifies that RBI has Rs.3 lakh crore (43$ million) in excess reserves.

• Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BofAML), the excess reserves that RBI holds could be up to Rs.3 lakh crore ($43 billion) or 1.5% of the GDP (Gross Domestic Product).

This also includes the excess capital in contingency reserves and revaluation reserves.

• The Bimal Jalan committee on the appropriate capital reserves for RBI was likely to identify this excess buffer. The committee was set up in December-end with a 6-member panel headed by former RBI governor Jalan.

Indranil Sen Gupta, chief India economist at BofAML notified that RBI maintains higher contingency reserves as a percentage of its total book compared to its peers in Brazil, Russia and South Africa, thus a lower cap will bring in more funds.

The BofAML report stated that capping overall reserves at 20% from 25.5% will release Rs. 1.96 lakh crore and there is no specific hindrance which would deter RBI from transferring the money to government.

• As of September 2018, the excess capital with RBI was Rs.9.6 lakh crore. If the cap is halved to 3.25% from the present 6.5%, it will release Rs. 1.282( around Rs. 1.3 lakh crore) lakh crore.

• Along with revaluation gains ranging from Rs. 300 crore to Rs. 1.8 lakh crore, RBI would be able to transfer the excess reserves to the government which can be used to recapitalize the country’s struggling state-run banks.

Deposits in Jan Dhan accounts are set to cross Rs 1 lakh crore mark.

• The total balance in the Jan Dhan accounts, which has been steadily rising, was at Rs 97,665.66 crore as on April 3, as per the latest government data.

The total number of Jan Dhan accounts have crossed 35.39 crore.

The deposits stood at Rs 96,107.35 crore on March 27 and Rs 95,382.14 crore in the week before.

• More than 27.89 crore account holders have been issued the Rupay debit cards.

Govt. increased the authorised capital of Allahabad Bank.

• The government has increased the authorized capital for the State-owned Allahabad Bank stated by Rs 5,000 crore to Rs 8,000 crore. The central government after consultation with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) increased the authorized capital of the bank.

• The increase in authorized capital will help enable the bank to raise further fund up to a maximum ceiling of Rs 8,000 crore.

• What is an Authorized Capital?

• It is the maximum amount of share that a company is authorized to have by its constitutional documents to issue to the shareholders. It is not necessary to issue the whole amount of the authorized capital, part of it can remain unissued. The amount of share that is issued to the shareholder is called the issued share capital of the company. To put in other words, authorized capital is the one which is the maximum amount of value of securities that a company can legally issue to the shareholders. The Authorized capital needs to be specified in the Memorandum of Association(MOA).

• Authorized capital is broadly divided into the:

• Issued capital

• Paid up capital

• Uncalled capital

APPOINTMENTS AND RESIGNATIONS:

Michelin-star chef Vikas Khanna named brand ambassador of Indo-American Arts Council (IAAC).

• Vikas Khanna, Michelin-star chef named as brand ambassador of Indo-American Arts Council (IAAC), a leading cultural organisation which will organise the annual New York Indian Film Festival (NYIFF) that would showcase the chef’s film ‘The Last Color‘ and Nawazuddin Siddiqui-starrer ‘Photograph’.

• The New York Indian Film Festival is North America’s longest-running and most prestigious Indian film festival that would be organised from May 7 to 12, 2019.

The festival will showcase 30 feature-length films, including 3 documentaries, 30 shorts and 19 regional films.

Uday Kumar Varma resigns from Assocham Secretary General post.

• Uday Kumar Varma, a former bureaucrat retired from the post of Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, resigned from the post of The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Assocham) Secretary-General. Currently, Assocham’s Deputy Secretary-General Saurabh Sanyal is discharging the duties of secretary general.

Twitter appoints Manish Maheshwari as new India MD.

• Manish Maheshwari, who previously served as the CEO of Network18 Digital, takes over the new role from April 29.

Prior to Network18, Maheshwari has worked with Flipkart, txtWeb, Intuit, McKinsey and P&G.

• Manish will be responsible for driving an integrated business strategy to accelerate Twitter’s audience and revenue growth in the country, overseeing Twitter India’s teams in Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru.

• He will be based in Delhi.

• Manish will report to Maya Hari, Twitter’s vice president and managing director of Asia Pacific.

• The appointment comes amid growing concerns over spread of misinformation on social media platforms across the world, including India.

India is among one of the biggest markets for internet companies like Facebook, Google and Twitter, given the large base of young population.

Twitter, which has over 30 million users in India (according to statista.com), had

• appointed Krish as an interim country head.

DAYS:

India observes National Panchayati Raj Day on 24th April.

• The National Panchayati Raj Day is celebrated every year in India on 24th April. The Constitution of India recognizes Panchayats as 'Institutions of self-government'. This day marks the passing of Constitution (73rd Amendment) Act, 1992 that came into force with effect from 24 April 1993. The Amendment Act permits states to take steps to organize village panchayats and provide them with necessary powers and authority necessary to facilitate them to function as units of self-government.

• National Panchayati Raj Day:

The first National Panchayati Raj Day was celebrated in 2010. The enactment of the 73rd Amendment Act had led a defining moment in the history of India which helped in the decentralization of political power to the grassroots level. In turn, it had led to the institutionalization of Panchayati Raj (PR) through the village, Intermediate and District level Panchayats.

• Constitution (73rd Amendment) Act, 1992:

The Constitution (73rd Amendment) Act, 1992 came into force with effect from 24th April, 1993. It has vested constitutional status on Panchayati Raj institutions. It marks a defining moment in the history of decentralization of political power to the grassroots level. The 73rd Amendment 1992 added a new Part IX to the constitution titled The Panchayats covering provisions from Article 243 to 243(O). A new Eleventh Schedule covering 29 subjects within the functions of the Panchayats. It implemented article 40 of DPSP which says that State shall take steps to organize village panchayats and endow them with such powers and authority as may be necessary to enable them to function as units of self-government.

AWARDS:

Swacchta Pakhwada Awards 2019 awarded to All India Radio.

• All India Radio, Publication Division and Children’s Film Society of India were given Swacchta Pakhwada Awards-2019 in New Delhi.

Secretary in the Information and Broadcasting Ministry Amit Khare gave away the awards.

• Director General of All India Radio F. Sheheryar and Director General (News) Ms. Ira Joshi received the Award for All India Radio.

Press Council of India, Press Information Bureau and BECIL were also mentioned during the award ceremony for their efforts during the Swacchta Pakhwada.

Benny Antony won National Intellectual Property Award.

• Benny Antony, Joint Managing Director, the Kochi-based Arjuna Natural Ltd, has been conferred with the National Intellectual Property Award for 2019 in the category of Top Individual for Patents and Commercialization.

He is the inventor of BCM-95, the world’s leading patented turmeric extract formulation, with over 80 international patents to his credit.

Antony was also conferred with the ‘WIPO Medal for Inventors’ jointly by Intellectual Property Office India and the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO).

SPORTS:

Bajrang Punia won gold at the Asian Wrestling Championships 2019.

• World No.1 Bajrang Punia won India’s first gold medal in the 65 kg category at the Asian Wrestling Championships 2019 in Xi’an, China.

Bajrang defeated Sayatbek Okassov of Kazakhstan 12-7 in the final to bag the medal.

• Meanwhile, Praveen Rana settled for silver and Satyavrat Kadian won bronze in 97 kg category.

• Apart from these two, in the women’s event, India’s top wrestlers Vinesh Phogat, Sakshi Malik, Pooja Dhanda and Divya Kakran are also in contention.

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