31st August 2015 - Important Current Affairs updates

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International Affairs

• The tallest mountain in North America, Mount McKinley (20,000 feet ), is to be renamed.
• For more than a century, this mountain was named after the 25th U.S. president, William McKinley.
• Now, in honor of Alaska's indigenous Athabascan people, who had always called it "Denali," US President Barack Obama is changing it back.
• India will host the 3rd India Africa Forum Summit in Delhi in October this year to further strengthen its political, economic and diplomatic links with the African continent.
• The five-day event will take place between 26th to 30th October 2015.

National Affairs

• 10th World Hindi Conference (WHC) will be organized from 10th to 12th September 2015
  
  in Bhopal by the Ministry of External Affairs.
• Prime minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the conference and Bollywood star Amitabh Bachchan will be the chief guest on the last day of the conference.
• External affairs minister : Sushma Swaraj
• Prime Minister Narendra Modi today released special digitally restored recording of epic Ramcharitmanas, as a set of digital CDs produced by All India Radio (AIR).
• Law commission has recommended abolition of death penalty for all crimes other than terrorism related offences and waging war against the state.
• Chairman of the Commission : Justice A P Shah 

New Appointments

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi appointed senior IAS officer (Rajasthan cadre) Rajiv Mehrishi as Union home secretary today.
• He is going to replace incumbent LC Goyal who took premature voluntary retirement today, barely months after being appointed to the post.
• Note : Rajiv Mehrishi became the Third Home Secretary to be appointed by the Modi government in the past one year. Mr. Mehrishi replaces L.C. Goyal,
• A 1978 batch IAS officer, Mr. Mehrishi was to retire as Secretary, Department of Economic Affairs today.

Awards & Honors

• Whistleblower bureaucrat Sanjiv Chaturvedi and founder of NGO Goonj Anshu Gupta were conferred the Magasaysay Award for the year 2015. 
• Complete Ramon Magsaysay Awardees 2015 (Announced on 29th July 2015)
• Anshu Gupta - India
• Sanjeev Chaturvedi  - India
• Kommaly Chanthavong - Laos 
• Ligaya Fernando - Philippines
• Kyaw Thu - Myanmar

Business & Economy

• The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) names country's largest lender State Bank of India (SBI) and biggest private lender ICICIBank as Domestic Systemically Important Banks (D-SIBs).
• This move will put them under tougher monitoring to avoid any collapse. 
• Note : SIBs are perceived as banks that are ‘Too Big To Fail’
• SBI Chairman - Arundhati Bhattachary
• ICICI MD & CEO - Chanda Kochhar
• Public Lender Indian Bank has launched IndPay, a mobile application service that enables its customers to operate bank accounts from anywhere, anytime.  
• IndPay can be operated through smartphones compatible with Android, Windows and iOS mobile operating systems. 
• Customers can do transactions like enquiries, getting mini statements and transferring funds to any account.
• Indian Bank MD and CEO : M K Jain

Sports

• US Open 2015, season's fourth and final Grand Slam begins today.
• Serena Williams, Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, and Marin Cilic to play their first round matches today.
• About US Open 2015 :
• It is the 135th edition of the US Open, the fourth and final Grand Slam event of the year 2015.
• Founded in : 1881
• Will be held from : 31st August 2015 to 13th September 2015
• Venue : USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center, New York
• Prize Money : $42,253,400

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