Current Affairs - July 13, 2017 Current Affairs

Renault-Nissan appointed Thomas Kuehl as President of its Indian operations. He replaces Guillaume Sicard. He joined Nissan from Volkswagen and he has more than 22 years of automotive experience in different countries.

Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Gujarat are the three best-performing states in "ease of doing business", NITI Aayog. On the other hand, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Assam fare worst in the rankings. Similarly, based on availability of electricity in rural households, the best-performing states are Andhra Pradesh, Goa, Kerala, Punjab and Tamil Nadu, which have achieved 100% penetration.

The Chhattisgarh government has decided to merge all the branches of the district central cooperative banks (DCCBs) with the state cooperative banks.The decision would enable small DCCB to merge into the state cooperative bank that would ensure the fiscal strength of the entity. After the merger, the working capital of the bank would increase to more than Rs 10 crore.

The 22nd World Petroleum Congress, the largest gathering for the oil and gas industry was held in Istanbul with a view to addressing the challenges facing the sector. More than 20,000 participants, including high-level executives, representatives of international organisations and government leaders from over 100 countries, are expected to be present for the five-day Istanbul Congress.

The Maharashtra government has decided to give free medical insurance cover of up to Rs10 lakh to all sitting and former legislators and their families. It will have to set aside Rs. 9.96 crore a year to pay the insurance premiums of 335 sitting legislators and 837 former legislators - 1,172 in all. Each premium works out to Rs. 85,000.

The 8th edition of Theatre Olympics 'The Biggest Theatre Celebration of the World' will be hosted by India from February 17 -April 08, 2018, which is being organised by National School of Drama, under the aegis of Ministry of Culture. The Theatre Olympics 2018 will feature maximum number of Indian & International theatre groups, invitee eminent theatre personalities along with their performances.

Rajasthan becomes the first state in the country to fix minimum educational qualification for contesting cooperative body polls. For contesting the election as members of governing boards of dairy societies, farming societies, consumer societies, weavers' societies, urban banks, housing construction societies, primary land development banks, credit societies and cooperative unions, the minimum educational qualifications will range from class 5 to class 8.

Maya, a Bengaluru-based mobile app that helps women track their menstrual cycles, won the Asia Pacific App of the Year at FbStart Apps of the Year awards announced by Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg. It helped seven million women stay on top of their health by tracking their menstrual cycles, setting health reminders, monitoring pregnancies and getting in touch with doctors. Maya was founded in India in 2014. It's now available in 14 languages and has been downloaded across 190 countries.

BJP President Amit Shah and RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat released a coffee table book on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's life in New Delhi. The book - Making of A Legend, composed by Sulabh International Founder Bindeshwar Pathak. The book fully explains about the Life History of Narendra Modi.

Union minister for earth sciences Dr Harsh Vardhan inaugurated Kerala's first doppler radar in Kochi.This was among the 27 radars being installed in the country and all of them are 100 percent indigenous developed with support of ISRO scientists and Bharat Electronics. The IMD as part of modernising its observational network is replacing its old and conventional radar by the state of art S-band Doppler Weather Radar (DWR) in a phased manner at different locations all over the country.

Indian skipper Mithali Raj has become the first player in the history of women's ODI cricket to have crossed 6000 career runs. She reached the milestone in India's ICC Women's World Cup 2017 match against Australia on July 12, 2017. So far, Mithali has scored 6028 runs with the help of five centuries and 49 half-centuries.

YES BANK launches 'YES GST' program for MSMEs (Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises) under its MSME CSR. It organises more than 3,000 events on GST over the next 6 months in partnership with National Small Industries Corporation (NSIC), Federation of Indian Export Organizations (FIEO) and Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations (FADA).

A team of international astronomers has found the smallest star known in our galaxy. The star - which only has the scientific designation of EBLM J0555-57Ab - is located about 600 light-years from Earth and can be seen from the Southern Hemisphere - if you look through a large telescope. The star is 2,000 to 3,000 times fainter than our own sun.

Union Cabinet approved establishment of International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) set up a regional centre International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), a Global Rice Research Institute. It will be named as IRRI South Asia Regional Centre (ISARC) and will be set up on the campus of National Seed Research and Training Centre (NSRTC) in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh.

Meghalaya Chief Minister Mukul Sangma launched the ambitious flagship programme titled "Livelihood Intervention and Facilitation of Entrepreneurship" (LIFE) at Songsak in East Garo Hills. The program for the year 2017 - 18 aims to launch the particular program at 2144 villages.

India's first Technology and Innovation Support Center (TISC) will be set up at Patent Information Centre in Punjab under the World Intellectual Property Organization's (WIPO) TISC program. For this, the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) has signed an institutional agreement with the Punjab State Council of Science and Technology in New Delhi. The objective of the TISC is to stimulate a dynamic, vibrant and balanced Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) system in India to foster creativity and innovation.