27th August 2016 - Important Current Affairs updates

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International Affairs

• Pakistan is going to host the 19th SAARC Summit in Islamabad and Murree during 9th & 10th November 2016. 
• It will be the meeting of the head of states or head of government of the eight SAARC countries. 
• Besides, nine observers of SAARC have also been invited to attend the Summit. 
  
• Important Note : The 18th SAARC Summit was held in Kathmandu, Nepal in November 2014.
• Theme : Deeper Integration for Peace and Prosperity. 
• Focused Area : Enhancing connectivity between the member states for easier transit-transport across the region 
• SAARC - South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation
• The United States is going to create world’s largest protected marine reserve area named as Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument off the Hawaiian coast. 
• It will be created by expansion of present national monument off Hawaii. 
• India has been ranked 77th on the World Risk Index 2016.
• This list was topped by Island state of Vanuatu.
• The 6th Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) began in Kenyan capital Nairobi today.
• African heads of State and VIPs from around the world participated in the two-day summit.
• Japan Government, along with the World Bank, the United Nations and the African Union, hosted the summit. 
• Important Note : For the first time since its inception in 1993, the summit is being held in Africa.

National Affairs

• Maharashtra Government has unveiled ambitious Mumbai-Nagpur Super Communication Expressway project in Mumbai. 
• The 46,000-crore rupee ambitious project will create state-of-the art road connectivity within a period of three years and give a fillip to investment in the state.
• Bombay High Court today announced that the ban on entry of women inside Haji Ali Dargah violates their fundamental right to practice any religion.
• Rebuking the Dargah Trust, the court said it has no right to discriminate entry of women into a public place of worship under the guise of 'managing the affairs of religion'.
• The 22nd edition of the Delhi Book Fair (DBF) began at Pragati Maidan in New Delhi today.  
• The 9 day event will conclude on 4th of September 2016. 
• Focus of the this edition of DBF will be to highlight initiatives undertaken by Union Government for its Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan to inculcate better reading habits among the younger generation.

New Appointments

• The Central government has appointed Gopal Murli Bhagat as Executive Director of Corporation Bank for a period of three years. 
• Prior to his elevation, Bhagat was General Manager with Bank of India.

Recent Committees in News

• The Union Finance Ministry has constituted 11 members high-level committee to suggest steps to promote card payments with an aim to discourage cash transactions. 
• The committee will be headed by : Ratan P Watal (Principle Adviser for social sector in NITI Aayog and former Finance Secretary)

Business & Economy

• Karnataka Bank has launched ‘KBL-SMARTz’, a mobile application (app) built on the unified payments interface (UPI) platform of the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).
• With the help of this app, users can perform the transactions on-the-go through this app, which can be downloaded from Google PlayStore.
• This App was launched by : P JayaramaBhat (Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer)

Sports

• Season-3 of the Indian Super League (ISL) Football would be held from 1st October 2016 to 18th December 2016, with the opening game scheduled in Guwahati and the venues of the two-legged semi finals to be decided later.

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