Current Affairs Update - 26 Sept, 2014

• ·         Country's largest lender State Bank of India(SBI) today said it has launched the Hindi version of its corporate website in a bid to widen and strengthen relationship with their customers.
• ·         "After launching the redesigned corporate website on June 28, SBI launched the Hindi version of the website, making it easier to connect with the customers, who would like to follow the contents in that language," a bank release said.

• ·         Country's largest lender State Bank of India(SBI) today said it has signed a line of credit (LoC) of $500 million with Export-Import Bank of Korea ( Korea Eximbank).
• ·         This line will be in addition to (LoC) of $200 million signed between the two institutions on January 16, 2014 to support Indian companies importing goods and services from Korea, SBI said in a release.
• ·         The agreement was signed between SBI's regional head (East Asia), C Venkat Nageswar and Korea Eximbank's member of Board of Directors, Young Whan Sul, at Seoul.

• ·         Union Government on 25 September 2014 launched Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Antyodaya Yojana for urban and rural poor. The Yojana aims at alleviating urban and rural poverty through enhancement of livelihood opportunities through skill development and other means.
• ·         Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Antyodaya Yojana has two components one for urban India and other for rural India. The Urban component will be implemented by the Union Ministry of Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation while rural component named as Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana.

• ·         The Yojana aims at training 10 lakh (1 million) rural youths for jobs in three years, that is, by 2017.
• ·         The minimum age for entry under the Yojana is 15 years compared to 18 years under the Aajeevika Skills Programme.
• ·         The Kaushalya Yojana will also the address the need for imparting training to the differently-able persons and chip in private players including international players to impart the skills to the rural youths.

• ·         Imparting skills with an expenditure of 15000 rupees to 18000 rupees on each urban poor.
• ·         Promotion of self-employment through setting up individual micro-enterprises and group enterprises with interest subsidy for individual projects costing 2lakhs rupees and 10 lakhs rupees for group enterprises. Subsidized interest rate will be 7 percent.
• ·         Training urban poor to meet the huge demand from urban citizens by imparting market oriented skills through City Livelihood Centres. Each Centre would be given a capital grant of 10 lakhs rupees.
• ·         Enabling urban poor form Self-Help Groups for meeting financial and social needs with a support of 10000 rupees per each group who would in turn would be helped with bank linkages.

• ·         India announced to contribute 12 million US dollars to the United Nations to fight the deadly Ebola virus in Africa. The contribution was approved by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 25 September 2014.
• ·         India will contribute 10 million US dollar to Fund of United Nations Secretary General for Ebola and 2 million US dollar for purchase of protective gear to tackle Ebola.
• ·         Recently, UN General Secretary Ban Ki-moon announced setting up of the UN Mission for Ebola Emergency Response (UNMEER) to put in place an effective response mechanism due to the wide spread of Ebola Virus in Africa.
• ·         The Ebola Emergency Response project will mobilize 52 million US dollars for Liberia, 28 million US dollars for Sierra Leone and 25 million US dollars for Guinea.
• ·         The World Bank Group also approved 105 million US dollars grant for Ebola Emergency Response to fight Ebola in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone in September 2014.

• ·         Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan resigned from his post on Friday, a day after the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) withdrew support to his government and reduced it to a minority.
• ·         Mr. Chavan submitted his resignation to Governor C. Vidyasagar Rao. “I offered to resign since that is the propriety under such circumstances,” Mr. Chavan told The Hindu. The resignation comes less than three weeks before the State faces Assembly polls.
• ·         There is no clarity yet on whether Mr. Chavan has been asked to continue as a caretaker till other arrangements are made.
• ·         Sources say Mr. Chavan had sought an appointment with the Governor in the morning and offered to resign. The Governor reportedly forwarded the NCP’s letter withdrawing support to the Congress-NCP government to Mr. Chavan’s office. Mr. Chavan sent in his resignation in the afternoon.

• ·         The board of Tata International, the global trading and distribution company, has announced the appointment of GK Pillai as Chairman of the company with effect from September 26.
• ·         He succeeds B Muthuraman, who retires from the Tata group.
• ·         GK Pillai is a distinguished alumnus of IIT Madras.
• ·         He belongs to the Kerala cadre of the Indian Administrative Service (1972 batch) and has held various positions in his cadre and at the centre.
• ·         Pillai is the former Union Home Secretary, Union Commerce Secretary and Secretary of the Department of Justice in the Ministry of Law and Justice.
• ·         As Special Secretary in the Commerce Ministry, he was India's Chief negotiator at the WTO.

• ·         International buyers from the SAARC, ASEAN, African, European and American countries are expected to visit the three-day Indian International Fabric Expo (IIFE) 2014 scheduled to open in Ahmedabad on October 14.
• ·         More than 150 Indian exhibitors would showcase their products including textile fabrics, denim, technical textiles, industrial fabrics, specialty fabrics, made-ups and home textiles. For powerloom entrepreneurs and exporters scouting for overseas buyers, this could be a golden opportunity, the organisers said.
• ·         The exhibition is being organised by the Powerloom Development and Export Promotion Council (PDEXCIL) with support from the Union Ministry of Textile and under the Market Assistant Initiative Scheme of the Union Ministry of Commerce & Industry, said Vishwanath Agrawal, Chairman, PDEXCIL.

• ·         Sukinda Chromite Mine of the Tata Steel in Odisha on 24 September 2014 won the Asian Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Leadership Award. The Sukinda mine of Tata Steels won the award for Community Development. The award was presented by World CSR Congress at Dubai, UAE.
• ·         Sumit Ghoshal, Regional Commercial Manager of Tata Steel in Middle East received the award on behalf of the company.
• ·         The award recognised the voluntary action of several officers of Sukinda Chromite Mine who have been sponsoring orphan tribal girls of nearby schools of Sukinda.

• ·         The Government on Friday announced the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Awards-2014 for 10 scientists in recognition of their work.
• ·         The scientists who will get a cash prize of ₹ 5 lakh, a citation and a plaque are Roop Malik (biological sciences) of Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai, Kavirayani Ramakrishna Prasad (chemical sciences), Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, Souvik Maiti of Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, New Delhi, Sachchida Nand Tripathi, (earth, atmosphere, ocean and planetary sciences) IIT-Kanpur, S Venkata Mohan (engineering sciences), Indian Institute of Chemical Technology, Hyderabad, Soumen Chakrabarti, IIT-Mumbai, Kaushal Kumar Verma (mathematical sciences), IISc, Bangalore, Anurag Agrawal (medical sciences), Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, Delhi, Pratap Raychaudhuri (physical sciences) TIFR, Mumbai, and Sadiqali Abbas Rangwala of Raman Research Institute, Bangalore.
• ·         The annual awards, named after the founder of Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), were announced on the occasion of the foundation day ceremony of the council.

• ·         Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair was named one of the top "gay icons" of the last thirty years on Friday in recognition of his work for gay rights.
• ·         Gay Times magazine awarded the politician the accolade in an edition marking the newspaper's 30th anniversary.
• ·         Blair, 61, won a landslide victory in a 1997 general election, and was the head of a left-leaning Labour Party government for the next decade.
• ·         His time in office saw the introduction of civil partnerships, the lowering of the homosexual age of consent to match that of straight couples, and the abolition of the "Section 28" law that banned authorities from "promoting homosexuality".

• ·         The men’s pistol team clinched a silver medal, while Sandeep Sejwal scooped a rare bronze in swimming but India slipped to the 16th position in the overall standings with a tally of 17 medals on the seventh day of competitions in the 17th Asian Games in Incheon on Friday.
• ·         The pistol team, spearheaded by London Olympic Games silver medallist Vijay Kumar and including Pemba Tamang and Gurpreet Singh, clinched the second place with a total score of 1740, two behind gold medallists China, in the 25m centre fire pistol competition.
• ·         The 25-year-old Sejwal provided some much-needed boost to the Indian swimming contingent by grabbing a bronze in the 50m breaststroke event after topping his heats.
• ·         There was some more good news from the squash arena after both the men’s and women’s teams were assured of at least silver medals after making the finals of their respective competitions.

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