18th August 2016 - Important Current Affairs updates

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International Affairs

• Australia has recently announced that it is going to close the controversial Asylum seeker detention centre in Papua New Guinea (PNG).
• India and Bangladesh today agreed to jointly produce a documentary on the 1971 War which led to independence for Bangladesh.
• The decision was taken after a meeting between Information and Broadcasting M. Venkaiah Naidu with his Bangladesh counterpart Hasanul Haq Inu.
  
• The All India Radio (AIR) would begin an exclusive service for Bangladesh and the Bengali diaspora titled “Akashvani Maitree” on August 23.

National Affairs

• The Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) is planning to document stories and legends relating to villages and towns across India into an encyclopedia.
• This initiative is aimed at to connect people better with the oral and folk traditions. 
• It would be among the key initiatives to be undertaken by ICHR. 
• Other initiatives to be undertaken includes,
• Study of the princely States of modern India, 
• Studies to fill the gaps between the Harappan civilisation (first Indian urbanisation) and the 6th century BC (second urbanisation).
• The Uttar Pradesh government has approved a Metro Rail project for Allahabad.
• Work is already underway on the Metro Rail in Lucknow and the Detailed Project Report for Varanasi and Kanpur has already been approved.
• The state cabinet also approved a scheme to provide free school bags and books to students till class VIII in government schools.
• A decision to increase the salaries of cabinet and state ministers was also approved by the cabinet.
• Important Details about Uttar Pradesh :
• Capital : Lucknow
• Districts : 75
• Chief Minister : Akhilesh Yadav
• Governor : Ram Naik
• Official languages : Hindi, Urdu   
• To enhance transparency in power transmission sector of the country, the Union Minister of State (IC) for Power, Coal, New & Renewable Energy and Mines, Piyush Goyal has launched the ‘TARANG’ Mobile App, ‘e-Trans’ & ‘DEEP’ e-bidding web portals.
• These were eveloped by Rural Electrification Corporation Transmission Projects Company Limited (RECTPCL), a subsidiary of REC Ltd.
• TARANG - Transmission App for Real Time Monitoring & Growth
• The Assam Assembly has passed the Assam Amusements and Betting Tax (Amendment) Bill, 2016 to give a fillip to the local film industry by reducing the service charge of cinema tickets. 
• However, the state government has raised the entertainment tax on cinema tickets by up to ten percentile points.
• The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Kanpur has adopted five villages in Uttar Pradesh under the Namami Gange programme. 
• These five villages are 
• Ramel Nagar, 
• Khoyra Katree, 
• Pratapur, 
• Hari Hindpur, 
• Katri Ladhva Khera.

Deaths

• Noted Odia actor and director Gobind Tej (88) passed away.
• In his career spanning over 50 years, he has contributed in many Odia feature films either as an actor, director or producer.

Science & Technology

• The world's "largest aircraft" the Airlander 10 embarked on its maiden flight, four days after a previous attempt was abandoned due to technical issues.
• The part plane part airship took to the skies at an airfield in Cardington in central England.
• The 92-metre-long Airlander 10, can fly at up to 4,880 metres and reach speeds of 148 kilometres per hour. 

Business & Economy

• Indian private banks HDFC Bank, Axis Bank and ICICI Bank along with their Chinese peers China Construction Bank Corp (CCB), Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) and Agricultural Bank of China (ABC) occupy the top six slots amongst global banks on key return ratios, namely:
• Return On Equity (or shareholders' funds) (RoE)
• Return on Assets (RoA)

Sports

• Freestyle wrestler Sakshi Malik (23) won India’s first medal at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games by clinching the bronze in the 58kg category. 
• With this victory she created history by becoming the first Indian woman wrestler to win an Olympic medal. 
• It was India’s overall 25th medal in Olympic Games.

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