Current Affairs : 26th And 27th September 2013

1. World Tourism Day (27 September 2013) is being celebrated today all over the globe. The 2013 theme for World Tourism Day is “Tourism and Water: Protecting our Common Future”. As the most widely celebrated global day for tourism‚ it represents a unique opportunity to raise awareness of tourism’s role in water access and shine a spotlight on the sector’s contribution to a more sustainable water future.

2. In a landmark judgement, the Supreme Court on Friday gave the citizens of India the right to reject all candidates in elections. Hearing a petition filed by the People’s Union for Civil Liberties, an NGO, the apex court ruled that the Electronic Voting Machines or EVMs should have a button that will allow the voters to choose “none of the above” option. The bench of Chief Justice P Sathasivam, Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai and Justice Ranjan Gogoi said that voters should be allowed to reject all candidates standing in an election in his/her constituency.

3. The Raghuram Rajan panel report has made a case for ending the ‘special category’ criteria for providing additional assistance to poorer states, as it ranked Goa and Kerala as the most advanced state and Odisha and Bihar the least. The committee, headed by the then Chief Economic Advisor Raghuram Rajan (now RBI governor) which was set up by the government amid demand for “special category” status by Bihar, suggested a new methodology for devolving funds on states based on a ‘Multi Dimensional Index (MDI)’.

4. The controversial GAAR provision, which seeks to check tax avoidance by investors routing their funds through tax havens, will come into effect from April 1, 2016. The provision of General Anti Avoidance Rules (GAAR) will apply to entities availing tax benefit of at least Rs 3 crore, according to the notification dated September 23. The notification is broadly in line with recommendations of the Parthasarathi Shome Committee, which was set up by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in July last year to address the concerns of investors.

5. RBI governor Raghuram G Rajan has been awarded the Fifth Deutsche Bank Prize for Financial Economics 2013, in recognition of his ground-breaking research work which influenced financial and macro-economic policies around the world. The academic prize is sponsored by the Deutsche Bank Donation Fund and carries an endowment of euro 50,000.

6. Eight eminent scientists have been selected for this year’s Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize, the country’s top most award for excellence in Science and Technology. The Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize is named after the founder-Director General of Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and carries a cash component of five lakh rupees. It is given annually to young scientists below the age of 45 who have made outstanding contributions in any field of science and technology.

7. India’s financial capital Mumbai has been named the world’s second-most honest city, according to a survey of 16 cities worldwide. Finland capital Helsinki bagged the top spot for the world’s most honest city in the survey, while Lisbon, the capital of Portugal, proved to be the least honest. The survey put hundreds of people to test in four continents to find out just how honest they were by dropping wallets and seeing how many would be returned.

8. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) will provide a loan of $500 million (Rs 3,100 crore) to build a power transmission system at the Bhadla park in Rajasthan to deliver clean electricity from wind and solar power projects to the state and national grids, the development financial institution said on Friday.

9. US anti-chemical weapons campaigner Paul Walker, 67, was jointly awarded the Swedish Right Livelihood Award on Thursday honouring those who work to improve the lives of others.

10. The University of British Columbia’s Faculty of Law on 25 September 2013 presented Anna Hazare with the inaugural Allard Prize for International Integrity at Vancouver, Canada. The Allard prize is one of the world’s largest awards recognizing efforts to combat corruption and to promote human rights.

11. Supreme Court gets dedicated customized pin code. The Department of Posts, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology of India allotted Customized Pin Code to the Supreme Court of India for the first time. The Customized Pin Code of the Supreme Court is 110 201.

12. Horticultural mail order company Thompson & Morgan developed a plant called The TomTato, which can produce not just the tomatoes, but also potatoes. The TomTato is described as the veg plot in a pot and it was launched in UK. The TomTato has the capability of growing over 500 sweet cherry tomatoes and also the white potatoes.

13. Anupam Shah has taken over as the new Chairman of the Engineering Export Promotion Council (EEPC). Prior to this, he was the Senior Vice-Chairman of EEPC and has also been the past president of the Merchant Chamber, Kolkata.

14. In Uttar Pradesh, the Centrally sponsored National Urban Health Mission will be launched soon. Over 3 crore urban population will be benefitted from the scheme.

15. The Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI) on 26 September 2013 appointed Sundeep Sikka, Reliance MF President and Chief Executive, as its Chairman. In the meanwhile, Sandesh Kirkire, Chief Executive Officer of Kotak Asset Management company was elected as the vice-chairman.

16. The Indian Newspaper Society (INS) was elected Ravindra Kumar, Editor of ‘The Statesman’ newspaper as its president for the year 2013-14. Kumar, who succeeds K N Tilak Kumar of Deccan Herald and Prajavani was chosen at the 74th Annual General Meeting of the society.

17. The Ministry of Civil Aviation has given its no objection certification (NOC) to AirAsia India to start a low-cost carrier. The next step for AirAsia will be to get an Air Operating Permit and prepare to kick-start its operations in India. AirAsia India, is a three way joint venture between AirAsia, the Malaysia-based low-cost airline, Tata Sons and Telestra Trade place which was formed to start a new low-cost domestic airline.

18. The 18th International Children’s Film Festival (ICFFI), popularly known as ‘The Golden Elephant’, will be held in Hyderabad from November 14-20. The festival will present four competitive sections and the best film would bag the Golden Elephant trophy and Rs 2 lakhs in cash.The second best feature will bag the Golden Elephant Plaque with Rs 1 lakh in cash.

19. Pond’s Femina Miss India World 2013 Navneet Kaur Dhillon on 27 September 2013 won the Multimedia Award at the Miss World 2013 in Indonesia. India won this award for the second time in a row. The award was first introduced by the Miss World Organization in 2012 and India’s Vanya Mishra was its first winner.

20. Japan will promote “womenomics” — a theory which asserts that theadvancement of women in society is directly correlated with its growth rate — and give over $3 billion of official development assistance (ODA) in the next three years targeting women’s participation in society and the empowerment of women, says Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

21. India will build its first strategic oil storage by January in an effort to insulate itself from supply disruptions. India, which is 79 per cent dependent on imports to meet its crude oil needs, is building underground storages at Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh and Mangalore and Padur in Karnataka to store about 5.33 million tonnes of crude oil. This is enough to meet nation’s oil requirement for 13-14 days.

22. The company launched its latest “Hummingbird” algorithm about a month ago and that it currently affects 90 percent of worldwide searches via Google. “Hummingbird” is the company’s effort to match the meaning of queries with that of documents on the Internet, said Singhal from the Menlo Park garage where Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin conceived their now-ubiquitous search engine.

23. Contemporary western wear brand AND has unveiled its first exclusive boutique in Vadodara. It offers diverse collection of western wear like jumpsuits, jeggings, tunics, maxis, and more. “Store in Vadodara is the brand’s 39th store in India.

24. Asia Cup Hockey: India lose 2-1 to Korea in SF match. India’s dreams of earning a World Cup hockey berth were shattered when they lost 2-1 in a semifinal match of the 8th women’s Asia Cup championship in Kuala Lumpur today.

25. Serena Williams has clinched the year-end women`s world number one ranking for the third time in her career after winning two grand slam titles during an excellent 2013.

26. India have entered the final of the Sultan of Johor Cup, Under-21 hockey tournament by virtue of points. India will now face hosts Malaysia in the final match.

27. Former Under-14 World Champion and Grandmaster Vidit Gujrathi won the bronze medal at the World Junior Chess Championship after settling for a quick draw with winner Yu Yangyi of China in the 13th and final round that concluded at Kocaeli in Turkey.

28. Sania Mirza and Cara Black beat the top-seeded duo of Su-Wei Hsieh of Chinese Taipei and Shuai Peng of China in the semi-finals to reach final of the Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo on Friday.