Current Affairs Update – 24th May, 2015

Hello and welcome to ExamPundit. Here are the important current affairs of 24th May, 2015.

• The Reserve Bank has entered into an MoU with the Central Bank of Seychelles (CBS) on exchange of information and mutual assistance in the banking sector supervision.
• The MoU was inked by C Edmond, First Deputy Governor, CBS and SS Mundra, Deputy Governor of the RBI, the central bank said in a statement today.
• In March, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had visited the Indian Ocean island country.
• The Reserve Bank has been signing the Memorandum of Understanding or Exchange of Letters (EoL) with supervisors of other countries to promote greater co-operation and sharing of supervisory information among the authorities.
• With this, RBI has signed 25 such MoUs, one Letter for Supervisory Co-operation and one Statement of Co-operation, with overseas regulators.

• The UK-based payment processing giant Worldpay has partnered with IndusInd Bank to offer acquiring services in India.
• The association will assist both the companies in processing customers' payments and marks the first step for Worldpay in entering the Indian market-  a result of the growth in eCommerce across the country, IndusInd Bank said in a filing to the BSE.
• This partnership will allow each company to benefit from the other's respective expertise in domestic and international payments thereby helping in promoting online payment services in India, he added.

• The Cosmos Co-operative Bank- the oldest and tech-savvy multi-state scheduled bank has tied-up with New India Assurance for Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana and with Life Insurance Corporation of India for the Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Yojana informed Krishnakumar Goyal – Chairman Cosmos Bank.
• Goyal informed that Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana and Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Yojana will be available at all the branches of Cosmos Bank and customers should take advantage of these facilities.

• The Narendra Modi led government has begun the process of having 70 super computers in the country, which will enable high-level research in different fields for not only government agencies but also the private sector.
• The super computer will help India do research in different fields ranging from climate, defence and other areas, which a normal computer is ill-equipped for.
• The computer would have a capacity (speed) of half petaflop to 20 petaflop, but by the time the project reaches its full peak, the speed of the super computers can go up to 50 petaflop. A petaflop is a measure of a computer’s processing speed and can be expressed as a thousand trillion floating point operations per second.

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led selection committees on Saturday discussed the modalities for the appointment of the Chief Vigilance Commissioner (CVC) and the Chief Information Commissioner (CIC).
• Held at the Prime Minister’s residence, the meetings were attended by Leader of the Congress in Lok Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge, Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, and Minister of State for Personnel Jitendra Singh.
• Union Minister Jitendra Singh later told the media that more information on the applicants should be obtained to begin the process. Once the screening is over, the committees would take up names for consideration at another meeting next week.
• Sources said the selection committee deliberated upon the Supreme Court guidelines on appointment of the CVC and a Vigilance Commissioner. It also discussed the procedure to be adopted for the screening of candidates and for appointment. Over 130 candidates have applied for the key post.

• Although India is set to become water scarce country by 2025 due to demand-supply mis-match, the water sector is expected to see investment of $13 billion from overseas players in the next few years, a new study has said. "India's demand for water is expected to exceed all current sources of supply and the country is set to become water scarce country by 2025.
• However, overseas players from Canada, Israel, Germany, Italy, United States, China and Belgium sees big investment opportunity worth USD 13 billion in the domestic water sector. The industry is expected to receive Rs 18,000 crore in the next three years, the report said.
• The country provides huge opportunities across the spectrum in infrastructure development for water supply and wastewater management.
• The industrial market is going to be the big opportunity till 2020, with growth in wastewater recycling and industrial water treatment, the report said. Maharashtra is emerging as a hub for the water sector. Over 12 international companies have already set up design and engineering centers in Mumbai and Pune. At present, there are more than 1,200 companies dealing in water and wastewater treatment in the state, mainly cater to the small & medium sector.

• In a huge boost to Indian cinema, debutant director Neeraj Ghaywan’s Masaan won the prestigious critics prize in the Un Certain Regard category, which runs parallel to the competition for the main prize, Palme d’Or, at the 68th Cannes Film Festival, the International Federation of Film Critics (FIPRESCI) announced late on Saturday.
• Masaan, a joint production of Manish Mundra, Macassar Productions, Arte France Cinema, Sikhya Entertainment & Phantom Films, stars newcomers like Vicky Kaushal and Shweta Tripathi, along with Sanjay Mishra and Richa Chadda. It received a five-minute standing ovation at the festival where it premiered on May 20.
• Hungarian film Son of Saul by László Nemes won the critics prize in Official Competition, and Paulina Paulina won the prize in Parallel Sections, a FIPRESCI release said. Indian film critic Borborah Bitopan from The Assam Tribune was part of the FIPRESCI jury this year.
• Masaan’s narrative is set in Varanasi and its characters connected with the Ganga. Ghaywan worked as assistant director to Anurag Kashyap’s Gangs of Wasseypur, which received acclaim at Cannes in 2012, finding new markets for younger film-makers.
• Ritesh Batra’s The Lunchbox and Chaitanya Tamhane’s Court followed, winning critical acclaim and sewing up distribution deals in international markets.

• The NMDC (National Mineral Development Corporation) has bagged PLATTS Global Metals Award 2015. The corporation is the first Indian firm to receive the award for its leadership in the Raw Materials and Mining Sector.
• NMDC Chairman and Managing Director Narendra Kothari received the award at a function organised in London on May 21.
• PLATTS provides information on energy, petro chemicals and metals industries. It is a source of benchmark prices for these industries.
• The corporation produces over 30 million tonnes of iron ore annually.

• An Indian-origin cardiologist was today re-elected as president of the Singapore's Global Organisation of People of Indian Origin (GOPIO).
• The organisation is planning a wide range of activities for the coming two-years, including lectures on businesses, social life-style and health matters.
• GOPIO Singapore would also continue to host visiting Indian Ministers as well as business leaders at seminars and forums, he added.
• GOPIO was inaugurated in March 2002 as part of the Global GOPIO Grouping representing some 31 million Indians living abroad.

• A leading Indian-origin entrepreneur has been elected as the head of the Bureau of International Recycling, a global organisation that facilitates free and fair trade of recyclables in a sustainable and competitive world economy.
• Ranjit Singh Baxi, chairman of J & H Sales (International) ltd, will serve a two-year term as president of the Brussels-based recycling association.
• The election was held at the association's World Convention & Exhibition in Dubai last Tuesday.
• The Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) is a global recycling industry, headquartered in Brussels, association representing more than 700 companies from the private sector and 40 national trade federations from 70 different countries, including India.

• Afghanistan's National Directorate of Security (NDS) and Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) that will see both countries working closely together to fight terror, officials have confirmed.
• According to the MoU, ISI will train and equip the NDS in its functioning. In addition, Afghanistan and Pakistan will fight terrorism jointly and both institutions will investigate the accused behind any terror incident within their respective countries, reports TOLOnews.
• The agreement signed in Kabul last week was also officially announced by the Pakistani Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) via its social network late Monday night.
• The first-of-its-kind deal between the two intelligence agencies followed the May 12 visit to Kabul by Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif along with army chief Gen. Raheel Sharif and ISI chief Lt. Gen. Rizwan Akhtar. The signing of the ISI-NDS agreement was the latest in a series of steps that Pakistan and Afghanistan have taken since the installation of the National Unity government (NUG) in Kabul.

• A crucial meeting of trade ministers of key WTO member countries including India and the US will take place in Paris next month to discuss the pending issues of the Doha Round and finalise the agenda for the Nairobi ministerial meeting in December.
• It will be held on the sidelines of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development meeting in Paris on June 4 or 5, said a senior official at the Commerce Ministry.
• India has recently expressed concern over slow progress in finalising the agenda for the Nairobi ministerial meeting of WTO members to resolve the pending issues of the Doha Round.
• Trade ministers of about 15 countries including India, the US, EU, Australia, Brazil, South Africa and China are expected to attend this crucial meeting. WTO Director General Roberto Azevedo will also participate in the deliberations.
• India will present its views on bringing back issues related to the long—stalled Doha Round including agriculture (export subsidies, cotton and fishery subsidies), market access and services, the official said.

• Nash, 86, and his 82-year-old wife Alicia were killed when their taxi crashed in New Jersey, they said.
• The mathematician is renowned for his work in game theory, winning the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1994.
• His breakthroughs in maths - and his struggles with schizophrenia - were the focus of the 2001 film.
• The Princeton University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) mathematician is best known for his contribution to game theory — the study of decision-making — which won him the Nobel economics prize in 1994.
• His life story formed the basis of the Oscar-winning 2001 film "A Beautiful Mind" in which actor Russell Crowe played the genius, who struggled with mental illness.
• Earlier this month, Nash and mathematician Louis Nirenberg received Norway's prestigious Abel Prize for their contributions to the theory of nonlinear partial differential equations (PDEs) and its applications to geometric analysis.

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