Current Affairs Update – 21 Jan, 2015

• Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna(PMJDY) on 20 January 2015
  made it to Guinness Book of World Records.
• Indian Banks opened 11.50 crore accounts under the
  Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana in a short span of five months. The feat was
  commended by the Guinness Book of World Records.
• Out of the total account opened, 5.68 crore accounts
  belonged to male and 5.82 crore account belonged to females. In percentage
  terms, 49.37 % accounts belonged to male while 50.63% accounts belonged to
  females.
• 6.84 crore accounts were opened in rural areas which is
  59.49%  of the total accounts opened
  while in urban area  4.66 crore accounts
  were opened which is 40.51%.
• In August 2014, Indian Government set a target of opening
  up 10 crore accounts to pass on benefits of various social security schemes to
  the account holders.
• Now, Government will transfer annual subsidy of around
  51029 crore rupees directly to bank accounts of 15.45 crore beneficiaries,
  plugging system leakages.
• PMJDY was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in
  August 2014. The scheme was launched for opening the most bank accounts—about
  1.80 crore— in one week as part of the financial inclusion campaign.

• Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and China’s
  e-commerce giant Alibaba on 20 January 2015 signed an agreement to provide
  global platform to Indian small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
• The agreement will facilitate greater economic engagement
  between Indian and Chinese SMEs.
• Alibaba.com and CII will collaborate and develop various
  trade opportunities and online promotions to facilitate greater economic
  engagement between Indian and Chinese small and medium enterprises (SMEs). CII
  and Alibaba.com will also work jointly towards providing trainings, promoting
  Industry clusters for SMEs in some key business sectors.
• Alibaba will work with CII to run their e-certificates
  programmes in India. The agreement is a step forward in forging greater
  partnerships, engagement between Indian and global business especially among
  SMEs.
• India’s manufacturing and services sector will be able to
  achieve the objectives of building greater India-China SME engagement by
  benefiting with the expertise of Alibaba.com in the digital space.

• International Labour Organisation (ILO) on 20 January
  2015 released a report tittled World Employment and Social Outlook – Trends
  2015 (WESO).
• The report warned that unemployment will continue to rise
  in the coming years, as the global economy has entered a new period combining
  slower growth, widening inequalities and turbulence.
• By 2019, more than 212 million people will be out of
  work, up from the current 201 million.
• The employment situation has improved in the United States
  and Japan, but remains difficult in a number of advanced economies,
  particularly in Europe.

• Moving up
  the ranks, India has emerged as the second most trusted country in the world in
  terms of faith reposed on its institutions even as globally trust levels have
  fallen, says a survey.
• As the
  world’s rich and powerful gather in the Swiss resort of Davos, a study by
  public relations firm Edelman has found that general level of trust in
  institutions among college-educated people around the globe are at levels not
  seen since 2009 in many of the markets it surveyed.
• Trust in
  institutions in India has improved sharply in 2015 with the country moving up
  three notches to the second place among 27 nations.
• While the
  number of “truster” countries are at an all-time low of six in 2015 including
  UAE, India, China and Netherlands, the number of “distruster” countries has
  grown significantly to 13 including Japan, Russia, Hong Kong, South Africa and
  Italy.
• Brazil,
  Malaysia, France and the US are among the 8 “neutral” nations as per the trust
  index, the survey said.
• India,
  which last year saw the BJP-led NDA government storming to power at the Centre,
  stands tall.
• According
  to the report, an “alarming evaporation of trust” has happened across all
  institutions, reaching the lows of the Great Recession in 2009.
• Trust in
  government, business, media and NGOs in the general population is below 50 per
  cent in two-thirds of countries, including the U.S., U.K. and Germany, it said.

• Hindi
  novel Farishta was in news in the fourth week of January 2015 after its author
  Kapil Isapuri accused the makers of film PK of plagiarism. The book was
  published in 2013.
• The
  novelist Isapuri approached the Delhi High Court and claimed that certain
  portions of the film like characters, expression of ideas and sequences were
  stolen from his novel Farishta and was used in the film.
• He sought
  punitive damages of 1 crore rupees from the filmmakers along with the credit of
  his work.

• State
  government of Sikkim on 20 January 2015 inked Memorandum of Understanding (MoU)
  with governments of the Netherlands and Thailand for development of
  floriculture in the state. This deal will help the state to reach out to the
  international market.

• Governments
  of the Netherland and Thailand will provide expertise and technology to develop
  hybrid Sikkim’s Cymbidium and other orchids and also cut flowers
• They will
  help the state in marketing and transportation of flowers

• India on
  20 January 2015 signed an agreement on transfer of sentenced persons with Hong
  Kong Special Administrative Region.
• Under the
  agreement, the two sides will exchange sentenced prisoners in each other’s
  jurisdiction. The agreement will mostly apply to Indian prisoners as there are
  very few Hong Kong residents in Indian prisons.
• There are
  at present 93 Indians in Hong Kong jails. Only 17 of them are undergoing
  sentence for serious crimes like drug dealing while most of the remaining
  prisoners have been jailed for relatively minor offenses like immigration law
  violation.
• The two
  sides have been engaged in discussions on this issue for a long time and it is
  only now that an agreement has been reached. The agreement will add to the
  existing framework of institutional cooperation between the two sides.
• India has
  similar agreements on exchange of prisoners with several other countries but
  none with Mainland China.

• The latest
  report on Status of Tigers in India, 2014 showed 30 percent increase in tiger
  population to 2226 from 1706 in 2010. India now has 70 per cent of the tiger
  population in the world. The report was released by National Tiger Conservation
  Authority (NTCA).
• The
  largest increase was recorded in the Western Ghats Landscape complex comprising
  Kerala, Karnataka, Goa and Tamil Nadu 
  with 776 tigers (up from 402 in 2006).
• In 2006,
  the number of tigers in Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka were 76, 46 and 290 respectively.
  In 2014, the number of tiger increased to 229, 136 and 406 in Tamil Nadu,
  Kerala and Karnataka respectively.
• The
  Mudumalai-Bandipur-Nagarahole-Wayanad complex holds the world’s single largest
  tiger population currently estimated at over 570 tigers.
• Goa now
  has a persistent tiger presence with three to five animals. The tiger
  population had increased in Karnataka, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu
  and Kerala. Odisha reported a fall in number.
• The
  Periyar Tiger Reserve of Kerala on 20 January 2015 won the National Tiger
  Conservation Authority (NTCA) biennial award. It was awarded for encouraging
  local public participation in managing the reserve.

• European Union (EU) on 20 January 2015 decided to lift a
  seven-month-long ban on the import of mangoes from India. The proposal to lift
  the ban was voted unanimously by the European Commission’s standing committee
  on plant health.
• India will be able to start the export again after a new
  EU legislation is formally adopted and published by the European Commission.
• The decision to lift the ban was made after India, the
  world’s biggest producer of Mangoes made significant improvements in plant
  health controls and certification system.
• The Commission’s Food and Veterinary Office in India in
  September 2014 carried out an audit and showed significant improvements in the
  phytosanitary export certification system.
• However, imports of four other products namely
  aubergines, bitter gourds, snake gourds and patra leaves, remain suspended
  subject to sustained improvements in plant pest control.
• European Union issued a temporary ban on import of Indian
  mangoes on 1 May 2014 after fruit flies and other quarantine pests were found
  in 207 consignments. The consignment infested with fruit flies were found by
  authorities in Brussels. The ban was supposed to be effective till December
  2015.