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Current Affairs Today – September 8 2015

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Current Affairs Sep 8 2015

Indian Affairs 

‘Ex-Ekuverin 2015′ – Indo-Maldives Joint Military Exercise

Ex-Ekuverin 2015′  is the sixth of the series Indo-Maldives joint Training Exercise on 31st Aug 2015 at Pangode Military Station, Trivandrum

Objective of the joint military exercies –

  • To acquaint both the forces with each other’s operating procedure in addition to increased understanding and interoperability between the two Armies
  • Enhance close military ties between the two countries

As part of this year’s Joint military exercise, Maldives is represented by Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF) and India by Indian army, (Bihar regiment) 45 members from each nation.

Along with joint military exercise art forms like KalaripayattuChendamelamMalkhamb and Jhanj Pathak is also being part of the exercise.

BSNL to Boost Minimum Broadband Speed  to 2 Mbps

  • More than one crore users of BSNL will be able to surf  internet with the minimum speed of 2 Mbps against the speed of 512 Kbps without any additional cost.
  • Ravi Shankar Prasad, Union minister for Communication and Information Technology inaugurated the services in Gurgaon.
  • BSNL took this initiative in order to bring back its business through numerous measures as it has been posting losses and it’s loss stood for Rs.7600 crore approximately at the end of March 15,2015.
  • Prior to this, BSNL has announced free roaming for its mobile users.Now it is aiming at increasing its landline based-broadband users.
  • On this occasion Anupam Srivastava, chairman of BSNL said that he is expecting 10% growth-rate in broadband users for every year.

India gave first tranche of $500,000 for Syrians

  • India gave the first tranche of $500,000 for distressed Syrians who are also displaced from their homes in their war torn country.
  • This is the first phase of the commitment which India had promised earlier in March, to provide $2 million for humanitarian assistance to Syrians.
  • Jordanian government coordinating a relief for the Syrian refugees and accordingly the Indian ambassador to Jordan gave the money to the Jordanian government.
  • The war which compelled large numbers of Syrian refugees fleeing to Europe shows no signs of coming to an end, with Assad and the opposition including ISIS and other Al Qaeda-affiliated groups continuing a brutal and bloody conflict in Syria.

International Affairs 

7 Indians Feature in Forbes Asia’s Heroes of Philanthropy List

  • Seven Indiansfeature in Forbes Asia’s ninth Heroes of Philanthropy list, highlighting most noteworthy contributions to philanthropy from 13 nations throughout the Asia Pacific.
  • Infosys co-founders Senapathy Gopalakrishnan, Nandan Nilekani and SD Shibulal feature the list for their individual contributions to health and education sectors.
  • Rohan Murthy, representing his father NR Narayana Murthy, another co-founder of Infosys, also features the list. He donated a whopping USD 5.2 million to Harvard University Press for promoting ancient Indian literary classics.
  • Dubai-based, Kerala-born entrepreneur Sunny Varkey, the founder of GEMS Education also feature the list for his pledging to donate half his fortune worth USD 2.25 billion as charity in response to the Giving Pledge Initiative, led by Bill Gates and Warren Buffet.
  • The others are India-born brothers and London-based entrepreneurs Suresh Ramakrishnan and Mahesh Ramakrishnan, the founders of Whitcomb & Shaftesbury Tailors, for their donation of USD 3 million for training of more than 4,000 people in tailoring across India. The beneficiaries of their benevolence are the victims of the 2004 tsunami and mainly ill-fated women.

The United States and South Korea conduct Joint anti biochemical exercises

  • Joint biological exercise are being held since 2011 by both the countries.
  • The exercises are aimed to coordinate between the two countries, United Nations and other organizations to examine and enhance the response systems to respond when the biochemical threat arises.
  • Able Response (AR) – 15 exercise is the fifth in the series, of Able Response exercises.
  • These exercise are to respond to the bio threats in the Korean Peninsula.
  • North Korea’s alleged Biochemical weapon capability and the potential threats to use it against Republic of Korea (ROK) becomes the main reason for conducting these exercise every year. It is alleged that North Korea possess more than a dozen viral and bacterial weapons.

Appointments 

Ramesh Chand appointed as new member of  NITI Aayog

Ramesh-Chand-Niti-Aayog-member

  • Dr.Ramesh Chand,Agriculture expert has been appointed as a new member of NITI Aayog(The National Institute of Transforming India), by the govt.
  • He has  been working as a director of National Institute of Agricultural Economics and Policy Research (NIAP) since 2010 in New Delhi and leading the  government panel on minimum support price.
  • Now, he is appointed as a Task force-Member under NITI Aayog(The think tank of govt.),which is framing strategies to enhance the agriculture sector.
  • He is the third member to join in this policy institute. The Aayog is being led by the well-known economist Mr.Arvind Panagariya and consists of two other members i.e Economist Bibek Debroy and Vijay Kumar Saraswat, the former DRDO(Defence Research and Development Organisation) chief.
  • Task force – Members under NITI Aayog are entitled to recommend the ways to re-strengthen the agriculture sector,formulate strategies and identify successful experiments from which all states can adopt.

Brij Raj sharma appointed as chief secretary of jammu and kashmir

  • Brij Raj Sharma, an IAS officer of 1984 batch  is appointed as the New Secretary of Jammu and Kashmir by the govt. of Jammu & Kashmir.
  • This new appointment has taken place on september 7th, as Mohammad Iqbal Khandey chose to seek Voluntary Retirement Scheme(VRS) three months prior the superannuation date(i.e November 30) due to the conflicts with his political bosses.
  • Now Mr.Sharma will remain as the Chief secretary of J&K  till 2020.

Sports

Wasim, Rameez to be PSL brand ambassadors

Former captains Wasim Akram and Rameez Raja have signed formal contracts with the PCB to be the brand ambassadors of the Pakistan T20 Super League (PSL) for the next three years.

Anirban Lahiri becomes 1st Indian to qualify for President’s Cup team

Anirban Lahiri becomes 1st Indian to qualify

Ace golfer Anirban Lahiri added another feather to his cap by becoming the first Indian to qualify for the prestigious President’s Cup.

Lahiri, World No.40, came through as one of the automatic qualifications for the International Team, which will take on United States in the biennial Presidents Cup in Korea.

Weightlifter Deepak Lather wins gold in Commonwealth Youth Games

  • Indian weightlifter Deepak Lather won a gold medal in fifth Commonwealth Youth Games (CYG) held in Apia, Samoa.
  • He won the medal the 62 kg category after finishing with a total of 258 kg with 120 kg in snatch. He has created a new CYG record and 138 kg in clean and jerk.
  • It is second gold medal India has won in in weightlifting at this edition of CYG. Earlier, Jamjang Deru had won the gold medal in the 56 kg weight category on the opening day of the event.
  • In the fifth edition of Commonwealth Youth Games (CYG), India is being represented by 25 athletes competing in eight different disciplines out of total nine events.

Books & Authors 

Kalburgi Murder : Kannada writer to return Pampa award

  • Prof. Chandrashekhar Patil, a Kannada writer,who belongs to Dharwad-Karnataka and a close friend of Late M.M Kalburgi (A writer,who murdered by two unidentified men on August 30,2015 in Karnataka) announced to return the Prestigious Pampa award honoured by Karnataka government to him in 2009.
  • Prof.Patil said that it is the least thing he could to as a writer to protest against the environment created in the country which is suppressing the freedom of expression and led to the murder of Kalburgi.
  • He also said that he would meet Siddaramaiah, CM of Karnataka to return the  Pampa award, which is the highest literary award given by the Karnataka Govt.

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