Current Affairs Update – 2 to 6 September, 2016

• India and Vietnam on 3 September
  2016 signed twelve agreements to boost the bilateral relations between the two
  nations. The agreements were inked after delegation level talks between of
  Prime Minister of the two nations, Narendra Modi and Nguyen Xuan Phuc.
• Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who
  is the first Indian premier to visit the country in 15 years, was on a two day
  visit (2-3 September 2016) to Vietnam. The last Prime Minister to visit Vietnam
  was Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who visited the nation in 2001.

1. Framework agreement on
   cooperation in the exploration and uses of outer space for peaceful purposes
2. Protocol for amending the
   agreement on avoiding double taxation
3. Program of cooperation in UN
   Peacekeeping Matters
4. Protocol on celebrating 2017 as
   the “Year of Friendship”
5. MoU on health cooperation
6. MoU on cooperation in information
   technology
7. MoU on cooperation between the
   Vietnam academy of social sciences and the Indian council of world affairs
8. MoU on cooperation in cyber
   security
9. MoU for cooperation in the fields
   of standardization and conformity assessment
10. MoU on establishment of the
    centre of excellence in software development and training
11. Technical agreement on sharing of
    white shipping information
12. Contract for offshore high-speed
    patrol boats

• Apart from this, India also
  extended 500 million dollar Line of Credit (LoC) to Vietnam for facilitating
  deeper defence cooperation with the South East Asian nation. The LoC was
  extended as the two nations elevated their ties to a Comprehensive Strategic
  Partnership to respond to emerging regional challenges.
• Till now, Vietnam had Strategic
  Partnership only with Russia and China.

• India and Chile have expanded
  their Preferential Trade Agreement with both offering to lower or eliminate
  tariffs on a number of items traded with each other.
• Chile has offered concessions to
  India on 1798 tariff lines with margin of preference (extent to which duties
  are lower than those offered to other countries) ranging from 30 per cent to100
  per cent.
• India’s offer to Chile is on
  1,031 products with a margin of preference between 10 per cent and 100 per
  cent.
• The agreement on the expansion of
  India–Chile Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA) was signed in a meeting between
  Commerce Secretary Rita Teaotia and Chilean Ambassador to India Andrés Barbé
  González on Tuesday, an official release said.

• India and Egypt on 2 September
  2016 signed an agreement on Maritime Transport. The agreemnt would help the two
  nations to step-up co-operation on the seas not only in terms of maritime
  commerce but also in transit of naval vessels.
• The agreement was signed after
  delegation level talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and visiting
  President of Egypt Abdel Fattah El-Sisi in New Delhi. President Sisi is on a three-day
  visit (1-3 September 2016) to India at an invitation of President Pranab
  Mukherjee.
• Earlier in October 2015, the
  Union Cabinet gave its approval for signing of an agreement between India and
  Egypt on Maritime Transport. It was decided that the agreement would be signed
  on a mutually convenient date and venue.
• The proposal was approved with a
  view to strengthening cooperation and to render sustained mutual assistance and
  advice on merchant shipping and other related maritime matters.

• South Korea’s LG Electronics Inc
  on 2 September 2016 tied-up with Amazon.com Inc on smart-home services.
• This tie-up will help enabling
  the services of Amazon such as the Alexa virtual assistant on some of the
  electronics maker’s devices.
• Alexa will work with its
  SmartThinkQ Hub, an LG device used to connect with home appliances over the
  internet.
• It will allow users to control
  the South Korean firm’s home appliances via voice-recognition technology.

• Odisha government on 3 September
  2016 signed a long-term lease agreement with Falcon Marine Exports for the
  operation of Jagatjore Shrimp Culture Project in coastal Kendrapara district.
  Falcon Marine Exports was the highest bidder of the project.
• The lease period will be for 15
  years which, will fetch revenue of 13 crore rupees to the government.
• The project was first implemented
  in 1992-93 in Mahakalpada Tahasil of Kendrapara District executed by the State
  Fisheries Department. It was executed with loan assistance from World Bank with
  a cost of 25.23 crore. It was completed in 2000.
• Odisha took up the Shrimp culture
  in 2001, under which 81 lakh rupees was provided to the BPL beneficiaries as
  working capital. But, the project became defunct as only crop was partially
  successful.
• The government decided to revive
  the project, which was lying idle for years on the suggestions from the Seafood
  Exporters Association. The association requested the government to use the
  developed infrastructure.

• Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu on
  1 September 2016 launched an insurance scheme for passengers travelling on e-
  ticket. The insurance cover will be up to 10 lakh rupees.
• The insurance coverage will be
  available in case of train accidents and other untoward incidents, including
  terrorist attack, dacoity, rioting, shooting or arson.

• A person booking a train ticket
  through the IRCTC website will be eligible for the travel insurance and it is
  optional.
• To avail the facility, train
  passengers will have to pay 92 paisa premium.
• The insurance cover will not be
  applicable for children up to 5 years of age and foreign citizens.
• The facility will be available
  only for confirmed and RAC ticket passengers.
• There will be no refund of the
  premium in case of ticket cancellation.
• The scheme offers travellers or
  nominees a compensation of 10 lakh Rupees in the event of death or total
  disabilty, 7.5 lakh Rupees for partial disability, up to 2 lakh Rupees for
  hospitalisation expenses and 10000 rupees for transportation of mortal remains
  from the place of a train accident.
• The compensation claim has to be
  made within four months of the incident and the insurance company is required
  to process the claim within 15 days of receipt of the require documents.
• Shriram General Insurance
  Company, ICICI Lombard and Royal Sundaram General Insurance have been roped in
  by Indian railways for providing the insurance cover.

• The government has approved
  projects worth about Rs 450 crore under ‘Swadesh Darshan’ scheme for five
  states, including poll-bound Uttar Pradesh.
• The scheme was launched with an
  objective to develop 13 theme-based tourist circuits in the country and the
  approval for five was given in a meeting of the central sanctioning and
  monitoring committee (CSMC) on Monday.
• ‘Ramayana circuit’ in Uttar
  Pradesh with a project cost of Rs 70 crore was approved, while ‘heritage
  circuits’ in Madhya Pradesh and Uttarakhand with costs of Rs 100 crore and Rs
  83 crore, respectively, were also sanctioned, he said.
• ‘Coastal circuit’ in Tamil Nadu
  with a cost of about Rs 100 crore and envisages development of
  Chennai-Mamamallapuram- Rameshwaram-Manpadu-Kanyakumari.
• The ‘heritage circuit’ in Madhya
  Pradesh, which covers Gwalior-Orchha-Khajuraho-Chanderi-Bhimbetka-Mandu with a
  total project cost of about Rs 100 crore, envisages infrastructural development
  of the sites, the official said.
• The ‘North East circuit’, with
  cost of Rs 95.50 crore, in Sikkim was given the green signal and it includes
  development of eco log huts, cultural centre, paragliding centre, craft bazaar,
  base camp for mountaineering and meditation hall, he added.
• Under ‘Swadesh Darshan’, 13
  thematic circuits have been identified for development, namely North-East India
  Circuit, Buddhist Circuit, Himalayan Circuit, Coastal Circuit, Krishna Circuit,
  Desert Circuit, Tribal Circuit, Eco Circuit, Wildlife Circuit, Rural Circuit,
  Spiritual Circuit, Ramayana Circuit and Heritage Circuit.

• Gumthala Garhu near Pehowa on 3
  September 2016 became the first Wifi hotspot village in Haryana circle under
  the bulk plan of BSNL for the state.
• The service was inaugurated by
  state Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar from Chandigarh.
• Gumthala Garhu is located on
  Ambala-Kaithal-Hisar road and has a population of 11000.
• The BSNL Haryana circle plans to
  have 238 Wifi hotspot locations with 1072 access points in the state. The
  project will be implemented to its full capacity during the current financial
  year.
• Key highlights
• The Wifi hotspot facility at the
  village uses bandwidth of 10 mbps through BSNL’s state-of-the-art network.
• Ten outdoor and one indoor access
  points have been installed to cover the village.
• The coverage from each access
  point is about 100 meters.

• The Odisha Government on 3
  September 2016 launched the Biju Kanya Ratna Yojana (BKRY) in three districts
  of the state.
• The scheme was launched for the
  development of girls.
• The scheme will be implemented
  for three years in Ganjam, Dhenkanal and Angul districts on a pilot basis.
• The objective of the Biju Kanya
  Ratna Yojana is to improve Sex Ratio at Birth (SRB) and Child Sex Ratio (CSR)
  in the three districts.
• The CSR has declined from 967 in
  the 1991 census to 941 in the 2011 census in Nayagarh, Dhenkanal, Angul and
  Ganjam districts. However, Nayagarh is covered under Beti Bachao Beti Padhao
  scheme.

• The BKRY will ensure enrolment of
  girls in elementary education.
• It will track dropout girls from
  schools and create a better environment for them.
• The scheme will create awareness
  on gender discrimination against girls, their health, nutrition and education.

• Union Government on 3 September
  2016 approved the use of Pelargonic Acid Vanillyl Amide (PAVA) as an
  alternative to pellet guns for crowd control. Pellet guns will be used in the
  rarest of rare cases.
• Pelargonic Acid Vanillyl Amide
  (PAVA) also called Nonivamide is chilli-based ammunition that is less lethal
  and immobilises the target temporarily. The shells actually contain an organic
  compound found in natural chilli.
• The PAVA shells were under trial
  for over a year at the Indian Institute of Toxicology Research, a Council of
  Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) laboratory in Lucknow.

• The Guinness World Records on 1
  September 2016 declared Assam’s Majuli as the largest river island in the
  world.
• The island is located in the
  Brahmaputra River.
• As per the Guinness World
  Records, the island lost around one-third of its area in the last 30-40 years
  due to frequent flooding of the river.
• Majuli had a total area of 1250
  square kilometres at the beginning of the 20th century. However, it had lost
  significantly to erosion.
• It had an area of only 352 square
  kilometres in 2014.

• Indian Army on 30 August 2016
  announced establishment of the Army Design Bureau (ADB) to indigenise procurements
  and reduce import dependence.
• The ADDB will facilitate the
  weapons and technology building efforts between the Defence Research &
  Development Organisation (DRDO), industry and the army.
• Establishment of ADB was
  announced by Army Chief General Dalbir Singh at an Army seminar on Make in
  India. At the seminar, the Army Chief also launched the ‘Make in India Army
  Website’ that will serve as a one stop platform for information to vendors.
• It was developed with an idea to
  bring together academic institutions and the industry to develop indigenous
  knowhow and for this the Army is open to sharing parts of its long-term plans.
• The ADB will integrate various
  stake holders in its long-term requirements and will be a single point contact
  for them.

• TVSN Prasad committee constituted
  to look into the alternatives to pellet guns submitted its report to Home
  Secretary Rajiv Mehrishi on 30 August 2016.
• As per reports, the committee was
  not in favour of completely removal of the pellet guns in the Kashmir Valley
  but suggests that it should be replaced with polymer, rubber and paper bullets.
• TVSN Prasad committee formed for
  exploring possible alternatives to Pellet Guns

• It suggests that the pellet guns
  should be used in rarest of rare cases.
• It suggests for use of other
  non-lethal weapons, like chilli grenade shells, for crowd control.
• It asks for use of Pelargonic
  Acid Vanillyl Amide (PAVA) also called Nonivamide and other non-lethal
  ammunition like ‘stun lac cells’.
• It calls for use of Long Range
  Acoustic Device (LARD), which create deafening noise to paralyse people, in
  rural areas as it could prove dangerous for old buildings in downtown Srinagar.

• The first BRICS Film Festival
  will kick started on 2 September 2016 at the Sirifort Auditorium Complex, New
  Delhi. Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Rajyavardhan Singh
  Rathore inaugurated the festival.
• The five-day festival aims at
  providing a platform for people of the film industry of member countries to
  explore areas of cooperation in the domain of cinema, culture and cuisine.
• Key highlights of the BRICS Film
  Festival
• The idea of BRICS film festival
  has been conceived to build bridges and bring harmony amongst the BRICS
  countries, i.e., Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
• The opening film for the festival
  will be the world premiere of the Malayalam movie, Veeram.
• The closing film will be the
  Chinese movie, Skiptrace, starring Jackie Chan directed by Renny Harlin.

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• Cardiologist K K Aggarwal was on
  2 September 2016 unanimously elected as the National President of the Indian
  Medical Association (IMA) for the year 2016-17. Aggarwal is currently the
  Secretary General of the IMA.
• Moreover, the association also
  elected Dr Ravi Wankhedkar from Maharashtra as the National President for the
  year 2017-18 and Dr R N Tandon as Honorary Secretary General.
• All these appointments will be
  effective from 28 December 2016.

• Religare Enterprises Limited
  (REL) on 5 September 2016 appointed Sunil Godhwani as its Chief Executive
  Officer (CEO).
• Godhwani is appointed the Whole
  Time Director and CEO for the remaining period of his tenure.

• Chennamaneni Vidyasagar Rao,
  Governor of Maharashtra, was sworn in as the acting Governor of Tamil Nadu on 2
  September 2016 as the tenure of K. Rosaiah ended on 31 August 2016.
• Rao was administered oath of
  office by the Madras High Court’s Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul at the Raj
  Bhavan, Chennai.
• Chennamaneni Vidyasagar Rao is
  the present Governor of Maharashtra.

• Mukund Chaudhari on 1 September
  2016 took over as Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) of MOIL Ltd, a miniratna
  company.
• Prior to taking over as CMD,
  Chaudhari served as the Director (Finance) of MOIL.
• MOIL Limited is a miniratna
  state-owned manganese-ore mining company headquartered in Nagpur, India.

• The Jan Shikshan Sansthan (JSS)
  of Malappuram, Kerala was on 1 September 2016 conferred with the 2016 Unesco
  Confucius Prize for Literacy. The award was conferred on the JSS in recognition
  of its literacy-linked skill development activities among the underprivileged
  in rural areas.
• The JSS bagged the prestigious
  international award for its initiatives in applying new technology in literacy.
  Innovations such as Braille applications and the Talking Pen used by the JSS
  impressed UNESCO.
• The award sponsored by China
  consists of 20000 US dollars, a diploma, and a silver medal. Moreover, a JSS
  team will be given a free study tour to China.

• Indian ecologist and conservation
  activist Bibhuti Lahkar on 4 September 2016 became the first Asian to be awarded
  the prestigious Heritage Heroes Award by the International Union for
  Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
• Lahkar received the award at the
  IUCN’s World Conservation Congress in Honolulu, Hawaii.
• The Indian ecologist was among
  five conservationists across the globe to be nominated for 2016 Heritage Heroes
  Award.
• The Heritage Heroes Award is
  aimed at recognising outstanding efforts around the globe in making a
  difference in the conservation of World Heritage sites in challenging
  situations.

• Mother Teresa on 4 September 2016
  was proclaimed a Saint by Pope Francis in a ceremony at the Vatican.
• Thousands of pilgrims attended
  the canonisation of Mother Teresa in St Peter’s Square.
• During the ceremony, Pope Francis
  announced “We declare and define Blessed Teresa of Calcutta to be a saint and
  we enrol her among the saints, decreeing that she is to be venerated as such by
  the whole Church.”
• With this, Mother Teresa became
  the fourth Indian to be made saint. Those who received the honour before her
  include Father Kuriakose Elias Chavara, Sister Euphrasia and Sister Alphonsa.
  Saint Gonsalo Garcia, though of Portuguese parentage, was born in India, and is
  considered an India born saint.

• Action movie star, writer,
  director and martial artist Jackie Chan will be given an honorary Academy
  (Oscar) Award for his extraordinary achievements in the movies.
• Chan will receive an honorary
  Oscar statuette at the Academy’s 8th Annual Governors Awards to be held on 12
  November 2016.
• The Board of Governors of the
  Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science recently voted to present the award
  to Chan, British editor Anne V Coates, casting director Lynn Stalmaster and
  documentary maker Frederick Wiseman.
• Academy President Cheryl Boone
  Isaacs described the four as true pioneers and legends in their crafts.

• India’s mixed doubles pair of
  Pranaav Jerry Chopra and N Sikki Reddy on 5 September 2016 won the 2016 Brazil
  Open Grand Prix. It was their maiden Grand Prix title.
• In the final clash, the top
  seeded Indian pair, ranked World no. 65, defeated Canadian combo of Toby Ng and
  Rachel Honderich 21-15, 21-16 in straight games at Costa Cavalcante.
• The 23-year-old Sikky won as many
  as five international challenger titles in 2015, which includes two mixed
  doubles and three women’s doubles crowns. She was also a part of the bronze
  medal winning Indian team at the 2014 and 2016 Uber Cup. So far, she played
  mixed doubles with six different partners, including V Diju, Alwin Francis,
  Tarun Kona, Manu Attri and K Nandagopal.

• The 2016 G20 Summit was held for
  two days on 4 September and 5 September 2016 at the Hangzhou International
  Exhibition Centre, Hangzhou, China.
• The theme of 2016 G20 Summit was
  Toward an Innovative, Invigorated, Interconnected and Inclusive World Economy.
• It was the first ever G20 summit
  to be hosted in China and the second Asian country to host the Summit. Before
  China, Seoul, South Korea, hosted the 2010 G20 Summit.
• It was the 11th summit since the
  inception of G20 in 1999.The summit was attended by all the leaders of the G20
  including Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
• The chair of the summit was Xi
  Jinping, President of China.
• Key highlights of the summit
• On 3 September 2016, Barack Obama
  and Xi Jinping announced the ratification of the Paris Agreement of the 2015
  United Nations Climate Change Conference by their countries. The United States
  and China represent respectively 18 percent and 20 percent of global carbon
  dioxide emissions.
• The world leaders endorsed free
  trade and a crowded agenda that included the Koreas, Syria and refugees.
• The 2017 G20 Summit will be held
  in Hamburg, Germany, under the leadership of Angela Merkel.

• American tech giants Microsoft,
  Google and Salesforce on 3 September 2016 officially adopted the EU-US Privacy
  Shield framework. This will enable them to receive personal data from the
  European Union (EU) in compliance with the new standards.
• They are now among the 103
  companies out of the 5526 signatories to replace the defunct Safe Harbour
  framework.
• Facebook, Apple and Twitter are yet
  to adopt Privacy Shield Framework.

• A newly discovered fish of the
  genus Tosanoides was in September 2016 named in honour of US president Barack
  Obama for his commitment to protect nature through the expansion of the
  Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument.
• The fish is found only within the
  Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, a World Heritage site encompassing
  1510000 square kilometres of ocean waters, including ten islands and atolls of
  the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands.
• The site is the largest swath of
  protected land or water on Earth and is home to millions of seabirds,
  endangered turtles, endangered monk seals, and more than 7000 species.

• The World Health Organisation on
  5 September 2016 certified Sri Lanka a malaria-free nation.
• Sri Lanka is the second country
  in the WHO South-East Asia Region to eliminate malaria after Maldives.
• Sri Lanka’s anti-malaria campaign
  adjusted its strategy to intensively target the parasite after the malaria
  cases jumped in the 1970s and the 1980s and the 1990s. The change in strategy
  was unorthodox, but highly effective.

• The International Union for
  Conservation of Nature (IUCN) on 4 September 2016 listed the eastern gorilla,
  the largest living primate, as critically endangered in its latest red list of
  threatened species.
• The eastern gorilla was listed in
  the latest update of The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species that was released
  at the IUCN World Conservation Congress taking place in Hawaii.
• The IUCN stated that the eastern
  gorilla has suffered a 70% population collapse over the past 20 years,
  primarily due to illegal hunting.
• The largest living primate’s
  population is now estimated to be fewer than 5000. Grauer’s Gorilla, one
  subspecies of Eastern Gorilla, has lost 77% of its population since 1994,
  declining from 16900 individuals to just 3800 in 2015. Hunting represents the
  greatest threat to Grauer’s Gorillas.
• The second subspecies of Eastern
  Gorilla, the Mountain Gorilla, is faring better and has increased in number to
  around 880 individuals.

• The International Day of Charity
  was on 5 September 2016 observed globally with an aim to recognise the role of
  charity in alleviating human ‎suffering within and among nations, as well as of
  the efforts of charitable organizations ‎and individuals including the work of
  Mother Teresa. 
• The  day was first celebrated in 2013.

• Noted Assamese poet, literary
  critic and author Nalinidhar Bhattacharyya passed away on 2 September 2016 in
  Guwahati following age-old ailments. He was 95.
• He was a former principal of Arya
  Vidyapeeth College, Guwahati.