10th July 2016 - Important Current Affairs updates

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International Affairs

• The 2-day long 2016 Warsaw summit of the NATO was concluded at National Stadium in Warsaw, Poland. 
• It was the 27th summit biannual summit of NATO since its inception in 1949.
• The summit was attended by Heads of State and Heads of Government of NATO members including the USA President Barack Obama, Polish president Andrzej Duda and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.
• Besides, the summit also saw the presence of Heads of Government of non-member States and organizations of NATO including Afghanistan.
• NATO - North Atlantic Treaty Organization
• Indian Army General and current Chief of the Army Staff (COAS) of the Indian Army Gen Dalbir Singh will be on 4 day visit to Australia.
  
• The visit assumes special significance in the light of enhanced military cooperation between the two countries.
• He will be visiting Australian naval ships Kuttabul and Adelaide, Headquarters Force Command, Headquarters Joint Operation Command, School of Military Engineering, Royal Military College, Land Network Integration Centre (LNIC) and Land Systems Division.
• The Bangladesh government today banned the broadcasting of Mumbai-based Islamic cleric Zakir Naik’s Peace TV. 
• The channel is already banned in India with the Centre recently warning cable operators of action for broadcasting the same. 
• Naik's activities are currently under the scanner for his speeches which allegedly inspired a gunman involved in the recent attack at a Dhaka cafe.

MOUs & Agreements

• India and Tanzania today signed 5 bilateral agreements during PM Narendra Modi's visit to the African country. 
• They are, 
• Agreement between National Small Industries Corporation of India and Small Industries Development Organisation Tanzania
• Agreement under which India will provide a Line of Credit of $92 million for rehabilitation and improvement of Zanzibar’s water supply system.
• MoU on water resource management and development, 
• MoU for establishment of vocational training centre at Zanzibar, 
• MoU on visa waiver for diplomatic/official passport holders.

National Affairs

• Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh today announced that a National Research Centre for Banana will be set up in Bihar. 
• The announcement came while inaugurating ‘Horti-Sangam 2016’, an event where farmers from over a dozen states put fruits, vegetables, and flowers on display.
• Jharkhand Chief Minister Raghubar Das today approved the setting up of 38 degree-level colleges in the state, with one each in the 35 constituencies where no such college exists. 
• Note : The state seeks to open degree-level colleges in all the 81 constituencies by 2022.
• All the 12 Regional Transport Offices (RTOs) in Delhi will remain open Seven days a week from Sunday. 
• The state Transport Department has also extended the operating hours of the RTOs from 7 am to 7 pm instead of from 10 am to 5:30 pm. 
• The move is aimed at ensuring “smooth issuance of driving licences to the applicants”.
• With an average of 5.6 people in each household, Uttar Pradesh has the largest household size in the country, according to a survey by IndiaSpend. 
• After UP, Rajasthan (5.5) and Jharkhand (5) have the largest families in India. 
• Note : 44% of households in Uttar Pradesh have more than six people.
• The mean age of females at marriage in West Bengal is 19.3 years, the least in the country, as per a survey by IndiaSpend. 
• West Bengal is followed closely by UP and Rajasthan, with mean age at marriage being 19.4 years for both. 
• Note : Uttar Pradesh has largest number of females married between 10-19 years of age (2.1 million).
• The Hemis festival will be held between July 14 and July 15 at the Hemis Monastery in Ladakh. 
• The festival honours Lord Padmasambhava, an 8th-century Buddhist master venerated as a 'second Buddha' in some places. 
• The largest Thangka (Tibetan Buddhist painting on cotton) will be unfurled this year after twelve years, as 2016 is the Tibetan Year of the Monkey.

Places in News

• The memorial of late President APJ Abdul Kalam will open to the public on July 27, which marks his first death anniversary. 
• Situated at Dilli Haat, it will display several of Kalam’s belongings like a rudra veena, spectacles, books, and research papers. 

Awards & Honors

• Cookbook author and food blogger Nimi Sunilkumar has won the Gourmand World Cookbook Award for 2015-16. 
• She was bestowed with this award for her cookbook “4 o’clock Temptations of Kerala”. 
• It was chosen for the award in the ‘Best Indian Cuisine Cookbook’ section.
• Suleiman, a 13-year-old flute player from Amritsar  today won the 7th season of the reality television show 'India's Got Talent'. 
• A ₹50 lakh cash prize, a car and a trophy bearing the signatures of the judges Kirron Kher, Malaika Arora Khan and Karan Johar were handed over to Suleiman. 
• Note : The young flautist is a student of Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia.
• Charleston, a city in the United States, has been named the World's Best City in an annual survey by the Travel + Leisure magazine. 
• The survey has ranked Chiang Mai in Thailand and San Miguel de Allende in Mexico second and third respectively. 
• Florence in Italy and Luang Prabang in Laos are among the other cities featured on the list.

Business & Economy

• The Centre and the Bihar government have signed a $290 million credit agreement with the World Bank under the state's rural development project 'JEEViKA-II'. 
• The project covers 300 new blocks in 32 districts not covered by earlier schemes.ets and financial services, the lender added.
• The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has downgraded its growth forecast for the Eurozone stating that "negative impact of the UK referendum” will dent the region's economic recovery over the next two years. 
• According to IMF, GDP in the Eurozone is expected to grow 1.6% in 2016 and 1.4% in 2017, as against the earlier estimate of 1.7% for both the years.
• The Revenue Department has imposed an anti-dumping duty of around $168.76 per tonne on the import of a chemical ‘Purified Terephthalic Acid’ used in the textile industry, from five countries, including China and Iran. 
• It has been imposed for five years in a bid to protect domestic manufacturers. 
• Important Note : Anti-dumping duty is imposed on goods being imported below the market value.

Science & Technology

• Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar today announced that India is working on manufacturing next generation routers to secure its telecommunication networks. 
• An agreement with ANURAG (Advanced Numerical Research and Analysis Group) has been signed for the same.

New Appointments

• Tathagata Roy sworn-in as Governor of Arunachal Pradesh.
• Dr. Joram Begi was also sworn-in as the Chief Information Officer of Arunachal Pradesh.

General Knowledge

• On this day (10th July) in the year 1962, NASA launched Telstar, the world’s first communications satellite to relay television and telephone signals through space.
• It successfully provided the first live transatlantic television feed, relaying footage of US President John F Kennedy talking about the price of the US dollar to Europe, and transmitting a video of French singer Yves Montand back to the US.
• Wireless technology Bluetooth was named after a 10th century Danish king, Harald ‘Bluetooth’, who is believed to have a visible ‘blue’ tooth. 
• It occurred to the engineers that just like Harald had united Denmark, the new technology would unite different devices, hence the name. 
• Indian cricketer Sunil Gavaskar was the first person in Test cricket history to reach the milestone of 10,000 runs. 
• Incidentally, he was also the first person to score more than 30 hundreds in Test matches. 
• Gavaskar, who made his international debut against West Indies in 1971, also holds the record for the most Test centuries against the West Indies.

Sports

• World number two Andy Murray won his second Wimbledon men’s singles title today, defeating Canadian Milos Raonic.
• This was Murray’s third Wimbledon final, with his first Championship victory coming in 2013 against Novak Djokovic. 
• Since the 2013 Wimbledon final, Murray has played three and lost all Grand Slam finals, coincidentally to Djokovic, until this win.
• Serena Williams and Venus Williams won their sixth Wimbledon doubles title after defeating Tímea Babos of Hungary and Yaroslava Shvedova of Kazakhsta today. 
• The American pair is now 14-0 in Grand Slam finals. 
• This is the fourth time Serena has won both singles and doubles titles in a single year, while Venus has done it twice herself.
• WWE wrestler Brock Lesnar defeated New Zealand mixed martial artist Mark Hunt on his UFC comeback, after five years. 
• Lesnar, a former UFC heavyweight champion, holds the record for the most pay-per-view buys in the UFC history. 
• This was Lesnar’s sixth win in nine UFC bouts, and he will be next seen facing Randy Orton in the WWE Summer Slam.
• Brazilian mixed martial artist Amanda Nunes became the Ultimate Fighting Championship’s first openly gay fighter to win a title after defeating American Miesha Tate today. 

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