GK and Current Affairs Updates

Indian men’s doubles duo of Tarun Kona and Alwin Francis emerged victorious at the II Peru International Series 2016 in the Peruvian capital of Lima on 6th march 2016. 
•    Kona and Francis, who were seeded second at this tournament, upset the top seeds; the Mexican pair of Job Castillo and Lino Munoz 21-8, 21-12 to win the final.
•    This is the second career title for this duo and their second of the season after triumphing at the Herbalife International Series in Guatemala just a week back. 
•    There too they had got the better of Castillo and Munoz in the summit clash, beating them comfortably by a score of 21-8, 21-14. 
•    The Guatemala title win shot them up 24 places to their current ranking of 108th.
•    After Peru, the duo has tournaments in Brazil and Jamaica lined up.

On 8th March 2016, Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announced to withdraw proposal to tax Employee Provident Fund (EPF) withdrawals. 
•    He further stated that government would also like to comprehensively review EPF tax proposal. 
•    But government retained the tax proposal for National Pension Scheme (NPS) withdrawals.
•    The proposal was made by Arun Jaitley while presenting the Union Budget 2016-17 in the Lok Sabha on 29 February 2016. 
•    Proposal said 60 percent of the amount deposited in the EPF account of the employee would be taxable at the time of withdrawal, and 40 percent would be tax free. 
•    It was going to be effective from 1 April 2016.
•    It also said that if the employee re-invested 60 percent of the EPF in an annuity or pension fund then it will not be taxed. 
•    Currently entire amount is tax free at the time of withdrawal if the employee has completed five years of continuous service.
•    The proposal to tax EPF withdrawals was made with an aim of to create a pensioned society, especially among employees in the private sector who have no provision for pension.
•    The EPF is a retirement benefit scheme for salaried employees. 
•    Any company with over 20 employees is required by law to register with the 

On 3rd  March 2016 chairman of Charutar Arogya Mandal and former chairman of the National Dairy Development Board Amrita Patel, , was awarded the prestigious Mahindra Samriddhi Krishi Shiromani Samman in Delhi.
•    It is also considered as the Lifetime Achievement Award.
•    Radha Mohan Singh, Union Minister of Agriculture, presented the award to Patel .
•    Mahindra Samriddhi India Agri Awards are given to the farmers and institutions to recognize their noteworthy and purposeful contribution to the field of agriculture.
•    Other winners of the Mahindra Samriddhi India Agri Awards (MSIAA) 2016 are:
•    Mahindra Samriddhi  Krishi Samrat Samman - Farmer of the Year Award (Male) - Land holding less than 5 acres -Mahendra Patidar
•    Mahindra Samriddhi  Krishi Samrat Samman - Farmer of the Year Award (Male) - Land holding from 5 to 20 acres -Krishnpal Singh Mourya
•    Mahindra Samriddhi  Krishi Samrat Samman - Farmer of the Year Award (Male) - Land holding more than 20 acres - Neelam Dutta
•    Mahindra Samriddhi Krishi Prerna Samman - Farmer of the Year Award (Female)- Sugan Bai Patidar
•    Mahindra Samriddhi Krishi Yuva Samman- Farmer of the Year Award (Youth)- P Jawahar Raja
•    Mahindra Samriddhi Krishi Sansthan Samman - Recognition for Public Sector organization- Indian Institute of Soil Science Bhopal
•    Mahindra Samriddhi Krishi Shiksha Samman - Recognition for Agricultural Universities - Acharya NG Ranga Agricultural University, Hyderabad
•    Mahindra Samriddhi Krishi Sahyog Samman - Recognition for NGOs / SHGs- Rajasthan Rural Institute of Development Management, Udaipur
•    Amrita Patel played an important role in the implementation of Operation Flood, the largest developmental programme in the world.
•    Programme helped to promote, finance and deliver a variety of supporting services to a national cooperative dairy structure that transformed the lives of millions of marginalised and small farmers and milk producers.
•    She was awarded Padma Bhushan in 2002.

Jawaharlal Nehru University has been named the winner of two of the three Visitor’s Awards President Pranab Mukherjee instituted last year.
•    The university took the prize in the “Innovation” and “Research” categories, while Assam’s Tezpur University was adjudged the “Best University”, according to an announcement by Rashtrapati Bhavan on Sunday.
•    While Tezpur University got the award for academic excellence and overall performance in 2015, Rakesh Bhatnagar, a JNU professor, and the Delhi institute’s Molecular Parasitology Group made the cut for innovation and research.
•    Bhatnagar developed a vaccine and therapeutic antibody against anthrax, and a team of scientists led by Professor Alok Bhattacharya worked on malaria, amoeba and kala-azar parasites. The sources said there were about ten entries in each category and were assessed by a panel of experts.
•    The recognitions for JNU come at a time the institution is at the centre of a sedition row following a campus event last month on executed Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru. A BJP MP, Maheish Girri, even described JNU as a “hub of treason”.
•    The crackdown that followed led to the arrest of students’ union president Kanhayia Kumar, who got bail last week.
•    Several ex-servicemen have been critical, too, and even suggested taking a tank inside the campus to create “nationalistic sentiments” among students.
•    Bhatnagar, who heads a panel that was set up to probe the February 9 campus event, didn’t want to comment about his work. Bhattacharya said several institutions were engaged in research on malaria, kala-azar or amoeba, but JNU was the only place for a comprehensive research on all three.
•    Tezpur University vice-chancellor Mihir K. Chaudhuri said the university had produced excellent research while catering to the needs of 3,600 students in a place whose location was a disadvantage.
•    The awards, which Mukherjee – the Visitor for all central universities – had instituted last year, will be given away next Monday.
•    Last year, Hyderabad University was adjudged the “Best University” for its performance in 2014. 
•    A Delhi University professor, Vijaya Chaudhary, and his team got the award for “Innovation”. The Centre of Theoretical Physics, from Jamia Millia Islamia, won the “Research” prize.

On 8th March 2016, President Pranab Mukherjee presented Nari Shakti Puraskar for the year 2015 to 15 women, 5 organisations, one state and panchayat. 
•    The awards are annually given by the Union Ministry of Women & Child Development to institutions and individuals who have made exceptional contribution towards empowerment of women specially belonging to vulnerable and marginalised sections of society. 
•    It carries cash award of two lakh rupees and a certificate for institutions and one lakh rupees and a certificate for individuals.
•    Haryana was awarded as a state for demonstrating improvement with work in improving Child Sex Ratio (CSR) and Sex Ratio at Birth (SRB) during 2015. 
•    Anganwadipuram Gram Panchayat, Mallapuram of Kerala was awarded for their work towards women empowerment. 
•    Other awardees are :
•    Lucky Kurien, Maharashtra 
•    Dr. Saurabh Suman, Bihar
•    Basanti Devi, Uttarakhand 
•    Suparna Baksi Ganguly, Karnataka 
•    Meena Sharma, Rajasthan 
•    Preeti Patkar, Maharashtra 
•    Uttara Padwar, Madhya Pradesh 
•    Polumati Vijaya Nirmala, Andhra Pradesh 
•    Vasu Primalni, Delhi 
•    Sujata Sahu, Haryana 
•    Jyoti Mhapsekar, Maharashtra 
•    Sumita Ghosh, Delhi 
•    Anjali Sharma, Delhi 
•    Krishna Yadav, Delhi 
•    Shakuntala Majumdar, Maharashtra 
•    Organisations who were awarded are Gudiya Shyam Sevi Sansthan, Varanasi, Jagori, Delhi,Kanaklata Women Urban Cooperative Bank (Institution), Assam,Technology Information, Forecasting and Assessment Council (Institution), Delhi, Breakthrough Trust

ICICI Bank on 7th March 2016 launched iWork@Home programme for its women employees to prevent them from dropping out of its workforce.

•    The iWork@Home is an information and communication technology initiative and will enable employees work from home.
•    It allows women employees to have access to their required operating systems in a safe and secure manner by creating a seamless office-like environment.
•    By using the platform, employees can carry out multiple tasks that include checking documents for loan disbursement, image-based verification of cheques for clearance and processing of export-import documents for payments, etc.
•    It was developed in-house by ICICI Bank in partnership with students from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi.
•    To address data security and privacy related issues, facial recognition technology is incorporated that will scan the face to ascertain identity.
•    Women in all roles, except those in direct customer-facing ones, would be eligible for this initiative based on their life stage needs.
•    These would include young mothers, expectant mothers, those suffering from medical conditions among others.
•    Initially, the facility will be available for one year and can be extended beyond the period based on the requirements of the employee.
•    At present, the bank has about 30 per cent women in its overall workforce.

Indian Railways on 8 March 2016 appointed Ernst & Young (EY) as a consultant to discover the advertising potential in trains and railway stations. 
•    EY will identify assets and formulate a pricing strategy for advertising across 7000 railways stations in the country.
•    This is the first time in India that such a large scale project on advertising for Railways has been initiated.
•    EY and Indian Railways will engage with leading advertisers through the course of the project for effective optimization of railway assets.
•    A unique aspect of the exercise will be the creation of a neutral assessment on the return of investments by advertisers in this medium.
•    Tapping the advertising potential of Indian Railways assets including fleet of trains spread in a wide network of about 7000 railway stations across India.
•    EY with its specialized offering Marketing and Advertising Risk Services (MARS) will help the Indian Railways to identify assets across its stations for the purpose of advertising.
•    It will also develop a pricing strategy to evaluate them for advertisers.
•    Ernst & Young is a multinational professional services firm headquartered in London, United Kingdom.
•    It is one of the Big Four audit firms and is the third largest professional services firm in the world by aggregated revenue in 2014, after PwC and Deloitte.
•    The current firm was formed by a merger of Ernst & Whinney and Arthur Young & Co. in 1989.
•    It was known as Ernst & Young until 2013, when it underwent a rebranding to EY.

Indian men's and women's team on 6 March 2016 bagged the gold medals at the Second Division of the World Team Table Tennis Championship held in Kuala Lumpur.
•    Indian women’s team defeated Luxemburg 3-1 in the event final of the Second Division, while Indian men’s team emerged victorious over Brazil with a score of 3-2.
•    In the women's team final, Mouma Das gave a winning start to her team when she defeated Danielle Konsbruck 3-0. 
•    Then, Manika Batra led India 2-0 against Tessy Gonderinger, who managed to win the third game. 
•    Manika clinched the fourth game to win 3-1 and provide India with a 2-0 lead.
•    Thereafter, India’s K Shamini lost her singles to Sarah De Nutte in straight games but Manika defeated Danielle 3-0 in the reverse singles to secure a win for India.
•    The World Table Tennis Championships have been held since 1926, biennially since 1957.
•    Five individual events, which include men's singles, women's singles, men's doubles, women's double and mixed doubles, are currently held in odd numbered years.
•    The World Team Table Tennis Championships, which include men's team and women's team events, are held in even numbered years.

Women have a poor 11% representation in India's Lok Sabha and 10.6% in the Rajya Sabha, making India 103th among 188 countries covered in the annual analysis on statistics of women members of parliament (MPs) conducted by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU).
•    The global average of women in parliaments as of November 2013 stood at 21.3%, a slight increase over the numbers in the immediately preceding two years (20.3% and 19.5%). 
•    Countries are ranked by the IPU based on percentage of women in the lower house of parliament. The top three countries in the 2013 analysis were Rwanda, Andorra and Cuba.
•    India fared poorly even when compared with her immediate neighbours. Here, Nepal, ranked at 24, led the pack, followed by China (55) and Pakistan (66).
•    With elections around the corner in India, several women groups have come together under the umbrella of 'Time for 33% Coalition' and are seeking passage of the women's reservation bill during the winter session which will start shortly.
•    The bill proposes to reserve 33% seats for women in the Lok Sabha and the state legislative assemblies. Various similar bills, introduced since 1996, have lapsed.
•    According to statistics released periodically by the Election Commission, for the 543 Lok Sabha constituencies, the number of elected women increased from 49 in 1999 to 59 in 2009, with 11% representation in the lower house. 
•    In 2009, the number of elected women over total seats was maximum in Punjab (30.8%), followed by Madhya Pradesh (20.7%) and Haryana (20.0%). Against this, the number of women voters in India has increased from 44.3% to 45.8%.