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Tuesday, June 16, 2020

Daily GK Updates - 16th June, 2020


NATIONAL UPDATES:

1. EPFO launches “Multi Location Claim Settlement” facility: Employees Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has launched a “Multi Location Claim Settlement” facility. It will allow settlement of all online claims including provident fund, pension, partial withdrawal, and transfer claims from any EPFO regional offices across the country. It will also reduce claim settlement delay by distributing workload across the nation enabling fast-track settlement. Cla The facility will enable EPFO offices to settle online claims from any of its regional offices, across the country.ims of containment zones are distributed to other locations for processing.

2. CBIC launches ‘e-Office’ in all CGST and Customs offices: Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) Chairman M. Ajit Kumar has launched ‘e-Office’ application in 500 CGST and Customs offices across India remotely. It marks the change in office procedure from manual file handling to automatic online procedures. It will provide ‘Faceless, Contactless and Paperless’ indirect Tax administration. It is developed by National Informatics Centre (NIC) with Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) under Mission Mode Project (MMP) of National e-Governance.
Note: Director General of National Informatics Centre (NIC): Neeta Verma.

3. Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan Launches India’s first online delivery-based gas trading platform Indian Gas Exchange: The Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas & Steel Shri Dharmendra Pradhan virtually launched India’s first nationwide online delivery-based gas trading platform, Indian Gas Exchange (IGX) on 15 June 2020. IGX has been incorporated as a wholly owned subsidiary of the IEX (India Energy Exchange) India’s energy market platform. The exchange will provide six market products - day-ahead, daily, weekly, weekdays, fortnightly and monthly. Initially, trading is proposed at the physical hubs at Hazira and Dahej in Gujarat and Oduru/Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh while new hubs would be introduced ahead. The exchange is expected to facilitate transparent price discovery in natural gas, and facilitate the growth of the share of natural gas in India’s energy sector.

4. MoS for Home affairs G. Kishan Reddy launches device ‘GermiBAN’:  A device named “GermiBAN” has been launched by the Union Minister of State for Home affairs G. Kishan Reddy. The device has been developed by Atal Incubation Centre & Association of Lady Entrepreneurs of India (ALEAP) Women Entrepreneurs (WE) HUB. The recently launched device has the capability of killing 99.9% of surface and air microbes. Hence the device will be very useful for quarantine centres, isolation wards, hospitals and all general places for killing viruses like coronavirus. ALEAP WE-HUB is an effort to encourage women startups across sectors

5. Union Minister Jitendra Singh Launches ‘Feedback Call Centres on COVID -19 Public Grievances’: The Union Minister of State for Personnel, PG and Pensions Dr. Jitendra Singh launched the “Feedback Call Centres on Public Grievances” on 15 June 2020. The Feedback Call Centres would take feedback from individual citizens on citizen satisfaction regarding the COVID-19 Public Grievances that have been filed on Centralised Public Grievance Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS) for the period 30/3/2020 to 30/5/2020. The DARPG (Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances) has in collaboration with BSNL operationalized Feed Back Call Centers in Bhubaneshwar, Guwhati, Jamshedpur, Vadodara, Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Ajmer, Guntur, Coimbatore and Guntakal with 1406 call centre operators. These call-centres would operate in Hindi, English, Gujarati, Marathi, Punjabi, Kannada, Konkani, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu, Oriya, Bengali, Assamese and Rajasthani.

INTERNATIONAL UPDATES:

1. India along with 12 other Countries leads ‘#VERIFIED’ initiative at UN to counter misinformation on COVID-19: India and 12 other countries have come together to lead United Nations initiative ‘#VERIFIED’, which aims to counter misinformation on the coronavirus by spreading fact-based content. The other countries are Australia, Chile, France, Georgia, India, Indonesia, Latvia, Lebanon, Mauritius, Mexico, Norway, Senegal and South Africa. Apart from these 13 nations, 132 other nations are endorsing the global call to fight the “infodemic” or manipulated information relating to the COVID-19 pandemic. Led by the UN Department for Global Communications (DGC),’Verified’ will provide information around three themes: (1) science- to save lives; (2) solidarity- to promote local and global cooperation; (3) solutions- to advocate for support to impacted populations. UN has launched this initiative in collaboration with Purpose, one of the world’s leading social mobilisation organisations.

2. India joins Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI) as a founding member: On 15 June 2020, India joined the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI or Gee-Pay) as a founding member to support responsible and human-centric development and use of Artificial Intelligence (AI). With this, India has joined the group of leading nations and economies like USA, the UK, EU, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Republic of Korea, and Singapore for launch of GPAI. GPAI will be supported by a Secretariat, to be hosted by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris, as well as by two Centers of Expertise — one each in Montreal and Paris. GPAI is an international and multi-stakeholder initiative to guide the responsible development and use of AI, with focus on human rights, inclusion, diversity, innovation, and economic growth. It is a first of its type initiative for better understanding of the challenges and opportunities around AI using the experience and diversity of participating countries.

3. Anmol Narang becomes 1st observant Sikh to graduate from US Military Academy:  Anmol Narang has made history by becoming the 1st observant Sikh to graduate from the distinguished United States (US) Military Academy at West Point. She was among about 1,100 cadets who graduated at the premier institution’s campus in New York with the rank of 2nd lieutenant. US Congress passed a law that prohibited Sikhs from keeping article of faith within military in 1987. She is hopeful that her efforts to represent her religion and community will encourage Americans to find out more about Sikhism. She was born and raised in Roswell, Georgia.

4. International Day of Family Remittances: 16th June: The International Day of Family Remittances (IDFR) is a United Nations General Assembly recognized day, observed on 16 June each year to celebrate the contribution of migrant workers, improve the lives of their family members back home, and to create a future of hope for their children. This year International Day of Family Remittances is celebrated under the theme: “Building resilience in times of crisis”. The first International Day of Family Remittances was celebrated on June 16, 2015.

OTHER UPDATES:

BANKING AND FINANCE

1. Airtel Payments Bank Launches ‘Suraksha Salary Account’ for MSME: The Airtel Payments Bank has launched ‘Suraksha Salary Account’, designed specifically for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME). With Suraksha Salary Account, MSMEs and other organisations will be able to make cashless payments and also provide a financial security blanket to their employees. Some features of the account include: The account has no minimum balance condition. Account holders will be able to make cash withdrawals, deposits and transfer money at Airtel Payments Bank’s 500,000 banking points across India. There are no charges on cash withdrawals of up to Rs 50,000 and deposits of up to Rs 20,000 in one month. The account offers benefits such as Hospicash Insurance and personal accidental insurance cover. This means in the event of hospitalization the account holder will get fixed cover of Rs 400/day up to a maximum of 10 days. The account holder will also get free group accidental cover of Rs 1 lakh.
Note: Airtel Payments Bank Headquarters: New Delhi; Airtel Payments Bank MD and CEO: Anubrata Biswas

2. ICICI Bank introduces ‘Insta FlexiCash’ facility for salary account holders: ICICI Bank has launched a fully digital overdraft facility for its Salary Account customers to get approval for overdraft (OD) instantaneously and in a paperless manner. The facility called, ‘Insta Flexicash’, will provide end-to-end fully digital experience to the customers using the Bank’s internet banking platform. The customers can apply for the OD from their home, without visiting a bank branch. The Bank will offer a credit limit worth up to three times of a customer’s net salary. The facility can be sanctioned immediately while customers can start using the approved OD limit within 48 hours. The interest payable on the OD is calculated on the basis of the actual amount availed by the customer, not on the full amount of the OD sanctioned.
Note: Managing Director & CEO of ICICI Bank: Sandeep Bakhshi; Non-Executive (part-time) Chairman of ICICI Bank: Girish Chandra Chaturvedi; ICICI Bank established: 1994; Headquarters of ICICI Bank: Mumbai, Maharashtra.

AWARDS AND HONOURS

1. Sprinter Hima Das nominated for Khel Ratna award by Assam Government: India's sprinter Hima Das (Dhing Express) has been nominated for the prestigious Khel Ratna award. She is one of the youngest nominee for this award. She is India’s first track athlete to win global title at U20 World Championship. She won 400m silver, 4X400 mixed relay gold and women's 4X400m gold at the Jakarta Asian Games in 2018. She is holding the current Indian national record in 400 mtrs with a timing of 50.79 s. Hima is already a recipient of Arjuna Award.

2. Chef Angad Singh Rana wins QualityNZ Culinary Cup 2020: Chef Angad Singh Rana has won QualityNZ Culinary Cup 2020. The award was announced by Cricket legend and Chennai Super Kings coach Stephen Fleming. Chef Angad Singh Rana grabbed the QualityNZ Culinary Cup 2020 alongside INR 50,000 worth of QualityNZ lamb and seafood and a Weber BBQ valued at over INR 46,000. This award is the New Zealand’s first ‘Virtual’ Chef competition – the ‘Quality NZ Culinary Cup’ held in India.
Note: Prime Minister of New Zealand: Jacinda Ardern; Capital of New Zealand: Wellington.
                                    
OBITUARIES

1. Former New Zealand cricketer Matt Poore passes away: Former New Zealand cricketer Matt Poore (90 years) passes in North Shore, Auckland, New Zealand. He was featured in 14 Tests for the Black Caps, scoring 355 runs, and picking up 9 wickets between 1953-1956. He also played 61 Tests for Canterbury and scored 2,336 runs and 68 wickets. He is widely remembered because of an incident involving a stray dog in New Zealand tour of India 1955 to Bengaluru after which 12 anti-rabies injections was given to him.

2. Former Lok Sabha MP Madhavrao Patil passes away: Former Lok Sabha member Madhavrao Patil (80 years) passes away in Maharashtra's Nashik district. He was the founder of Janalaxmi Cooperative Bank on 14 February, 1976 and was the chairman of the bank. He was the staunch supporter of Sharad Pawar and was among the first to join Nationalist Congress Party in 1999. He won Nashik Lok Sabha constituency seat on a Congress ticket in 1998 defeating Rajaram Godse of Shiv Sena.

3. Uttarakhand folk singer Heera Singh Rana passes away:  Noted folk singer of Uttarakhand, Heera Singh Rana passed away. He was born in 1942 in Manila Dandholi village of Almora. He visited Kolkata with a scholarship to review music. Recently he was appointed vice-chairman of Garhwal, Kumaoni and Jaunsari Academy by the govt of Delhi. He began singing in various forums since the age of 15.

4. Former Bangladesh Minister Mohammad Nasim passes away: Former Bangladesh Minister Mohammad Nasim (72 years) passes away in Dhaka. Mohammad Nasim was Health Minister of Bangladesh from 2014 to 2018. He was also Bangladesh’s Home Minister from 1999 to 2001. He was the chairman of the Standing Committee on Ministry of Food of the present parliament. He was also presidium member of the Awami League and was serving as the spokesperson of the 14-party alliance.
Note: Bangladesh PM: Sheikh Hasina.

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