GK Power Capsule – OCTOBER 2014 (The Hindu Review) 1. Continuing the effort to fight “persisting inflation” and inflationary pressures, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Raghuram Rajan maintained the policy rates at the current levels in 4 th Monetary Policy. The RBI also retained the growth projection for the current fiscal at 5.5 per cent. Repo Rate 8% (Unchanged) Rev. Repo 7% (Unchanged) CRR 4% (Unchanged) SLR 22% ( Unchanged) MSF 9% (Unchanged) Bank Rate 9% (Unchanged) 2. Rajiv Mehrishi took charge as Union Finance Secretary. He succeeded Arvind Mayaram. 3. Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) candidate Devendra Gangadharrao Fadnavis sworn-in as the Chief Minister of Maharashtra. He is the first BJP candidate to become CM of Maharashtra. 4. First-time legislator from BJP Manohar Lal Khattar , 61, is the 21st Chief Minister of Haryana. 5. Vice President of Zambia Guy Scott was appointed as acting President by the Zambia government. 6. Prasar Bharati CEO Jawhar Sircar was elected Vice-President of Asia Pacific Broadcasting Union in Macau. 7. Surya Prakash was appointed as the Chairman of Prasar Bharti Board for a term of three years. 8. The former Union Minister Jairam Ramesh was designated as the head of Future Earth Engagement Committee, a global research platform panel on sustainable development. 9. Union Government appointed US-based economist Arvind Subramanian as Chief Economic Advisor (CEA) in the Union Finance Ministry for three years. 10. Khaled Bahah was appointed as Prime Minister of Yemen. 11. Bollywood actor, director and producer Aamir Khan was appointed as the Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF in South Asia. Aamir Khan will focus on supporting child nutrition to end stunting across the region. 12. Kalpana Morparia was appointed as first woman director of Hindustan Unilever Limited. 13. Union Ministry of Civil Aviation approved the appointment of Cramer Ball as Chief Executive Officer of Jet Airways. 14. President Pranab Mukherjee authorised Vigilance Commissioner Rajiv to act as chief of Central Vigilance Commission until the appointment of the Central Vigilance Commissioner. 15. Justice H L Dattu was sworn-in as the 42nd C hief Justice of India. He succeeded Chief Justice RM Lodha. This GK Capsule has been prepared by Career Power Institute Delhi (Formerly Known as Bank Power). This has been prepared on the basis of news and events appea red in The Hindu Newspaper in the month of October 2014. bankersadda | careerpower.in | careeradda.co.in 16. Malala Yousafzai won the 2014 World’s Children Prize after a global vote involving millions of children. 17. Malala Yousafzai was conferred with the 2014 Liberty Medal at the National Constitution Centre in Philadelphia. 18. Congolese gynecologist Denis Mukwege Mukengere won the prestigious Sakharov human rights prize 2014. 19. Australian author Richard Flanagan won Man Booker Prize for his wartime novel The Narrow Road to the Deep North. This was the first year that the Man Booker prize was open to all authors writing in English, regardless of nationality. 20. All India National Unity Council honoured poet- diplomat Abhay K with Asia-Pacific Excellence Award. 21. Noted lyricist Sameer was honoured with the National Kishore Kumar Award for 2012-13. 22. The UK government announced the inaugural Dadabhai Naoroji Awards to honour individuals who have worked to strengthen the UK-India relationship over the years. 23. Dr. Raghuram Rajan, Governor of Reserve Bank of India was conferred with Euromoney’s Central Bank Governor of the Year Award 2014 in Washington. 24. Indian-origin Singaporean poet and writer KTM Iqbal was named for the 2014 Cultural Medallion, the highest cultural award of Singapore. 25. An eminent Indian scientist Dr Sanjaya Rajaram received the World Food Prize 2014 for his scientific research that led to a prodigious increase in world wheat production. 26. French economist Jean Tirole won the 2014 Nobel Prize for Economics . Jean Tirole was awarded for his analysis of market power and regulation. 27. French author Patrick Modiano won the Nobel Prize for literature for the year 2014. The Nobel Prize for Literature is granted by the Swedish Academy. 28. Pakistani child education activist Malala Yousafzai and Indian child rights activist Kailash Satyarthi won the Nobel Peace Prize 2014. 29. Kailash Satyarthi is an Indian childrens rights activist born in Vidisha, Madhya Pradesh. His organization Bachpan Bachao Andolan has been active in the Indian movement against child labour. 30. Malala Yousafzai is a Pakistani school pupil, education activist who is known for her activism for right to education for women. 31. Eric Betzig, Stefan W Hell and William E. Moerner won the 2014 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for the development of super-resolved fluorescence microscopy. 32. Three Japanese-born researchers Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamu ra won the 2014 Nobel Prize for Physics. They were honoured for inventing efficient blue Light- Emitting Diodes (LED) lamps that worked as a bright and energy-saving white light sources. 33. Saiyid Hamid was conferred with Sir Ross Masood Lifetime Achievement Award 2014 for Excellence in Leadership, Education, community & Public Service. 34. The Nobel Assembly decided to award the 2014 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine to John O ́Keefe, May-Britt Moser and Edvard I. Moser. The award was given for their discoveries of cells that constitute a GPS in the brain. 35. The President of India Pranab Mukherjee presented the Lal Bahadur Sh astri National Award 2014 to Dr Apathukatha Sivathanu Pillai. 36. Former New York Mayor and philanthropist billionaire Michael Rubens Bloomberg was granted an honorary knighthood from Queen Elizabeth II in Britain. 37. Anoop Jain won 2014 Waislitz Global Citizen Award. 38. Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan received Global Diversity Award 2014 at the Britain’s House of Commons. 39. Bollywood legend Amitabh Bachchan was recently in news as he was summoned by a US Federal Court in Los Angeles for allegedly bankersadda | careerpower.in | careeradda.co.in instigating violence against the Sikh community during the November 1984 riots. 40. Manjul Bhargava was recently in news because he won the Fields Medal awards for the year 2014. The Fields Medal is also known as the Nobel Prize of Mathematics. 41. Google CEO Larry Page appointed Sundar Pichai as new Product Chief of Google. 42. Alan Eustace, a senior Google vice-president broke the world altitude record for highest free- fall parachute jump from an altitude of 135908- feet. Eustace broke the world altitude record of parachute jump set by Austrian Felix Baumgartner. 43. Five year old Indian boy Harshit Saumitra became the youngest person to reach the Everest Base Camp. 44. Sadiq, a 10-year old terminally ill boy became Hyderabad Police Commissioner for a day. 45. J Jayalalithaa, the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu was found guilty in the disproportionate assets case by the Special Court in Bangalore. The Court pronounced a jail term of 4 years and fined 100 crore rupees to her in 18-year-old 66.65 crore rupees disproportionate assets case. 46. Warren M Anderson, the former Chairman of Union Carbide Corporation who was blamed for the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy died. 47. South Africas football captain and goalkeeper Senzo Meyiwa died after being shot. 48. Noted freedom fighter Jagdish Sharan Pande died after prolonged illness. 49. Founder of social site Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg arrived in New Delhi on a two day visit. 50. President Pranab Mukherjee became the first Indian head of state to visit Norway and first president to cross the Arctic Circle. 51. India became the world’s fourth largest steel producer by delivering 62.41 Million Tonnes (MT) output from January 2014 to September 2014. India was preceded by China, Japan and the United States. 52. ISRO Chairman K Radhakrishnan announced that the Indian space agency will launch GSLV Mark- III within next 45 days. 53. Fourth International Counter-Piracy Conference was held in Dubai. The theme of the Conference was Securing State Recovery: Sustaining Momentum at Sea, Confronting Instability Land. 54. President Pranab Mukherjee released a commemorative postage stamp on Sri Lankan Buddhist monk Anagarika Dharmapala . 55. Srilankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa flagged off Yal Devi Express from Palai after 25 years. The train will be extended to Jaffna. The India Railway Construction International has now completed the restoration of the railway lines from Palai to Jaffna. 56. Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the countrymen over radio for the first time in his programme Mann Ki Baat. 57. Tropical Storm Trudy struck Mexico. 58. Hudhud is a cyclone which struck Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh. Hudhud name derives from the Hoopoe bird, a colorful bird found across Afro-Eurasia suggested by Oman. 59. The Antares, an unmanned cargo rocket carrying supplies to the International Space Station exploded just seconds after the launch. 60. A stampede occurred at Gandhi Maidan in Patna during the Ram Leela ceremony on 3 October 2014. In the stampede at least 32 people were killed and about 15 were injured. 61. The novel Half Girlfriend authored by Chetan Bhagat was released. 62. Biography of Allama Muhammad Iqbal was released. The biography is titled Iqbal: The Life o f a Poet, Philosopher and Politician. The biography is written by Zafar Anjum, the editor of Kitaab. 63. The Narrow Road to the Deep North is a novel of Australian author Richard Flanagan . The book was in news after it won the 2014 Man Booker Prize. 64. The book on Rajesh Khanna Dark Star: The Loneliness of Being Rajesh Khanna was released. The book was written by Gautam Chintamani. 65. A book titled Final Test: Exit Sachin Tendulkar authored by writer-journalist Dilip D’Souza was released on 15 October 2014. The book has been bankersadda | careerpower.in | careeradda.co.in 86. Narendra Modi government named three — Pradip Burman, formerly of Dabur group, Goa- based mining firm Timblo Pvt Ltd and its five directors and Rajkot-based bullion trader Pankaj Chimanlal Lodhiya — against whom prosecution has been launched. 87. A significant oil discovery has been made near Ahmedabad in the Cambay basin that may be the biggest onland find this year. 88. Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted a tea party for all NDA MPs, the first such event after the BJP - led alliance stormed to power in May. 89. In a complete U-turn from its earlier stand, the Home Ministry has come out in full support of the Aadhaar scheme saying it will facilitate anytime, anywhere, anyhow authentication to its beneficiaries. 90. Clocking the slowest compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of about 6.9% in terms of gross state domestic product (GSDP), Uttar Prades h is the lowest among the traditional BIMARU states (Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and UP) in this regard during the past nine years, that is, during 2004-05 and 2012-13, according to an Assocham study. “Bihar has ranked on top among the BIMARU states registering highest growth rate of 9.3% in GSDP during the aforesaid nine year period followed by Madhya Pradesh (8.8%) and Rajasthan (8.2%) even as India’s overall gross domestic product (GDP) grew at 8% during 2004-05 and 2012-13,” said a study titled ‘Analysis of BIMARU states’, conducted by Assocham. 91. India has opted to buy Israels Spike anti-tank guided missile. India will buy at least 8,000 Spike missiles and more than 300 launchers in a deal worth 32 billion rupees ($525 million). 92. The Narendra Modi government is aiming to improve Indias ranking in ease of doing business index to 50th position in the next two years from the current 134th. 93. Unfazed by Chinas objections to development of border areas, Government announced setting up of 54 new border outposts and a Rs 175 crore package for beefing up the infrastructure along the border in Arunachal Pradesh. 94. Chinas economy is likely to grow by 7.4 percent this year, slightly below the governments target, and expand 7 percent in 2015. 95. The Uttar Pradesh government has decided to develop Allahabad as an integrated industrial township, on the lines of Noida and Greater Noida. 96. Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS) has launched a mobile app on Android platform for train enquiry. 97. The Narendra Modi government has decided to create a fund starting with Rs 930 Cr to help Indian industry acquire cutting-edge technology in the capital goods sector and finance new production units of capital-intensive heavy equipment. 98. The government proposes to implement the Goods and Services Tax (GST) from April 1, 2016. 99. Airports at Delhi and Mumbai would be developed as seamless hubs by the 27-member airline grouping Star Alliance and work on it may start next year itself. 100. State-owned Air India will get around Rs 3,000 crore more in the later part of this fiscal from the Government towards capital infusion. bankersadda | careerpower.in | careeradda.co.in 101. India is poised to become a USD two trillion economy this year, while its GDP size would cross another milestone of USD three trillion after five years in 2019, according to IMFs latest world economic outlook. Indias ranking would also improve to seventh largest economy in the world, while measured on current prices basis in US dollar, in 2019 from its tenth position currently. 102. Prime Minister unveiled half a dozen schemes including a unified web portal where employers can submit a single compliance report for 16 labour laws, a new labour inspection scheme, Unique Account Number facility for EPFO members, a new skill development and apprenticeship scheme and a revamped Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana . 103. The number of hungry people has declined in India with its score on the Global Hunger Index improving to 55th position in 2014 due to progress made in addressing underweight in children, says a report. 104. The government deferred the country-wide rollout of the National Food Security Act, 2013, by another six months, to the first week of April 2015, because of states’ inability to create requisite infrastructure and identify beneficiaries. Eleven states and Union Territories – Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Delhi and Chandigarh — have so far implemented the Act, some fully and others partially. 105. The government is expediting the work to replace Wholesale Price Index (WPI), used for capturing price movements to decide on policy measures, with a more effective and comprehensive Producers Price Index (PPI) by the next fiscal. 106. India will retain its top spot with $71 billion in remittances this year, the World Bank has said. 107. IMF chief Christine Lagarde warned that the global economy could be sinking into a prolonged period of mediocre growth which could endanger efforts to bring down unemployment worldwide. 108. Finance Ministry said 5.29 crore bank accounts have been opened and 1.78 crore RuPay debit cards have been issued so far under the Jan Dhan Yojana. 109. Indian Railways is going to increase the taktal fares of most popular trains. Half of the tatkal tickets will be sold as per the dynamic pricing, that is, depending upon the seat availability and the demand. 110. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has directed the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to ensure “universal coverage” under Aadhaar by June 2015. The current Aadhaar enrolment is about 68 crore. 111. O . Panneerselvam will be the next Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. 112. Facebook plans to start testing its Internet- carrying solar-powered drones in 2015, with the ultimate aim of getting two-thirds of the global population online. 113. Ashraf Ghani’s government will sign a long- delayed deal to allow some U.S. troops to stay in Afghanistan into next year. 114. In his maiden visit to India, after taking over as the CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, announced that the company would offer commercial cloud services — Azure and Office 365 — in the country from local data centres. 115. Pakistan has decided to introduce electronic voting machines (EVMs) in two years before the next general elections due in 2018. 116. The Competition Commission of India (CCI) imposed Rs.2.83 crore penalty on Super Cassettes Industries, known as ‘T-Series’, for unfair business practices with regard to licensing of Bollywood music to private FM radio stations. 117. The Chief Executive of e-commerce major Amazon, Jeffrey P Bezos, called on Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Mr. Bezos have been visiting Indian cities this week. 118. Canada has decided to sign a contract with Antrix, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)’s commercial arm, for the launch of its satellite. Canada announced that Antrix would be given the contract for the July 2015 launch of its bankersadda | careerpower.in | careeradda.co.in M3M (Maritime Monitoring and Messaging Micro-Satellite) communications satellite. 119. Eight new polio cases have surfaced in Pakistan, taking the number of those affected by the crippling disease this year to 202, surpassing the previous high of 199 cases recorded in 2000, officials said. 120. Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan has been honoured with Global Diversity Award 2014 by British parliament for his contribution to cinema. 121. Days after it published an offensive cartoon mocking India’s successful Mars mission, The New York Times apologized , saying it was not trying to “impugn” India. 122. The country will have state-of-the-art virology diagnostic laboratories operational in 120 districts by 2015. 123. The Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) has upheld the Securities and Exchange Board of India’s order against Angel Broking in case related to violations of stock broker norms and fraudulent dealings in shares of Sterling Green Woods. 124. Kerala would become the first State to have high-speed Internet connecting all the panchayats in the State by March next year. 125. Queen Elizabeth II has honoured campaigning actress Angelina Jolie in a Buckingham Palace ceremony. 126. China and Russia have begun implementing their $400 billion mega-gas deal — a strategic project that would allow Moscow to lower its dependence on the European market. Russia’s eastward shift is anchored by the agreement to supply China 38 billion cubic meters of gas every year for 30 years. Gas flows will commence in 2018. 127. Lawmakers in France, the world’s most nuclear-dependent country, voted to cut reliance on the energy source from more than 75 per cent to 50 per cent within a decade. 128. Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiled a blueprint for the Saansad Adarsh Gram Yojana (SAGY) on Jayaprakash Narayan’s birth anniversary. The scheme encourages Members of Parliament from both Houses to identify and develop one village from their constituency as a model village by 2016, and two more by 2019, covering over 2,500 villages of the 6 lakh villages country-wide. Under SAGY, Lok Sabha MPs can select any village with a population of 3,000- 5,000 in plains and 1,000-3,000 in hilly areas in their constituencies besides their own village. MPs are expected to facilitate a village development plan, motivate villagers to take up activities and use the Rs.5-crore MPLAD fund. 129. A Supreme Court-appointed committee led by Chief Justice of India (retired) R.M. Lodha on the “catastrophic floods” in Jammu and Kashmir details the failures of the State government. 130. SEBI imposed a ban on realty major DLF and its top executives from accessing the capital markets for three years, for suppressing information in its initial public offering (IPO) prospectus and for sham transactions. 131. India bans the import of animal-tested cosmetics. 132. An inspector Shakti Devi with the Jammu and Kashmir Police has bagged the International Female Police Peacekeeper Award 2014 instituted by the U.N. for her “exceptional achievements” while serving with the U.N. mission in Afghanistan. 133. Wholesale price inflation dropped to a near five-year low in September to 2.38 per cent, helped by moderation in food and fuel prices. 134. The BBC’s website was blocked in China, hours after a video of Hong Kong police beating and kicking a pro-democracy protester began circulating online. 135. The Department of Telecom has set a target date of March 31, 2015, to implement the full mobile number portability. 136. PSLV-C26 lobbed the 1,425 kg Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS-1C) satellite into its precise orbit. Mission was ISRO’ s twenty-seventh consecutively successful PSLV flight. bankersadda | careerpower.in | careeradda.co.in 137. India’ first long-range sub-sonic cruise missile, Nirbhay (fearless), was test-fired for a range of over 1,000 km from the Integrated Test Range wheeler Island, Orissa. 138. The Reserve Bank of India has signed a pact with the Central Bank of Kenya for exchange of information and supervisory cooperation. 139. Africa’s most populous nation Nigeria was declared officially Ebola free. 140. India received the most number of votes in the Asia-Pacific group of the U.N. Human Rights Council, winning a second consecutive two-year term at the world body. 162 of 190 countries voted for India. Three other countries including Indonesia, Bangladesh and Qatar were elected. 141. The Central Government ordered merger of the scam-hit firm NSEL with its holding company Financial Technologies India Ltd (FTIL). 142. Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a package of Rs. 745 crore for the reconstruction of flood-ravaged houses and hospitals in Jammu and Kashmir. 143. The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), launched by China, with an authorised capital of $100 billion, is expected to be formally established by the end of 2015. Beijing- headquartered has 21 nation members - Bangladesh, Brunei, Cambodia, China, India, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Laos, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Oman, Pakistan, Philippines, Qatar, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Uzbekistan and Vietnam. 144. European Union leaders have reached a deal on a comprehensive package of climate targets, including a binding 40 per cent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from the level of 1990 by 2030. 145. U.K. engineering group Penspen has been awarded a contract to carry out a technical feasibility study for the proposed 1,820-km pipeline Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan- India (TAPI) natural gas pipeline. 146. Election Commission announced that Jammu and Kashmir, along with Jharkhand, will go to the polls in five phases — on November 25, and December 2, 9, 14 and 20. 147. The Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) meeting, chaired by Defence Minister Mr. Arun Jaitley, cleared deals worth Rs. 78,000 crore and made allotments amounting to Rs. 47,000 crore for the three services. 148. GSAT-16, the next national communications satellite, reached French Guiana this week and is on its way to the space port near Kourou ahead of an early December flight, European launch service company Arianespace has said. The 3,150-kg satellite is scheduled to be flown on an Ariane-5 launcher numbered Flight VA221. 149. Vishal Bhardwaj’s Haider — a modern-day adaptation of Hamlet — won the People’s Choice Award in the Mondo Genre (world genre) at the ninth edition of the Rome Film Festival. 150. P. Sainath (for his reporting in TheHindu ), Al Jazeera English, USA Today and Global Post were among the winners of the World Media Summit (WMS) Global Awards for Excellence, 2014
Posted on: Wed, 07 Jan 2015 12:07:05 +0000
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