GK and Current Affairs Updates

The Taliban on 12 April 2016 said that it has launched its annual spring military offensive in Afghanistan, titled Omari Operation. It said that the operation has been named after its deceased leader Mullah Omar.
•    In a statement, the Islamist insurgent group promised large scale attacks on enemy positions, martyrdom-seeking (suicide) and tactical attacks against enemy strongholds and assassination of enemy commanders in urban centers.
•    Earlier during the 2015 fighting season, the Taliban inflicted heavy casualties on Afghan security forces, killing nearly 6000 personnel, including soldiers and police. 
•    It also captured more territory then at any point since it was ousted from power in 2001 for harbouring al-Qaida.
•    Afghan leaders blame the withdrawal of international forces for the battlefield and other losses but have vowed to evict Taliban insurgents from areas they now control and keep them from making advances this year.

Maharashtra Governor C Vidyasagar Rao on 12 April 2016 conferred the Hridaynath Award on Chess wizard Viswanathan Anand in Mumbai.
He was conferred the award during the celebrations of 25th anniversary of the Hridayesh Arts which gives the awards.
He was chosen for the award for his contributions to the game of Chess in India by becoming five-time world chess champion.
With this, he joined others personalities who have received the award like LataMangeshkar, BabasahebPurandare, Asha Bhosle, Amitabh Bachchan, HariprasadChaurasia and AR Rahman.  
VishwanathanAnand also is the first sports personality to have received this prestigious award.
Born on 11 December 1969, Anand became India's first grandmaster in 1988. He held the FIDE World Chess Championship title from 2000 to 2002 and became the undisputed world champion in 2007.
Other sports personalities who were felicitated during the awards ceremony were D Prasad, Praveen Thipsey along with his wife Bhagyashree, PadmashreeAnupamaGokhale, RaghunandanGokhale, Dhanraj Pillay, Devendra Joshi, Kamesh Mehta and ParnaliDharia.
• It was instituted by Hridayesh Art, a Mumbai- based socio-cultural organization founded in 1990 in honour of music composer and singer HridaynathMangeskar.
• The annual award given since 2011 recognises individuals for success in various walks of life. It comprises a cash award of 2 lakh rupees and a memento.
 

The term Brexit, made with combination of two words ‘Britain’ and ‘Exit’, was in news in second week of April 2016. It came in news after International Monetary Fund (IMF) on 12 April 2016 warned of risks of Brexit or Britain’s exit from the European Union (EU) amidst cutting the global growth forecast.
•    IMF said if the voters of Britain opt to leave the EU that the referendum could do severe regional and global damage by disrupting established trading relations.
•    Brexit is a political aim of some advocacy groups including individuals and political parties like justice secretary, Michael Gove, and London's mayor Boris Johnson in the United Kingdom (UK), who believe that Britain leaving the EU will be in favour of them.
•    The demand for it gained momentum largely because of Europe’s migration crisis and the interminable euro mess. Some recent surveys even find a majority of Britons wanting to leave.
•    This led to Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron on 20 February 2016 declaring to hold a referendum on the country's membership of the EU on 23 June 2016 following the passing of the European Union Referendum Act 2015.
(https://www.google.co.in/imgres?imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fglocdn.investing.com%2Fnews%2FLYNXNPEC210WM_L.jpg&imgrefurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.investing.com%2Fnews%2Feconomy-news%2Fimf-cuts-global-growth-forecasts-and-warns-on-brexit-394878&docid=miLR_gZjij_GgM&tbnid=b2R4-1Jq69GvJM%3A&w=800&h=533&ved=0ahUKEwid173-5I3MAhVFJ6YKHbqZCIAQMwgdKAEwAQ&iact=mrc&uact=8)
Kane Williamson named Wisden Almanack's Cricketer of the Year
New Zealand’s Kane Williamson on 13 April 2016 was named the Wisden's Leading Cricketer in the World for the year 2015.
On the other hand, White Ferns captain Suzie Bates was named the Leading Women's Cricketer in the World for 2015.
For the first time two New Zealand players - Williamson and Brendon McCullum - were named among the Wisden Almanack's Five Cricketers of the Year. England's Ben Stokes and Jonny Bairstow, and Australia's Steve Smith completed the list of Five Cricketers of the Year.
Williamson and Bates were chosen by Wisden editor Lawrence Booth for the award, which has been handed out in various formats since 1889.
The principal criterion is excellence or influence on the previous English summer. No one can be chosen more than once, although exceptions were made for Englishmen Plum Warner and Jack Hobbs early in the 20th century.
In 2014, Sri Lanka’s Kumar Sangakkara was the winner of the prestigious accolade.
• Kane Stuart Williamson is currently the captain of New Zealand. He is a right-handed batsman and occasional off-spinner.
• As of April 2016, he is the number third ranked batsman in Test cricket.
• He made his first-class debut in December 2007.
• He made his U-19 debut against the touring Indian U-19 team the same year and was named captain of the New Zealand U-19 team for the 2008 U-19 Cricket World Cup.
• He made his international debut in 2010.

Union Road, Transport and Highways and Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari and South Korea Oceans and Fisheries Minister Kim Young Suk signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on 13 April 2016 in Mumbai.
This MoU is for cooperation and mutual assistance between India and Republic of Korea in port related matters and their developments.
The Union Cabinet approved the proposal of the Shipping Ministry for signing of this MoU on 6 April 2016.
• It will help both countries to encourage and facilitate the development of ports, port related industry, and maritime relationship
• It will encourage cooperation in the tasks of sharing of technology, experiences in the fields of port development and operation.
• It will also help in exchange of information on construction, building, engineering and related aspects in the field of port development
• Enable exchange of information on joint participation in port-related construction, building and engineering projects that both parties are interested in
• Exchange of experts including officials from the relevant ministries of each country in the field of port.
• The other types of cooperation related education and training may be mutually agreed upon between the two 

Nuclear capable undersea ballistic missile, code named K-4, was successfully test fired on 31 March 2016 from an undisclosed location in the Bay of Bengal. The test was conducted nearly 45 nautical miles away from Vishakhapatnam coast in Andhra Pradesh.
The trial was carried out with the support of the personnel of Strategic Forces Command (SFC) while the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) provided all logistics.
The missile was fired from 20-meter deep and covered more than 700 km before zeroing on the target with high accuracy reaching close to zero Circular Error Probability (CEP).
The K-4 missile was fired from onboard silos of the Ship Submersible Ballistic, Nuclear (SSBN) submarine. The maiden test represented the capability of the newly built underwater warship to fire long range nuclear capable missiles and the killing efficiency of the most advanced state-of-the-art weapon system.
• K-4 is a nuclear capable intermediate-range submarine-launched ballistic missile under development by DRDO to arm the Arihant-class submarines.
• The missile has a reported effective range of over 3500 km.
• The development of the K-4 was undertaken after facing significant difficulties in compacting similarly capable Agni-III to equip INS Arihant, which has a limited 17-metre diameter hull.
• K-4 has range comparable to Agni-III with major length reduction from 17 metres to 12 metres.
• The gas-booster designed for K-4 was successfully tested from a submerged pontoon in 2010.
• The missile is reported to be 12 metres long with a diameter of 1.3 metres and weighs nearly 17 tonnes.
• It can carry a warhead weighing up to 2 tonnes and is powered solid rocket propellant.

Maharashtra cadre IPS officer Meeran C Borwankar on 8 April 2016 was appointed the Director General (DG) of Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPR&D). BPR&D is a consultancy organisation under the Centre for modernisation of police forces.
The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has appointed Ms. Meeran C.Borwankar, IPS (MH:81) as Director General in the Bureau of Police Research & Development (BPR&D) till the date of her superannuation i.e. 30.9.2017, from the date of assumption of the charge or until further orders, whichever is earlier
The Appointments Committee of Cabinet appointed Borwankar, a 1981 batch IPS officer, as the organisation’s DG till 30 September 2017, the date of her superannuation.
At present, Borwankar is working in her cadre state Maharashtra. In her long career, she has also worked in Maharashtra's Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS).
• The Bureau of Police Research and Development was set up on 28 August 1970 in furtherance of the objective of the Government of India for the modernisation of police forces. It has evolved as a multifaceted, consultancy organisation.
• At present, the organisation has 4 divisions, which are Research, Development, Training and Correctional Administration.

Airtel M Commerce Services (AMSL), a subsidiary of Bharti Airtel, on 11 April 2016 was granted the first payments bank license from Reserve Bank of India (RBI).
AMSL is a wholly owned subsidiary of Airtel, which offers mobile money services under the brand name Airtel Money. It proposes to convert the existing pre-paid payment instrument license into a Payments Bank license as per the guidelines prescribed by the Reserve Bank of India.
• The Payments Bank will be set up as a differentiated bank and shall confine its activities to acceptance of demand deposits, remittance services, internet banking and other specified services, as per RBI notification.
• Payments Banks will initially be restricted to holding a maximum balance of 1 lakh rupees per individual customer.
• They will be allowed to issue ATM/debit cards as also other prepaid payment instruments, but not the credit cards.
• These banks can also distribute non-risk sharing simple financial products like mutual funds and insurance products.
• They will not be allowed to undertake lending services and non resident Indians will not be allowed to open accounts.
On 19 August 2015, RBI had issued in-principle approval to 11 applicants to set up payments banks. The companies who were issued payment bank license under the Guidelines for Licensing of Payments Banks issued on 27 November 2014 included Aditya Birla Nuvo, Airtel M Commerce Services, Cholamandalam Distribution Services, Department of Posts (DoP), Fino PayTech, National Securities Depository, Reliance Industries, Dilip Shantilal Shanghvi, Vijay Shekhar Sharma, Tech Mahindra and Vodafone m-pesa.
All companies, which received in-principle approval from RBI in August 2015, will have to make their banks operational by March 2017.

Haryana Government on 12 April 2016 decided to rename Gurgaon as Gurugram and Mewat as Nuh.
•    Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar has accorded approval to the proposal but this new decision will be placed before the Haryana cabinet before being sent to the Union Government.
•    The decision to change the name of Gurgaon was taken on the basis of the representations received at several forums by the people of Gurgaon. 
•    The city’s name change stems from a proposal by the municipal corporation in 2012. A committee had been formed to address the issue.
•    Gurgaon had been a centre of learning where the princes, Pandavas and Kauravas, used to get education from Guru Dronacharya and at that time the city was known as Gurugram.
•    However, Mewat is not a town, in fact it is a geographical and cultural unit spread beyond Haryana in the adjoining States of Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan. 
•    The Headquarters of Mewat district is at Nuh town. The decision of changing its name was taken following the demand of people of area and the elected representatives. They had been demanding that the name of Mewat be changed as Nuh.

Bollywood Actress Aishwarya Rai Bachchan on 12 April 2016 won the Global Indian of the Year 2016 award at third season of NRI of the Year award function held in Mumbai.
•    The NRI of the Year Award recognizes outstanding achievements of the Indian diaspora globally. From 2016 the awards will be woven together thematically and the debut theme is Contemporary Crusoes.
•    The awards are conferred to salute the spirit of the nimble-footed globetrotting Indians who have resided in any of the four regions of America, Asia Pacific, Middle East and UK.
•    Besides Aishwarya, Indian Tennis player Sania Mirza was also honored at the NRI of the Year Award 2016.
•    17 individuals were given the awards under different categories like entrepreneur, professional, academics, arts & culture, philanthropy, special jury award, global icon of the year and India’s global icon award.
•    The awards of global Indian of the year 2014 and 2015 were conferred on Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rikh Khan respectively.

President Pranab Mukherjee presented remaining of the Padma Awards on 12 April 2016 at a Civil Investiture Ceremony held at Rashtrapati Bhavan. He conferred 5 Padma Vibhushan, 11 Padma Bhushan and 40 Padma Shri awards.

The Union Government announced Padma awards 2016 for 112 eminent persons on 26 January 2016 among them 56 members received the awards on 28 March 2016 while remaining 56 members who received the awards are:
Padma Vibhushan
• Dr Vasudeva Kalkunte Aatre
• Dr Girija Devi
• Rajanikanth
• Ramoji Rao
• Dr V Shanta
Padma Bhusan
• Ravindra Chandra Bhargava
• Robert Dean Blackwill
• Indu Jain
• Udit Narayan Jha
• Heinam Kanhailal
• Sania Mirza
• Yarlagadda Lakshmi Prasad
• Dayanada Saraswati (Posthumus)
• Ram Vanji Sutar
• NS Ramanuja Tatacharya
• Swami Tejomayananda
Padma Shri
Some of the prominent personalities among the other 40 who received Padma Shri Awards include:
• Priyanka Chopra
• Salman Khan
• SS Rajamouli (Director of Bahubali)
• Veena Tandon