3rd May 2016 - Important Current Affairs updates

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International Affairs

• Today (1st Tuesday of the May) is World Asthma Day.
• This day aims to raise awareness about the illness and helps educate you how to cope, care and support asthma sufferers in your family and community.
• Theme of this year : ‘You can control your Asthma’
• World Press Freedom Day, proclaimed by the United Nations in 1993, is celebrated today (May 3rd).
• This day is being observed every year to draw focus on the freedom of information, protecting journalism from censorship, and ensuring safety for journalists. 
• This day marks the anniversary of the Declaration of Windhoek, a statement of free press principles put together by African newspaper journalists in 1991.
• Around 80 countries will attend the first-ever World Humanitarian Summit in Istanbul this month to re-think how to confront global crises created by the Syrian Civil War.
• The three-day gathering will seek to chart a course with new strategies to address humanitarian crises and the rising cost of aid efforts.
• Note : World governments, international organisations and aid agencies are struggling to cope with the largest refugee crisis since World War II affecting six crore people on the move.

National Affairs

• The Telangana government is setting up a Spices Park in Nizamabad. 

• The park will come up in Padigal in Nizamabad district with an outlay of ₹31 crore.
• The park is coming up in 40 acres, catering to farmers in Nizamabad, Karimnagar, Adilabad and Warangal.
• The main aim of this park is to eliminate middlemen and provide the farmers with remunerative prices for the commodity.
• The Supreme Court of India has appointed a three-member panel to oversee the functions of the Medical Council of India.
• It is the regulator of medical profession and education in India.
• This panel will be headed by : RM Lodha (former Chief Justice of India (CJI))
• Besides Lodha, the panel consists of former Controller and Auditor General (CAG) Vinod Rai and Dr SK Sareen.
• Important Points to Note :
• Earlier, RM Lodha headed a three-member panel appointed by the top court to look into the 2013 betting scandal in the Indian Premier league (IPL) and the functioning of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and also headed the committee appointed to sell assets of Pearls Agrotech Corporation Ltd (PACL) and refund 49 thousand crore rupees to the investors.

New Appointments

• Italian sports car manufacturer Ferrari has appointed its Chairman Sergio Marchionne as the new CEO with "immediate effect", adding yet another title for the Italian-Canadian manager, who also runs Fiat Chrysler. 
• Marchionne replaced 69-year-old Amedeo Felisa, who recently retired from his post.
• 1982 batch IAS officer of Himachal Pradesh Cadre Ajay Mittal today took charge as the Information and Broadcasting Secretary.
• He replaced Sunil Arora who retired on Saturday.
• Cricketer Rohit Sharma became the Brand Ambassador of world famous Swiss luxury watch maker Hublot.
• The Mumbai batsman is the second cricketer who have been assigned for the role.
• Earlier renowned cricketer after former Australian captain Michael Clarke have been associated with the brand.
• Former KPMG Director Dilip Tuli was appointed the new Senior Vice President - Strategy & New Business Initiatives of Housing.com, India’s leading online real estate platform.
• Physicist Sriram Ramaswamy, Director of TIFR Centre for Interdisciplinary Sciences, Hyderabad, was elected as the Fellow of The Royal Society.

Deaths

• Former Jammu and Kashmir Minister and senior Congress leader Romesh Sharma today passed away after a prolonged illness.
• Veteran RSS leader and founder of Bharatiya Jan Sangh, Balraj Madhok passed away this morning.

Awards & Honors

• The Guinness World Records today recognised businessman cum politician Pankaj Parakh from Maharashtra as the man with "the most expensive gold shirt in the world". 
• The gold shirt, which weighs 4.10 kg, is currently valued at over ₹1.30 crore.
• Veteran actors Dharmendra and Jeetendra were honoured by the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) for their contribution to the film industry. 
• They were honoured as part of the Maharashtra Day event by MNS. Backstage artists including Chetan Sashital, regarded as Amitabh Bachchan's official dubbing artist, fight master Ravi Diwan and ticket-seller Chandrashekar Dhuri were also felicitated.

Business & Economy

• According to SocialCops' analysis of World Bank data, India ranks 137th of 210 countries on electrification with 78.7% of its population having access to electricity. 
• There are 87 countries with 100% access to electricity, 40 countries with 90-99%, and 6 countries with 80-89%. 
• Note : Of the bottom 20 countries (with 0-22% access to electricity), 18 are in Africa.
• India has agreed to pay an interest of 1.5% on the $6.5 billion that refiners like Essar Oil and Mangalore Refinery owe Iran in oil dues, as a "goodwill gesture", a Finance Ministry official said. 
• Note : Iran had reportedly made a demand for the interest, to make up for foreign exchange losses, during Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan's visit in April.
• The Reserve Bank of Australia has cut its benchmark interest rates by 25 basis points to a record low of 1.75%. 
• This is the central bank's first rate cut in a year which reportedly seeks to restrain a rising currency and insulate the economy from disinflation.
• Anil Ambani-led Reliance Defence has received 15 new industrial licences to manufacture a range of defence equipment, taking its total number of licences to 25, the highest held by a private firm in India.
• Note : Reliance Defence had last week collaborated with three Ukrainian firms including two state-owned firms for their range of military equipment.

Sports

• Inaugural Indian Super League (ISL) champions, Atletico de Kolkata, announced the appointment of former Villareal coach Jose Francisco Molina Jimenez as their Head Coach for ISL-2016. 
• India have been placed second in the International Cricket Council (ICC) Test Team Rankings, six points behind top-ranked Australia (118). 
• Pakistan, who have been placed third, lie one point behind India, while South Africa have dropped from third to sixth spot. Notably, the latest update includes results from May 2013 onwards.
• UK-born professional snooker player Mark Selby defeated China's Ding Junhui with a final scoreline of 18-14 to win his second World Snooker Championship title today. 
• Note : Selby is only the sixth player in the World Championship's history to win multiple world titles, after having won his first against five-time champion Ronnie O’Sullivan in 2014.
• Former cricketer Sachin Tendulkar today accepted Indian Olympic Association's invitation to be India's Goodwill Ambassador at the 2016 Rio Olympics. 
• Note : He joins Salman Khan and former Olympic gold medalist Abhinav Bindra as Goodwill Ambassadors for the Indian contingent. 
• The BCCI has nominated Indian Test captain Virat Kohli for the Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award and Ajinkya Rahane for the Arjuna award. 
• This comes four years after the BCCI nominated former Indian skipper Rahul Dravid for the award. 
• Note : Sachin Tendulkar and MS Dhoni are the only two cricketers to have won the Khel Ratna so far.

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