Current Affairs Update – 1st December, 2015

Hello and welcome to ExamPundit. Here are the Important Current Affairs of 1st December, 2015. These are important for the upcoming IBPS Clerk Exam and Insurance Exams.

Finance/Economy
RBI keeps repo rate
unchanged at 6.75%

  • RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan today kept the key policy rate
    unchanged but affirmed the Central Bank’s commitment to ease it as and when
    room is available, saying inflation is likely to perform better than expected.
  • Accordingly, the repo rate at which the Reserve Bank lends
    to the system will continue at 6.75 per cent. The cash reserve ratio (CRR) or
    the amount of deposits banks park with RBI has also been unchanged at 4 per
    cent. The status quo was widely expected.
  • RBI, which is set to achieve its target of getting inflation
    down at 6 per cent by January and is aiming to reduce the number further to 5
    per cent by March 2017, will monitor developments on the commodity prices,
    including food and oil and external developments in its future policy
    formulations, Mr. Rajan said.
  • Though the RBI Governor noted that second-quarter GDP
    numbers indicate early signs of recovery, he chose to stick to the earlier
    projection of 7.4 per cent for the fiscal with a marginal downward bias.
  • Rajan also expressed anguish at the banks’ reluctance to
    pass on the benefits of the earlier rate cut actions to the borrowers, saying
    the median decrease in the base rates over the course of the year has only been
    0.60 per cent as against the RBI’s 1.25 per cent cut in the repo rate since
    January.

IMF approved China’s
Yuan as Elite Reserve Currency

  • International Monetary Fund (IMF) on 30 November 2015
    included China’s Yuan into its elite reserve currency basket. Yuan’s entry into
    the basket takes effect from 1 October 2016.
  • Yuan also known as the Chinese Renminbi (RMB) was included
    in the basket after it met the existing criteria for its inclusion. The action
    was taken after the executive board at IMF completed the regular five-yearly
    review of the basket of currencies that make up the Special Drawing Right
    (SDR).
  • Yuan will be a freely usable currency and will be included
    in the SDR basket as a fifth currency, along with the US Dollar, Euro, Japanese
    Yen and British Pound.
  • Launching the new SDR basket on 1 October 2016 will provide
    sufficient lead time for the Fund, its members and other SDR users to adjust to
    these changes.

India
Union Government
launched IPV injection as part of Global Polio Endgame Strategy
  • The Union Government on 30 November 2015 launched the
    injectable Inactivated Polio Vaccine (IPV) as part of its commitment to the Global
    Polio Endgame Strategy.
  • The IPV injection was launched in New Delhi by Union
    Minister for Health and Family Welfare JP Nadda. It is part of next step in
    India’s universal immunization programme to fight against polio in the country.

Main highlights of
the Initiative
  • The first phase this vaccine will be introduced in six
    states, viz Assam, Gujarat, Punjab, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, and Uttar Pradesh.
  • IPV injection will be given to children below one year of
    age along with the third dose of the Oral Polio Vaccine (OPV) at the routine
    immunization sessions free of cost.
  • New evidences now clearly show that IPV and OPV together
    will further strengthen the children’s immune system and will provide double
    protection against polio.

India, France
launched International Solar Alliance

  • India and France on 30 November 2015 launched the
    International Solar Alliance in Paris. The alliance was launched jointly by PM
    Narendra Modi and French President Francois Hollande during the United Nations
    climate change conference (COP21).
  • The alliance also invited all countries located fully or
    partly between the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn to join the group. It will
    function from the National Institute of Solar Energy in India, Gurgaon.

Highlights of the
alliance
  • It aims to bring 121 tropical countries together to tap
    solar energy.
  • The Alliance will enable solar-rich developing countries to
    make the best use of an abundant, free natural resource.
  • It seeks to share collective ambitions to reduce the cost of
    finance and technology that is needed to deploy solar power widely.
  • It would adapt the generation and storage technologies to
    the individual countries’ needs.

Awards
& Honors –
Hinduja Brothers
received lifetime achievement award at Asian Business Leadership Forum 2015

  • Hinduja Brothers on 29 November 2015 were honoured with the
    prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award at the annual Asian Business Leadership
    Forum (ABLF) Series in Dubai.
  • The prestigious award recognizes the most powerful and
    influential business leaders.
  • ABLF Series’ Royal Patron and the UAE’s Minister of Culture
    Sheikh Nahyan Mubarak Al Nahyan presented the award to Gopichand P Hinduja,
    Co-Chairman, Hinduja Group of Companies, The Hinduja Group, UK.

Robert Lewandowski
awarded with four Guinness World Record certificates for scoring five goals in
nine
minutes

  • Polish professional footballer Robert Lewandowski’s
    nine-minute, five-goal haul for German Football Club Bayern Munich against
    Wolfsburg was officially recognised on 30 November 2015 by Guinness World
    Record.
  • Lewandowski was presented with four separate official
    Guinness World Records certificates for his goal scoring spree during a special
    press conference which took place at Bayern Munich’s ground.

The record
  • On 22 September 2015, the Polish star scored five goals
    during the league encounter with Wolfsburg in nine minutes, the fastest in any
    major European football league since records have been kept.
  • He broke a series of records including Fastest Bundesliga
    hat-trick (3 minutes 22 seconds), Fastest Four Goals in a Bundesliga Match (5
    minutes 42 seconds), Fastest Five Goals Scored in a Bundesliga Match (8 minutes
    59 seconds), Most Goals Scored by a Substitute in a Bundesliga Match (5 goals).

Embrace of the
Serpent bagged Golden Peacock Award for Best Film at IFFI 2015

  • Internationally co-produced adventure drama film Embrace of
    the Serpent on 30 November 2015 was awarded with the Golden Peacock Award for
    the Best Film at the 46th International Film Festival of India (IFFI), Goa.
  • The Best Film Award comprises the Golden Peacock and a
    citation with prize money of 40 lakhs rupees to be shared between the Director
    and the Producer of the movie.
  • The film is produced by Christina Gallego and directed by
    Ciro Guerra.

IFFI Winners 2015
  • The Best Director award went to Peter Greenaway for the film
    Eisenstein in Guanajuato.
  • The Best Actor (Male) went to Vincent Lindon for his
    portrayal of a laid off factory worker Thierry Taogourdeau in the film The
    Measure of a Man.
  • The Best Actor (Female) award was shared by Gunes Sensoy,
    Doga Doguslu, Tugba Sunguroglu, Elit Iscan and Ilyada Akdogan for portrayal of
    role of five young orphaned sisters in the Turkish fim Mustang.
  • The Special Jury Award went to the Spanish film Sealed Cargo
    directed by Julia Vargas.
  • The ICFT – UNESCO Fellini Medal was awarded to Kaushik
    Ganguly’s Cinemawala that focuses on the sad state of single screen cinema
    halls in West Bengal.

Days
World AIDS Day
observed across the world

  • The World AIDS Day was on 1 December 2015 observed across
    the world with the theme Getting to zero, End AIDS by 2030. However, the
    federal theme for the World AIDS Day 2015 was The time to act is now.
  • Both themes comply with fast-track strategy of UNAIDS, the
    Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, to end the Aids epidemic by 2030.
    The strategy is aimed at averting 21 million Aids-related deaths, 28 million
    new HIV infections and 5.9 million new infections among children by 2030.

World
UN chief launched
Anticipate, Absorb, Reshape Initiative to build climate resilience
  • The United Nations (UN) Chief Ban Ki-moon along with the agencies
    of the UN system on 30 November 2015 launched initiative titled Anticipate,
    Absorb, Reshape to build climate resilience in the world’s most vulnerable
    countries.
  • The initiative was launched during the United Nations
    climate change conference (COP21) in Paris. The initiative was launched in the
    wake of economic losses that have increased by more than half over the past
    decade. Ecosystems, and food and water supplies are under increasing pressure.

Lists
& Indexes –
ITU released
Measuring the Information Society Report 2015

  • The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) on 30
    November 2015 released the Measuring the Information Society Report 2015. It
    was launched on the first day of the World
  • Telecommunication/ICT Indicators Symposium (WTIS) 2015 in
    Hiroshima, Japan.
  • The report, through ICT Development Index (IDI), captures
    the level of ICT developments in 167 economies worldwide and compares progress
    made since the year 2010.
  • As per the report, India ranked 131 out of 167 nations
    surveyed in terms of information and communication technology development.

Key findings of
the report
  • Top 5 countries with higher ICT development are South Korea
    (1), Denmark (2), Iceland (3), the UK (4) and Sweden (5).
  • Bottom 5 countries are Malawi (163), Madagascar (164),
    Ethiopia (165), Eritrea (166) and Chad (167).

Report with
respect to India
  • Compared to its 125th rank in 2010, India was placed at the
    131st position in the overall ranking with 2.69 IDI score.
  • In terms of IDI access and IDI use categories India was
    placed at the 135th position.

However, in terms of IDI skills India was placed at the 120
position.
Appointments
Roch Marc Christian
Kabore elected president of Burkina Faso

  • Roch Marc Christian Kabore on 30 November 2015 was elected
    as the President of the West African country Burkina Faso.
  • Kabore won the vote in the first round with 53.49 percent of
    ballots, which was enough to secure a first round victory.
  • Zephirin Diabre came in the second place with 29.6 percent
    of the vote, and Tahirou Barry stood third with just three percent of the
    votes.

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This post was last modified on July 20, 2019 10:16 am