Current Affairs - June 2, 2017 Current Affairs

India's first automatic coastal warning for disasters to come up in Odisha. Odisha is the first state in India that has developed an automatic public address system that can be activated along its entire coastline. It can warn the population residing along its 480km long coastline by pressing one single button from a control room in the State capital in the event of the occurrence of natural disasters like a cyclone or tsunami.

India's Dhanraj Choudhary, who represents Asia in the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF), has been re-elected as a Board of Director (BoD) for another four years along with other continental representatives. He is the former secretary general of the Table Tennis Federation of India (TTFI), will serve his second successive term as BoD at the ITTF.

Raveena Tandon was awarded Phalke Best Critic Award for her performance in Maatr at the 148th Dadasaheb Phalke Jayanti Celebration.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit will be held in Astana, Kazakhstan on June 8-9, 2017. In this summit, India and Pakistan will become full members of the organization. India and Pakistan signed the memorandum of obligations on 24 June 2016 at Tashkent, thereby starting the formal process of joining the SCO as full members. It is mainly aimed at military cooperation between the members and involves intelligence- sharing, counter-terrorism operations in Central Asia. Afghanistan, Belarus, India, Iran, Mongolia and Pakistan have observer status.

Reserve Bank of India appointed S. Ganesh Kumar as Executive Director. His appointment is consequent upon voluntary retirement of Chandan Sinha on May 31, 2017. As Executive Director, Ganesh Kumar will look after Department of Information Technology, Department of Payment and Settlement Systems and Department of External Investments and Operations.

The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) in the U.S. detected merger of two black holes. The third Hole named GW170104 marks the detection of gravitational waves coming from a binary black hole merger.

A 12-year-old Californian student, Ananya Vinay, won the 90th Scripps National Spelling Bee competition. She correctly spelled the word marocain and awarded the cash prize of $40,000. The competition was held in Washington's Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center.

The 70th World Health Assembly held in Geneva, Switzerland. It is attended by delegations from all WHO Member States and focuses on a specific health agenda prepared by the Executive Board. The main functions of the World Health Assembly are to determine the policies of the Organization, appoint the Director-General, supervise financial policies, and review and approve the proposed programme budget.

Bharti Airtel-Telenor Merger has received the approval of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and National Stock Exchange of India Limited (NSE). Airtel and Telenor have also filed a joint application before the New Delhi bench of National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) for approval of the merger. As part of the deal, Airtel will assume the Telenor unit's liabilities related to licence fees and lease obligations for phone towers.

India and Russia signed an agreement for the two new reactors at the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant (KNPP) on the sidelines of the annual summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin. The KKNPP was the outcome of an inter-governmental agreement between the Soviet Union and India in 1988.

MITS Mega Food Park was inagurated at Rayagada, Odisha. It is the first Mega Food Park in the state of Odisha and 7th Mega Food Park operationalized in the last 3 years by the present government. This aims to give a major boost to the food processing sector by adding value and reducing food wastage at each stage of the supply chain with particular focus on perishables, Ministry of Food Processing Industries is implementing Mega Food Park Scheme in the country.

Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (IOCL) has appointed Sanjiv Singh as the new chairman of the company with immediate effect. Singh was earlier a director of Refineries at IOCL. Singh will be replacing B Ashok, who superannuated from the services of the company on May 31 and ceased to be the chairman of the company from June 1.

India's first 'freight village' will be developed by the Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh. A 'Freight Village' is a specialised industrial estate which attracts companies that require logistics services and can cluster to improve their competitiveness. This will allow relocation of retailers, warehouse operators and logistics service providers supplying the regional FMCG market.

India successfully test-fired Prithvi-II ballistic missile of the Integrated Test Range (ITR) at Chandipur in Odisha's Balasore. It is capable of carrying 500 kg to 1,000 kg of warheads and is thrust by liquid propulsion twin engines. It is a surface-to-surface missile, which has a strike range of 350 km, was carried out from a mobile launcher.

Ramachandra Guha, appointed by the Supreme Court as one of the four administrators of The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) resigned from the post due to personal reasons. was a member of the Committee of Administrators (COA).

Japan launched a new satellite to improve the global positioning system's (GPS) accuracy and establish an efficient communication system in the event of natural disasters. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries launched the latest version of the H-IIA rocket with the Michibiki 2 communications satellite on board from the Tanegashima Island space centre in Kagoshima.

Former union minister and BJP MP Prof (Dr) Ram Shankar Katheria on Wednesday was appointed as the chairman of the National Commission for Schedule Caste (NCSC) for a period of three years. L Murugan will be vice chairman while K.Ramulu, Dr Yogendra Paswan and Dr. (Ms) Swaraj Vidwan members of the constitutional body, said the government.