Current Affairs Update – 8th March, 2016

Hello and welcome to ExamPundit. Here are the Important Current Affairs of 8th March, 2016.

• Private lender Yes Bank on
  Tuesday launched an all-women operated bank branch ‘Yes Grace’ on Cunningham
  Road here aimed at offering customised banking solutions to women.
• The new branch, served by eight
  employees currently and with plans to raise the count to 12, will also drive
  for financial literacy, family banking, safety and wellness amongst women.
• Simultaneously on Tuesday, two
  more all-women bank branches were opened in at Kalkaji, New Delhi and Vile
  Parle (E), Mumbai with plans to open more branches in major cities.
• Ravichander said the number of
  Yes Bank branches will go up to 60 by 2018 in Bengaluru and Hyderabad and 1,500
  all over the country by 2020.
• Founded in 2004 after receiving a
  greenfield bank license from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) by Rana Kapoor and
  Ashok Kapoor, the lender’s branch network currently stands at 850 across India.

• Union Minister for Women and
  Child Development Maneka Sanjay Gandhi on 7 March 2016 launched Mahila e-Haat
  portal in New Delhi.
• The Mahila e-Haat portal,
  , is an online marketing platform. It will provide
  access to markets to thousands of women who make products and are spread all
  over the country.

• It is a unique initiative since
  this is the first time that the government will help women to sell products
  online.
• Products & services: It
  allows women entrepreneurs to leverage technology for showcasing products made
  or manufactured or sold by women entrepreneurs. This facility is also available
  to services, like tailoring, also.
• Rahstriya Mahila Kosh (RMK) is
  primarily involved in the creation of the portal and the entire business of
  e-Haat can be handled through mobile phone.
• 3-Stages of women empowerment:
  The launch of Mahila E-Haat is the first stage towards achieving the objective
  of women empowerment.
• In the second stage Mahila E-Haat
  will be integrated with e-commerce portals to provide a larger platform for
  selling and buying.
• In third and final stage, it will
  culminate into Women’s Entrepreneurs Council which will help to expand this
  initiative further and give it an institutional shape.

• Swedish furniture retail giant
  IKEA on Tuesday signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the government
  of Haryana for an investment of Rs 2,000 crore. The company would be opening
  its stores in the state. Its first store is likely to come up in Telangana
  though.
• The company said it would employ
  about 1,000 workers directly and engage around 3,000 more for providing
  services such as furniture assembly, delivery services, among others.       
• The MoU stands for mutual
  commitment from both parties and intends to provide clarity on working methods
  and ensure a legally and ethically compliant business environment. In 2015,
  IKEA had signed MoUs with Karnataka, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra
  to set up stores. 

• Online payment solutions provider
  PayPal has tied up with budget hotel room aggregator OYO Rooms to help it
  source payments from global consumers and allow Indian users to make
  international bookings.
• The companies, however, did not
  provide any financial details.
• PayPal’s technology protects
  merchants such as OYO Rooms against unauthorised transactions and mitigates
  associated risks, he added.
• The partnership with PayPal will
  enable OYO Rooms’ customers to pay for their bookings in Malaysia and other Southeast
  Asian countries, the two companies said in a joint statement.

• Union Finance Minister Arun
  Jaitley on 8 March 2016 announced to withdraw proposal to tax Employee Provident
  Fund (EPF) withdrawals. He announced to withdraw the proposal while clarifying
  NDA government’s stand on the issue in the Lok Sabha.
• He further stated that government
  would also like to comprehensively review EPF tax proposal. However, government
  retained the tax proposal for National Pension Scheme (NPS) withdrawals.
• The proposal was made by the
  Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley while presenting the Union Budget 2016-17
  in the Lok Sabha on 29 February 2016. As per the proposal 60 percent of the amount
  deposited in the EPF account of the employee would be taxable at the time of
  withdrawal, and 40 percent would be tax free. This proposal would have become
  effective from 1 April 2016.
• It also said that if the employee
  re-invested 60 percent of the EPF in an annuity or pension fund then it will
  not be taxed. At present, the entire amount is tax free at the time of
  withdrawal if the employee has completed five years of continuous service.

• The Union Minister of State
  (Independent Charge) of Environment, Forest and Climate Change Prakash
  Javadekar on 5 March 2016 released the list of re-classified industries based
  on pollution levels.
• The new four-colour scheme was
  announced as per the resolution adopted at the two-day State Environment and
  Forest Ministers’ Conference in April 2015.
• The re-classification of
  industries is based on the Pollution Index (PI) scores and the new categories
  are as follows –

1. Industry Category – PI Score – No
   of Industries Covered
2. Red – 60 and Above – 60
3. Orange – 41 to 59 – 83
4. Green – 21 to 40 – 63
5. White – Up to 20 – 36

• Telangana and Maharashtra
  governments have decided to set up an inter-state river water dispute
  resolution board to settle the issues pertaining to the irrigation projects,
  both old and new, being proposed in Godavari basin on both sides.
• Maharashtra Chief Minister
  Devendra Fadnavis and his Telangana counterpart K Chandrasekhara Rao on Tuesday
  signed an agreement in Mumbai for establishing a dispute resolution mechanism
  for the inter-state projects on Godavari.
• The inter-state board, a rare
  step volunteered by two neighboring Indian states, will be headed by one of the
  two chief ministers by rotation.
• The new board will strive to
  resolve the disputes through consultations in line with the river water
  allocations made by the Godavari Water Dispute Tribunal (GWDT) in the past.

• Multinational Field Training
  Exercise (FTX) – Exercise FORCE 18, involving ASEAN Plus countries commenced in
  Pune by displaying true jointmanship and team spirit.
• This is the largest Ground Forces
  Exercise ever conducted on Indian soil and would be conducted from March 2 to
  8, 2016 with themes based on ‘Humanitarian Mine Action’ and ‘Peacekeeping
  Operations’.
• In its first phase, over 28
  foreign trainers were trained by the Indian Army from February 24 and March 1,
  2016. These trainers will form the training backbone for the conduct of
  ‘Exercise FORCE 18’.
• The Indian Army contingent of 40
  soldiers is being led by Lt Col Sophia Qureshi, a Woman Officer from the Corps
  of Signals, who now has the rare distinction of becoming the first woman
  officer to lead an Indian Army training contingent in such a large
  multinational exercise.
• The officer also happens to be
  the only Woman Officer Contingent Commander amongst all other ASEAN Plus
  contingents present for the exercise.

• On June 18, India will in all
  likelihood get its first women fighter pilots.
• Bhawna Kanth, Avani Chaturvedi
  and Mohana Singh are likely to create history as India’s first women fighter
  pilots if they put on the wings and are inducted into the IAF fighter stream.
  Who among the three, or all of them, make the final cut depends on them clearing
  the advanced stage training.
• This was announced by the Chief
  of the Indian Air Force Air Chief Marshal (ACM) Arup Raha on Tuesday while
  speaking on the occasion of the International Women’s Day.

• International Women’s Day was
  observed across the world on 8 March 2016. This year’s theme for the Day is
  “Planet 50-50 by 2030: Step It Up for Gender Equality”. The campaign theme for
  the day is #PledgeForParity.
• United Nations observance and the
  idea of this theme reflect on how to accelerate the 2030 Agenda, building
  momentum for the effective implementation of the new Sustainable Development
  Goals.

• Former world number one Maria
  Sharapova on 7 March 2016 in a press-conference at Los Angeles announced that
  she failed a drug test at the Australian Open. Due to this failure, she was
  provisionally suspended from Tennis.
• The International Tennis
  Federation said Sharapova, a five time Grand Slam champion, is provisionally
  suspended from 12 March 2016 pending further action. She was charged on 2 March
  2016 with an Anti-Doping Rule Violation after testing positive for meldonium.
• The 28-year-old Russian star tested
  positive for meldonium, a substance, she has been taking since 2006 for health
  issues. World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) on 1 January 2016 included meldonium in
  its forbidden list.

• The Patna Pirates on 5 March 2016
  defeated U Mumba 31-28 to lift their maiden Pro Kabaddi League trophy in the
  final played in New Delhi.
• Rohit Kumar of Patna Pirates was
  awarded Best Raider and Mohit Chillar of U Mumba was announced the Best
  Defender of the Match.
• U Mumba’s Rishank Devadiga
  finished the season as the Most Successful Raider with 106 points.

• Australian golfer Adam Scott on 6
  March 2016 won the 2016 WGC-Cadillac Championship at Doral, Florida, U.S.
• Scott recovered from two double
  bogeys in his first five holes with six birdies the rest of the round to
  prevail by one stroke over United States’ Bubba Watson.
• The victory was Scott’s second
  consecutive win on the PGA Tour, having won The Honda Classic in February 2016.

• The US and South Korean troops on
  7 March 2016 began their largest ever military exercises off the coast of the
  Korean peninsula. The bilateral exercises come just days after the UN passed
  new sanctions against Pyongyang, North Korea following its recent nuclear test
  and rocket launch.
• The 8-week long drill will
  involve about 300000 South Korean troops and 15000 US personnel. These are
  being conducted near the demilitarized zone separating the two Koreas and off
  the eastern coast of South Korea.
• Drills will include ground, air,
  naval and Special Operations components apart from the computer-simulated
  training.

• International Labour Organization
  (ILO) on 8 March 2016 released a report titled Women at Work: Trends 2016. The
  Women at Work report provides the latest ILO data on women’s position in labour
  markets and examines the factors behind these trends and explores the policy
  drivers for transformative change.
• The report which was released on
  International Women’s Day says that gender equality in the workplace remains
  elusive. It finds millions of women worldwide are not getting the same kind of
  quality, well-paying jobs as men.
• New data of 178 countries present
  a gloomy picture of the current state of working women. The report shows the
  gender gap in employment, wages and social protection has changed little in 20
  years.
• If female employment rates were
  to match male rates, the GDP of India would increase by 27 per cent.
• In India, the minimum wages for
  domestic workers is lower than that of the cleaning workers, who are the lowest
  paid. Despite the low minimum wage set for domestic workers in India and other
  countries that were studied, the compliance rate is less than 50 per cent in
  the majority of the countries.
• In India, Estonia, Japan, Mexico,
  Portugal, Republic of Korea and Turkey, women devote more than three times as
  much time to unpaid care work as men do.

• Amrita Patel, chairman of Charutar
  Arogya Mandal and former chairman of the National Dairy Development Board, on 3
  March 2016 was conferred with the prestigious Mahindra Samriddhi Krishi
  Shiromani Samman (Lifetime Achievement Award) in Delhi.
• Radha Mohan Singh, Union Minister
  of Agriculture, presented the award to Patel for her contribution that made a
  difference in the field of agriculture to increase productivity and rural
  prosperity.
• Instituted in 2011, the Mahindra
  Samriddhi India Agri Awards are bestowed upon the farmers and institutions to
  recognize their noteworthy and purposeful contribution to the field of
  agriculture.

• Popular Malayalam actor and folk
  singer Kalabhavan Mani passed away on 6 March 2016 in Kochi. He was 45.
• The winner of National Special
  Jury Award in 2000 for his performance in Malayalam film Vasanthiyum Lakshmiyum
  Pinne Njaanum, Mani died allegedly because of methyl alcohol consumption.

Regards

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