Current Affairs Update – 24 Sept, 2014

• ·        
  Private sector bank ICICI Bank on Wednesday
  launched a savings account for minors above 10 years of age.
• ·        
  The account, which will be opened in the name
  of the minor, will offer a personalised cheque book and a debit card with a
  picture of his or her choice, the bank said in a statement.
• ·        
  Minors will be able to undertake various
  banking transactions including issuing cheques, paying bills, recharge mobile
  phones, open fixed deposits and recurring deposits among others.
• ·        
  They will also have access to banking
  channels such as ATM, mobile and Internet banking.

• ·        
  A group of five alumni from the Indian School
  of Business (ISB) has won the prestigious Hult Prize and a $1 million funding
  support from the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI).
• ·        
  The prize was given away by former US
  president Bill Clinton and Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank in New
  York last evening.
• ·        
  The winning team- Nano Health- consisted of
  Aditi Vaish, Ashish Bondia, Manish Ranjan, Pranav Kumar Maranganty, and
  Ramanathan Lakshmanan, all students of the Class of 2014 at the ISB.
• ·        
  The objective of the HULT Prize, the largest
  student business plan competition in the world, is for teams to design a social
  enterprise – an annual challenge set by former US President Bill Clinton.
  “Solving Non-Communicable Diseases in the Urban Slums” was the
  challenge for participants this year. All teams had to propose solutions which
  would impact at least 25 million people in urban and semi urban areas. The ISB
  group competed against teams from the USA, Latin America, the Middle East and
  China.

• ·        
  India today created space history by
  successfully placing its low-cost Mars spacecraft in orbit around the Red
  Planet in its very first attempt, catapulting the country into an elite club of
  three nations.
• ·        
  The successful manoeuvres were carried out in
  early hours, watched keenly by Prime Minister Narendra Modhi, his cabinet
  colleagues and Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah.
• ·        
  Watched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, ISRO
  scientists successfully ignited the main 440 Newton Liquid Apogee Motor (LAM)
  and eight small thrusters that fired for 24 minutes from 7.17 a.m. and slowed
  down the speed of Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) spacecraft ‘Mangalyaan’ for it to
  slip into a smooth orbit around the Red Planet after almost an year-long
  voyage.
• ·        
  “Today MOM has met Mangal (Mars). Today
  Mangal has got MOM. The time this mission was short named as MOM, I was sure
  that MOM won’t disappoint us,” Modi, who wore a red coloured jacket, said
  annnouncing the Rs. 450-crore mission’s success, after nerve-wracking final
  moments at the command centre of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)
  here.
• ·        
  Scientists broke into wild cheers and
  congratulated each other after the 1,350 kg spacecraft was manoeuvred into its
  designated place, capping a 666 million km journey that began on November 5
  last.
• ·        
  India’s MOM is the cheapest inter-planetary
  mission, costing a tenth of NASA’s Mars mission Maven that entered the Martian
  orbit on September 22.
• ·        
  It aims to study Mars’ surface and mineral
  composition, and scan its atmosphere for methane, a chemical strongly tied to
  life on Earth.
• ·        
  Given the high rate of failures — only 21 of
  the total of 51 missions sent to Mars by various countries being successful,
  the success of MOM has given a boost to India’s global standing in Space.

• ·        
  Geethu Mohandas’s Hindi-language feature film
  Liar’s Dice on 23 September 2014 was selected for India’s official entry in the
  2015 Oscars Awards. The 87th Oscar Awards event will take place in the US on 22
  February 2015.
• ·        
  The movie was nominated for the Best Foreign
  Language Film category. Out of 30 entries, this movie was chosen  unanimously by 12-member jury headed by eminent
  filmmaker T. Hariharan.
• ·        
  Liar’s Dice was released in
  Thiruvananthapuram on 19 September2014 
  and will open in Pune on 26 September 2014. It will be exhibited across
  the country in November 2014 by PVR Pictures.
• ·        
  The movie stars national award winning actors
  Geetanjali Thapa and Nawazuddin Siddiqui.
• ·        
  The movie is set along the Himachal-Tibet
  border. It deals with distress migration.

• ·        
  Ehsaas-e-Kashmir: a concert organised by
  German Embassy to raise funds for the Valley
• ·        
  German Embassy of India on 23 September 2014
  organised a concert for Kashmir named Ehsaas-e-Kashmir to show solidarity with
  the people of Kashmir and raise funds for rehabilitation and relief work of
  Kashmir’s who were affected by the floods.
• ·        
  The concert was organsied at the residence of
  German Ambassador to India, Michael Steiner. The performers of the concert were
  Kashmiri musicians Bhajan Sopori and Abhay Sopori along with their team. The
  music presented had Sufi elements and was mixed with a bit of folk.
• ·        
  Apart from this, the German Embassy had given
  25 lakh rupees for basic healthcare in Kashmir in cooperation with German
  doctors, who are working in the region as a part of an NGO. The Embassy has
  also set up a special bank account for those who wish to donate.

• ·        
  Govind Mishra, the renowned Hindi author was
  given the Saraswati Samman in New Delhi on 23 September 2014. He was given the
  Samman by Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh for his novel Dhool Paudhon Par
  that was published in 2008.
• ·        
  Govind Mishra is the second Hindi author to
  be conferred with this honour after Harivansh Rai Bachchan in 1991 for his
  autobiography in four volumes in Hindi.
• ·        
  The KK Birla Foundation has instituted three
  awards in the field of literature. These are Saraswati Samman, Vyas Samman (for
  Hindi) and Bihari Puraskar (for Hindi and Rajasthani writers of Rajasthan).
• ·        
  On 2 August 2013 the Saraswati Samman 2012
  was given to Sugathakumari, the Malayalam poetess for Manalezhuthu (the
  Writings on the Sand), a collection of poems in Malayalam.

• ·        
  The Supreme Court of India on 24 September
  2014 formed a five member committee to evaluate the damage caused by
  devastating floods in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) in September 2014.
• ·        
  The 5-member committee will comprise a senior
  Registrar of J & K High Court posted at Srinagar, Secretary of the J&K
  Department of Revenue, Relief and Rehabilitation, a nominee of the central
  government and the presidents of the bar associations of Sringar and Jammu
  regions.
• ·        
  The committee will assess the ground
  situation in J&K after floods and submit the report to the SC within two
  weeks. The interim report of the committee will also be submitted to the
  J&K High Court
• ·        
  The committee was formed by SC bench headed
  by Chief Justice RM Lodha while hearing the J&K government’s counsel on
  J&K floods.

• ·        
  Airports Authority of India (AAI)  on 23 September 2014 signed  a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) agreement
  with the  US Trade & Development
  Agency (USTDA).
• ·        
  The agreement was signed for the development
  of Aviation Security Equipment Testing and Evaluation Programme. This will
  enable AAI and Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) to create clear
  standards, specifications and testing procedures in accordance with the Indian standards
  of aviation security.
• ·        
  The whole procedure will be in alignment with
  international practices for three types of aviation security equipment. These
  three equipment are designed to scan carry-on luggage, checked baggage and
  passengers.

• ·        
  Mahendra Mohan Gupta, Managing Editor of
  Hindi daily Jagran, and Hormusji N Cama, Managing Director of Bombay Samachar,
  were today unanimously elected Chairman and Vice-Chairman, respectively of the
  Press Trust of India.
• ·        
  Gupta, who is also the Chairman and Managing
  Director of Jagran Prakashan that publishes 34 editions of the daily besides
  other publications in Hindi, Urdu, English, Gujarati and Punjabi, succeeds K N
  Shanth Kumar of Deccan Herald.
• ·        
  He and Cama, whose daily is the oldest
  continuously published newspaper in India from 1855, were elected unanimously
  at a meeting of the PTI board following the company’s 66th AGM here.
• ·        
  Besides having served a six-year term as a
  member of the Rajya Sabha, Gupta has formerly been President of the Indian
  Newspaper Society (INS), Indian Language Newspapers Association (ILNA) and
  Chairman of the news agency UNI. He has also been a member of the Press Council
  of India.

• ·        
  Swedish furniture retailer Ikea has signed up
  with the Telangana Government to set up a retail store in Hyderabad.
• ·        
  The MoU for establishing its store in the
  State was signed by CEO Juvencio Maeztu and Pradeep Chandra, Special Chief
  Secretary Industries, Government of Telangana, today in the presence of Chief
  Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao.
• ·        
  Ikea is one of the world’s largest
  international furniture, household goods and textiles retail companies
  headquartered in Sweden. It was one of the first companies in India to be
  allowed 100 per cent FDI in retail. It plans to open a number of stores in India
  with the first store in Hyderabad.
• ·        
  The Ikea retail outlets have a standard
  design and each location entails an investment of $100 million (Rs 500-600
  crore). It also promotes backward integration of supplier linkages, seen to
  have tremendous economic impact to the State.
• ·        
  Assuring all necessary support to Ikea, the
  Chief Minister suggested to the Ikea representatives that they tie up with
  artisans in Telangana such as Nirmal, Silver Filigri, Pembarti and so on for
  their furniture as add-on things.

• ·        
  The Union government on 23 September 2014
  appointed Debroy Panel to suggest ways for restructuring the Railway Board. The
  Panel has been tasked to suggest measures to reorganize the Railway Board and
  its departments so that policy making is separated from day-to-day operations.
• ·        
  The Panel would submit its report till the
  end of 2015. The seven-member panel will be headed by economist Bibek Debroy.
• ·        
  The other members are former cabinet
  secretary K M Chandrasekhar, Gusharan Das, former CMD of P&G, Ravi Narain,
  former MD of National Stock Exchange and Partha Mukhopadhyay, Senior Fellow of
  Centre for Policy Research, as other members.

• ·        
  Edward Snowden has been selected among the
  winners of the Right Livelihood Award, also known as the “alternative Nobel,”
  for his disclosures of top secret surveillance programs.
• ·        
  The award foundation on Wednesday said the
  former National Security Agency contractor splits the honorary portion of the
  prize with Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger.
• ·        
  The 1.5 million kronor ($210,000) cash award
  is shared by Pakistani human rights activist Asma Jahangir, Basil Fernando of
  the Asian Human Rights Commission and U.S. environmentalist Bill McKibben.
• ·        
  Award foundation director Ole von Uexkull
  said all winners were invited to the December 1 award ceremony in Stockholm,
  though he added it’s unclear whether Mr. Snowden, who remains exiled in Russia,
  can attend.

• ·        
  UN Climate Change Summit 2014 was held at UN
  headquarters in New York on 23 September 2014 to put the planet on course towards
  reversing global warming.
• ·        
  The purpose of the 2014 Climate Summit was to
  raise political momentum for a meaningful universal climate agreement in Paris
  in 2015. Moreover, it aimed to galvanize transformative action in all countries
  to reduce emissions and build resilience to the adverse impacts of climate
  change.
• ·        
  It is the largest gathering of world leaders
  on climate change after the Copenhagen conference on climate change that ended
  in disarray in 2009. However, absence of leaders of China and India puts the
  cloud over the event.
• ·        
  Hollywood star Leonardo DiCaprio was also
  present on the UN summit on climate change. 
  UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon hosted the summit of all 120 leaders.

• ·        
  The government on Wednesday said that the
  National Sports Development Bill was “ready” and it will be introduced in
  Parliament in the upcoming winter session of the House.
• ·        
  All the National Sports Federations (NSFs)
  accredited to the government need to comply with the stipulations that office
  bearers retire at the age of 70 years and except for the President who is
  allowed three consecutive terms, none of the other office-bearers would be
  eligible to contest a third term immediately after completing two successive
  terms.
• ·        
  IOA had initially objected to age and tenure
  guidelines even as some NSFs have already implemented them.
• ·        
  Sharan made the statement in presence of
  Sports Minister Sarbanand Sonowal, who through his secretaries, made a
  presentation, listing achievements after completing 100 days in the office and
  policies for future.
• ·        
  The government has decided to felicitate on
  October 22 the men’s hockey team that won gold medal in the Tokyo Olympic Games
  in 1964.
• ·        
  The government also announced that it would
  focus on identifying and supporting potential medal prospects for 2016 and 2020
  Olympic Games through Target Olympic Podium (TOP) Scheme.
• ·        
  Under this initiative, the government would
  focus on seven sports — athletics, archery, badminton, boxing, wrestling,
  weightlifting and shooting.
• ·        
  Athletes will be selected after rigorous
  screening and scientific analysis by a High Level Committee under the
  chairmanship of Anurag Thakur.

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