- Actor Soumitra Chatterjee will receive Legion of Honour award
Having honoured acclaimed actor Soumitra Chatterjee with the “Legion of Honour” which is the highest order of merit in France, the French government will confer the award to the legendary actor at the 42nd Kolkata Book Fair on January 30.
The award comes to the octogenarian Bengali screen legend exactly 30 years after Satyajit Ray got the honour. Ray was awarded the Legion of Honour by then French President Francois Mitterrand in 1987.
- NPCI appoints Dilip Asbe as new MD and CEO
National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), an umbrella organisation for retail payment systems in India, has appointed Dilip Asbe as Managing Director and CEO of the organisation.
Asbe was appointed CEO-in-charge in August last year. He had come in place of AP Hota, whose term as MD and CEO had ended on August 10 last year.
- Karen Bradley named new Northern Ireland secretary
Culture Secretary Karen Bradley is to take over from James Brokenshire as Northern Ireland secretary. Her appointment follows the resignation of James Brokenshire due to health reasons.
Mrs Bradley, 47, has been the MP for Staffordshire Moorlands since May 2010, and became a Home Office minister in 2014.
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Secretary of State for Northern Ireland |
| Her Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, informally known as the Northern Ireland Secretary is the principal secretary of state in Her Majesty’s Government with responsibilities for Northern Ireland.
The Secretary of State is a Minister of the Crown who is accountable to the Parliament of the United Kingdom and is the chief minister in the Northern Ireland Office. |
- Rajesh Ranjan appointed as the High Commissioner of India to Botswana
Rajesh Ranjan presently Director in the Ministry of External Affairs has been appointed as the next High Commissioner of India to Botswana.
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Botswana |
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| Capital | Gaborone |
| Currency | Botswana pula |
- India’s fastest supercomputer inaugurated in Pune
India’s fastest supercomputer with “multi-petaflops” was dedicated to nation in Pune. Union minister for science and technology Harsh Vardhan inaugurated the powerful computer. Petaflops is a measure of a computer’s processing speed.
Flops stands for floating point operations per second, which is a measure of computer performance, useful when floating-point calculations are required.
The supercomputer has been installed at the High Performance Computing (HPC) facility at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), Pune.
- Butterfly parks to turn ‘eco-monitors’ in Kerala
A string of butterfly parks, providing natural habitat for beautiful flying insects that is getting endangered, will soon play as ‘eco-monitors’ in Kerala.
The State-run Kerala Forest Research Institute (KFRI) has drawn up an ambitious programme to create a number of butterfly gardens/parks in selected schools and other spots in the State.
The objective of setting up butterfly parks was not only to provide a natural environ for the flying insects but also to use them as ‘environment-monitors.
The KFRI recently set up a butterfly park on the premises of Kanakakkunnu Palace in the heart of the city as part of the ongoing ‘Vasantholsavam’, the annual flower show.
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Kerala |
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| Capital | Thiruvananthapuram |
| Chief Minister | Pinarayi Vijayan |
| Governor | P.Sathasivam |
- Bihar government bans electronic cigarettes in state
The state government has banned even e-cigarette in Bihar. E-cigarette is smoked through electronics nicotine delivery system (ENDS) for nicotine intake.
Its manufacture, distribution, sale, purchase, display and advertisement also stand banned. Even online purchase of e-cigarettes has been banned in the state.
State drug controller (SDC) Ravindra Kumar Sinha issued the notification in this regard recently and also sent it to all assistant drug controllers (ADCs) and drug inspectors for its strict enforcement in their respective areas.
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Bihar |
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| Capital | Patna |
| Chief Minister | Nitish Kumar |
| Governor | Satya Pal Malik |
- Delhi to create 1.5L tonnes e-waste per yr by 2020: Assocham
Delhi-National Capital Region (NCR) is likely to generate about 1,50,000 metric tonnes (MT) of e-waste per annum by 2020 from the current level of 85,000 metric tonnes, according to industry body Assocham.
E-waste is expected to be generated at compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of about 25 per cent in the Delhi-NCR region.
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DELHI |
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| Capital | New delhi |
| Chief Minister | Arvind Kejriwal |
| Governor | Anil Baijal |
- January 09: Pravasi Bharatiya Divas
Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) is celebrated on 9th January every year to mark the contribution of Overseas Indian community in the development of India.
January 9 was chosen as the day to celebrate this occasion since it was on this day in 1915 that Mahatma Gandhi, the greatest Pravasi, returned to India from South Africa, led India’s freedom struggle and changed the lives of Indians forever.
- Ola, ICICI Bank to introduce new range of integrated offerings
Ola, the taxi hailing app, has tied up with ICICI Bank to provide a range of integrated offers, including micro-credit to their customers and digital payment facilities to driver partners, respectively.
As per the partnership, ICICI Bank customers can now book and pay for Ola on the bank’s mobile app and wallet itself.
Besides, the bank will also provide micro-credits to Ola customers, wherein they can use the credit for 3-4 rides and then repay later. The bank will, however, use analytics and algorithms to understand the creditworthiness of the riders.
ICICI Bank customers will get the dual benefit of booking a cab and making payments directly through their ‘iMobile’ and ‘Pockets’ application.
| Co-Founder and CEO of Ola | Bhavish Aggarwal |
| Executive Director of ICICI Bank | Anup Bagchi |
- IndusInd Bank to roll out battery-powered payment cards
IndusInd Bank and Dynamics Inc have announced plans to introduce the first battery-powered, interactive payment cards in the Indian market in 2018.
The new IndusInd Bank card from Pennsylvania-based Dynamics, which designs and manufactures intelligent, battery-powered payment cards, has multiple buttons that let the consumer use a single card to pay in multiple ways.
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IndusInd Bank |
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| Head Quarters | Mumbai |
| CEO | Romesh Sobti |
- Flipkart’s PhonePe inks pact with FreeCharge
Flipkart’s payments arm PhonePe has partnered mobile wallet company FreeCharge to allow the latter’s customers pay for transactions at PhonePe’s partner merchants.
According to the deal terms, PhonePe has now enabled its over 45 million users to link their existing FreeCharge wallets to the PhonePe app.
Once linked, PhonePe customers will be able to spend their FreeCharge wallet balance at all online and offline merchant outlets that accept payments via PhonePe.
- China agrees to stop road construction in Arunachal Pradesh
China has agreed to stop road construction activity at Bhising area in upper Siang district of Arunachal Pradesh.
It was on December 26, 2017 India discovered that China was trying to construct an operational track – an unpaved road for movement of men and material – along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in upper Siang district of Arunachal Pradesh.
- 22-yr-old Rabada becomes world’s highest-ranked Test bowler
Young pacer Kagiso Rabada has become the number one ranked bowler in the ICC Test Rankings after helping South Africa to a 72-run victory over India in the first Test of the three-match series at Newlands.
Australia’s Steve Smith is unchanged on 947 points in first position. England captain Joe Root has leapfrogged India’s Virat Kohli and Kane Williamson of New Zealand’s into second position, while India’s Cheteshwar Pujara has slipped from third to fifth.
- Aditya Mehta wins Kolkata Open
Asian Games medallist Aditya Mehta bounced back to down English pro Alfie Burden 5-4 in a thrilling final and clinch the Kolkata Open International Invitation Snooker Championship . This is his third Kolkata Open title since it’s inception.
