Current Affairs Update - 17 Oct, 2014

• ·         The Reserve Bank has signed a pact with Central Bank of Kenya for exchange of information and supervisory cooperation.
• ·         With this, RBI has signed 22 such MoUs and one Letter for Supervisory Co-operation, it added.
• ·         The MoU was signed by RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan and Central Bank of Kenya Governor Njuguna Ndung'u.
• ·         The RBI has been signing the MoUs and Letter for Supervisory Co-operation with supervisors of other countries to promote greater co-operation and share supervisory information among the authorities.

• ·         The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) will commence direct lending to food processing industries in mega food parks and designated food parks by end of October. The Bank has set up a fund with a corpus of Rs 2,000 crore for this purpose, a top bank official said.
• ·         He said the guidelines have been approved and will be released at the stakeholders? meeting in Mumbai on October 29, 2014. "Once guidelines are released, we will start accepting proposals from the state governments and the private companies and issue sanctions thereafter," he said.
• ·         Under the new Fund, Nabard would provide loans for a period of seven years at an attractive interest rate of 7.8 per cent to 8 per cent. Nabard would provide loans for large food chains and food processing units in a food park and also for creation of infrastructure at food parks, he said.
• ·         However, he said, considering short period available in the current fiscal, disbursals might spill over to the next financial year. The government would provide funds every year for this purpose, which will be announced during the next budget, Bhanwala said.

• ·         Kerala-based Federal Bank has won the IDRBT Banking Technology Excellence award for 2013-14 in four out of total five categories in the mid-sized lenders segment.
• ·         Federal Bank was adjudged as the 'best bank' for use of Technology for Financial Inclusion, Social Media and Mobile Banking, Business Intelligence Initiatives and for Best IT Team, becoming the bank to have won the maximum number of awards this year, is said in a statement.
• ·         The awards were presented to the winners at a function held in Hyderabad on October 1. Shyam Srinivasan, the bank's Managing Director and CEO, received the awards from RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan.
• ·         Instituted in 2001, the IDRBT Banking Technology Excellence Awards recognise and honour the best innovative use of information technology to enhance levels of customer service.

• ·         Indian-origin Singaporean poet and writer KTM Iqbal on 15 October 2014 was named for the 2014 Cultural Medallion, the highest cultural award of Singapore. He will be awarded by the Tony Tan, the President of Singapore.
• ·         Along with the award, Iqbal will get 80000 Singapore dollar grants, which can be used to fund artistic endeavours over their lifetime.
• ·         This award will be the highest recognition for the 74-year-old Tamil poet. His achievements include more than 200 children's songs written for Radio Singapore in the 1970s and 1980s, as well as seven collections of poetry.
• ·         Iqbal is a poet, whose compositions are studied in schools and some of them have appeared in the subway stations as part of efforts to bring the arts close to the community.

• ·         The Union Government on 16 October 2014 decided to import potatoes to check rising prices. This is the first time that the potatoes will be imported.
• ·         As per the decision, potato will be imported from Pakistan and European countries. Imports will be done to ensure sufficient supply till January 2015.
• ·         Also, National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation will float tender in this regard and the tenders will be invited by end of October 2014 so that shipments reach India by the end of November 2014.
• ·         Apart from this, the government also asked Small Farmers' Agri-Business Consortium to explore possibilities of imports.
• ·         India in crop-year 2013-14 produced more than 44 million tonnes of potatoes which is 2.3 per cent less than crop-year of 2012-13. As a result, potatoes prices in last few weeks have shown a rising trend and in the National Capital Delhi, it is being retailed at 35 to 40 rupees per kilogram.

• ·         Proving a host of technologies and bridging the critical gap in the country's arsenal, India's first long range subsonic cruise missile, Nirbhay, was successfully test fired from the Integrated Test Range at Chandipur, in Orissa, for a distance of about 1,000 km on Friday.
• ·         This was the second flight trial of the missile as the maiden test had to be aborted mid way in March last year when the missile deviated from its path. The 6m tall, low altitude flying missile which can evade detection by radars was fired from a mobile launcher at 10.05 am.
• ·         After blasting off like a rocket to a height of 100m, the booster got separated as the missile turned horizontal and the wings got deployed making it fly like an aircraft. At the same time, the Turbo Prop engine kicked off and provided thrust to the missile which began cruising at 0.7 Mach at an altitude of 4.8 km.
• ·         The tree-top flying missile, which can carry conventional and nuclear war heads then made a series of manoeuvres and navigated `5 way points during a flight lasting one hour and 10 minutes. Carrying a dummy payload of n350 kg, the4 missile also demonstrated the critical ability to zero in on its target by diving towards a pre-designated impact point in the Bay of Bengal.

• ·         An eminent Indian scientist Dr Sanjaya Rajaram on 16 October 2014 received the World Food Prize 2014 for his scientific research that led to a prodigious increase in world wheat production by more than 200 million tons building upon the successes of the Green Revolution.
• ·         Rajaram is credited with developing the Veery lines of wheat in the 1980s which were used to breed locally adapted high-yielding varieties in various wheat-growing countries.
• ·         PBW-343, a workhorse wheat variety grown in about 10 million hectares of India was based on the Veery material that was bred at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT) under Rajaram.
• ·         The Veery lines resulted from a cross between a Russian winter wheat Kavkaz and a Mexican spring wheat Buho. These new lines showed improved resistance to stripe and leaf rust pathogens which helped create a second generation of high-yielding wheat.

• ·         Venezuela, Angola, Malaysia, New Zealand and Spain on 16 October 2014 were elected as non-permanent members of United Nations Security Council (UNSC).
• ·         They were elected after member states voted in support of these five nations after three rounds of voting. All these five new members received over two-thirds of the votes cast in a secret ballot.
• ·         The new members of the Security Council will begin their two-year appointment on 1 January 2015 and will serve on the Council until 31 December 2016.
• ·         These nations will join five other non-permanent members, namely Chad, Chile, Jordan, Lithuania and Nigeria.
• ·         On the other hand, Argentina, Luxembourg, South Korea, Australia and Rwanda will step down from their seats on 31 December 2014 to make way for the newly-elected members.

• ·         India’s efforts to encourage greater investment from its diaspora in the UK kicked off on Thursday, as Ministry officials pitched the “Make in India” programme in London ahead of Britain’s first regional Pravasi Bharatiya Divas.
• ·         The Pravasi Bharatiya Divas, which is set to kick off on Friday, is the first regional one to be held in the UK. Last year a regional Diaspora day was held in Sydney.
• ·         The meet aims to identify more specific opportunities for Britain’s 1.5 million-strong Indian community (with its not insignificant share of high net worth individuals, as well as NRIs and Persons of Indian origin) to better engage with India. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj is set to inaugurate the event. “The Overseas Indians must become a part of India’s new development agenda.” said Prem Narain, secretary at the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs, and Chair of the Overseas Indian Facilitation Centre, at an event organised by the OIFC and the CII. “We have a huge Diaspora from this country who had somehow been left out.”
• ·         Amitabh Kant, Secretary of the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, and secretaries of other departments, including Upendra Tripathy, Secretary in the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy outlined the opportunities for greater engagement through the drive.