Current Affairs - December 10, 2018 Current Affairs

The Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi approved Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between India and the United States of America (USA). The MOU focuses on Scientific and Technical Cooperation in the Earth Sciences. The MoU was signed on 1st November 2018.

The Vice President of India Shri M.Venkaiah Naidu released Compilation of Selected speeches of the President, Ram Nath Kovind titled, "The Republican Ethic" in English and "Loktantra ke Swar" in Hindi at a function in Vigyan Bhawan in New Delhi. Both the books- The Republican Ethic & Loktantra ke Swar are a collection of President of India Shri Ram Nath Kovind's selected speeches made by him in the first year of assuming the office. The event has been organized by the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting.

The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) signed a loan agreement worth USD 100 mn with Green Climate Fund (GCF) to boost rooftop solar power capacity projects through the private sector participation. The Total corpus of the project is USD 250 mn, which will be executed by Tata Cleantech Capital Ltd. The Agreement was signed, on the sidelines of ongoing COP24 in Katowice, Poland, by Shri Shankar A Pande, Chief General Manager, NABARD in the presence of Shri A K Mehta, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC).

The government appointed Dr. Krishnamurthy Subramanian as the new Chief Economic Advisor. Dr. Subramanian will have a tenure of three years. The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has cleared his name. He is currently working as an Associate Professor at the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad. A Ph.D. from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and a top-ranking IIT-IIM alumnus, Subramanian is one of the world's leading experts in banking, corporate governance and economic policy.

Shalindra Kumar will take over as the Chief Electoral Officer of Jammu and Kashmir on 12th December 2018. He will be replacing the incumbent Shaleen Kabra. His office will take effect a day after the completion of the ongoing nine-phased panchayat polls in the State. The panchayat elections in J&K is being held after a gap of seven years. The elections in the State began on November 17 and will culminate on December 11.

India will retain its position as the world's top recipient of remittances in 2018 with its diaspora sending a whopping USD 80 billion back home, according to the World Bank report. India is followed by China (USD 67 billion), Mexico and the Philippines (USD 34 billion each) and Egypt (USD 26 billion), according to the global lender. The Bank estimates that officially-recorded remittances to developing countries will increase by 10.8% to reach USD 528 billion in 2018.

The 10th Edition of the bilateral exercise between the Indian Navy and Russian Federation Navy (RuFN) started at Visakhapatnam. The Maritime exercise will conclude on December 16. The Primary aim of the exercise is to increase interoperability amongst the two navies, develop common understanding and procedures for maritime security operations. This Year's edition of exercise would be held in two phases, The Harbour phase would be held at Visakhapatnam from 9-12 December and the Sea phase would be held from 13-16 December in the bay of Bengal. Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW), Air Defence Drills, Surface firings, Visit Board Search and Seizure (VBSS) operations and tactical procedures will be the thrust of exercises at sea.

Rashtriya Lok Samta Party (RLSP) Chief Upendra Kushwaha resigned as Union Minister of State in the Ministry of Human Resource Development. This comes a day ahead of the start of the Parliament's Winter Session, triggering a realignment of political equations in Bihar.

Indian Navy agreed to gift INS Cuddalore, a decommissioned Pondicherry-class vessel, to the Union territory of Puducherry for the creation of country's first underwater museum. The 60 m long and 12 m wide vessel was decommissioned in March 2018 after sailing 13000 nautical miles. It would be sent to the seabed at a depth of 26 m and 7 km off the Pondicherry coast to act as an underwater marine museum for scuba diving and snorkeling activities. This would enhance tourism in the UT.

Mexico's Vanessa Ponce de Leon won the coveted Miss World 2018 crown at a grand event held in the Chinese city, Sanya. Thailand's Nicolene Pichapa Limsnukan was declared the runner-up. Former Miss World Manushi Chillar (India) presented the crown to the new winner during the pageant in which 118 contestants participated. India's Anukreethy Vas failed to make a mark at the pageant as she could not even make it to the top 30.

After the Success of container cargo being shipped form Kolkata to Varanasi, Kolkata-Patna has become India's Second Inland Water Transport origin destination pair for containerized cargo movement on National Waterway-1. Bihar Capital Patna will witness to a new landmark in India's Inland Water Transport (IWT) sector with 16 TEUs of Container Cargo from food giants PepsiCo India and Emami Agrotech Ltd reaching Gaighat IWT terminal from Kolkata on river Ganga.

The Japanese government enacted a new law to bring more blue-collar foreign workers into the country, in a controversial move to address chronic labour shortages. Under the new law, Japan plans to bring in 345,000 foreign workers in construction, food services, nursing and other sectors for 5 years. The law will take effect in April 2019 and create two new visa categories. The first status allows foreign nationals with skills in sectors facing severe shortages to obtain five-year visas, which will not allow them to bring their families. The second status allows foreign workers in those fields who hold stronger qualifications and pass a more difficult Japanese language test will be able to obtain a visa that can be extended indefinitely, eventually leading to residency, and will be able to bring over family.

The Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) in the Ministry of Commerce and Industry and the Government of Goa hosted the annual #startupindia Global Venture Capital Summit in Goa. The theme of the Summit was: 'Mobilizing Global Capital for Innovation in India.' The International Finance Corporation (IFC), a sister organisation of the World Bank Group, Invest India and the Indian Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (IVCA) were the partners for this initiative. Participation came from around 100 funds from countries like United States of America, China, Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore. Government of Goa through its participation aims to make the state, one of the most preferred start-up destinations in India, and one of the top25 start-up destinations in Asia by 2025.

According to Oxford Economics report, the top 10 fastest growing cities in the world from 2019 to 2035 are in India. Gujarat's Surat tops the list followed by Uttar Pradesh's Agra. Surat, a diamond processing and trading center in the western state of Gujarat, will see the fastest expansion through 2035, averaging more than 9 percent. Agra and Bangalore gets 2nd and 3rd spot respectively. By 2035, the GDP of Asian countries will be 17 percent higher than all North American and European urban centers combined. Mumbai was termed as the world's 12th richest city with a total wealth of $950 billion and India is the 6th largest wealth market in the world (in terms of total wealth held) after USA, China, Japan, Germany and the UK.

The Kannur international Airport-KIAL in Kerala began its operations with Union minister for civil aviation Suresh Prabhu and Kerala Chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan jointly lighting the lamp inside the terminal building, marking the inauguration of the airport. With this, Kerala became the only state in the country with four international airports.

The Global Investors Meet (GIM) 2019 is to be held in Chennai, India on January 23 and 24, 2019. The officials of the Airports Authority of India (AAI) have planned to spruce up the Chennai airport to give a facelift to a host of facilities. AAI has set up separate counters for e-visas, foreign passports and passengers having Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) passports. A special parking area will be created for the those coming to attend the GIM 2019. It has also decided to deploy additional manpower and put up some facilitation counters to help those arriving at the airport. Even when the first ever Global Investors Meet happened in 2015, the airport was revamped.

Human Rights Day is observed every year on 10 December. On this day, the United Nations General Assembly adopted, in 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This year, Human Rights Day marks the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. #StandUp4HumanRights is the global campaign launched on for year 2018.

Sixteenth International Anti-Corruption Day celebrated on December 9, 2018. The day has been celebrated since the passage of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption on 31 October 2003 to raise public awareness for anti-corruption. UN along with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) organized a global campaign called- "Corruption: An impediment to Sustainable Development Goals"- for spreading the awareness on corruption.