GK and Current Affairs Updates

Rajasthan has become the first state in the country to submit State Annual Action Plan under Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) targeting universal coverage in respect of water supply connections and sewerage connections to all urban households in the state. The State Government has proposed projects under these two categories worth Rs.1,087 cr for approval by the Union Urban Development Ministry during the current financial year. 

Under the State Annual Action Plan, AMRUT projects are proposed to be taken up in 13 of the 28 AMRUT cities in Rajasthan. These include Alwar, Beawar, and Nagaur in which both water supply and sewerage projects will be taken up while water supply projects will be taken up in seven other cities of Baran, Bhiwar, Bhilwara, Chittorgarh, Dhaulpur, Ganganagar City and Sujangarh. In 3 cities of Bhiwadi, Sikar and Udaipur, only sewerage and septage management projects will be taken up. 

These cities have been identified by the state government in line with the principles of prioritization suggested in the Mission Guidelines after analyzing the gaps in coverage in respect of household water supply connections and sewerage network services. For the first time in the country, formulation of urban development plans including identification of projects, their appraisal and approval has been delegated to the States and Rajasthan has become the first state to act under this new architecture. 

Supreme Court of Pakistan ordered immediate adoption of Urdu as official language of the country. With this order, Urdu will be used as an official language at the government offices of Pakistan.

The order was passed by a three member bench headed by Chief Justice Jawwad S. Khawaja while delivering judgment in a case. The petitioner Advocate Kokab Iqbal through his petition wanted promotion and implementation of the national language. The Court also ruled that under the 1973 Constitution it is must to adopt Urdu as official language. It also ordered that there should be no delay in implementation of Article 251 in line with Article 5 of the Constitution. It also issued nine guidelines for making Urdu the official language.

World football governing body FIFA has appointed Uganda's Moses Magogo on the committee for security and integrity.Ahmed Hussein, spokesman of Uganda's football governing body said that they had received a communication from the Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) about the appointment.

"We wish you success and enjoyment in this role at FIFA and look forward to welcoming you soon in Zurich," said the communication sent to the Uganda FA president.Magogo is also a member of Confederation of African Football Inter-clubs competitions committee.

Government of India launched Tourist Visa on Arrival (TVoA) enabled by Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA), presently known as e-Tourist Visa scheme on 27th November 2014. At present e-Tourist Visa facility is available for citizens of 113 countries (including 36 countries for which the facility was extended on 15th August, 2015) arriving at 16 Airports in India (includes 7 airports added from 15th August, 2015). 

The following are the important highlights of e-Tourist Visa during August, 2015: 

(i)    During the month of August, 2015 a total of 22,286 tourist arrived on e-Tourist Visa as compared to 2,705 during the month of August, 2014 registering a growth of 723.9%. 

(ii)    During January- August, 2015 a total of 1,69,976 tourist arrived on e-Tourist Visa as compared to 17,120 during January-August, 2014 registering a growth of 892.9% . 

(iii)    This high growth may be attributed to introduction of e-Tourist Visa for 113 countries as against coverage of earlier TVoA scheme for 12 countries. 

(iv)    The percentage shares of top 10 source countries availing e-Tourist Visa facility during August 2015 were as follows: 

USA (25.93%), Germany (10.00%), UAE (8.92%), France (8.76%), Australia (7.20%), Canada (6.39%), Republic of Korea (4.23%), Japan (3.41%), Russian Federation (2.37%) and Singapore (2.22%).

(v)    The percentage shares of different ports in tourist arrivals on e-Tourist Visa during August 2015 were as follows: 

New Delhi (42.67%), Mumbai (23.40%), Bengaluru (10.37%), Chennai (9.07%), Kochi (5.44%), Hyderabad (4.21%), Kolkata (2.38%), Trivandrum (1.87%) and Goa (0.58%).

4.    Nooyi Fortune's powerful women in business list

PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi is the sole Indian-origin executive in Fortune's list of 50 most powerful women in business, which has been topped by General Motors CEO Mary Barra.

India-born Nooyi is ranked 2nd on the list, moving up a notch from her third position last year. Fortune said about the 59-year-old top executive that she beaten back a challenge from activist investor Nelson Peltz, landing a big marketing deal with the NBA, and managed to post 4 per cent organic revenue growth in 2014.

Barra tops the Fortune list of 50 Most Powerful Women in Business and in her second year as head of the nation’s largest auto-maker. The list also includes IBM CEO Ginni Rometty on the third rank, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg on 8th, and Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer at 18th.

Smt. Smriti Irani, Union Human Resource Development Minister launched the National Web Portal  at New Delhi for promotion of National Apprenticeship Scheme for Graduates, Diploma holders and 10+2 pass-outs vocational certificate holders. The Union Minister also released a Logo and a Slogan “Sashakt Yuva, Samarth Bharat” for the National Web Portal. 

The web portals of regional BOATs/BOPT have been integrated and data of all the regional BOATs/BOPT has been transferred to the National Web Portal. There has been a vacuum in obtaining reliable data at the central level about the needs of students who wish to join Apprenticeship Training. The National Web Portal will now ensure seamless connectivity with all stake holders including students, establishments and technical institutions across the country for transparent administration through e-Governance. It will also be a multilingual platform which currently engages with the user in Marathi, Bengali, Tamil and Hindi. 

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Under the gold bond scheme, approved by a meeting of the cabinet presided over by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, up to 500 grams worth of bonds per annum can be bought by an individual with lock-in of five-seven years and appropriate interest so that they are protected from volatility.The gold monetisation scheme, also approved, calls for people to deposit their gold with authorised agencies for a short-, medium- or long-term periods, for which they will be given certificates of holding, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said at a briefing.

"This will also bear interest," Jaitley said, adding: "This has been done to replenish the Reserve Bank's gold reserves."According to the World Gold Council, an estimated 22,000-23,000 tonnes of gold is lying idle with households and institutions in India. The annual imports amount to around 850-1,000 tonnes valued at $35 billion to $45 billion.Officials said the objective of these two schemes are three-fold: Mobilise idle gold with people, give a fillip to the gems and jewellery sector by making the metal available from banks on loan and reduce the reliance on imported gold and conserve foreign exchange.

The sixth Indo-Maldives joint Training Exercise commenced on 31 Aug 2015 with an impressive opening ceremony at Pangode Military Station, Trivandrum.  Aim of the Joint Exercise is to acquaint both the forces with each other’s operating procedure in addition to increased understanding and interoperability between the two Armies.
          A total of 45 soldiers each from the Maldivian National Defence Force and the Indian Army (BIHAR Regiment) will take part in this exercise. Varied training activities are being conducted to enhance interoperability and jointness between the two defence forces.  The joint training will conclude with a tactical exercise. The closing ceremony is scheduled on 13 Sep 15 and would involve cultural displays by various military display teams besides aerial acrobatics display by Sarang Team.

The award has been conferred under the ‘Shakshar Bharat Karyakram’. President Pranab Mukherjee conferred the National Literacy Award upon Bastar District  in New Delhi, Bastar District Collector Amit Kataria received the National Literacy Award at the hands of President Pranab Mukherjee at Vigyan Bhawan in New Delhi.

Another  National Literacy Award was given to Gram Panchayat Ghiroud (Development Block Dharsiva) of Raipur district.Union Human Resources Development Minister Smriti Irani and Union Minister of State Upendra Kushawaha were also present. Chief Minister Raman Singh and School Education Minister Kedar Kashyap congratulated the citizens of Bastar and Village Panchayat Ghiroud on the historic achievement.Sarpanch of Gram Panchayat Ghiroud Chandrakumar Naik also received the award.Three districts were chosen for the National Literacy Award- Bastar (Jagdalpur) district, Haveri in Karnataka, Dhramapuri in Tamil Nadu.Village Ghiroud has achieved the rare distinction of 85 per cent literacy. It is a part of MP Model Village Scheme also.

J. Manjula has been named DRDO's first woman Director General and has taken charge of the Electronics & Communication Systems cluster.Before her elevation, Ms. Manjula, who is a DRDO Outstanding Scientist, was Director of the Defence Avionics Research Establishment, Bengaluru, since July 2014.She took charge from K.D. Nayak, Distinguished Scientist & Director General, who held the additional charge of the six ECS laboratories.The DGs of seven clusters form the defence R&D establishment's second rung and report to its Secretary-Director General.An alumna of Osmania University and a practising electronics and communications engineer, Ms. Manjula joined DRDO in 1987 after a brief stint in the Electronics Corporation of India Ltd. At the Defence Electronics Research Laboratory, Hyderabad, she worked in the area of integrated electronic warfare and is credited with developing fast signal acquisition receivers, high power RF systems, responsive jammers and controller software for various systems used by the military and the paramilitary.

Her specialisation includes configuration of communication and radar ESM and ECM systems.Ms. Manjula has been conferred the DRDO award for performance excellence, the Scientist of the Year award for 2011 and the India Today Woman Summit award for 2014.

This contains all the words Gandhiji spoke and wrote, day after day, year after year, beginning from 1884 till his assassination on January 30, 1948. The work will maximise the reach of Gandhian philosophy at a time when the world is facing number of man made crises. These books represent the history and ideology of a man who the world remembers as Mahatma Gandhi from more than 130 years ago. 

The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi (CWMG), published by the Publications Division, is a monumental document of Gandhiji's words which he spoke and wrote, day after day, year after year, beginning from 1884 till his assassination on January 30, 1948. It took 38 years for Prof. K. Swaminathan to compile it. All this is now available in a CD. A CD that will be launched by Minister of Information and Broadcasting Arun Jaitley on Tuesday at Gandhi Peace Foundation, New Delhi. Ms. Dinaben Patel - A renowned Gandhian Scholar and co contributor of the CD version says this will help maximise the reach of Gandhianism at a time when the world is facing number of manmade crises. 

The 3 Gandhian scholars behind the electronic version of Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi met with Minister of state for information and broadcasting Rajhyevardhan Rathore .Publications division of the I &b ministry worked together with Gandhian scholars to ensure that the e version is completely authentic and factual. This content will be free to be viewed on internet at Gandhi Heritage Portal. Master copy is also to be preserved in National Archives so that Gandhi's legacy is not lost.