28th March 2017, Important Daily Current Affairs

Important Current affairs dated 28th March 2017 for Competitive Exams in India.
Hello Readers, We bring you another issue of current affairs that covers the important news in Current Affairs Today Section.
Current Affairs help in your preparing yourself for the various Competitive Exams in India. UPSCSuccess.com wishes all the readers best of luck. These Current Affairs coverage will help you to Score Good Marks in Competitive Exams such as UPSC, and other PSCs.

Indian Affairs

Government imposes 10% import duty on wheat, tur

•  Union Government has imposed an import duty of 10 per cent on wheat and tur in a bid to check falling domestic prices and support farmers and traders.
• The decision is significant as prices of agri commodities in the domestic market, especially pulses, are already under pressure due to a bumper crop.
• The government had reduced customs duty on wheat to zero from 10 per cent in December 2016 to increase availability in the market and control prices.
• But, with new wheat crops starting to arrive in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Gujarat, and the government estimating a record production of 96.64 million tonnes in the 2016-17 crop year (July-June) against 92.29 million tonnes last year, availability is no more a concern.
• In fact, new-season wheat supplies have dragged prices below the minimum support price (MSP) of ₹1,625 per quintal declared for wheat produced in 2016-17.

Government Launches Online Film Certification System

The Union Information and Broadcasting Ministry has launched the e-Cinepramaan, an online film certification system of the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC).
This initiative was launched on the lines of Union Government’s vision of ease-of-doing-business and digital India, to make the entire process transparent and efficient.
Its objective is to eliminate the need for a human interface to the extent possible and enable good governance by automating film certification process.
Features of e-Cinepramaan:

1. The system will show status of each application online in the dashboard of the producer and concerned CBFC official.
2. Producers of short films/promos/trailers less than 10 minutes can submit their creations online for examination purposes without need to not visit CBFC Office/Theatre.
3. In case of films longer than 10 minutes, the producer/applicant will only have to show the film at the Examining theatre. He will not have to visit the CBFC Offices at all except to collect their certificates.
4. The producer/applicant will be informed status of their application by SMS/e-mail. It will also inform any action needed and provide receipt of application to the certificate collection.
5. It will bring transparency in the system by eliminating middle men. It will mitigate chances of any corruption and avoid allegations of jumping the queue or rigging up of Examination committees.
6. Under it, QR code on the certificates will be implemented to eliminate chances of fraudulent certificates.
7. The system also envisages a robust MIS system for performance tracking and efficient reporting. It has inbuilt alerts depending on the pendency of application to ensure that time limits prescribed by the Rules.
8. It will be an important step in making the CBFC office paperless and will enable effective monitoring and real-time progress tracking for both the CBFC officials and the applicants.

International Affairs

China nominates Tai Chi for UNESCO list

• China has nominated Tai Chi, a form of ancient martial art, for inclusion in the UNESCO List of Intangible Cultural Heritage.
• The nomination, submitted by Wenxian county of Henan province, has been in the making since 2006, when the country drew up its first national intangible heritage list and included Tai Chi.
• As a precious traditional Chinese legacy, we all have a responsibility to protect it.
• China attempted to get the UNESCO status for the martial art form in 2008, but the application — one of 35 from China — was withdrawn after an evaluation deemed it.
• The following year, the rules were changed to limit nations to only two nominations, which for China were Peking Opera and acupuncture. Both made it to the list.
• The latest attempt to include Tai Chi comes amid speculation that South Korea and Japan could make similar nominations.

Source: The Hindu

India disproportionately benefits from H-1B scheme

• Indian companies and workers are disproportionately gaining from the current method of allocation of H-1B visas and this is a distortion of the programme.
• The current system of selecting H-1B visa recipients is neither fair nor efficient, and it must be replaced.
• Congressman Darrell Issa, has recently introduced a Bill that proposes to raise the minimum salary of H-1B employees to $1,00,000 per year from the current level of $60,000.
• Mr. Issa said once there are enough people being recruited under higher salaries proposed in the bill, the proposal to expand the programme could be considered.
• The demand for H1-B is oversubscribed by several times every year. But the current levels of salary are way too low a price for a way too valuable product. Who gets that valuable resource should be based on a fairer mechanism.

Banking and Finance

Odisha becomes the first state to bring banking to remote rural areas through SHG

• Odisha has become the first state in the country to carry financial inclusion and extend banking services to unbanked areas through Self Help Groups.
• The state government has signed an agreement with State Bank of India to provide banking facilities to people in unbanked areas.
• In the first phase, SHGs would be engaged as Banking Correspondents in around 1,000 remote Gram Panchayats having no banking facilities.
• The system would be of great help to people in rural areas under social security schemes like Pradhan Mantri Bima Surakshya Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Yojana, Atal Pension Yojana etc and would also be helpful in the promotion of digital banking.
• Odisha is a pioneer state in carrying forward financial inclusion through close cooperation between SHGs and banks.

Vijaya Bank inks MoU with Piaggio Vehicles

• Vijaya Bank entered into an MoU with Piaggio Vehicles for providing financial support for the purchase of vehicles under Small Road Transport Operators (SRTO) scheme in Bengaluru.
• Vijaya Bank Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Dr. Kishore Sansi flagged off the first batch of vehicles under the MoU in the presence of Piaggio Vehicles Vice-President Praveen Nagpal.

Source: The Hindu

Syndicate Bank opens 40 ‘Ananya’ branches

Awards and Recognition

President Pranab Mukherjee Presents Dr. B.C. Roy National Awards

The President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee presented Dr. B. C. Roy National Awards for the years 2014, 2015 and 2016 and Hari Om Ashram Alembic Research Awards for the years 2008, 2009, 2010, 2014, 2015, 2016 at a function held at Rashtrapati Bhavan today.
Click here for list of the awardees
Abour Dr. B. C. Roy National Awards:
Bidhan Chandra Roy Award was instituted in 1976 in memory of B. C. Roy by Medical Council of India.

KVB bags ‘best small bank’ award

• Karur Vysya Bank has been adjudged the ‘Best Small Bank for 2016’ (balance sheet size of less than ₹1-lakh crore).
• K Venkataraman, Managing Director, KVB, received the award from Sudhir Munguntivar, Minister of Finance and Planning, Government of Maharashtra, at a function in Mumbai. This is the eighth award won by KVB in the current fiscal.

Appointments & Resigns

Indian-American Vanita Gupta appointed president of ‘Leadership Conference’

• Indian-American Vanita Gupta, who headed civil rights division in the Department of Justice in the Obama Administration, has been appointed as president and CEO of ‘The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights’, becoming the first woman to head the prestigious organization.
• Newly Appointed Vanita Gupta said that, The Leadership Conference Education Fund’, will begin her new role on June 1. “At a time when our nation’s ideals and progress are being threatened in such fundamental ways, The Leadership Conference is a vital nerve center of the broad swath of civil and human rights organisations that are fighting for justice, fairness, and equality around the country.
• As head of the civil rights division, Gupta oversaw a wide range of criminal and civil enforcement efforts to ensure equal justice and protect equal opportunity for all during one of the most consequential periods for the division.
• She joined the ACLU in 2006 as a staff attorney, where she subsequently secured a landmark settlement on behalf of immigrant children from around the world detained in a privately-run prison in Texas that ultimately led to the end of “family detention” at the facility.

Minoru Kato appointed as new HMSI CEO

• Honda Motor Co, the Japanese automobile MNC has reportedly appointed Minoru Kato as the president and chief executive officer of its Indian arm, Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India Pvt Ltd (HMSI). 
• He will assume the responsibility of this role from April 1, succeeding Keita Muramatsu, who will now be the executive vice president at American Honda Co Inc.

 
 

Business

Bharat Dynamics, L&T sign up for torpedo export

• Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL) entered into a MoU with L&T for export of torpedoes (LWT- XP), designed and developed at Naval Science and Technological Laboratory (NSTL), Visakhapatnam and manufactured by BDL.
• V Udaya Bhaskar, CMD, BDL and Jayanth Patil, Head of Defence, L&T exchanged the MoU documents in the presence of Arun Jaitley, Union Minister of Defence and Dr Subhash Bhamre, Raksha Rajya Mantri at a ceremony in New Delhi recently.

Science and Technology

ESI mobile clinics launched in AP, Telangana

• Workers in small industries covered by the ESI facility but unable to access the medical services due to locational problems will have something to look forward to with the government launching mobile clinics.
• Telangana and Andhra Pradesh will be the first States in the country where the facility would be made available initially and later expanded to other parts of the country.
• Telangana and Andhra Pradesh will be the first States in the country where the facility would be made available initially and later expanded to other parts of the country.
• Each clinic will have a vehicle with a doctor, pharmacist, attendant, driver and the necessary equipment and medicines. The vehicle will visit two locations in a day for three hours each and conduct basic investigations. Each location will be covered twice a week, Mr. Dattatreya said. The annual expenditure for these will be around Rs. 30
• The vehicle will visit two locations in a day for three hours each and conduct basic investigations. Each location will be covered twice a week.
• The annual expenditure for these will be around Rs. 30 crores. ESI services cover 48 lakh beneficiaries through 12 lakh insured persons in Telangana. There are six ESI hospitals, 70 dispensaries, 149-panel clinics and two diagnostic centres.

Obituary

Eminent jurist TR Andhyarujina passes away

• Eminent jurist and senior advocate T R Andhyarujina passed away.
• Andhyarujina, 84, who also served as Solicitor General during 1996-98, was part of the team of constitutional law expert H M Seervai in his initial days as a lawyer and witnessed from close-quarters the history-defining hearings in the ‘The Kesavananda Bharati Case’.
• Seervai had appeared for the Kerela government in the famous Kesavananda Bharati case.
• Before joining the bar, Andhyarujina was selected for Indian Foreign Services in 1958 securing the third rank in the then ICS exam.

 
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