Current Affairs Update – 3rd July, 2015

Hello and welcome to ExamPundit. Here are the Important Current Affairs of 3rd July, 2015. These are very important for the SBI PO Mains Exam 2015 and RBI Assistant 2015.

• India’s GDP crossed the
  $2-trillion mark in 2014, according to data released by the World Bank in
  Washington late on Wednesday. After taking 60 years to reach the $1-trillion
  mark, India added the next trillion in just seven years.
• The World Bank data also show
  that India’s gross national income per person rose to $1,610 (around Rs. 1
  lakh) a year during 2014 from $1,560 the previous year. An analysis by The
  Hindu found that it would take India a little more than a decade to rise from
  its current ‘lower middle income’ category to the ‘upper middle income’ level.
• India’s growth rate, at 7.4 per
  cent in 2014, makes it the fastest growing major economy along with China’s,
  which is a whopping $10.4 trillion in size. The Indian economy, at $2.06
  trillion, has almost doubled in size since the financial crisis hit the country
  in 2008, and has more than quadrupled from the start of this millennium.
• Despite its increase in per
  capita gross national income (GNI), India has remained in the ‘lower middle
  income’ category ($1,046-$4,125). Using the World Bank’s data, The Hindu
  extrapolated from India’s average annual growth rate in per capita GNI over the
  last decade — of 8.9 per cent — and found that it would become an ‘upper middle
  income’ country ($4,126-$12,735) in 2026, a little more than a decade from now.
  This will put it in the category China occupies now.
• China, however, with a per capita
  GNI of $7,380 and an average annual growth in this parameter of 15.6 per cent,
  will leave the ‘upper middle income’ category by 2018 to become a ‘high income’
  country like the U.S., the U.K., Germany and Japan. It will take India till
  2039 to reach that level, at the assumed growth rate.

• Country’s largest lender State
  Bank of India on Friday launched an initiative to provide doorstep services and
  expedite home loans application process.
• The initiative known as ‘Project
  Tatkal’ will help get the loan within 10 days after receipt of application form
  and relevant supporting documents, the bank said in a release.
• “It will bring down the average
  time taken for delivery of home loan to within 10 days from the date of receipt
  of completed home loan application form and relevant supporting documents from
  the customer,” the release said.
• The implementation will be done
  at large centres with sizable home loan business.
• The bank has also recently
  introduced an online customer acquisition solution (OCAS) for instant
  e-approval of home loan applications.
• The bank has over three million
  home loan customers with a portfolio of over Rs. 16,60,000 crore.

• Kotak Mahindra Bank’s proposal to
  raise foreign investment limit in the lender to 55 per cent was cleared by the
  Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) today.
• After deferring a decision on the
  proposal in the past, the FIPB cleared the application during today’s meeting
  after the Department of Financial Services gave its opinion on the matter,
  sources said.
• FIPB is headed by Finance
  Secretary Rajiv Mehrishi.
• Kotak Bank had approached the
  Board after the Reserve Bank barred overseas investments in it as foreign
  shareholding hit the permissible threshold following the merger of ING Vysya
  Bank with Kotak Bank.
• Investments from FIIs, FPIs and
  foreign banks had reached 48.55 per cent in the merged entity.
• The clearance comes days after
  Kotak Bank’s shareholders gave approval for issuance of bonus shares.

• European major Airbus teamed up
  with diversified Mahindra Group, to establish a joint venture for manufacturing
  helicopters for the Indian Armed Forces.
• The joint venture between Airbus
  Helicopters and Mahindra Defence aims to become the first private Indian
  helicopter manufacturer under the ‘Make in India’ initiative, the companies
  said.
• To be set up in the coming
  months, the venture would produce helicopters to meet the country’s military
  requirements.
• According to the statement, the
  venture would create hundreds of high-tech jobs locally and lead to a flow of
  cutting edge technologies to India, should it be selected in the governmental
  helicopter tenders.
• Guillaume Faury, Airbus
  Helicopters President & CEO, said the joint venture would be dedicated to
  supply the Indian Armed Forces with Made-in-India, state of the art helicopters
  of high reliability, quality and safety standard based on combat-proven
  platforms
• Mahindra Defence is a Mahindra
  Group subsidiary and Airbus Helicopters is a division of Airbus Group.

• Leading mobile wallet MobiKwik on
  2 July 2015 tied up with books and stationary retailer WHSmith India to enable
  offline shopping at all its retail stores.
• With this tie-up, WHSmith India
  stores will also serve as MobiKwik Nodes where users can load money on their
  MobiKwik wallet.
• MobiKwik targets to create
  India’s largest independent payments network with 100 million digitally paying
  users and two lakh retailers by the end of 2015.

• Around 73 per cent of households
  in India are rural, according to the Socio Economic and Caste Census (SECC)
  data released by the government on Friday. Of these, 18.5 per cent and
  scheduled caste households and 11 per cent belong to the scheduled tribe
  category.
• The SECC, jointly released by
  Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Rural Development, Panchayati Raj and
  Drinking Water Supply and Sanitation Minister Chaudhary Birendra Singh, also
  shows that the bulk of India’s rural households subsist on very low incomes.
  According to the data, 74.5% of rural households have an income of the highest
  earning member below Rs. 5000 per month. Only 8.3% of rural households have an
  income of the highest earning member above Rs. 10,000 per month.
• Only the provisional data
  pertaining to rural India was released on Friday. The Census also provides data
  on households regarding various aspects of their socio-economic status-housing,
  land-holding/landlessness, educational status, status of women, the
  differently-abled, occupation, possession of assets, SC/ST households, incomes,
  etc.
• The data also shows the
  hand-to-mouth existence of large parts of rural India. For example, over 50 per
  cent of rural households get the bulk of their incomes from manual casual
  labour and 56 per cent do not own any land.

• India in June 2015 launched
  online registration system named eMigrate system (www.emigrate.gov.in) for
  foreign employers (FEs) who wants to recruit Indian workers, including nurses.
  Under the system, FEs will have to register in the eMigrate system.
• The filled registration
  application will be vetted by the Indian mission.
• The new system will be
  implemented in phases.

• It will allow FEs to raise their
  demand for Indian workers and seek a permit to recruit directly or select
  Recruiting Agents (RAs) in online manner.
• Such FEs will have to declare the
  terms and conditions of employment of each category of the job at the time of
  applying for the demand registration.
• The declared terms and conditions
  of employment will act as a specimen contract and will form the part of
  employment contract at the time of actual recruitment.

• FEs recruiting more than 150
  Indian workers are required to register online with immediate effect in order
  to raise demand and seek a permit to recruit directly or select RAs.
• FEs recruiting between 50-150
  Indian workers are required to register online before 30 June 2015.
• FEs recruiting between 20-50 Indian
  workers are required to register online before 31 July 2015.
• FEs recruiting less than Indian
  workers are required to register online before 31 August 2015.

• The countrywide Mobile Number
  Portability (MNP) has become a reality today. This means mobile subscribers can
  now keep their existing mobile phone numbers even while shifting between states
  and circles.
• So far, while mobile users could
  retain their existing number when switching service provider, this was possible
  only within the same state or telecom circle. The move lays the first stone for
  the government’s ‘One nation, One number’ plan and is sure to benefit millions
  of people across the country.
• Earlier, the deadline to rollout
  full MNP was May 2, 2015. This was, however, extended by two months after the
  Cellular Operators Association of India asked for an extension from the telecom
  department.
• India is divided into 22 telecom
  service areas or circles.
• With about 3 million intra-circle
  MNP requests every month, more than 157 million subscribers have ported to
  other operators as of April, according to Trai data.

• Now, rag pickers’ services will
  be recognised by the government which has decided to give national award for
  their contribution to keep India clean.
• “There are millions of rag
  pickers in the country. This informal sector has saved the country. They are
  doing a good job and I have decided to recognise their efforts. We will grant
  national award,” Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said at an event on
  waste management in New Delhi.
• The national award, with a cash
  prize of Rs. 1.5 lakh, will be given to three best rag pickers and three
  associations involved in innovation of best practices, he added.
• Stating that rag pickers are
  helping to some extent in handling waste, the Minister pitched for setting up
  of a credible agency like Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) that can guide
  municipal bodies to take measures to address waste management in a scientific
  way.

• The Union Cabinet on 2 July 2015
  approved the institutional framework for the National Skill Development Mission
  2015. The Mission will provide a strong institutional framework at the Centre
  and States for implementation of skilling activities in the country.

• The Mission will have a
  three-tiered, high powered decision making structure.
• The Mission’s Governing Council,
  chaired by the Prime Minister, will provide overall guidance and policy
  direction.
• The Steering Committee, chaired
  by Minister in Charge of Skill Development, will review the Mission’s
  activities in line with the direction set by the Governing Council.
• The Mission Directorate, with
  Secretary, Skill Development as Mission Director, will ensure implementation,
  coordination and convergence of skilling activities across Central
  Ministries/Departments and State Governments.
• The Mission will also run select
  sub-missions in high priority areas.

• Punjab Chief Minister Parkash
  Singh Badal on 2 July 2015 launched the state Portal ePMS (Electronic Projects
  Management System) to fast track infrastructural development. The portal was
  launched during the Digital India week.
• The project was started to
  enhance efficiency, bring transparency, boost the investor confidence, revive
  the investment cycle, eliminate the human interaction and improve the
  communication between industries to Government (B2G), State to Centre (G2G), or
  vice versa (G2B).

• It will fast track infrastructure
  investment stalled projects, both in the public and private sectors, involving
  investment between 100 crore rupees and 1000 crore rupees.
• It will allow submission of a new
  project, editing/updating the projects, reviewing the projects, submission of
  details relating to bottlenecks.
• It will provide various Graphical
  Analysis, Reports and Investment Monitoring module.

• Four Indian-Americans, including
  top US attorney Preet Bharara, are among 38 distinguished personalities who
  have been honoured with this year’s prestigious “Great Immigrants: The
  Pride of America” award.
• Among other Indians honoured with
  the top annual award by the prestigious New York-based Carnegie Corporation are
  Rakesh Khurana, Dean of Harvard College and Marvin Bower Professor of
  Leadership and Development; Madhulika Sikka vice president, executive editor,
  Mic and Abraham Verghese, eminent physician, professor and author.
• The immigrants have been honoured
  for their “vital” contributions to the fabric of the nation and the
  strength of its democracy.
• The 38 immigrants honoured this
  year come from more than 30 countries around the world and represent leadership
  in a wide range of professions.
• Other notable honorees include
  Nobel Prize-winning Biochemist of Israeli origin Arieh Warshel, German-origin
  Nobel Prize-winning Neuroscientist Thomas Sudhof, Pakistani-American
  immigration attorney Rabia Chaudry, Colombian-origin actress Sofia Vergara
  among others.

• The UN Educational, Scientific
  and Cultural Organisation (Unesco), has inducted the Old City of Sana’a to the
  list of World Heritage sites in danger due to the “serious damage” done amidst
  clashes between Shiite Houthi rebels and pro-government forces in Yemen.
• The decision was made on Thursday
  during the 39th session of the World Heritage Committee in Bonn, Germany, while
  the Old Walled City of Shibam in Yemen and the ancient Iraqi city of Hatra were
  also added to the list.
• The committee issued a statement
  voicing its sadness and concern over the destruction and damage that inflicted
  “an Islamic city of great historic and heritage” significance.
• Sana’a, located in a mountainous
  valley 2,200 meters, dates back more than 2,500 years and was an important
  center of Islam thought in the 7th and 8th centuries.
• The Old City of Sana’a, with a
  legacy of 103 mosques, 14 public bathhouses, 6,000 homes built before the 11th
  century and its flagship tower-houses built of rammed earth, was inscribed on the
  World Heritage List in 1986.
• The Old Walled City of Shibam was
  also included in the list of sites in danger due to threats posed by the
  conflict in Yemen.

• Former Indian cricketers
  Hrishikesh Kantikar and Ajay Ratra on 2 July 2015 retired from all forms of
  cricket.
• Kanitkar, a left-handed batsman
  and a right-arm off break bowler, played his last Test match from 2 January to
  4 January 2015 against Australia in Sydney. He played his last ODI on 30
  January 2000 against Australia in Perth.
• Ratra, a right-handed batsman and
  wicketkeeper, played his last Test match from 5 September to 9 September 2002
  against England at the Oval. He played his last ODI on 9 July 2002 against
  England at the Oval.

• K P P Nambiar, founding Chairman
  of Kerala State Electronics Development Corporation Limited (Keltron) died on 1
  July 2015 due to age-related illnesses. He was 86.
• Nambiar is survived by wife
  Umadevi Nambiar, a son and a daughter.

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