General Awareness

NATIONAL AFFAIRS - February 2017

Feb 2017

Mar 20, 2021

Telangana Finance Minister Harish Rao Presents State Budget

Telangana Finance Minister Harish Rao presented the state budget estimated for 2021-2022, amounting to Rs. 2,30,825 crore.
The government earmarked Rs. 5 crore to each Assembly constituency under Assembly Constituency Development Fund—set to introduce Dalit empowerment scheme.
In the financial year 2021-22, Finance Minister proposed a total expenditure of Rs. 2,30,825.96 crore. Of this, revenue expenditure is Rs. 1,69,383.44 crore and capital expenditure is Rs. 29,046.77 crore. Revenue surplus in the Budget is estimated at Rs.6,743.50 crore and the estimated fiscal deficit is Rs. 45,509.60 crore.

BJP Announces 148 Candidates for WB Assembly Polls

BJP announced its list of 148 candidates for the last four phases of assembly election in West Bengal, rewarding around 20 turncoats and fielding party heavyweights Mukul Roy and Rahul Sinha.
The party is facing protests and resignations as many of its aspiring old-timers did not find their names in the list of candidates.
Roy' son Subranghshu, a sitting TMC MLA, state BJP Mahila Morcha president Agnimitra Paul, film personalities Rudranil Ghosh, Srabanti Chattopadhyay and Parno Mitra were among those given tickets by the saffron party.
Roy, BJP national vice-president and former union minister is back in the electoral fray after a gap of two decades.

Indian EAM to Attend Meet on Afghanistan

Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar, Pakistani Foreign Minister SM Qureshi will be attended the 9th Ministerial Conference of the "Heart of Asia" on March 30 in Dushanbe, Tajikistan. After many years both Indian and Pakistani foreign ministers will be together and will be under one roof.
Heart of Asia – Istanbul Process is a decade old initiative of Afghan-Turkey that has 15 countries as part of it. The initiative aims at peace in Afghanistan. Most of the countries are Afghanistan's neighbours and west Asian countries like Iran, Saudi Arabia and UAE as part of it. India hosted the same meet in 2016 in Amritsar.

Jaishankar Holds Talks with Kuwaiti Counterpart

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar held wide-ranging talks with his Kuwaiti counterpart Sheikh Ahmed Nasser Al-Mohammed Al-Sabah to elevate bilateral relations.
Historically, India-Kuwaiti ties have always had an important trade dimension. India has consistently been among the top trading partners of Kuwait.
In the financial year 2019-20, Kuwait was the 10th largest oil supplier to India, and it met about 3.8 per cent of India's energy needs.
Various aspects of bilateral ties and regional issues were discussed in the talks between the two Foreign Ministers.

Mar 19, 2021

Karnataka Govt. Plans to Produce, Sell Gold Coins with State Emblem

The Karnataka government is planning to open jewellery retail outlets and promote the yellow metal with 'Brand Karnataka' image.
The government is also planning to produce and sell gold coins with state emblem 'Gandaberunda' (mythical two-headed bird) embedded in them, and aiming to partner with private jewellers.
This landmark initiative will help government generate more revenue and employment opportunities.
Initially the retail outlets will be opened in Tier-1 cities and based on customer response they will be opened in Tier-2 cities.
The government is also planning to set up a Special Economic Zone exclusively for jewellery in the 'Kalyana Karnataka' region, where it is proposing to set up a jewellery park in one of the locations.

Dr. Harsh Vardhan Appointed as Chairman of International Body Stop TB Partnership Board

Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare Dr. Harsh Vardhan has been appointed as the Chairman of the international body Stop TB Partnership Board. He was appointed in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the movement to eradicate Tuberculosis from India by 2025. Dr. Harsh Vardhan will serve a three-year term, commencing from July this year.
The Stop TB Partnership is a unique international body with the power to align actors all over the world in the fight against TB. The participation of a wide range of constituencies gives this global body the credibility and the broad range of medical, social and financial expertise needed to defeat TB. The Partnership's vision is a TB-free world.
The appointment of Dr. Harsh Vardhan as the Chair of this prestigious global body is a proud recognition of India's political commitment to the eradication of TB. Established in the year 2000, the 'Stop TB Partnership' is mandated to eliminate Tuberculosis as a public health problem.

Arindam Bagchi Next Spokesperson of Ministry of External Affairs

Senior diplomat Arindam Bagchi is set to be the new spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), succeeding Anurag Srivastava.
A 1995-batch Indian Foreign Service (IFS) officer, Bagchi is currently serving as the joint secretary (north) at the MEA headquarters.
Srivastava will assume charge as the joint secretary (north) in place of Bagchi.
Bagchi served as India's ambassador to Croatia from November 2018 to June 2020.
He was India's Deputy High Commissioner to Sri Lanka and also served at the Prime Minister's Office as a director.

Parliamentary Panel for Use of 'Officials of the Union of India' in Place of Central Government O...

A parliamentary committee has suggested the use of the term "officials of the Union of India" in place of "central government officials" for those serving in all the three organs of governance – the executive, the legislative and the judiciary.
In its report, the panel observed that the executive, the legislature and the judiciary have well-defined roles and they all function under the Constitution.
The committee is of the considered opinion that these three organs of governance, by and large, constitute the Union government.
The committee desires the term 'Central Government' to be substituted by 'Union of India' and the officials of the three organs of governance of the Union government, henceforth, be referred to as Officials of the Union of India.

EU Joins India-promoted Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure

The 27-member European Union has joined India's Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) initiative, following its endorsement of the charter of the CDRI earlier.
Launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2019 at the UN Climate Change Summit, the CDRI is an international platform involving the public and private sector, aiming to promote resilience of new and existing infrastructure systems to climate and disaster risks while supporting sustainable development.
The CDRI is a welcome initiative to help tackle these objectives in a multilateral approach, which will help implementation of the Paris Agreement, through both global reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and enhanced climate change adaptation action.

Mar 18, 2021

No Decision on Nationwide NRC Yet

The Centre said that it had not taken any decision on the nationwide rollout of the National Register of Citizens (NRC).
Union Minister of State for Home Nityanand Rai was replying to a question in the Rajya Sabha on whether the Central government had any plans to implement the NRC throughout the country.
The NRC was updated in Assam under the supervision of the Supreme Court. When the final NRC was published on August 31, 2019, a total of 19.06 lakh people were excluded out of the total of 3,30,27,661 applicants, which created a ripple across the country.

No Proposal to Appoint Regulator for Social Media

The government informed Parliament that there is no proposal with the IT ministry to set up a regulator for social media.
Union IT and Communications Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, however, said that the government has released Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Rules, 2021, under the IT Act that specifies the due diligence to be followed by all the intermediaries, including the social media intermediaries.
The government in February had announced sweeping regulations for social media firms like Facebook and Twitter as well as OTT players such as Netflix, requiring them to remove any content flagged by authorities within 36 hours and setting up a complaint redressal mechanism with an officer being based in the country.

Mar 17, 2021

Union Cabinet Cleared Proposal For Setting Up Of Development Finance Institution

Union Cabinet has cleared the setting up of a Development Finance Institution.
Development Finance Institution will also have some tax benefits for a 10-year long period.
Cabinet approved introduction of Bill for setting up of a new infrastructure focused Development Financial Institution as a provider, enabler and catalyst for infrastructure financing.

As Many as 22 of World's 30 Most Polluted Cities are in India: Report

Twenty-two of the world's 30 most polluted cities are in India, with Delhi being ranked as the most polluted capital city globally.
The report is prepared by Swiss organisation, IQAir, in the form of the 'World Air Quality Report, 2020', which has released globally.
The report, however, shows that Delhi's air quality improved by approximately 15 per cent from 2019 to 2020.
It said that despite the improvement, Delhi ranked as the 10th most polluted city and the top polluted capital city in the world.
Besides Delhi, the 21 other Indian cities among the 30 most polluted cities in the world are Ghaziabad, Bulandshahar, Bisrakh Jalalpur, Noida, Greater Noida, Kanpur, Lucknow, Meerut, Agra and Muzaffarnagar in Uttar Pradesh, Bhiwari in Rajasthan, Faridabad, Jind, Hisar, Fatehabad, Bandhwari, Gurugram, Yamunanagar, Rohtak and Dharuhera in Haryana, and Muzaffarpur in Bihar.

Mar 16, 2021

Ayush Export Promotion Council to be Set up

The Minister of Commerce and Industry, Piyush Goyal, informed the Parliament that AYUSH ministry is holding consultations with the stakeholder to explore the setting up of an AYUSH Export Promotion Council (EPC). The government is also exploring the procedural steps which would be involved in setting up the council.
The "Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI)" has been tasked to coordinate with the Department of Commerce and the Indian Industry members who have shown their interest in forming the corpus for AYUSH export promotion council. Ministry of AYUSH has also set up a task force to expand the trade classification, quality control and standardization of Indian Systems of Medicine (ISM) & Herbal Products. The recommendations provided by the task force are under examination by the government current.

IPU President on a Week-long Visit to India

Inter Parliamentary Union President Mr. Duarte Pacheco called on Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla and witnessed the proceedings of the Upper House.
Mr. Pacheco is on a week-long visit to India on the invitation of Indian Parliament. He is scheduled to attend a felicitation ceremony and address the Parliament Members under the auspices of the Indian Parliamentary Group (IPG) in Central Hall of Parliament House.
Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) formed in 1889, is one of the oldest and largest international Parliamentary body consisting of more than 179 Members. IPU espouses for the cause of promoting democracy across the world and take up issues of international importance, such as, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Climate Change, Gender Equality, etc.

Punjab Second among all States in Contributing to Army's Rank and File

Piping its neighbours, Punjab, often referred to as the sword army of the nation, has the second highest number of soldiers, other than officers, serving in the Army amongst all states and union territories in the country.
The strength of army personnel from Punjab is 89,088, according to information placed by the Ministry of Defence in Parliament. This accounts for 7.7 per cent of the Army's rank and file, even though its share of the national population is 2.3 per cent.
With 1,67,557 soldiers, Uttar Pradesh tops the list of states contributing manpower to the Army. While Uttar Pradesh, the nation's most populous state, makes up 16.5 per cent of the country's population, its share in the rank and file is 14.5 per cent. Maharashtra, with 87,835 soldiers occupies the third slot followed by Rajasthan, with 79,481 soldiers.

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