Current Affairs Update – 14-16th May, 2016

Hello and welcome to exampundit. Here are the Important Current Affairs of 14, 15 and 16 May, 2016. These are important for the upcoming SBI PO 2016, SBI Clerk 2016 and UIIC AO 2016.

• PayU India and Paytm have got
  amongst the first in-principle approvals for operating as a Bharat Bill
  Payments Operating Unit (BBPOU), allowing them to offer interoperable bill
  payment service to consumers.
• Consumers will be able to pay all
  their bills anytime and anywhere under the Bharat Bill Payment System (BBPS),
  and the companies will provide platforms to offer these services.
• Companies with in-principle
  approvals would have to meet two conditions, including a certification from
  National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI) for adherence to BBPS standards
  and system readiness. A system audit would also have to be conducted to
  evaluate the hardware, software, critical applications and security.
• In November 2015, RBI had granted
  in-principal approval to NPCI to function as Bharat Bill Payment Central Unit.
• RBI had received 62 applications
  for authorisation from non-bank entities and 80 requests in all for approvals
  from banks for operating as a payment operating unit under BBPS. Till now, it
  has given approvals to 33 applicants including Oxigen , aggregators like
  BillDesk and banks including SBI , ICICI, HDFC and others.

• Singaporean lender DBS Bank is
  creating its biggest technology hub outside of headquarters, in Hyderabad where
  the company plans to have over 1,500 headcount.
• The foreign bank, which was among
  the first ones to apply to operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary in the country
  after drawing expansion plans, will steadily take the total number of those
  employed at the Hyderabad facility to over 1,500 in two years.
• The hub will help in
  strengthening the lender’s technological capabilities across Asia as well as
  its digital banking strategy, it said in a statement.
• It has created a wholly-owned
  subsidiary — DBS Asia Hub 2 — for this purpose and according to a filing with
  the exchanges, the initial and paid-up capital for the same stands at Rs 70.5
  crore.

• The board of World Bank has
  approved a $625 million loan to support the central government’s programme to
  generate electricity from rooftop solar power plants.
• The board also approved a
  co-financing loan of $120 million on concessional terms and a $5 million grant
  from the Climate Investment Fund’s Clean Technology Fund, the global
  development bank said in a statement on Monday.
• The statement added that the sanctions
  will help finance installation of at least 400 MW of grid connected rooftop
  solar photovoltaic projects across India.
• State Bank of India will on-lend
  funds to solar photovoltaic developers and end-users who wish to invest in
  mainly commercial and industrial rooftop solar power systems. The financing
  will be provided to those with sound technical capacity, relevant experience
  and creditworthiness as per State Bank of India’s standards.

• AirAsia India has flown 2.5
  million passengers as of today, the airline said.
• AirAsia India reached its 1
  million passengers milestone in August 2015 and in a little more than six
  months, the number of passengers flown by it has grown to 2.5 million, it said.
• To celebrate this occasion,
  AirAsia India is offering 50 per cent off on return fares for 50 hours across
  the AirAsia Group network.
• The 50 per cent off is also valid
  on international destinations such as Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Bali, Phuket,
  Singapore, Melbourne, Auckland and many more connected by the Group airlines,
  AirAsia Berhad (Flight code AK), AirAsia X (Flight code D7) and Thai AirAsia
  (Flight code FD).

• The Union Government in the
  second week of May 2016 decided to replace 5-year plans with 15-year vision
  documents.
• The long-term perspective plans
  will be prepared by the National Institution for Transforming India (NITI)
  Aayog beginning from 2017-18 financial year.

• Unlike the earlier 5-year plans,
  the new document will also cover subjects like internal security and defence.
• The previous twelve 5-year plan
  documents, for the period between 1951 and 2017, focused on social and economic
  infrastructure like health, connectivity and education.
• The decision to bring internal
  security and defence in the ambit of the vision document is in tune with the
  government’s announcement to done away with plan and non-plan expenditure from
  2017-18.
• The initial vision document will
  be co-terminus with the United Nations Sustainable Development Agenda
  (2016-2030) to which India is a signatory.

• Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited
  (BHEL) on May 14, 2016 commissioned a 660 MW supercritical thermal unit at
  Mouda Super Thermal Power Station (STPS) at Mouda in Nagpur district of
  Maharashtra. The order for setting up two coal-based thermal units of 660 MW was
  placed with BHEL by NTPC Ltd.
• While the first unit has been
  commissioned, work on the other 660 MW unit is also in an advanced stage.
  Notably, BHEL has earlier set up two units of 500 MW each at Mouda STPS, which
  are in operation.
• In the supercritical segment,
  BHEL has successfully demonstrated its leadership status and technological
  capability in the manufacture and execution of 660 MW, 700 MW and 800 MW sets.
  Notably, the unit, commissioned by BHEL at Mouda, is the first to be
  commissioned out of the 11 units ordered under bulk tendering to different
  manufacturers.

• The Prime Minister along with Sri
  Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena on 14 May 2016 released ‘Simhastha
  Declaration’ at Ninora village in Ujjain.
• Both leaders addressed the
  concluding session of the 3 day International Vichar Mahakumbh for the
  month-long Simhastha Mela. Sri Lankan President Sirisena was on a two day visit
  to India from 13 May to 15 May 2016.
• 51 sacred points have been
  included in this declaration for betterment of mankind and these elixir points
  will start new discourse for India and the world.

• The declaration is a prescription
  on how a duty-centered system that had been the origin of Indian philosophy of
  life is relevant in today’s India.
• Saints and seers, scholars and
  subject experts from the country and abroad discussed on various issues in the sessions
  of ‘Vichar Mahakumbh’.

• India on 15 May 2016 successfully
  test fired an indigenously developed Advanced Air Defence interceptor missile,
  Ashwin. It was launched from the complex of Abdul Kalam Island (formerly known
  as Wheeler Island) off Odisha coast.
• The advanced version of low
  altitude supersonic ballistic interceptor missile was fired at a ballistic
  missile, a modified version of Prithvi weapon system. It was test fired to
  validate various parameters of the interceptor in flight mode.

• The Union Ministry of AYUSH and
  the World Health Organization (WHO) on 13 May 2016 signed the Project
  Collaboration Agreement (PCA) for cooperation on Global promotion of
  Traditional Systems of Medicine.
• The agreement was signed by Ajit
  M Sharan, Secretary of Union Ministry of AYUSH and, Dr Marie Kieny, Assistant
  Director General of Health Systems and Innovations at WHO in Geneva.

• The PCA is titled as Co-operation
  on promoting the quality, safety and effectiveness of service provision in
  traditional and complementary medicine between WHO and AYUSH, India, 2016-2020.
• It aims at promoting the quality,
  safety and effectiveness of service provision in traditional and complementary
  medicine.

• Parkash Singh committee
  constituted to inquire into the omission and commission on part of all officers
  and officials of police and civil administration during Jat Quota agitation
  submitted its report to Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar. The report
  was submitted on 13 May 2016.
• The panel submitted its report in
  two volumes which run into about 450 pages, of which the Main Report is in
  about 200 pages and another 200 pages is of Annexures. While the, second volume
  of only about 40 pages, deals with the role of Intelligence in the context of
  the riots.
• After receiving the report, Chief
  Minister said that government would examine the report and would take
  appropriate action accordingly.

• Yasmine Hilton , currently
  chairman of Shell Companies in India, will end her assignment on 30 September
  2016, after 37 years with Shell.
• Nitin Prasad , country head of
  Shell Lubricants , will succeed Hilton effective 1 October 2016.
• Prasad is an electrical engineer
  from Georgia Institute of Technology, USA and a management graduate from
  INSEAD. He took up his current appointment in 2011 as general manager, Shell
  Lubricants, in the third largest lubricants market in the world.
• His previous roles in Shell
  include chemicals where he was general manager APME supply chain, and senior advisor
  on downstream strategy.

• World governing body for
  football, FIFA (International Federation of Association Football) on 14 May
  2016 appointed Justice (retd) Mukul Mudgal as deputy chairman of its Governance
  Committee.
• Portuguese Luis Miguel Maduro,
  Advocate General of European Court of Justice (ECJ), was appointed as the
  Chairman of the Governance Committee.
• Justice Mudgal was also appointed
  as the head of the FIFA’s first Independent Review Committee along with Luis
  Miguel Maduro.

• Justice Navin Sinha on 14 May
  2016 was sworn-in as the new Chief Justice of the Rajasthan High Court.
• Governor Kalyan Singh
  administered the oath to the new Chief Justice of the state High Court.
• Sinha was appointed by President
  Pranab Mukherjee as per provisions Article 222 of Constitution after following
  recommendation of the Supreme Court collegium headed by Chief Justice of India
  (CJI) T.S. Thakur.

• Indian women’s squash team on 15
  May 2016 won the silver medal at the 18th Asian Team squash championships. In
  the final played at Taipei in Chinese Taipei, Indian team lost to the Malaysian
  team by 0-2 margin.
• This was the ninth women’s Asian
  Team Squash Championships title for the Malaysian team.
• In the first match, India’s
  Sachika Ingale lost in straight games 7-11, 6-11, 10-12 to Malaysian
  Sivasangari Subramaniam. Later, Delia Arnold of Malaysia defeated India’s top
  player Joshna Chinappa 9-11, 13-11, 11-8, 11-9.

• World No. 1 women’s doubles team
  of Sania Mirza and Martina Hingis on 15 May 2016 captured the Italian Open
  title. The pair defeated Elena Vesnina and Ekaterina Makarova 6-1, 6(5)-7, 10-3
  in the final to clinch the title.
• The Italian Open women’s doubles
  title was the fifth title for the Indo-Swiss pair after Sydney, Brisbane,
  Australian Open and St Petersburg.
• With the win, Mirza and Hingis
  also captured their 14th women’s doubles title together.

• Andy Murray on 15 May 2016 won
  his first Italian Open Men’s Singles Tennis title. In the final played in Rome,
  third-ranked Murray defeated the top-ranked Djokovic 6-3, 6-3.
• It is Murray’s first title in
  Rome and it comes exactly a week before the French Open begins on 22 May 2016.
• The only other British man to win
  the tournament was George Patrick Hughes in 1931. He is also the first British
  singles champion in Italy since Virginia Wade won the title in 1971.
• On the other hand, Serena
  Williams ended a nine-month title drought with a 7-6, 6-3 win over Madison Keys
  in an all American women’s Singles final.

• Dutch teenager, Max Verstappen,
  on 15 May 2016 became Formula One’s youngest race winner after winning the
  Spanish Grand Prix. Red Bull’s Verstappen defeated Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen by
  0.616 seconds.
• His teammate Sebastian Vettel
  stood at the third position.
• Verstappen drove to triumph
  after, Mercedes drivers Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg crashed out in the
  first lap of the race.
• At 18 years and 228 days, Max
  Verstappen is the youngest race winner in F1 history. The Dutchman was two
  years and 210 days younger than the previous youngest winner, Sebastian Vettel.

• Beti, a four minute documentary
  film on girl child education from India, has been invited for special screening
  at the 42nd Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF), Washington DC.
• Beti is the only short film from
  India to be featured amongst 421 films representing 85 countries and will be
  screened on 30 May 2016, which is Seattle Memorial Day at the SIFF.

• The Air Forces of India and the
  U.S. on 13 May 2016 concluded the 2016 Red Flag aerial combat exercises at
  Alaska in the U.S.
• A successor to the Cope Thunder
  exercise series, the main phase of the Red Flag exercises had commenced on 28
  April 2016 with a mix of combat and support elements from the Indian Air Force
  (IAF), US Air Force (USAF) and US Navy (USN).
• The four-week long aerial combat
  exercises were held at the Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska, United States of
  America. This was the second time India had participated in such an exercise
  after 2008.

Regards

Team ExamPundit