GK and Current Affairs Updates

Folk singer and Padma award winner Diwaliben Punjabhai Bhil passed away on 19th May in her hometown Junagadh.
•    Her final rites were performed in Junagadh in presence of local political leaders, folk artists among others.
•    A primary school dropout, Diwaliben was a self-taught folk artist who rose from humble background to gain acclaim both in India and around the world.
•    Diwaliben, began her singing career from a local Garbi, has become the voice of hundreds of Gujarati folk songs and garbas, 
•    Born in a tribal family, she worked at a primary school as part of the government's literacy programme, before her talent was recognized.
•    Besides Gujarati folk songs, Diwaliben has also sung many garba and bhajans, and even given voice to numerous Gujarati film songs.
•    Diwaliben Bhil got major recognition with her song "Aiwa Aiwa" on the album 'Mann ke Manjeere' released in April 2001

The Odisha Government on 17 May 2016 decided to launch Green Passage Scheme for orphan students.
•    The scheme will ensure that the orphan students get free of cost higher education in the state.
•    Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik also gave his green signal for the scheme, which would function under the department of higher education.
•    Orphan students pursuing higher education from Plus-II level to post-graduation level will no longer have to bear the education expenses.
•    As many as 16382 orphan students lodged in 272 institutions across the state, will be exempted of admission fee, tuition fees and laboratory fees for higher studies.
•    They will be provided free hostel facilities and food.
•    The state government has also directed all government, private, government aided colleges and universities to ensure that the orphan students are not charged in any form.
•    The state government will bear all cost of the orphan students.
India records its Highest temperature at 51 C

A small city in northwest India scored 51 degrees Celsius on 19th may 2016 afternoon, and broke the country's record for all-time hottest temperature. 
•    The previous record, 50.6 degrees Celsius, was set in 1886.
•    The record was broken in Phalodi, which is just 125 miles away from the city that, up until this afternoon, claimed fame as the hottest location in India - Pachpadra.
•    April and May tend to be the hottest months in northwest India, and this year has been exceptionally so.
•    Christopher C. Burt, a weather historian at Weather Underground, posited that April's heat wave was the most intense ever observed in Southeast Asia.
•    In India it lasted for weeks - but the heat never truly dissipated, dragging on into May. Hundreds of people have died from heat-related illness. 
•    Northern India and Nepal have been battling their worst wildfires in years. Officials have on occasion banned daytime cooking in an attempt to prevent accidental fires that killed nearly 100 people in late April.
•    The India Meteorological Department issued a "severe heat wave warning" for a huge swath of the country on Thursday, which will continue through Saturday. 
•    The department expects temperatures will remain above average through at least May 27.
•    A similar period of extreme heat killed over 2,500 people in 2015.

State-owned BHEL has commissioned a 250 mw thermal unit in Maharashtra.
•    The unit has been commissioned at Parli Thermal Power Station (TPS), located in Beed district in the Marathwada region of Maharashtra, Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) said in a BSE filing.
•    The project is owned by Maharashtra State Power Generation Company (Mahagenco). This is the eighth coal-based unit commissioned by BHEL at Parli TPS.
•    BHEL has been a major partner in the power development programme of the state and has commissioned 16,000 mw of power generation capacity in Maharashtra, its highest in any single state.
•    The 200-270 MW rating class sets supplied by BHEL form the backbone of the Indian power sector and have been performing much above the national as well as international benchmarks.
•    Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) owned by the Government of India, is a power plant equipment manufacturer and operates as engineering and manufacturing company based in New Delhi, India. Established in 1964
•    BHEL is India's largest engineering and manufacturing company of its kind. The company has been earning profits continuously since 1971-72 and paying dividends uninterruptedly since 1976-77.

Punjab National Bank reported a net loss of Rs 5,367.14 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 2016 against net profit of Rs 306 crore in the same quarter a year ago.
•    Provisions of the bank jumped nearly 3 times, 173 per cent, to 10,485.23 crore for the quarter under review from Rs 3834.19 crore in the same quarter last year.
•    The asset quality of Punjab National Bank deteriorated as gross non-performing assets rose to 12.90 per cent of gross advances during the quarter, from 6.55 per cent in the year-ago period.
•    Gross NPAs were Rs 55,818.33 crore in the quarter against Rs 25,694.86 crore last year.
•    Bad loans as a percentage of net advances stood at 8.61 per cent during the last quarter of 2015-16, from 4.06 per cent year ago. 
•    Net interest margins of Punjab National Bank slid 27 per cent to Rs 2767.71 crore in Jan-Mar 2016 period against Rs 3791.58 crore in the same period last year.
•    For the full fiscal, the lender reported a net loss of Rs 3,974.39 crore compared with a net profit of Rs 3,061.58 crore in corresponding last fiscal.
•    At 12.47 am, shares of public sector bank erased their initial gains and were trading 0.07 per cent at Rs 73.85.
•    With this huge loss, Punjab National Bank is now among the several public sector banks that have reported losses due to bad loans. 
•    Syndicate Bank reported a net loss of Rs 2,158.17 for the quarter ending March 2016 due to more than three-fold rise in provisions for bad loans and contingencies. 
•    Bank of Baroda, UCO Bank, Central Bank of India, Allahabad Bank and Dena Bank have earlier reported losses due to bad loans.

Nepal SBI Bank, one of the largest overseas subsidiaries of SBI, has launched payment gateway to facilitate online trade and non-trade transactions between the Himalayan nation and India.
•    With the launch of above services, the customer of Nepal SBI Bank can utilise various features of mobile banking and other value added services along with the platform of the payment gateway, the bank said in a statement.
•    The Payment Gateway was inaugurated by SBI Managing Director B Sriram, and Indian Ambassador to Nepal Ranjit Rae.
•    Nepal SBI Bank is providing banking services from its 70 Offices including 59 branches and 3 Regional Offices.
•    Besides, Sriram also handed over a cheque for Rs 5.21 crore to Nepal Prime Minister K P Oli for PM Natural Disaster Relief Fund.
•    As a part of social responsibility initiatives of Nepal SBI, Sriram also inaugurated construction of main entrance gate of Pashupati area development trust on the theme of UNESCO World Heritage Design. 

The cyclonic storm ROANU that emerged in the west central Bay of Bengal was in news. It came into news after India Meteorological Department (IMD) in its prediction said that the Cyclone is likely to intensify into a severe cyclonic storm by 20 May 2016 night and will hit Andhra coast.
•    At present, ROANU is moving northeastwards and lay centred at south-southeast of Machilipatnam, about 290 km south-southwest of Visakhapatnam & 160 km south-southwest of Kakinada.
•    IMD issued an orange warning message to Andhra Pradesh and Odisha.
•    IMD issued yellow message for West Bengal as the system would turn into severe cyclonic storm.
•    Moving northeastwards, the system is likely to cross south Bangladesh coast between Khepupara and Cox’s Bazar on 22 May 2016.
•    It issued heavy to very heavy rainfall warning to coastal Andhra Pradesh, coastal Odisha and coastal Gangetic West Bengal under the influence of the cyclonic storm coupled with gusty winds speeds reaching 90-100 kmph.
•    Fishermen have been advised not to venture into sea as the condition along and off Andhra Pradesh, South Odisha and West Bengal coasts are very likely to be high to very high.
•    In Andhra Pradesh the district administrations have been asked to see that people staying in low-lying areas are shifted to safer places.

Tsai Ing-wen was sworn-in as the President of Taiwan on 20 May 2016. With this, she became the first woman to hold the post in Taiwan.
•    Before being presented the official seal, 59-year-old, Tsai swore the presidential oath in front of national flag. She succeeded outgoing President Ma Ying-jeou.
•    Tsai has said she will preserve the status quo in relations with China, but that Beijing must respect Taiwan's democracy.
•    Earlier in January 2016, Tsai led the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) to a landslide win in parliamentary and presidential elections.
•    This is the only second time that DPP has won an election in Taiwan. The Kuomintang (KMT) has been in power for most of the past 70 years.
•    The DPP has traditionally leaned towards independence from China, and its victory has led to a cooling of cross-straits relations. China sees Taiwan as a breakaway province, which it has threatened to take back by force if necessary.

Rakesh Kumar Mishra, has been appointed as the new Director of the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research.
•    He is a noted expert in the study of function of genes,
•    He had joined CCMB in 2001 as a senior scientist after stints at the IISc, Bangalore, the University of Bordeaux, France, Saint Louise University, USA and the University of Geneva, Switzerland for post-doctoral experience.
•    An MSc from Allahabad University, Mishra's research interests include investigating evolutionarily conserved features of genome organisation, chromatin structure and epigenetic regulation of genes during embryonic development stages.
•    The Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology or CCMB is an Indian Biotechnology research establishment of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research located in Hyderabad, India, and a designated Center of Excellence for Global Molecular and Cell Biology Network, UNESCO. 

Election Commission on 19 May 2016 announced results of 2016 Legislative Assembly Election Assam. 
•    The elections were held in two phases on 4 April 2016 and 11 April 2016 for 126 assembly seats.
•    In the election, BJP and its alliance partners have won an absolute majority in Assam state assembly election.
•    It has won 60 seats on its own in the 126 member House. Its ally AGP has won 14 seats while another ally BPF has bagged 12 seats.
•    BJP has thus made history by winning an assembly election in the state. Ruling Congress has bagged 26 seats, AIUDF 13 and one seat has gone to an independent.
•    BJP Chief Ministerial candidate Sarbananda Sonowal has won from Majuli seat, defeating his nearest rival by more than 18000 votes. 
•    Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi has won in Titabar, with a margin of over 17000 votes.
•    This thumping win of BJP in north-east India can be seen as its entry in the north-eastern part of India or expanding political influence beyond its traditional heartland. 
•    The interesting fact of the results is that the party managed to break into Congress stronghold.
•    Assam is known for Assam tea and Assam silk. The first oil well in Asia was drilled here. 
•    The state has conserved the one-horned Indian rhinoceros from near extinction, along with the pygmy hog, tiger and various species of Asiatic birds. 
•    It provides one of the last wild habitats for the Asian elephant. The Assamese economy is aided by wildlife tourism, centred around Kaziranga National Park and Manas National Park which are World Heritage Sites. 
•    Sal tree forests are found in the state, which as a result of rainfall looks green all year round. Assam receives more rainfall compared to most part of India.