General Awareness

BUSINESS AND ECONOMY - January 2019

Jan 2019

Dec 21, 2022

Bandhan Bank Signs MoU with Defence Ministry for Defence Pensioners

Bandhan Bank signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Controller General of Defence Accounts, Ministry of Defence, for extending banking services to the defence pensioners and their families through 557 branches.
The bank is aligned with the vision of the government in being a one-stop solution to all pension related activities of defence pensioners under the Outreach Programme for Defence Pensioners on System for Pension Administration Raksha (SPARSH).
The Defence Secretary virtually inaugurated a SPARSH Service Centre in Delhi Cantonment, offering various services such as service requests and grievance redressal, annual life certification, Pensioner Data verification (PDV), manage profile changes including Aadhaar number, PAN number, postal address and bank details.

UTs Top Performers in Social Progress Index

Four Union Territories (UTs) feature among the top-10 performers in the inaugural edition of the Social Progress Index (SPI) with Puducherry bagging the top rank. It was followed by the UTs of Lakshadweep (second), Chandigarh (eighth) and Jammu & Kashmir (tenth).
Among the states, Goa (third), Sikkim (fourth) and Mizoram (fifth) found place in the top-10 pecking order.
Assam, Bihar and Jharkhand feature at the bottom of the rankings.
The index was prepared for the states, UTs and districts of the country by the Institute for Competitiveness and Social Progress Imperative. It was mandated by the Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council (EAC-PM).
The index uses 12 components across three critical dimensions of social progress to make the assessment. They are Basic Human Needs (like nutrition and basic medical care, water and sanitation, personal safety and shelter), Foundations of Wellbeing (access to basic knowledge, access to information and communication, health and wellness, and environmental quality), and Opportunity (personal rights, personal freedom and choice, inclusiveness, and access to advanced education).

Gadkari Launches Country's First-ever Surety Bond Insurance Product

The country's first ever 'Surety Bond Insurance' product developed by Bajaj Allianz General Insurance, a private general insurer, was launched by Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister of Road Transport & Highways.
Surety Bond Insurance, which will help replace bank guarantees, is expected to optimise capital for contractors while giving a fillip to the country's infrastructure sector.
This product launch is in line with the Government's vision to up-scale the infrastructure development in the country.
In Budget 2022-23, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman had announced that Surety Bond Insurance would be allowed as a substitute for bank guarantees in case of government procurement and also for gold imports.
Surety Bond Insurance, which is mainly aimed at infrastructure development, is a risk transfer tool that shields the principal from the losses that may arise in case the contractor fails to perform their contractual obligation.

Dec 20, 2022

PTC India Ties up with Bhutan for Export of 600 MW Power During Winter

PTC India Ltd, entered into an agreement with Bhutan, for supply of power from Indian power market to the Himalayan nation in order to meet its power requirement during the dry winter season.
Designated Authority (DA) for cross border power trading accorded an approval for import of power by Bhutan.
Bhutan has also executed the agreement with Settlement Nodal Agency for settlement of grid operation related charges.
With all requisite approvals, Bhutan will now start procuring up to 600 MW of power, through PTC, from the Indian power market.

Wipro Consumer Enters food Category; Acquires Nirapara

Wipro Consumer Care and Lighting signed an agreement to acquire Nirapara, one of the largest-selling traditional food brands in Kerala, for an undisclosed sum, to foray into the food business category.
This acquisition comes after Wipro's announcement of its foray into the food business in India and its aspirations to become a significant player in the snack food, spices, and ready-to-cook market.
Nirapara was launched in 1976 and is known for its blended spices.
The acquisition will also give Wipro Consumer Care and Lighting an entry into the Rs. 70,000-crore spices market.

Indian Bank Launches Special Retail Term Deposit "Ind Shakti 555 Days"

Indian Bank launched a new special retail term deposit dubbed as "Ind Shakti 555 days" offering higher rate of interest for investment starting from Rs. 5000 to less than 2 Crore for 555 days in the form of FD/MMD with callable options."
The bank is giving an interest rate of 2.80% on deposits that mature in the next 7 to 29 days, and Indian Bank is offering an interest rate of 3.00% on deposits that mature in the next 30 to 45 days. On deposits maturing in 46 days to 90 days, Indian Bank is giving an interest rate of 3.25%, and on deposits maturing in 91 days to 120 days, the bank is promising an interest rate of 3.50%. FDs with maturities between 121 and 180 days will now pay interest at a rate of 3.85%, while those with maturities between 181 and less than nine months will now pay interest at a rate of 4.50%.
The bank is giving an interest rate of 4.75% on FDs maturing in 9 months to less than 1 year, whereas Indian Bank is offering an interest rate of 6.10% on those maturing in 1 year. The interest rate offered by Indian Bank is 6.30% for deposits maturing in less than 2 years and less than 3 years, and 6.50% for deposits maturing in less than 2 years and under three years. Deposits maturing in the next three to five years will now pay 6.25% interest, while those maturing in the next five years or more will now pay 6.10% interest.

IDFC FIRST Bank Launches ZERO Fee Banking on Savings Accounts

IDFC FIRST Bank announced ZERO Fee Banking on savings accounts and waived fees on 25 commonly used banking services.
The banking services include savings accounts such as cash deposit and withdrawal at branches, third party cash transactions, demand drafts, IMPS, NEFT, RTGS, cheque book, SMS alerts, interest certificates, insufficient balance for ATM transactions, international ATM usage and so on.
Even customers maintaining as low as Rs. 10,000 as average monthly balance (AMB), as well as the Rs. 25,000 AMB savings account variant will enjoy these benefits. This will benefit all customers, and particularly those with lesser financial literacy who find it difficult to compute the fees and charges.

Dec 19, 2022

ReNew Power Signs 150 MW Agreement with Microsoft

ReNew Power, subsidiary of renewable energy company ReNew Energy Global Plc, signed a renewable energy agreement of 150 MW with Microsoft India, in one of the largest such deals in the country.
As part of the arrangement, ReNew will produce 150 MW of clean energy from a recently commissioned solar site near Bikaner.
This deal signifies that corporates globally, including India, are increasingly integrating renewable energy into their operations in every form, and this partnership further paves the way for innovative models that will accelerate the energy transition.

Punjab Ranks 2nd in Average Monthly Income per Agricultural Household

Punjab ranked second in the country in average monthly income per agricultural household. This fact came to light in a data provided by Union Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Narendra Singh Tomar.
As per information, Meghalaya topped across the country with average monthly income per agricultural household (Rs. 29,348).
Punjab (Rs. 26,701) is followed by Haryana (Rs. 22,841), Arunachal Pradesh (Rs. 19,225), Jammu and Kashmir (Rs. 18,918), group of Union Territories (Rs. 18,511), Mizoram (Rs. 17,964), Kerala (Rs. 17,915), group of northeastern states (Rs. 16,863), Uttarakhand (Rs. 13,552), Karnataka (Rs 13,441), Gujarat (Rs 12,631), Rajasthan (Rs. 12,520), Sikkim (Rs. 12,447) and Himachal Pradesh (Rs. 12,153).

PNB Housing Fin Opens 'Roshni' Branches for Affordable Housing Loans

PNB Housing Finance opened 'Roshni' initiative branches in various locations, including tier II and III cities, for deepening its customer base in the affordable housing segment.
Through its affordable home loan scheme Roshni, the city-based lender also renewed its commitment towards the government's Housing for All mission.
Under this initiative, PNB Housing Finance will offer retail loans to individuals in the range of Rs. 5 lakh to Rs. 30 lakh.
The company's Roshni branches inaugurated in Chennai, Coimbatore, Ghaziabad, Hyderabad, Indore/Ujjain, Lucknow, Mumbai, Nagpur, Pune, Rajkot and Varanasi will cater to customers in this segment.

The Union Cabinet Approves the National Geospatial Policy

The Union Cabinet is learnt to have approved the National Geospatial Policy that seeks to boost entrepreneurship for the socio-economic development of the country.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi chaired a meeting of the Union Cabinet.
The policy also seeks to promote the use of geospatial products and services, generate useful insights from geospatial data and strengthen India's geospatial infrastructure and capabilities.

Dec 18, 2022

Wipro Signs Multi-year Deal with Finastra for Corp Banks in Middle East

IT company Wipro signed a multi-year digital transformation partnership with fintech firm Finastra for corporate banks in the Middle East.
The multi-year engagement will make Wipro the exclusive implementation and go-to-market partner to deploy Finastra's trade finance solutions in the region.
This exclusive partnership with Finastra will enable Wipro help clients transform into truly digital platform players.
Wipro has been operating in Middle East since last several decades. It is one of the six focus regions that comprise Wipro's Asia Pacific, Middle East, India, and Africa (APMEA) Strategic Market Unit.

HDFC Bank Partners with Startup India for Parivartan SmartUp Grants

HDFC Bank announced the launch of its sixth annual grants program for social start-ups in partnership with the Government of India's flagship initiative 'Startup India'. Known as Parivartan SmartUp Grants, the program aims to identify start-ups working in the social impact space and support them through monetary grants to their incubators.
The grants have been offered under the aegis of Parivartan, the umbrella name for the bank's social initiatives. So far, the bank has disbursed over INR 30 crore to more than 45 incubators which supported over 165 start-ups working in areas like environment, agri-business, ed-tech, waste management, healthcare, and skill development sectors.

NITI Aayog, UNDP Launch Fifth 'Youth Co:Lab' for Social Entrepreneurs

NITI Aayog's Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) and UNDP India launched the fifth edition of 'Youth Co:Lab' to support young social entrepreneurs.
The applications for this edition were launched by AIM mission director Chintan Vaishnav and UNDP India Resident Representative Dennis Curry.
Launched in partnership with AIM in 2019, Youth Co:Lab is an UNDP India initiative that aims to establish a common agenda for Asia-Pacific countries to invest in and empower youth to accelerate implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through leadership, social innovation, and entrepreneurship.
The Prime Minister appoints the Vice-Chairperson of NITI Aayog. NITI serves as a think tank for Government of India. Its objective is to foster Cooperative federalism through the involvement of State Governments.
NITI Aayog is headquartered in New Delhi.

Dec 17, 2022

TMB Ties up with Kotak Mahindra General Insurance Co.

Private sector lender Tamilnad Mercantile Bank Ltd. (TMB) entered into a strategic alliance with Kotak Mahindra General Insurance Co. Ltd., to market the latter's general insurance products.
Since getting listed in the stock exchanges, TMB is adding features to the choice of its customers on various products and services.
In November, Tamilnad Mercantile Bank tied up with Cholamandalam General Insurance and Max Life Insurance Company to offer their insurance products.
Headquartered in Tamil Nadu's Thoothukudi, the bank has a pan India presence with 509 branches and 12 regional offices across 16 states and 4 Union Territories and serves more than 5 million customers.

WhatsApp Pay India Chief Vinay Choletti Quits

WhatsApp Pay India chief Vinay Choletti resigned just four months after he was elevated to the position.
Choletti's resignation is the fourth high-profile exit in about one and half months from Meta in India after its country head Ajit Mohan stepped down in November.
After Mohan, WhatsApp India head Abhijit Bose and Meta India Public Policy Head Rajiv Aggarwal also resigned from the company in November.
He joined WhatsApp from Amazon in October 2021 to head Merchant Payments vertical WhatsApp Pay.

DealShare Appoints Kamaldeep Singh as President of Retail Business

Social e-commerce company DealShare announced the appointment of former Big Bazaar CEO Kamaldeep Singh as its president of retail.
As per DealShare, Singh's deep knowledge of Indian consumer behaviour, building sourcing organization, vast network of brands, and building talent and team fits well for DealShare's next phase of growth.
The move came after DealShare, a Jaipur-based social commerce start-up owned and operated by Merabo Labs Pvt Ltd, raised an additional $45 million from Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), as an extension of its Series E round, earlier this year.

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