Current Affairs Update – 23 Dec, 2014

• Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on 22 December 2014 licensed
  Ford Credit India to operate as a non-banking financial company (NBFC). Ford
  Credit India is a subsidiary of Ford Motor Credit Company.
• The company will start automotive financing in India by
  first quarter of 2015.
• Ford Credit provides a range of automotive financial
  products and services to about 5200 Ford and Lincoln dealers and more than 3.8
  million customers around the world.
• The company plans to begin dealer wholesale inventory
  financing in the first quarter of 2015. Consumer retail financing will follow
  later in the year 2015.
• Ford had identified India as a key market in its Asia
  Pacific strategy. It is on course to invest 2 billion US dollar, nearly half of
  which is being spent on a new manufacturing facility in Sanand, Gujarat.
• The manufacturing facility in Sanand will nearly double
  the company’s installed production capacity in the country to 6.1 lakh engines
  and 4.4 lakh vehicles a year.
• Mark Constable is the Managing Director (MD) of Ford
  Credit India.

• Public sector banks have written off loans worth Rs.
  1,06,170 crore in the last five years, Parliament was informed on Tuesday.
• “The RBI data reporting system does not collate data on
  the number of account holder having more than Rs. 1 crore, whose loans were
  written off,” Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha said in written reply
  to the Rajya Sabha.
• The amount of bad loans written off or restructured by
  the PSU banks has more than doubled in the last three years ending March 2014
  to Rs. 42,447 crore.
• The rise in bad loans is being attributed to slowdown in
  the economy which slipped to below five per cent in the two consecutive financial
  years — 2012-13 and 2013-14.
• The loans written off/compromised by PSU banks soared
  from Rs. 20,752 crore in 2011-12 to Rs. 32,992 crore in 2012-13 and further to
  Rs. 42,447 crore in 2013-14, as per RBI data.
• In a separate reply, Mr. Sinha said, “a total of 1,600
  wilful defaulters (non-suit filed accounts) of Rs. 25 lakh and above as on
  March 31, 2014, have been declared by the banks.”

• The government has ordered a cut of nearly 20 percent in
  its 2014/15 healthcare budget due to fiscal strains, putting at risk key
  disease control initiatives in a country whose public spending on health is
  already among the lowest in the world.
• Two health ministry officials told Reuters on Tuesday
  that more than Rs 6,000 crore, or $948 million, has been slashed from their
  budget allocation of around Rs 30,000 crore for the financial year ending on
  March 31.
• Despite rapid economic growth over the past two decades,
  successive governments have kept a tight rein on healthcare expenditure. India
  spends about 1 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on public health,
  compared to 3 percent in China and 8.3 percent in the United States.
• But hopes were high that Prime Minister Narendra Modi,
  who was elected in May, would upgrade basic health infrastructure and make
  medical services more affordable for the poor.
• The United Nations estimates about one third of the
  world’s 1.2 billion poorest people live in India.
• In addition to the healthcare budget, the finance
  ministry has also ordered a spending cut for India’s HIV/AIDS programme by
  about 30 percent to Rs 1,300 crore rupees ($205.4 million).
• India had the third-largest number of people living with
  HIV in the world at the end of 2013, according to the U.N. AIDS programme, and
  it accounts for more than half of all AIDS-related deaths in the Asia-Pacific.

• Reserve Bank of India on 22 December 2014 issued
  guidelines to define non-cooperative borrowers. RBI also fixed the cut off
  limit for classifying borrowers as non-cooperative borrowers.
• As per the guidelines, a non-cooperative borrower is one who
  does not engage constructively with his lender by defaulting in timely
  repayment of dues while having ability to pay;
• who thwarts lenders’ efforts for recovery of their dues
  by not providing necessary information sought, denying access to assets
  financed/collateral securities, obstructing sale of securities, etc; and who
  have aggregate fund-based and non-fund based facilities of 5 crore rupees from
  the concerned bank/financial institution (FI)

• A non-cooperative borrower in case of a company will
  include its promoters and directors (excluding independent directors and
  directors nominated by the Government and the lending institutions).
• In case of business enterprises (other than companies),
  non-cooperative borrowers would include persons, who are in-charge and
  responsible for the management of the affairs of the business enterprise.
• Banks/FIs to report information on non-cooperative
  borrowers to the Central Repository of Information on Large Credits (CRILC)
• The banks/FIs to put in place a transparent mechanism for
  classifying borrowers as non-cooperative.
• The decision to classify the borrower as non-cooperative
  borrower should be entrusted to a committee headed by an Executive Director and
  consisting of two other senior officers of the rank of general managers/deputy
  general managers as decided by the board of the concerned bank/FI.
• An opportunity should be given to the borrower for a
  personal hearing if the committee feels such an opportunity is necessary.
• The order of the committee should be reviewed by another
  committee headed by the Chairman/CEO and MD and consisting of two independent
  directors of the bank/FI and the order shall become final only after it is
  confirmed by the Review Committee.
• Boards of banks/FIs to review on a half-yearly basis the
  status of non-cooperative borrowers.

• Federal Bank CEO Shyam Srinivasan was on 19 December 2014
  appointed as the Chairman of the reconstituted Indian Banks’ Association
  committee on Member Private Sector Banks for 2014-15.
• The committee consists of executives from 13 private
  banks. The committee is tasked to look after the specific needs of all the 23
  private sector banks that are members of the IBA. The term of the committee is
  one year.

• Shyam Srinivasan is an alumnus of the Indian Institute of
  Management, Kolkata and Regional Engineering College, Tiruchirapally.
• He has served on the Global Executive Forum (the top 100
  executives) of Standard Chartered Bank from 2004 to 2010.
• In September 2010, Shyam Srinivasan took charge as the
  Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer of the Federal Bank Ltd, a
  major private commercial bank in India.
• He is a member of the committee on Financial Sector
  Legislative Reforms set up by the Reserve Bank of India.

• The World Trade Center India Services Council (WTCIS) and
  National Institute for Entrepreneurship and Small Business Development
  (NIESBUD) on 22 December 2014 signed an agreement to promote and develop small
  businesses in the country.
• The agreement will allow WTCIS to expand its services to the
  MSME sector in India, which will play a vital role in socio-economic
  development.
• Under the agreement, WTCIS would assist NIESBUD to
  promote and develop an entrepreneurial environment through training, research
  and consultancy, and it will also assist organisations in developing and
  promoting entrepreneurship and self-employment.
• NIESBUD is an organisation under the Ministry of Micro,
  Small and Medium Enterprises, and is engaged in training, consultancy as well
  as research, to promote entrepreneurship.

• Private sector lender Yes Bank on Tuesday said it has
  raised $200 million in an unsecured loan from Asian Development Bank for
  onlending to small farm households and rural womens’ self help groups (SHG).
• The money will be used for onlending in rupee equivalent
  amounts to finance working capital and investment requirements of the twin
  target groups, it said.
• Yes Bank’s chief executive and managing director Rana
  Kapoor said the deal should be seen as one which reiterates its focus on
  responsible banking and furthering the financial inclusion agenda.
• Financial details like the landing cost of the money,
  including interest and hedging cost, of the money were not made available
  immediately.
• Apart from the unsecured loan, Yes Bank said ADB will
  also provide a Capacity Development Technical Assistance grant up to $1
  million, which will be used for capacity building and improving the financial
  literacy of women borrowers.

• The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) added two more feathers
  in its cap by getting the numbers to form a government on its own in Jharkhand,
  the first time in the 14-year history of the state any one party has managed to
  do so; and becoming the second largest party in Jammu and Kashmir with 25
  seats.
• The BJP fell badly short of 44, the seats needed in the
  87-member Kashmir Assembly to form a government and was unable to win a single
  seat in the valley (all but one of its candidates lost their deposits in
  Srinagar). But it achieved the distinction of being the only national party to
  have won upwards of 20 seats in the Assembly.
• The party’s parliamentary board will meet tomorrow to
  take a view on its alliance partner in Jammu and Kashmir and finalise the name
  of its chief ministerial candidate in Jharkhand.

• Rajya Sabha today referred two bills, including one that
  aims at bringing country’s banking payment system in sync with international
  practices, to the Select Committees.
• The Payment and Settlement Systems (Amendment) Bill, 2014
  and The Repealing and Amending Bill, 2014 were passed by Lok Sabha in the
  Winter session of Parliament.
• The Select Committee for Payment and Settlement Systems
  (Amendment) Bill, 2014 consists of 13 members.
• The bill also aims at increasing transparency and stability
  of the financial market.
• The other bill sent to the Select Committee is the
  Repealing and Amending Bill, 2014, which seeks to repeal 90 Amendment Acts
  which have become redundant.

• Former Union Minister G. Venkataswamy died on 22 December
  2014 in Hyderabad, Telangana. He was 85.
• He represented the Peddapalli constituency of Andhra
  Pradesh (present Telangana) and was a member of the Indian National Congress
  (INC) political party.
• He was a member of the 14th Lok Sabha of India.

• He was elected to the Assembly of the undivided Andhra
  Pradesh in 1950 and held several key positions in the government as well in the
  party
• During his political-career of more than five decades, he
  was elected to the State Assembly twice (1957- 62 and 1978-84) and seven times
  for Parliament (fourth, fifth, sixth, ninth, tenth, eleventh and fourteenth Lok
  Sabha)
• He served in the congress government led by former Prime
  Ministers Indira Gandhi and PV Narasimha Rao
• He held Pradesh Congress Chairman for Andhra Pradesh
• Popularly known as Kaka was born on 5 October 1929 in
  erstwhile Hyderabad state (now in Telangana)

• National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) on 19 December 2014
  released Situation Assessment Survey of Agricultural Households for the Crop
  Year 2012-13. The survey was conducted between January 2013 and December 2013.
• The survey focused on a common perception regarding
  agriculture — how it generates just 15 per cent of India’s GDP (2012-13 data)
  despite rural areas houses 68.8 per cent of the total population (2011 Census).
• The survey aimed at capturing the condition of
  agricultural households in the rural areas of the country in the context of
  policies and programmes of Government of India.
• A total number of 35200 households were surveyed in the
  first visit and 34907 of them were re-surveyed in second visit.

• The survey found that hardly 58 per cent of rural
  households in India are engaged in farming activity, which, in turn,
  contributes not even 60 per cent to their average total monthly incomes.
• Only 9.02 crore (57.8 percent) out of the country’s
  estimated 15.61 crore rural households were agricultural. Agricultural was
  defined as those having at least one member self-employed in farming, either in
  principal or subsidiary status, during the last 365 days.
• Uttar Pradesh accounted for about 20 percent of all
  agricultural households in the country.
• Rajasthan had highest percentage of agricultural
  households (78.4 percent) among its rural households
• Kerala had the least percentage share of agricultural
  households (27.3 percent) in its rural households.
• 13 per cent of the marginal farmers do not have ration
  cards.
• Out of total agri-households, 23 per cent of agricultural
  households depend on livestock as prime source of income.
• The households which possess 0.4 ha of land claimed that
  agriculture is the principal source of income for them.
• Forty-four per cent of total agricultural-households
  possess MGNREGA job cards.

• The Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) on 22
  December 2014 signed the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Odisha
  government and 2 ports to develop commercially viable stretches of National
  Waterway 5.
• These two ports are Paradip Port and Dhamra Port Company
  Limited that serve the Eastern and Central parts of the country.
• In the National Waterway-5, East Coast Canal has been
  integrated with Brahmini river and Mahanadi delta rivers (588 km).

• The Inland Waterways Authority of India Act, 1985
  established the Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) for the regulation
  and development of Inland Waterways as National Waterways (NWs). The
  development of National Waterways (NW) comes under the purview of central
  government.

• Ganga-Bhagirathi-Hooghly river system
  (Allahabad-Haldia-1620 km) in National Waterway-1.
• River Brahmaputra (Dhubri-Sadiya-891 km) in National
  Waterway-2.
• West Coast Canal (Kottapuram-Kollam) along with
  Udyogmandal and Champakara Canals-(205 km) in National Waterway-3.
• Kakinada-Puducherry canals along with Godavari and
  Krishna rivers (1078 km) in National Waterway-4.
• East Coast Canal integrated with Brahmani river and
  Mahanadi delta rivers (588 km) in National Waterway-5.

• The National Heritage City Development and Augmentation
  Yojana (HRIDAY) was in news recently as Union Urban Development Minister M
  Venkaiah Naidu announced the plans to launch the scheme.
• HRIDAY is a scheme for conserving and preserving the
  heritage characters of 12 cities. These are: Amritsar, Varanasi, Gaya, Puri,
  Ajmer, Mathura, Dwarka, Badami, Velankanni, Kanchipuram, Warangal (Telangana) and
  Amaravati (Andhra Pradesh).
• The scheme aims at developing tourism and job creation
  because India’s rich cultural, historical, religious and natural heritages have
  a huge potential of tourism.
• Earlier, in his maiden budget speech in July 2014, Union
  Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had made the announcement of launching HRIDAY
  scheme.
• As per the announcement, the scheme will involve a
  partnership between the government, academic institutions and local
  communities, combining affordable technologies.

• The book titled Why I Assassinated Gandhi written by
  Nathuram Godse and Gopal Godse was in news in third week of December 2014.
• The first revised edition of book was published by
  Delhi-based Farsight Publishers and Distributors. The revised edition has been
  compiled and edited by Virender Mehra. The book was first published in 1993 by
  Surya Bharti Prakashan.
• The 14-chapter, 208-page book includes a profile of
  Godse, and critical commentary on Gandhi’s politics. It also includes Nathuram
  Godse’s statement before the court at the Red Fort trial in its unabridged
  form.
• Besides, it contains the narrative of Justice G D Khosla
  who was the part of full bench of the then East Punjab High Court that heard
  the Nathuram Godse case on 23 May 1949.
• Bombay High Court in 1968 had lifted the ban on Nathuram
  Godse’s statement to the special court.

• The Advisory Group for Integrated Development of Power,
  Coal and Renewable Energy headed by Suresh Prabhu submitted its report to the
  Union Ministry of Power and Coal on 22 December 2014.
• The Group has suggested measures for enhancement of coal
  production in the short, medium and long term.

• There is a need for improvements in Coal India Limited
  (CIL) and its subsidiaries including Central Mine Planning and Design Institute
  Limited (CMPDI)
• It has recommended opening up of the coal sector and
  upgradation of Coal India Limited (CIL) and its subsidiaries. This will
  increase domestic production of the dry fuel.
• It also mentioned the issues of coal block auction
  Process, coal linkage rationalisation and swapping of coal linkages and
  stressed on the need for urgent action on coal linkages to power plants already
  commissioned and likely to be commissioned by March 2015.

• The Advisory Group was set up by the Union Government to
  on 25 June 2014. The Group was chaired by Suresh Prabhu, Union Railway
  Minister.

• Kiyaa, claimed to be India’s first branded fashion doll,
  was launched today in a marketplace dominated by heavyweights such as Barbie,
  Bratz and Daisy.
• The doll, created by a city-based start-up Shel Studio
  Design, mirrors the image of a common teenager, dressing up in the country’s
  ethnic fashion mould, including embroidery and handlooms, yet having a
  contemporary touch.
• Priced at Rs. 699, as compared to the minimum price tag
  of Rs. 999 for a Barbie, the product was launched in the on-line market, including
  on Snapdeal and Amazon. “We will be slowly putting the doll at retail stores
  across the country. We are targeting sales of 10,000 pieces in the next one
  year,” Sailaja Theerdhala, founder of the start-up, said.
• Sailaja, who runs a local boutique, spent nearly three
  years in creating Kiyaa (meaning cooing of the bird in Sanskrit).

• Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on 22 December 2014
  announced that Gujarat will host 13th Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) from 7
  January 2015 to 9 January 2015.
• The 13th edition of PBD will mark the 100th year of
  Mahatma Gandhi’s return to India from South Africa.  PBD is an event which celebrates the
  achievements of Indians living abroad.
• The chief guest of the 13th PBD would be Guyana President
  Donald Ramotar.
• On 7 January 2015, the youth segment of PBD will be
  inaugurated with the theme Bharat ko jano and Bharat ko mano. The aim of the
  youth segment is to familiarising children of migrant Indians with the traditions
  and history of the country as well as its modern day achievements in different
  fields.
• The main highlights of the 13th PBD will include a
  plenary session in which presentations will be made on the flagship programmes
  of the government such as Namami Ganga, Swachh Bharat, Skill Development and
  Urban Development and NRIs and People of Indian origin (PIO).
• Besides, there would be separate sessions for Girmitya,
  Indian migrants taken to work in plantations, Gulf countries, French speaking
  countries and Diaspora organisations in various countries and the Ambassadors
  of these countries would be present to understand their problems.
• PBD is the world’s largest annual gathering of people of
  Indian origin. PBD is aimed at enhancing networking and reinforcing commercial
  linkages. There are 25 million people of Indian origin residing outside India.

• Kisan Diwas was observed across the country on 23
  December 2013 to celebrate the birthday of Chaudhary Charan Singh.
• Government in 2001 had decided to observe 23 December
  every year as Kisan Diwas (Farmers Day).
• Celebrating Kisan Diwas, e-retailing firm Snapdeal.com
  today announced the launch of “The Agri Store”, offering products like seeds,
  fertiliser and irrigation tools, among others, to farmers.
• A Hindi version of the store will also be launched soon
  to aid farmers in making an informed decision, the company said in a statement.

• Chaudhary Charan Singh (23 Dec 1902 – 29 May 1987) was
  the fifth Prime Minister of India. He served as the Prime Minister from 28 July
  1979 to 14 January 1980.
• Chaudhary Charan Singh holds the record of being the only
  Prime Minister of India who did not face the Parliamentary floor for a single
  day after assuming the office.

• In a defining moment for Indian Naval Aviation, the first
  prototype (NP1) of Naval Light Combat Aircraft (LCA), the first indigenously
  designed and developed 4th plus generation combat aircraft designed to operate
  from the decks of air-craft carriers, had a successful first flight from ski-jump
  facility of shore-based test facility at INS Hansa in Goa on Saturday.
• Piloted by Commodore Jaideep Maolankar, the Chief Test
  Pilot of National Flight Test Centre, the aircraft had a perfect flight with
  results matching the predicted ones to the letter.
• LCA (Navy) is designed with stronger landing gears to
  absorb forces exerted by the ski jump ramp during take-off, to be airborne
  within 200 m as against 1000 m required for normal runways.

• Leaders of Ukraine, Russia, France and Germany on 22
  December 2014 reached an agreement to hold new round of peace talks on Ukraine.
  The peace talks are the latest attempt to negotiate a settlement to the
  conflict that has badly strained the ties between Russia and West.
• The talks would involve negotiators from Ukraine, Russia,
  pro-Russian rebels and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
• The negotiations talks will be held in Belarusian
  capital, Minsk on 24 December and 26 December 2014.
• The agreement to hold a new peace talks was reached
  during a conference call between Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, Russian
  President Vladimir Putin, French President Francois Hollande and German
  Chancellor Angela Merkel
• Previous peace talks of September 2014 led to a tenuous
  peace agreement, although fighting continued in eastern Ukraine. In this fight
  at least 1300 civilians have died. However, United Nations report suggests that
  since outbreak of the conflict in eastern Ukraine between government forces and
  pro-Russia separatists in April 2014 more than 4700 people have been killed.

• The US President Barack Obama on 19 December 2014 signed
  the annual defence budget National Defence Authorisation Act (NDAA) for the
  fiscal year 2015.
• The 2015 NDAA sets overall defence spending at 578
  billion US dollars and also provide for release of Coalition Support Fund (CSF)
  of 1 billion US dollars to Pakistan.
• The annual defence budget for the fiscal year 2015 was
  sponsored by US Senator Carl Levin and Howard P. ‘Buck’ McKeon.

• The NDDA 2015 intends to provide vital benefits for US
  military personnel and their families, as well as critical contingency
  authorities needed to counter the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and to
  respond to emerging needs in the face of evolving terrorist threats and
  emergent crises worldwide.

• For the first time, Pakistan and Russia have signed an
  energy deal worth $1.7 billion to lay a gas pipeline from Karachi to Lahore, a
  move that may lead to further improvement in their ties.
• The supply of a Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) is expected
  to start before March next year, The Express Tribune reported.
• The report cited unidentified officials saying the
  pipeline would be used to transport imported LNG from Karachi to Punjab
  province.
• The energy agreement was signed during the day-long visit
  of Sergei Shoigu last month, the first visit by a Russian Defence Minister to
  Pakistan in 45 years. The last visit to Pakistan was made by Soviet Union’s Defence
  Minister Andrey Grechko.

• The European space mission Rosetta was on 19 December
  2014 named as the most important scientific Breakthrough of the Year 2014 by
  Science journal.
• Rosetta landed its three-legged Philae module on the
  comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on 12 November 2014, 10 years after the
  spacecraft was launched.
• At the end of a seven-hour journey after being separated
  from Rosetta, Philae bounced twice off the speeding comet’s surface before
  making a soft landing, but it appeared to have rested on its side and in the
  shadows of a cliff.
• Rosetta’s collection of spectrometers, known as the
  Rosetta Orbiter spectrometer for Ion and Neutral Analysis (ROSINA), has
  detected water, methane, and hydrogen as well as some rarer molecules,
  including formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide in the comet 67P’s halo.

• The mission began in March 2004. It was launched from
  Kourou in French Guiana aboard an Ariane 5 rocket. The spacecraft is an
  aluminium box weighing about 3000 kg and carries Philae, which is about 100 kg.
• Rosetta reached the Comet named 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko
  in August 2014. It has been orbiting it and scrutinizing it from as close as 10
  kilometers away. The mission will end in December 2015.

• The results of 2014 Presidential elections of Tunisia
  were declared on 22 December 2014. Beji Caid Essebsi of Nidaa Tounes party won
  the elections with 55.68 percent of the run-off vote.
• On the other hand, his rival and incumbent Moncef
  Marzouki’s won 44.32 percent of the votes.
• In the first round of voting no candidate won a majority
  leading to a second round of voting on 21 December 2014 to decide between
  incumbent Moncef Marzouki and Essebsi.
• Essebsi’s victory will enable him to consolidate power,
  with his party already controlling Parliament after defeating the main Islamist
  party in legislative elections in October 2014.
• 88-year old Essebsi is a veteran of Tunisia’s political
  establishment. He was the Prime Minister of Tunisia from 27 February 2011 to 24
  December 2011. Before that he was both Foreign and Interior Minister for his
  predecessor, Habib Bourguiba. He is the founder of the Nidaa Tounes party.

• A few weeks after they were left out of the 30-member
  preliminary squad for the 2015 World Cup, Gautam Gambhir and Yuvraj Singh were,
  on Monday dropped, from the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI)
  contracts list while medium pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar was promoted to a Grade A
  contract.
• Pacer Mohammed Shami, Ambati Rayudu and Ajinkya Rahane
  have been promoted from Grade C to Grade B, while Gambhir, Yuvraj, Dinesh
  Karthik and Jaydev Unadkat have been struck off the contracts list.
• Both Yuvraj and Gambhir were part of Grade A contracts
  last season.

• Grade A: Mahendra
  Singh Dhoni, Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina, Ravichandran Ashwin, Bhuvneshwar Kumar.
• Grade B: Pragyan
  Ojha, Murali Vijay, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ravindra Jadeja, Ishant Sharma, Shikhar
  Dhawan, Umesh Yadav, Rohit Sharma, Ajinkya Rahane, Ambati Rayudu, Mohammed
  Shami.
• Grade C: Amit
  Mishra, Varun Aaron, Wriddhiman Saha, Stuart Binny, Pankaj Singh, R. Vinay
  Kumar, Mohit Sharma, Dhawal Kulkarni, Parveez Rasool, Axar Patel, Manoj Tiwary,
  Robin Uthappa, Karn Sharma, Sanju Samson, Kuldeep Yadav, KL Rahul.