2nd September 2016 - Important Current Affairs updates

sponsored links

International Affairs

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi embarks on a two nation tour to Vietnam and China today.
• Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi arrived in New Delhi on a three-day visi.
• During this visit, he will hold talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi with an aim to step up engagement in areas of security, counter-terrorism and trade. 
• Today (2nd September) is World Coconut Day.
• September 2nd has been declared World Coconut Day by the Asian and Pacific Coconut Community (APCC) headquartered at Jakarta, Indonesia, to coincide with APCC’s foundation day.
• The celebration is aimed at creating an awareness about the importance of the coconut and its potential in alleviating poverty, encouraging investments and promoting the development of the coconut industry in the member countries. 
• About APCC : The APCC is an inter-governmental organization of 18- member countries mandated to promote, coordinate, and harmonies coconut developmental activities of the Asian Pacific region.
• All major coconut-growing countries, including India, are members of the APCC. 
• Note : In India, 12 million people are dependent on coconut farming for their livelihood and the contribution of the coconut farming sector to the GDP of the country is around Rs 10,000 cr
• India stands first in production and productivity of coconut in the world and third in the area of cultivation.
• Theme of the World Coconut Day 2016 : Coconut, the tree of life Sustains family wel lbeing
• West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee today left for a week-long visit to Rome and Germany.
• During this visit, she will attend Mother Teresa's canonisation ceremony. 
• She will also hold meetings with businessmen in the manufacturing sector and meet potential investors. 
• Two Indian naval ships, INS Kolkata and INS Aditya, arrived at Port Louis in Mauritius on a three-day visit today.
• The aim of this visit is to promote maritime security in the Indian Ocean Region. 
• During the visit, the Indian Navy and the Mauritius National Coast Guard will hold professional interactions regarding disaster management and maritime threats of terrorism and privacy.
• The annual La Tomatina Festival was celebrated in the Spanish town of Buñol today. 
• Over 1,50,000 kilograms of ripe tomatoes were used by around 20,000 people who participated in the hour-long festival. 
• The tradition, which is known to have started in 1945, attracts tourists from around the world and is considered to be the world's biggest food fight.

National Affairs

• India’s first international conference on cooking gas has started in Bhubaneswar, Odisha. 
• The 2-day conference was inaugurated by Jharkhand Governor Droupadi Murmu. 
• Cricketer-turned-politician and ex-BJP MP Navjot Singh Sidhu has formed a new political party named ‘Awaaz-e-Punjab’ along with hockey player-turned-MLA Pargat Singh and independent MLAs Simarjeet Singh Bains and Balwinder Singh Bains.  
• The government has reportedly formed five new investigative teams of 50 officers from CBI, RAW, ED and IT departments to nab absconding underworld don Dawood Ibrahim. 
• The teams have been mandated to dismantle Ibrahim's business empire spread over several countries. 
• Note : Ibrahim, reportedly hiding in Pakistan for over two decades, is confined to Karachi due to his deteriorating health.
• The annual socio-religious Solung festival of Adi tribe has started in Arunachal Pradesh. 
• Solung is 5-day long agro-based festival is celebrated every year by the Adi tribe in the first week of September.
  
• A 60-year-old Japanese government document, which was made public today, has revealed that Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose died in a plane crash in Taiwan on August 18, 1945. 
• Following the crash, he suffered burns and later succumbed to his injuries. 
• This seconds the findings of the Shah Nawaz Khan-led panel instituted by the then Prime Minister Jawahar Lal Nehru.
• The Union Government has notified National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme (NAPS) for providing apprenticeship training to over 50 lakh youngsters in order to create more jobs. 
• The Scheme has an outlay of 10,000 crore rupees with a target of 50 Lakh apprentices to be trained by 2019-20. 
• It is first of its kind scheme notified to offer financial incentives to employers.
• Odisha today passed the Goods and Services Tax Bill, becoming the 16th assembly to ratify the legislation, granting the minimum required states' support for the bill to be sent for President's approval. 
• Earlier, the bill was passed by Assam, Bihar, Jharkhand, Himachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi, Nagaland, Maharashtra, Haryana, Telangana​, Sikkim, Mizoram, and Goa.
• Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa today said the government will increase maternity leave for female state government employees from six months to Nine months, fulfilling an electoral promise.
• The 1st BRICS film festival has begun at the Sirifort Auditorium Complex in New Delhi. 
• The film festival is the run up to the BRICS summit which is to be held in Goa in October 2016. 
• It was inaugurated by Minister of State (MoS) for Information and Broadcasting Rajyavardhan Rathore and Minister of State (MoS) for External Affairs V.K. Singh.
• The Indian Army has set up Army Design Bureau (ADB) in an attempt to indigenise procurements and reduce import dependence. 
• It has been established as part of the government’s ‘Make in India’ initiative and will integrate various stake holders in its long-term requirements.

Awards & Honors

• Actress Priyanka Chopra is set to present at the upcoming 68th Primetime Emmy Awards that will be held on September 18. 
• The list of presenters also includes Indian-American actor Aziz Ansari. 
• Note : Priyanka had also presented at the 88th Academy Awards held earlier this year. 
• Other actors who will reportedly present at the event include, Kristen Bell and Larry David.
• Guinness World Records has officially recognised Majuli located in the Brahmaputra river in North East India as the world's largest river island. 
• Home to around 1,60,000 people, the island presently covers an approximate area of 880 square kilometres.

MOUs & Agreements

• India and Egypt have signed an agreement in the area of Maritime Transport to step up co-operation on the seas.
• The agreement was signed after delegation level talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and visiting President of Egypt Abdel Fattah El-Sisi in New Delhi.
• The Gujarat government has inked a tripartite memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Ministry of Civil Aviation and the Airport Authority of India (AAI). 
• Under these MoUs, 11 small airports and airstrips will be developed under the Centre’s Regional Connectivity Scheme (RCS) to boost regional air connectivity in the State. 
• With this, Gujarat became the third State after Jharkhand and Maharashtra to have signed such an agreement under the Centre’s Regional Connectivity Scheme (RCS).

New Appointments

• Brazil's former Vice President Michel Temer was sworn in as the country's new President, hours after the Senate voted to remove Dilma Rousseff from office yesterday. 
• He is expected to stay in power until the next scheduled election in 2018. 
• The Nepal government today re-appointed Deep Kumar Upadhyay as Nepal's ambassador to India after recalling him in May this year. 

Business & Economy

• India has been placed at the 35th rank in the World Bank’s 2016 Logistics Performance Index (LPI) among 160 countries.
• The government incorporated the Sagarmala Development Company with an initial authorised share capital of ₹1,000 crore, to provide equity support to port-led development projects. 
• Sagarmala is a developmental model for modernising ports to link coastal territories with remote areas. 
• Earlier, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari had said the project will create around 10 million jobs.
• India's nuclear energy generation capacity has crossed 6,000 MW after the synchronisation of Unit II of Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant in Tamil Nadu, according to reports. 
• Note : The Nuclear Power Corporation of India will reportedly add four more reactors in one year.

Science & Technology

• Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will launch the INSAT - 3 DR satellite on 8th of this month using heavyweight GSLV Mark - II.

Recent Committees in News

• The Union Government has constituted 4 member expert committee to study silt in river Ganga in Bihar. 
• The team will be headed by : A .K. Sinha (member of Ganga Flood Control commission).

Awards & Honors

• Actor Jackie Chan will be awarded an honorary Oscar by the Academy of Motion Pictures, Arts & Science. 
• Chan along with documentary maker Frederick Wiseman, British film editor Anne V Coates and casting director Lynn Stalmaster will be the recipients of the 2016 Governors Awards.

Sports

• Following Bastian Schweinsteiger's retirement from international football, the German Football Association has announced goalkeeper Manuel Neuer as the team's new captain. 
• The 30-year-old, who is widely known for his sweeping skills, has 71 caps for the national side, which includes Germany's World Cup title win in 2014. 
• Neuer will lead Germany for the first time in November against Italy.

Read more Daily Current Affairs updates from here

sponsored links