Current Affairs - July 10, 2018 Current Affairs

British Prime Minister Theresa May appointed Jeremy Hunt as Foreign Secretary. This appointment has come after Boris Johnson resigned from the post in protest at the government's Brexit plan.

Indian goalkeeper PR Sreejesh will lead the 18-member Indian men's hockey squad while Chinglensana Singh Kangujam will serve as his deputy in the 18th Asian Games, which will begin in Jakarta and Palembang, Indonesia in August 2018.

India's ace squash player Dipika Pallikal has been appointed as Asia's representative in the prestigious Athletes Advisory Commission of the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF). The CGF Athletes Advisory Commission is the body that represents and speaks on behalf of all Commonwealth athletes.

The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) approved the merger of Vodafone India and Idea Cellular which will create the country's largest mobile services operator. The department has asked Idea Cellular to pay Rs. 3,926 crore in cash for Vodafone's spectrum and furnish a bank guarantee of Rs. 3,342 crore. The combined operations of Idea and Vodafone will create the country's largest telecom operator worth more than over Rs. 1.5 lakh crore, with a 35% market share and a subscriber base of about 430 million.

Uday Kumar Varma is a former Information and Broadcasting secretary. He is a former IAS officer of 1976 batch from the Madhya Pradesh cadre. He was also a member of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT). He succeeds Wajahat Habibullah, whose term at the BCCC has ended recently.

India and South Korea have signed five MoUs in the field of Science and Technology in New Delhi. Science and Technology Minister, Dr Harsh Vardhan and his South Korean counterpart You Young Min signed three MoUs which are Programme of Cooperation 2018-21, Establishment of Future Strategy Group and Cooperation in Bio-technology and Bio-economy. Two other MoUs were signed between Council of Scientific and Industrial Research and South Korean National Research Council for Science and

in 1994 the Christian Embassy of Christ's Ambassador marked August 27th as the National Forgiveness day. Later, National Forgiveness Day was renamed as Global Forgiveness Day, and the date was also shifted from August 27th to July 7th. The main motto of Global forgiveness day is to forgive and to be forgiven. People use this opportunity to seek forgiveness for their mistakes and to main peace and harmony in the society.

The Reserve Bank of India has announced that the licence of Alwar Urban Co-operative Bank in Alwar, Rajasthan has been cancelled as it is not in a position to pay its depositors in full as and when their claims accrue, among other reasons. The reasons for the cancellation of the licence were, the bank does not have adequate capital and earning prospects, and hence does not comply with the relevant provisions of the Banking Regulation Act, 1949.

Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved 503-million US Dollar lining project of the Son canal in Shahabad-Bhojpur region of Bihar which would benefit the agriculture sector immensely in the region. The estimated cost of the project is 503 million dollars out of which 352 million dollars is being provided by ADB.

The Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) and Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) signed a MoU for facilitating the right of use of land for the corridor for the proposed signal-free corridor from Vellara junction to Hope Farm Junction. HAL handed over 3,100 sq.m. to the BBMP for the 17.5-km signal-free corridor. The estimated cost for the signal-free corridor is Rs. 109.5 crore. It is being constructed with funds from the Nagarothana scheme. The project will take around five months for the underpasses to be completed.

Schwenk will take charge from November 1 by replacing Roland Folger, who will assume a new position for Mercedes-Benz's Thailand and Vietnam markets. Schwenk is currently the CFO of Beijing Mercedes-Benz Sales Service Co. in China.

Ministry of Housing and City Affairs, Hardeep S Puri launched 5 new initiatives below AMRUT and the "Sensible Cities Mission" India Sensible Cities Fellowship (ISCF) Program, India Sensible Cities Internship (ISCI) Program, The Sensible Cities Digital Funds Awards (SCDPA) 2018, Cities Funding To Innovate, Combine and Maintain (CITIIS) problem below the Sensible Cities Mission and the Native Space Plan (LOCAL AREA PLAN - shortly LAP)/City Planning Scheme (TOWN PLANNING SCHEME - shortly TPS) to be carried out in 25 cities on pilot foundation below AMRUT. These iniatives and internship program will provide the youth an opportunity to experience the aspects of Urban planning and governance.

IIT Delhi, IIT Bombay, IISc Bangalore, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, BITS Pillani and Jio Institute have been granted 'Institution of eminence' tag by Human Resource Development Ministry. Government institutions with this tag will get special funding of Rs 1,000 crore over the next five years. The aim of the "Institutions of Eminence" scheme is to bring selected higher educational institutions in top 500 of world ranking in the next 10 years and in top 100 eventually overtime.

The commerce ministry has approved a proposal of HCL Technologies to establish a new IT special economic zone (SEZ) in Vijayawada, Andhra Pradesh, with a proposed investment of Rs 408.48 crore. SEZs are developed as export hubs. They contribute nearly 25% in India's total exports. There are 223 operational SEZs with 5,146 units from several sectors like IT, pharma, textile, food processing, leather, biotechnology and diamond polishing.

Dr. Sandeep Sancheti, Vice Chancellor of SRM Institute of Science and Technology (SRMIST) has assumed charge as the 97th President of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU), New Delhi. The AIU has currently more than 720 members represented by Vice Chancellors. Seen as the representative of all Universities of India, the AIU facilitates coordination and mutual consultation among Universities as well as acting as a liaison with Central and State governments.

The Ministry of Statistics & Programme Implementation (MoSPI) has organised a two-day International Round Table Conference on 'Data for New India' in New Delhi. The objective of the Round Table Conference was to identify innovative ideas for improving the statistical system in India, taking cue from the best practices followed in advanced countries like Canada, UK and Australia.