Current Affairs - September 9, 2018 Current Affairs

Ayushman Bharat call centre was formally inaugurated in Bengaluru by CEO of Ayushman Bharat Dr. Indu Bhushan. This national call centre is operational since August 25. The call centre functioning 24?7 in collaboration with Medi assistant is sharing info in English and Hindi initially and 9 more regional languages to be added later. The executives are working in 7 different shifts and one more such call centre functioning in Hyderabad.

Axis Bank announced that Amitabh Chaudhry has been appointed as its managing director & CEO from January 1, 2019, for a period of three years. Mr. Chaudhry, the MD & CEO of HDFC Standard Life Insurance Company at present, will take the charge at India's third largest private sector bank after incumbent Shikha Sharma steps down on December 31, 2018. Mr. Chaudhry, 54, has been associated with HDFC Life since January 2010.

Real Madrid midfielder Luka Modric has been named UEFA Men's Player of the Year for 2017/18. Modric beat off competition from former Madrid team-mate Cristiano Ronaldo and Liverpool forward Mohamed Salah, who joined him on the three-man shortlist announced on 20 August. The Croatian international received the trophy on stage in Monaco during the UEFA Champions League group stage draw. He was also named UEFA Champions League Midfielder of the Season.

India Ideas Summit is an effort by USIBC and by the US Chambers of Commerce. It was inaugurated by the Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and Union Minister of Commerce and Industry and Civil Aviation Suresh Prabhu delivered the key note address. It was held in Mumbai on 5th and 6th September 2018.

Noted Odia poet Satrughna Pandav will be honoured with the prestigious 'Sarala Puraskar' for his poetry collection 'Misra Dhrupad'. The 'Sarala Puraskar', instituted by eminent Odia industrialist late Dr Bansidhar Panda and late Ila Panda in 1979 and awarded by the Indian Metals Public Charitable Trust(IMPaCT) will be presented to Pandav on October 26. The award carries a cash prize of Rs 5,00,000 and a citation.

Union Minister for HRD Prakash Javadekar Inaugurates 4th World Summit on Accreditation (WOSA-2018) at New Delhi. WOSA is a biennial Summit organised by NBA, which provides platform to stakeholders to share their knowledge and information on accreditation. The Summit will facilitate the exchange of information on various challenges being faced during the transition between input-output based accreditation to outcome-based accreditation.

Turkey is hosting the 87th Izmir International tradeshow 2018 in Izmir from September 7th to 11th, in which India is the Partner Country. In this tradeshow, India will also launch a mega business pavilion 'Source India' to increase India's exports to Turkey and other neighbouring countries. Owing to India's participation as Focus Country status, India's National Anthem will be played and the National Flag displayed on the screens put up in the show. Special signage will be erected to lead buyers and visitors to the 'Source India' pavilion. Source India, with 75 Indian participating companies, is a multi-product pavilion though some of the key potential areas for increasing trade with Turkey are ceramics, cereals and machinery or mechanical appliances.

Indian movie 'Gold' has created history by becoming the first Bollywood film ever to release in Saudi Arabia. The Reema Kagti-directed sports film 'Gold' is a fictional re-telling of India's iconic win at the 1948 London Olympics. It stars Akshay Kumar, Mouni Roy, Kunal Kapoor, Vineet Kumar Singh, Amit Sadh, and Sunny Kaushal. This film is only the second movie after Rajnikanth's social drama "Kala" to hit the theatres in the Gulf country. Saudi Arabia had held a private screening of international cultural phenomenon, "Black Panther" in May 2018 to herald the launch of movie theatres in the kingdom and opening them to the public.

Facebook will invest more than $1 billion to build its first data centre in Asia in Singapore. It is expected to be opened in 2022. The data centre will be built on an area of 170,000 square metre.

Ankur Mittal claimed the men's double trap gold medal in the ISSF World Championship for his career's biggest triumph, as the Indian shooting team continued its dominance in the premier tournament in Changwon, South Korea. Ankur also won the team bronze in the event along with compatriots Md. Asab and Shardul Vihaan, their tally of 409 points putting them behind China's 410 and the gold-winning team Italy's tally of 411.

Naomi Osaka became the first Japanese woman to win a Grand Slam title after she registered an emphatic win over Serena Williams in the finals of the U.S Open. Osaka got off to an aggressive start in the first set, breaking the six-time U.S Open champion twice. She used her tremendous movement and brutal baseline hitting to close the set in just 33 minutes.

Recently, the Delta Force has celebrated its 25th Raising Day on September 6 in the memory of those who sacrificed their lives in the line of duty. It is the counter insurgency force of the Indian Army that has been instrumental in eliminating terrorism from the Chenab Valley and ushering peace in the region. Till date, the Force has been honoured with 1,380 Gallantry Awards including one Ashok Chakra, five Kirti Chakras and 46 Shaurya Chakras.

Jharkhand Chief Minister Raghubar Das was on a four-day visit to China at the invitation of the International Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC). He invited China to participate in food processing summit, which will be organised by Jharkhand Government in November.

The expenditure on advertisements through print media stood at nearly Rs 127 crore while more than Rs 5 crore was spent on advertisements with outdoor media. There was "nil" expenditure for the same on electronic media. The Goods and Services Tax (GST) was implemented on July 1, 2017. The government had also roped in Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan as brand ambassador to promote GST and inform people about its benefits.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) bought 8.46 tonne of gold in financial year 2017-18. This is the first purchase in almost nine years. RBI now has 566.23 tonne of gold in this year. Earlier in November 2009, RBI had bought 200 tonne of gold from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The value of gold held as asset of Banking Department rose by 11.12% due to the depreciating value of rupee against dollar.