61. Social Progress Index 2014 has put India at a dismal rank of 102. The study measures a country’s achievement on three pillars of satisfying Basic Human Needs, Foundations of Wellbeing, and Opportunity to progress. Top three countries are New Zealand, Switzerland and Iceland. 62. Given even the first forecast of the met predicts a 60% chance of El Niño and a 23% chance of a deficit monsoon, the government is taking no chances and is finalising a comprehensive contingency plan for 500‐odd districts to deal with any exigency. 63. India slid down to 83rd spot among 148 economies in terms of leveraging information and communications technologies (ICT) for growth and well being, says a World Economic Forum report. 64. The railways will launch semi‐high‐speed trains that will run at an average speed of 130 km per hour. To start with, these trains are expected to become operational on three routes — Delhi‐Chandigarh, Delhi‐Lucknow and Delhi‐Bhopal — by the end of this year. 65. Andhra Pradesh has recorded highest growth in terms of both milk production and per‐capita milk availability at over 41 per cent and about 36 per cent, respectively. 66. International Monetary Fund expects country’s economic growth to move up to 5.5 per cent in the current fiscal and 6.25 per cent in the next fiscal. 67. Finance ministers and central bank governors of the Group of 20 Nations reiterated their commitment to boost global growth by 2 per cent, or over USD 2 trillion, over the next five years and achieve exchange rate flexibility. G‐20 said in a communique issued on the sidelines of the annual spring meeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in Washington. 68. Having received USD 70 billion in 2013, India has topped the list of countries receiving remittances from overseas workers, the World Bank said. 69. Gold and silver imports declined 40 per cent to USD 33.46 billion in 2013‐14 mainly due to restrictions imposed by the government. Imports of gold and silver in 2012‐13 stood at USD 55.79 billion. 70. Foreign direct investment (FDI) in the services sector declined by about 61 per cent year‐on‐year to USD 1.8 billion during April‐January. 71. Maharashtra has emerged as the number one investment destination in India replacing Gujarat. 72. India’s GDP is poised to accelerate to 5.5 per cent in 2014‐15 on the back of improved performance in industry and services but it may take some time for the country to reach its potential growth rate, says an Asian Development Bank (ADB) report. 73. In a bid to prevent bank failures in the future, a high‐powered panel has proposed the setting up of a Financial Resolution Authority (FRA) to deal with any exigency in a financial institution and even allow “temporary public ownership” of troubled banks. The committee under Financial Stability and Development Council, chaired by RBI deputy governor Anand Sinha, said the experience and expertise of Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Corporation (DICGC) could be transformed into the proposed FRA to deal with failures of banks. 74. Communications satellite INSAT‐3E has completed its life and gone out of service. 75. Reserve Bank’s plan to put in circulation Rs 10 plastic currency notes on trial basis will be delayed as the initial bids have failed to qualify the technical criteria and the whole process will start again. The selected cities are Kochi, Mysore, Jaipur, Shimla and Bhubaneswar. 76. The Foreign Investment Promotion Board deferred a decision on HDFC Bank’s proposal to increase its overseas shareholding limit to 67% from 49%. 77. Government is planning to make additional infusion of up to Rs 7,000 crore in the public sector banks during the current fiscal. In the interim budget, the government provided Rs 11,200 for the public sector banks. 78. Qatar‐based Doha Bank has entered into an agreement with HSBC Bank Oman to purchase the latter’s banking business in India. 79. Stepping up pressure on public sector banks (PSBs) to bring down bad loans, the finance ministry has widened its monitoring of non‐performing assets (NPA) from ‘top 30’ NPA accounts to ‘top 50’ for all state‐owned lenders. 80. After launching accounts on Facebook and Youtube, SBI took one more step by launching a twitter account. 81. IDFC Ltd and Bandhan Financial Services Pvt Ltd won banking licences, with the Raghuram Rajan’s RBI approving permits for only two of the 25 applicants. 82. Reserve Bank asked banks not to levy penal charges on customers who don’t maintain a minimum balance in basic savings bank accounts. 83. A recent and most modern acquisition of the Indian Air Force from the United States, the C‐130J Super Hercules military transport aircraft, crashed near Gwalior. 84. Fiji’s military rulers set September 17 as the date for the South Pacific nation’s first democratic elections in nearly eight years following a military coup. 85. India’s total external debt stock stood at $426 billion as on December 31, 2013, or 5.2 per cent higher than that on March 31, 2013. The external debt to GDP ratio has marginally worsened to 23.3 per cent from 21.8 per cent. 86. Ajay S. Shriram has been elected President of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) for 2014‐15. He succeeds S. Gopalakrishnan. 87. President Pranab Mukherjee cleared the re-promulgation of the SEBI (Securities and Exchange Board of India) Ordinance. The move to arm the regulator with more stringent powers against the proliferation of chit fund and the Rs.2,000‐crore Sardhaa chit fund scam. 88. The UN’s International Court of Justice (ICJ) asked Japan to stop its whaling program in the Antarctic. Japan catches about 1,000 whales each year in the region for what it calls scientific research. 89. The Centre will provide an assistance of Rs. 352 crore to farmers for replanting horticulture crops that were hit by untimely rain and hailstorm earlier this month in parts of Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Rajasthan. 90. RBI Governor, Raghuram Rajan said that the centralbank had adopted the new Consumer Price Index as the key measure of inflation instead of Wholesale Price Index. 91. NATO decided to freeze bilateral cooperation, while the European Union promised to help Ukraine reduce its energy dependence on Russia. 92. The RBI‐appointed Urjit Patel panel, in its report, has set CPI target of 8 per cent by 2015 and 6 per cent by 2016. 93. The National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom) appointed Executive Vice‐Chairman of Cognizant India R. Chandrasekaran as its Chairman for 2014‐15. 94. Social media site Facebook has crossed 100million active users in India, its largest base outside the US. 93. Axis Bank, on the occasion of its 20th anniversary, announced the launch of ‘Asha Home Loan’, a 30‐year home loan product for first time home buyers in the lower income segment, seeking affordable EMIs. 94. India marched towards establishing its own navigation system when its Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV‐C24) put into precise orbit the country’s second navigation satellite, the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS‐1B). IRNSS‐1B will form part of a constellation of the seven navigation satellites. It was the 25th success in a row for the PSLV, after it majestically lifted off from the first launch pad at Sriharikota. 95. Doha Bank will be opening its first branch in Mumbai next month. 96. India was the third most affected country in 2013 by the notorious Zeus malware‐attack that is used to steal sensitive data from industries like finance. 97. Mukesh Ambani‐led Reliance Jio Infocomm has signed an agreement with younger brother Anil AmbaniControlled Reliance Communications (RCom) for sharing the latter’s extensive intra‐city optic fiber infrastructure. 98. Sabotage is one of the six possible reasons for the sinking of kilo‐class submarine INS Sindhurakshak in August 2013 according to the committee report chaired by Commodore Deepak Bisht. 99. India’s Mars Orbiter completed half the distance of its epic voyage to the red planet. On 10 April, the spacecraft sailed past 34 crore kilometres of its 68‐crore‐km curved path. On November 5, 2013, the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV‐C25) put the Mars Orbiter into its earth‐orbit. ISRO has been continuously monitoring the spacecraft using its deep space network station at Byalalu, near Bangalore. 100. State Bank of India has hit the overseas bond market with a dual tranche benchmark issue of 5‐ year and 10‐year maturity to raise up to $1 billion. 101. India has decided to send the naval stealth frigate INS Shivalik to participate in an international fleet review and maritime exercise hosted by the Chinese Navy on April 23. China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy is hosting the review and exercise in the northeastern port of Qingdao, the headquarters of its North Sea fleet, as it prepares to mark its 65th anniversary with great fanfare. 102. Gunmen attacked Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Saleh al‐Mutlak’s convoy in the Abu Ghraib area of Baghdad. 103. Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) imposed a fine of Rs.1.77 crore on Reliance Life Insurance for violation of various norms. 104. U.S. regulators have warned Facebook and WhatsApp to uphold the data privacy of their users, following the announcement of their $19 billion merger. 105. Libya’s interim Prime Minister Abdullah al‐Thani stepped down. 106. In a ground‐breaking trial, researchers in the UK will test artificial blood made from human stem cells in patients for the first time. 107. Supreme Court recognised the transgender community as a third gender along with male and female. 108. India‐born poet Vijay Seshadri has won 2014 Pulitzer Prize in the poetry category for his collection of poems “3 Sections.” 109. State Bank of India launched three digital banking facilities at the customer’s door step using TAB banking; one for customers opening Savings Bank accounts and another for Housing Loan applicants. The third is e‐KYC (Know your Customer). 110. The Mt Gox bitcoin exchange in Tokyo is headed for liquidation after a court rejected its bankruptcy protection application. 111. The Supreme Court made it clear that private companies that share revenue from natural resources such as spectrum with the government would be subjected to audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General. 112. Russia, the United States, the European Union and Ukraine have agreed on a plan to resolve the crisis in Ukraine through a constitutional reform that would grant more powers to Russian speaking regions. After talks in Geneva, the Foreign Ministers of the four nations signed a joint statement on de-escalation of the Ukraine crisis. 113. India’s foreign exchange reserves jumped to $309.444 billion in the week ended April 11 on the back of a healthy rise in currency assets. 114. China has for the first time released details of its recently announced “maritime Silk Road” plan, announcing that the Indian Ocean focused initiative will prioritise building ports and improving infrastructure in littoral countries like Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. 115. Syria will hold presidential elections on June 3, despite a civil war. 116. For the first time, senior Indian Army officers interacted with the Chinese General responsible for troop operations on implementing the Border Defense Cooperation Agreement (BDCA). 117. Pakistan conducted a successful training launch ofthe short range surface to surface ballistic missileHatf III (Ghaznavi), which can carry nuclear and conventional warheads to a range of 290 km. 118. Reserve Bank of India has suggested that banks introduce two stage authentications to ensure security of transactions. The banks have been mandated to issue EMV (card with chip and pin) to certain category of customers and for the others, banks have been given option to either issue EMV cards or adopt Aadhaar biometric authentication as additional factor of authentication. 119. Promoters of National Power Exchange have decided to wind up the company. National Power Exchange is jointly promoted by NTPC, PFC and NHPC and private sector Tata Consultancy Services. 120. India and Bhutan signed an agreement for the development of joint hydropower projects in a bid to further strengthen their bilateral strategic partnership. 121. Air passengers can now use portable electronic devices such as mobiles, laptops and tablets in all phases of flight, the Directorate General Civil Aviation (DGCA) said. 122. WhatsApp now has 500 million regular, active users around the world. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg announced in February that his social network was acquiring WhatsApp for $19 billion. 123. Siddharth, a Hindi film by Indian Canadian director Richie Mehta, was the winner at the Beijing film festival. 124. The small Pacific nation of the Marshall Islands is taking on the United States and the world’s eight other nuclear armed nations. The island group that was used for dozens of U.S. nuclear tests after World War II was filing a suit against each of the nine countries in the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands. 125. The much publicised Inflation Indexed Bonds (IIBs) failed to attract investor interest, either retail or institutional, in the last financial year. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is now planning to launch again this product in a restructured form. 126. Japan and the United States have announced joint support for the U.N. Women’s Safe City Programme in Delhi. The announcement was made during U.S. President Obama’s visit to Tokyo. 127. The Philippines and the United States announced they would sign an agreement to allow a greater U.S. military presence on Filipino soil for the next decade.
Posted on: Mon, 09 Jun 2014 09:43:06 +0000
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