Daily GK Updates - 4th October, 2015

NATIONAL UPDATES:

   I.            PM Modi inaugurates Solar-Powered Court in Jharkhand.

II.   Dabur India to adopt 5 UP villages to support ‘Swachh Bharat’ campaign: Coinciding with the first anniversary of PM’s Swachh Bharat initiative, homegrown FMCG major Dabur India adopted five villages in Uttar Pradesh and pledged to make them ‘Open Defecation free’ within the current fiscal.

III.         S Mookherjee is new Financial Commissioner of Railways.

IV.     E-FIR system launched in Odisha: The Odisha Police launched its ambitious e-FIR system under the Centre-sponsored Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and Systems (CCTNS) Project.

INTERNATIONAL UPDATES:

  

I.          INS Sahyadri in Vietnam on a four-day visit: As a part of India’s Look East Policy, Indian Navy’s indigenously built multi-role stealth frigate INS Sahyadri entered Da Nang in Vietnam.

II.     Microsoft acquires Irish 3D physics provider Havok from Intel: Redmond based technology major Microsoft has acquired Irish video game engine and 3D physics provider Havok from American chip maker Intel.

III.    Google Inc has morphed into Alphabet Inc: Alphabet replaced Google as the publicly traded company that will house Google’s Search and Web advertising businesses, maps, YouTube and its ‘moonshot’ ventures such as driverless cars.

OTHER UPDATES:

FINANCE/BANKING:

  I.    Gold zooms Rs 660, biggest one day gain this year: Snapping its five day falling streak, gold rebounded by Rs 660, its biggest one day surge this year, to trade at Rs 26,810 per ten grams at the bullion market.

II.   ICICI brings in card-less mVisa: ICICI Bank has become the first institution worldwide to launch m-Visa, a card less solution to make the payments. It has incorporated the m-visa application in its Pockets app, which allows payments to be made by scanning at a QR code and entering the amount.

III.  India’s foreign reserves plunge by over $2 million: India’s foreign exchange (FOREX) reserves declined by $2.04 billion to $349.97 billion in the week ended.

IV.   Asian Development Bank (ADB) will help to finance the increased transmission capacity of electrical link between India and Bangladesh: ADB’s loan of $120 million to Bangladesh will double the capacity of the existing interconnection system which links the power grid of Western Bangladesh at Bheramara and the grid of eastern India in Bharampur.

SPORTS:

V.           Shashank Manohar elected unopposed as BCCI President.

VI.         SaniaMirza and Martina Hingis won Wuhan Open women’s doubles WTA title.

VII.   Venus Williams wins Wuhan Open: Venus Williams won her second title of the season at the Wuhan Open in Central China after GarbineMuguruza retired in the second set.

VIII.  Jordon Spieth voted PGA Tour Player of the Year: American world number one Jordon Spieth was named as the PGA Tour’s Player of the year after a stellar 2014-15 campaign highlighted by two major victories among his five wins.