Current Affairs Update – 24th June, 2015

Hello and welcome to ExamPundit. Here are the Important Current Affairs of 24th June, 2015. These are important for the upcoming SBI PO Mains 2015 and RBI Assistant 2015.

• Union Ministry of Finance on 22 June 2015 issued draft
  proposals for facilitating electronic transactions in the country.
  E-transactions mean authorization of transfer of money through electronic means
  and flow of funds directly from one account to another.
• The goal of the proposed policy is to provide the necessary
  incentives to use E-transactions to replace the use of cash – either in
  government transactions, or in regular commerce over a period of time through
  policy intervention.

• It aims to build a transactions history to enable improved
  credit access and financial inclusion
• It seeks to encourage Government, Corporates, Institutions
  and merchant establishments to facilitate non cash payments
• Utility service providers could be advised to give a
  discount to users for small ticket payments through E-payments, on the lines of
  BSNL, which provides an incentive of 1 percent of the billed amount if the
  payment is done through electronic mode
• It envisages adoption national E-payment gateway PayGov
  India for collection of revenue, fee, penalties etc.
• Tax benefits could be provided to merchants for accepting
  electronic payments, e.g. an appropriate tax rebate can be extended to a
  merchant if at least say 50% value of the transactions is through electronic
  means.
• It proposes to levy a nominal cash handling charge on
  transactions greater than a specified level.
• It also proposes to mandate that settling of high value
  transactions of, say, more than 1 lakh rupees could only be done through
  electronic means.
• To facilitate high value transactions by a credit
  cardholder, the ceiling of 2 lakhs rupees could be increased to say 5 lakhs
  rupees or more.
• It proposes to improve broad band connectivity to enable
  mobile based payments on a wider scale

• The Board of Financial Benchmarks India Private Limited
  (FBIL) on 22 June 2015 decided to adopt FBIL overnight Mumbai Inter-Bank Offer
  Rate (MIBOR) from 22 July 2015.
• FBIL overnight MIBOR is a new method to set the overnight
  interest rate benchmark that will be based on traded levels instead of
  contributions from market participants.

• The new overnight MIBOR will be administered by the FBIL
  Board which will replace National Stock Exchange (NSE) and Thomson Reuters in
  administering the overnight rate benchmark.
• The new benchmark rate will replace the current MIBOR
  benchmark interest rate administered by FIMMDA-NSE (Fixed Income Money Market
  and Derivatives Association of India – National Stock Exchange).
• It will be based on trade-weighted call money transactions
  conducted on Clearing Corporation of India’s (CCIL) trading platform between 9
  am – 10 am.
• Clearing Corporation of India (CCIL) will be the calculating
  agent for the new benchmark rate.
• It will be in contrast to the current MIBOR, which is
  compiled by polling market participants and is used to benchmark overnight
  pricing of call money rate in India.
• It reflects Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) response to the
  rigging controversy that affected the London interbank offered rate (LIBOR) in
  2014.

• Online retailer Amazon today joined hands with Best Deal TV,
  a home shopping channel co-founded by Bollywood actor Akshay Kumar to expand
  foothold in fashion and apparels segment in India.
• Under the partnership, Amazon will sell fashion and
  lifestyle products backed by Bollywood celebrities including Shilpa Shetty,
  Akshay Kumar, Farah Khan and Bipasha Basu besides other items from Best Deal
  TV.
• Best Deal TV, India’s first celebrity shopping channel is
  co-founded by Akshay and Raj Kundra, husband of actor Shilpa Shetty.
• Exuding confidence that the partnership will help in
  expanding Amazon’s customer base, he said when celebrities lend their name
  there is an assurance of quality to customers.

• The Centre today launched the country’s first modernised
  anganwadi centre (AWC) at Hasanpur village here, which will be replicated at
  4,000 other places and is likely to change the face of government’s 40-year-old
  children and women-oriented scheme.
• The Sonepat facility, built in partnership with private
  mining firm Vedanta at a cost of Rs 12 lakh, is part of Central government’s
  Nand-Ghar Yojna that aims at transforming the anganwadis centers, which
  accommodate around 50 children in daytime everyday, by making them equipped
  with latest facilities.
• The Nand-Ghar Centers, involving an area of 780 square feet,
  will be constructed by state-run National Buildings Construction Corporation
  Limited, as per the guidance of the WCD Ministry. The cost of construction will
  be shared by the Ministry and Vedanta, while the land will be provided by the
  Gram Panchayat. The building will have a singular design.
• Based on the concept of ‘Building as a Learning Aid’ piloted
  by UNICEF, the centers would attempt to increase attendance of children. These
  will be in addition to the existing anganwadi model of the Ministry for
  efficient delivery of Integrated Child Development Scheme.
• Under the scheme, supplementary nutrition is provided to
  children in the age group of 0-6 years and to pregnant/lactating mothers with
  main objective to fight the problem of malnutrition.

• Uttar Pradesh Government on 23 June 2015 renamed the Lucknow
  Prani Udyan, popularly known as Lucknow zoo, as Nawab Wajid Ali Shah Prani
  Udyan, Lucknow. 
• Shah was the last Nawab of Oudh under whom the province was
  annexed by the British under the policy of Doctrine of Lapse in 1856. Later,
  Shah was exiled to Matia Birj in Bengal.
• Lucknow Zoo established in 1921 and named after England’s
  Prince of Wales as Prince of Wales Zoological Gardens was renamed as Lucknow
  Prani Udyan on 4 June 2001.
• Since independence, it is the first incident in which a
  monument was named after a Nawab of Oudh or Avadh.

• Trinity College of Engineering in Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala
  in the fourth week of June 2015 launched the Trinity Adrak Student Satellite
  (TASSAT) building project. The student satellite project is scheduled for
  completion by 2018.
• The satellite was named so because the funding for the
  ambitious initiative came from an Oman-based company called Al Adrak.
• As part of the TASSAT project CubeSats and NanoSats at a
  regular pace will be built. The former is a small satellite with a mass of less
  than 1.33 kilograms and a volume of 1 liter. It is crafted using off-the-shelf
  materials. The latter is a satellite featuring a mass ratio anywhere between 1
  to 10 kilograms.

• To aid National Mission for Clean Ganga, the Union Water
  Resources Minister Uma Bharti on 23 June 2015 launched Bhuvan Ganga mobile
  application and a web portal.
• The app will allow people to upload pictures of pollution
  sources of river Ganga for further action by the concerned authorities.
• The application and web portal was launched after a
  Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between the National Mission for
  Clean Ganga and the National Remote Sensing Centre (ISRO).

• To promote Kerala’s tourism departments Visit Kerala Scheme,
  Kerala government on 23 June 2015 appointed tennis legend Steffi Graf as
  Ayurveda brand ambassador.
• Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said that the decision
  to appoint Graf as Brand Ambassador was taken by the state Cabinet.
• An agreement in this regard was reached between the state’s
  tourism department and former World number one tennis player of Germany, who
  had bagged 22 Grand slam single titles, which is second only to 24 singles
  titles won by Margaret Court of Australia.

• Three scholars have been awarded the prestigious Sahitya
  Akademi ‘Bhasha Samman’ for contribution to classical and medieval literature
  in various languages.
• K Meenakshi Sundaram has been selected for contributions to
  Classical and Medieval Literature (Southern) for year 2013 while Acharya
  Munishwar Jha has been recognised for Classical and Medieval Literature
  (Eastern) for the year 2014, the Akademi said in a statement today.
• Charu Chandra Pande and Mathuradutt Mathpal have been
  jointly recognised for their work towards the enrichment of Kumauni, a language
  not recognised by the Akademi.
• The ‘Bhasha Samman’ carries a cash prize of Rs 1,00,000, an
  inscribed copper plaque and a citation. In case of joint winners, the prize
  money is equally shared between the winners.
• The award will be presented to them by the President of the
  Sahitya Akademi at a special function to be held later.

• Benni Joseph Mavelil, a UK-based philanthropist, was on 21
  June 2015 selected for the VK Krishna Menon Award in recognition of his
  outstanding professional and altruistic achievements, contributions and
  services to the community and wider multicultural society.
• Mavelil, President of the UK Knanaya Catholic Community,
  will receive the award at a function hosted by the VK Krishna Menon Institute
  in 2015.
• At present, Mavelil is a registered Manager and Director for
  the Ideal Fostering in Birmingham, United Kingdom. He is originally from
  Koodalloor, Kerala and has been living and working in the UK for over a decade.
  He graduated from St. Stephens College of Delhi.

• Three Indians on 22 June 2015 won the inaugural Queen’s
  Young Leaders Award in the UK for taking the lead in transforming the lives of
  others and making a lasting difference in their communities. These winners are
  Ashwini Angadi, Devika Malik and Akshay Jadhao.
• These three Indians are among 60 others who received the
  Queen’s Young Leaders award from the British monarch at a gala ceremony in
  Buckingham Palace. The first 60 recipients of the Queen’s Young Leaders Award
  will meet the Queen Elizabeth II and David Cameron.
• Ashwini Angadi was awarded for using her own experiences as
  a visually impaired student to lobby for more braille and audio books. She runs
  Belaku Academy in Bengaluru, offering education to disabled students from rural
  areas.

• Inderjit Singh and Jinson Johnson of India on 23 June 2015
  bagged gold at the first leg of the Asian Athletics Grand Prix in Bangkok,
  Thailand.
• Inderjit won the gold in Shot Put by throwing 19.83 meters
  while Johnson won the gold in 800 meter event with a time of 1:48.52.
• This was Inderjeet’s second gold in an international event
  in June 2015, having won the shot put event at the Asian Championships in
  Wuhan, China on 3 June 2015.

• The Indian Railway Team on 23 June 2015 won the World
  Railway Championship 2015 in Tennis and Volleyball.
• In the Tennis (World Railways) Championship 2015, Indian
  Railway Team defeated France by a margin of 3-1 in the finals and won USIC
  Tennis Championship 2015. It was held at Nuremberg, Germany from 31 May 2015 to
  6 June 2015.
• In the Volleyball (World Railways) Championship 2015, Indian
  Railway Team defeated Russian team in the finals and won USIC Volleyball
  Championship 2015. It was held at Gomel, Belarus from 10 June 2015 to 17 June
  2015.

• Book titled Red Tape to Red Carpet… and then some authored
  by Gina Rinehart was released on 23 June 2015. Rinehart is Chairperson of the
  Australian mining company Hancock Prospecting Group.
• The book highlights the industry of Red Tape which thrives
  on doubt and Red Carpet which is built on trust.
• The book was released by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in New
  Delhi in presence of Australian Minister for trade and investment, Andrew Robb,
  and former Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating.

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• James Horner, the two-time Oscar-winning composer, died on
  23 June 2015 in a plane crash in California, United States. He was 61. He was
  an accomplished concert hall composer and later he moved into writing film
  scores.
• His first major movie score was in Star Trek II: The Wrath
  of Khan (1982) film. He had also composed for the Avatar and Titanic, both are
  highest-grossing films of all time. Till date, he has 95 soundtrack and 158
  composes to his credits which includes music of over 100 films.
• He was recognised for his work on two other Best Pictures-
  Braveheart and A Beautiful Mind. He also received nominations for An American
  Tail, Field of Dreams, Apollo 13 and House of Sand and Fog.

Regards

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