Current Affairs Update - 28-29 Sept, 2014

• ·         The Finance Ministry hopes to bring a bill for merging Forward Market Commission (FMC) with the Securities & Exchange Board of India (SEBI) during the winter session of Parliament.
• ·         “There are two options. Either to give more power to FMC through enactment of long pending Forward Contract Regulation Act (FCRA) Amendment Bill or to scrap FCRA and merge FMC with SEBI,” a senior Finance Ministry official told Business Line.
• ·         The second option (scrap FCRA) has higher probability and a bill could be brought during winter session, the official said adding that this will require amendment in SEBI Act.
• ·         FMC regulates forward trading of commodities while SEBI is capital market regulator.
• ·         Forward trading in commodities market is facing tough time as volume has dipped to five year low. Imposition of Commodities Transaction Tax (CTT) besides factors such as NSEL incidence and shifting of investors from commodities to equity are key reasons for this fall.
• ·         According to FMC latest figure, trading volume during first fortnight of September stood at ₹ 2.49 lakh crore which is nearly 25 per cent less than corresponding period of the previous fiscal. Currently, there are 6 national and 16 regional exchanges.
• ·         The merger has some logic as forward trading in commodities is also one of the capital market activities and a kind of financial transactions, the official said. Besides, the Financial Sector Legislative Reforms Commission (FSLRC) has recommended bringing all the financial transactions under one regulator (barring banking which will continue to be regulated by RBI).

• ·         President’s rule was imposed on poll-bound Maharashtra on Sunday, a day after the Union Cabinet recommended its imposition.
• ·         Following the stepping down of Prithviraj Chavan as Chief Minister on Friday, the Union Cabinet chaired by Home Minister Rajnath Singh made the recommendation on Saturday.
• ·         Mr. Chavan quit his post, following the end of the 15-year-old Congress-NCP alliance in the State. His resignation was accepted by Governor C. Vidyasagar Rao on Saturday.
• ·         Assembly elections in Maharashtra are scheduled on October 15.

• ·         Prime Minister Narendra Modi has invited New Jersey Governor Chris Christie to visit India with a trade mission.
• ·         Mr. Modi extended the invitation to Mr. Christie when the latter called on him at the New York Palace hotel, where the Prime Minister is staying for attending the annual session of the U.N. General Assembly.
• ·         Mr. Christie, a popular Republican politician and a 2016 presidential election aspirant, has accepted the invitation to visit India with a trade delegation sometime next year, said Andy Shenoy, Director on the Board of United Nations Development Corporation who played a major role in coordinating this important meeting.
• ·         Mr. Modi and Mr. Christie held discussions on the hurricane Sandy’s effect on business and life of people in New Jersey.
• ·         The two leaders shared their thoughts on disaster management.

• ·         AIADMK Treasurer O Panneerselvam was sworn-in as Chief Minister (CM) of Tamil Nadu on 29 September 2014. He replaced the former AIADMK chief J Jayalalithaa.
• ·         He is the 28th Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu since 1920. Along with Panneerselvam, the State Cabinet was also sworn-in by the Tamil Nadu Governor K Rosaiah.

• ·         Justice Handyala Lakshminarayanaswamy Dattu was sworn-in as the 42nd Chief Justice of India on 28 September 2014. He was administered the oath of office by President Pranab Mukherjee at Rashtrapati Bhawan. He succeeded Chief Justice RM Lodha who demitted office on 27 September 2014.
• ·         Dattu will have tenure of 14 months as the Chief Justice of India as he will retire from his office on 2 December 2015.
• ·         His name for the appointment for the office of the Chief Justice of India was cleared by President on 3 September 2014. Dattu will be the CJI with longest tenure in recent years, as the previous two CJIs namely Justice S Sathasivam and Justice RM Lodha retired from their office with a tenure of nine and five months respectively.

• ·         Delhi Metro has been ranked second among 18 international Metro systems in terms of overall customer satisfaction in an online customer survey.
• ·         According to a DMRC official, in the survey conducted among the commuters of those Metro systems by Global Metro Benchmarking Groups 'NOVA' and 'CoMET', Delhi Metro along with London DLR and Bangkok were the best three performers in the 'Net Promoters Score' (NPS) category.
• ·         Under this category the survey analysed the likelihood of customers recommending the service to others on the basis of their satisfaction.
• ·         More than 41,000 respondents gave their feedback worldwide in this survey conducted online through the websites and social media links of 18 major Metros of the world from April 28th to May 25th earlier this year. The Metro systems that participated in this survey apart from Delhi Metro were Hong Kong MTR, London Underground, Metro De Madrid, Paris RATP, Metro De Sandiago, Singapore SMRT, Barcelona TMB, Brussels STIB, Bangkok BMCL, London DLR, Istanbul Ulasim, Kualalumpur Rapid PL, Metropolitano De Lisboa, Montreal STM, Newcastle Nexus, Metro Rio and Toronto TTC.

• ·         A hotel management professional has found a dire need for an online source for medical and healthcare information in India. He spent all his savings, hired three techies and keyed in scientific data himself to build, what he claims, the first dedicated medical search engine.
• ·         Titled Braham (or the universe), the search engine can also be used as a general search engine. “But I would like it to emerge as a one-stop-shop information source for all medical and healthcare related information,” Rajeev Shandilya told Business Line over phone.
• ·         To beat high costs in acquiring the servers, Rajeev chose to take virtual servers on pay-per-use mode. “At present, I am getting about 10,000 hits a day,” he said.
• ·         Apart from providing answers to medical queries, the search engine gives city-based information on the availability of hospitals and doctors.

• ·         World Heart Day was observed across the world on 29 September 2014. The objective of the day is to inform people around the world of the danger of heart disease and stroke.
• ·         2014 theme for World Heart Day’s is Heart Choices NOT Hard Choices. The World Health Organization on the occasion said that there is a need to reduce the consumption of salt that is linked to death of people from cardiovascular diseases.
• ·         On the other hand, the World Heart Federation members spread the news that at least 80 percent of premature deaths from cardiovascular disease could be avoided of major four risk factors is controlled. The four major risk factors are
• •       Tobacco use
• •       Unhealthy diet
• •       Physical inactivity
• •       Harmful use of alcohol

• ·         Libya’s new parliament on Sunday swore in Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni and his cabinet during a meeting in the eastern port town of Tobruk.
• ·         The ceremony followed weeks of political manoeuvring in the fractious assembly, as clashes continued between rival militias near the capital Tripoli and in the eastern city of Benghazi.
• ·         In Tripoli, a rival government under Omar al-Hassi claims power with the support of Islamist militias and the reconvened former interim parliament, the General National Congress.
• ·         In Benghazi, the largest city in eastern Libya, radical Islamist militias have succeeded in pushing rival forces loyal to retired general Khalifa Haftar out of most areas.
• ·         The Tobruk-based parliament, the House of Representatives, has swung behind the anti-Islamist forces, declaring the main Islamist militias to be terrorist organizations.

• ·         In the first meeting between Indian and Israeli Prime Ministers in more than a decade, Prime Minister Modi asked Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to explain Israel’s perspective on the Islamic State (ISIS). According to Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin, the two leaders discussed the situation in West Asia. “Given that Israel is well placed in that region, the Prime Minister requested and was given a briefing of their understanding of the situation.”
• ·         The conversation takes significance given it came before Mr. Modi’s dinner meeting with US President Barack Obama in Washington, as well as Mr. Modi’s address to the council for foreign relations to outline his government’s foreign policy objectives.
• ·         Mr. Modi and Mr. Netanyahu also discussed ways of increasing bilateral ties in the areas of agriculture, water management and urban development. Israel is one of India’s largest defence suppliers, and Mr. Modi discussed his government’s decision to open up Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in the field to 49 per cent. He also told Mr. Netanyahu that Israel should consider defence partnerships based in India, in line with his “Make in India” initiative. According to The Jerusalem Post, Mr. Netanyahu said “the sky is the limit” for relations between both countries.

• ·         The Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi on 27 September 2014 addressed the 69th session of United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York. He addressed the 193-member UN General Assembly in Hindi becoming the second Prime Minister after Atal Behari Vajpayee who was a Prime Minister from 1998 to 2004.
• ·         Apart from this, Modi is the third person to address the UNGA session in Hindi aafter Vajpayee and PV Narasimha Rao. Rao addressed the session in Hindi as foreign minister in 1988 and Vajpayee also addressed the UN General Assembly's Millennium Summit session in Hindi in 1977.
• ·         The theme of the UNGA was delivering and implementing a transformative Post-2015 development Agenda.

• •       He termed the 69 UN peacekeeping missions since 1948 as the blue helmet, the colour of peace.
• •       India is ready to engage in a serious bilateral dialogue with Pakistan but in a peaceful atmosphere, without the shadow of terrorism, to promote our friendship and cooperation. For this purpose, Pakistan should take its responsibility seriously to create such an environment.
• •       He also called for concerted multilateral action to meet the challenges like fragile global economy, terrorism, Ebola health crisis, climate change and poverty.
• •       While calling for concerted international efforts to fight with terrorism, he termed that it takes new shape and new name and there is no country either big or small across the world is free from its threat. So efforts should be made to combat terrorism and extremism by keeping aside the difference by adopting Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism
• •       All G-groups should be converted into G1 or G-All
• •       The United Nations including the Security Council should be made more democratic and participative
• •       Development and empowerment should be spread at the speed of Facebook or Twitter
• •       The eradication of poverty must remain at the core of the Post-2015 Development Agenda
• •       Technology and capabilities of the countries should be shared with each other
• •       International Yoga Day should be adopted

• ·         China’s e-commerce giant Alibaba, which completed the world’s largest initial public offering ever this month, has won approval from authorities here to establish a private bank as it diversifies into financial services.
• ·         Alibaba, through its subsidiary Zhejiang Ant Small and Micro Financial Services Group Co, will hold 30 per cent of share capital of the new bank, the China Banking Regulatory Commission said.
• ·         Having its own commercial bank will afford Alibaba greater control over many of its key services, including online payment and wealth management products.
• ·         Alibaba is the latest company outside the financial sphere to win approval to start a bank in China. Beijing hopes private banks will help in its drive to open up the economy to more competition and get private capital to more parts of the economy.
• ·         Alibaba completed the biggest initial public offering ever this month by selling $25 billion of stock to investors keen to tap into the world’s biggest pool of Internet users.
• ·         Shanghai JuneYao Group, the parent of Juneyao Airlines, also received regulatory approval to set up its own bank and will own a 30 per cent stake, according to the regulator.

• ·         Yogeshwar Dutt ended India’s 28-year-old wait for a wrestling gold medal in the Asian Games by emerging champion in the men’s freestyle 65kg category at the Dowon Gymnasium in Incheon Sunday.
• ·         The Indian, an Olympic bronze medallist, put on a stupendous show in winning 3-0 against Zalimkhan Yusupov of Tajikistan in the title clash.

• ·         On Sunday, Indian race walking’s wonder girl Khushbir Kaur won a sensational silver in the 20km at the 17th Asian Games here. It was the country’s first-ever women’s silver in the event at the Asiad.
• ·         “I’ve been to the World Cup and Asian Championships, yes, I was expecting this medal,” said the 21-year-old. “This is not my personal best, I’ve run faster but I got two cautions today, the first at the 10km and the second between the 16 to 18km and this slowed me down. I was worried after that, I did not want to lose a medal chance. I was in the first group of four girls early.” A few hours later, quartermilers M.R. Poovamma and Arokia Rajiv picked up bronze medals while Manju Bala brought another in the women’s hammer throw.

• ·         Sanam Singh could not add a second consecutive Asian Games gold medal to his kitty as he and Saketh Myneni settled for a silver after losing the hard-fought final in straight sets to Korea’s Yongkyu Lim and Hyeon Chung, in Incheon on Monday.
• ·         The fifth seeded Indians lost the summit clash 5-7, 6-7(2) in an hour and 29 minutes to the eighth seeded local favourites.
• ·         The Koreans, cheered by the home fans, were precise in shot-making and won points with some intelligent tennis against the fighting Indians.
• ·         The Koreans stood out with their shot selection as some of the drop volleys won them crucial points.
• ·         Sanam had won men’s doubles gold with Somdev Devvarman at the Guangzhou edition in 2010.

• ·         Sania Mirza and Saketh Myneni's successful run at the Asian Games 2014 continued as the pair beat Chinese Taipei's Hsien Yin Peng and Hao Ching Chan 6-4, 6-3 to win India's sixth gold medal at Incheon. 
• ·         This is Sania's third consecutive Asian Games mixed doubles final appearance. In 2006, she won a gold with Leander Paes. She followed that up with a silver medal in 2010 with Vishnu Vardhan and has now won a gold with Saketh Myneni at Incheon.

• ·         Discus thrower Seema Punia Antil ended India's gold-less streak in track and field events on the third day of athletics competitions as she beat back a strong challenge from two Chinese rivals to bag the coveted yellow metal at the Asian Games on Monday.
• ·         Seema ran away with the gold with a best throw of 61.03m in the women's discus throw final while team-mate Krishna Poonia finished fourth with a below par 55.57m at the Incheon Asiad Main Stadium here.
• ·         Prior to Sema's golden throw, women's metric miler O P Jaisha and men's 3000m steeplechaser Naveen Kumar picked up a bronze each to boost the country's medal tally from athletics to eight from three days.

• ·         Europe on 28 September 2014 won the 40th Ryder Cup in Gleneagles, Scotland. Europe defeated United States by 16½ points to 11½. The team captains were Paul McGinley for Europe and Tom Watson for the USA.
• ·         Europe took 10-6 lead over the United States into final day of Ryder Cup. 
• ·         Europe has now won eight of the last 10 Ryder Cups. Europe was the defending cup holders, having defeated the USA in 2012 at Medinah.
• ·         The 40th Ryder Cup Matches were held from 26–28 September 2014 on the PGA Centenary Course at the Gleneagles Scotland.
• ·         This was the second time that Scotland hosted the Ryder Cup. First time, the competition was held at Muirfield in 1973.