CURRENT AFFAIRS: NATIONAL NEWS
Venkaiah Naidu to inaugurate exhibition on Ek Bharat Shrestha Bharat in Hyderabad:
- Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu will inaugurate an exhibition on Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat in Hyderabad city.
- Exhibition will be organised by the Regional Outreach Bureau, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
- This exhibition will highlight the various interesting aspects of the paired states of Haryana and Telangana like art forms, cuisine, festivals, monuments and tourism spots.
- It will be open for viewing from 12th to 14th December at Potti Sreeramulu Telugu University Campus, Nampally, Hyderabad.
- The Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat programme is a unique initiative by the Government to promote the spirit of national integration and to strengthen the fabric of emotional bonds between the people of our country.
- The programme was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in October, 2015 on the occasion of the 140th birth anniversary of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, who played a significant role in the unification of the country post-independence.
NEDFI Announces Atmanirbhar Hastshilpkar Scheme
- North Eastern Development Finance Corporation Ltd. (NEDFi) has launched the Atma Nirbhar Hastshilpkar scheme which will provide financial assistance to the grass root Artisans of the region.
Objective:
- To develop the petty artisans of the North Eastern Region by providing financial assistance in the form of term loan for income generating activities for setting up / expansion / modernization / working capital requirement and other activities related to the sector.
- During the launching ceremony, a total of 17 artisans have been provided with credit assistance of INR 1 lakh per artisan.
- The credit facility is collateral free and carries a subsidized interest rate of 6% p.a., which is repayable in 24 months.
- For regular repayment, an incentive of 1% on the interest rate is provided, which will be refunded to the artisans on successful repayment of loans.
- The interested artisans can apply for the scheme at NEDFI registered office Guwahati and any of its branch offices with the following eligibility criteria:
- a) Registered/ unregistered artisan/ Individual
- b) Having valid qualification or practicing any art form
- c) No existing loan from any other bank/ financial institution
- d) Bank Account
- e) Aadhaar Card (optional)
About NEDFI:
- Headquarters: Dispur, Guwahati, Assam
- It is a premier financial institution in the North-Eastern Region
PM Modi to address function on Depositors First-Guaranteed Time-bound Deposit Insurance Payment up to Rs 5 Lakh:
- Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address the function on Depositors First-Guaranteed Time-bound Deposit Insurance Payment up to 5 Lakh rupees in Vigyan Bhawan.
- Union Finance Minister, Minister of State for Finance and RBI Governor will also be present during the occasion.
- Deposit insurance covers all deposits such as savings, fixed, current, recurring deposits in all commercial banks functioning in India.
- Deposits in State, Central and Primary cooperative banks, functioning in States and Union Territories are also covered.
- In a path-breaking reform, Bank deposit insurance cover was enhanced from one lakh to 5 lakh rupees.
- The number of fully protected accounts at end of previous financial year constituted 98.1 percent of the total number of accounts, as against the international benchmark of 80 percent.
- The first tranche of interim payments has been released by the Deposit Insurance and Credit Guarantee Corporation recently, against claims received from depositors of 16 Urban Cooperative Banks which are under restrictions by RBI.
- Payout of over 1300 crore rupees has been made to alternate bank accounts of over 1 lakh depositors against their claims.
Ministry of Defence signs MoU with IITE, Gandhinagar for training of 800 Sainik School teachers:
- Ministry of Defence (MoD) has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Indian Institute of Teacher Education (IITE) Gandhinagar to facilitate training to teachers of Sainik Schools.
- The MoU was signed in New Delhi on December 10, 2021 by Joint Secretary (Land & Works) and Honorary Secretary, Sainik Schools Society (SSS), Rakesh Mittal on behalf of MoD and Registrar of IITE Dr Himanshu Patel in the presence Defence Secretary Dr Ajay Kumar and IITE Vice Chancellor Dr Harshad A Patel.
- Terming the MoU as a significant step towards capacity building of teachers of Sainik Schools in terms of imparting quality education to students with Indian ethos, the Defence Secretary, it would help to enhance the brand of not only existing Sainik Schools but also 100 upcoming Schools.
- The MoU is for the period of five years commencing with effect from January 2022 under which 800 plus teachers of all Sainik Schools will be trained through courses named ‘Gurudiksha’ & ‘Pratibaddhta’.
- The main objective of this MoU is to nurture the teachers of tomorrow with the transformative knowledge of Indian traditions and usher in a new era of teacher education focusing upon the integral development of teachers
ABU Robocon 2022 comes to New Delhi – Doordarshan to host International Finals:
- Doordarshan will be hosting the international finals of Robocon 2022 in August next year.
- The Robot competition, which is organised by Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union and hosted by different member countries every year, will be held in New Delhi in 2022.
- ABU Robocon 2021 was hosted by China wherein the international Robocon contest was held on December 12, 2021.
- Teams from Nirma University and Gujarat Technological University (GTU), Ahmedabad, who were the India finalists, participated in the international contest from India.
- Prasar Bharati Board Member Shaina NC graced the occasion and addressed the participating engineering students of Nirma University and Gujarat Technological University in Ahmedabad.
- To all engineering students, especially the girls, to participate in next year’s Robocon to be hosted by
Chairperson, Lokpal of India, Justice Pinaki Chandra Ghose inaugurates Digital Platform for Management of complaints- ‘LokpalOnline’:
- Chairperson, Lokpal of India, Justice Pinaki Chandra Ghose today inaugurated’ a digital Platform for Management of Complaints called ‘LokpalOnline’ here that can be accessed by all citizens of the country and complaints can be filed from anywhere, anytime at http://lokpalonline.gov.in
- Justice Pinaki Chandra Ghose, corruption is a key element in underperformance of the economy and it undermines democracy and rule of law.
- Lokpal Online is an end-to-end digital solution for the management of complaints against public servants filed under the Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act, 2013.
- Justice Ghose said that the LokpalOnline is a web-based facility, which will quicken the disposal of complaints in an accountable, transparent and efficient manner with benefits to all stakeholders.
- It facilitates handling of complaints during the complete lifecycle of the Complaint, right from its filing to the final disposal and this will bring more transparency and efficiency in the complaint handling mechanism.
NITI Aayog and Bharti Foundation announce the launch of ‘Convoke 2021-22’:
- NITI Aayog in partnership with Bharti Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Bharti Enterprises, launched Convoke 2021-22.
- Convoke is a National research Symposium which aims at addressing challenges in imparting education and strengthening its quality with special focus on all teachers, educationists, heads of schoolsacross India.
- Through this platform, School Teachers/ Heads/Principals of Government Schools and teachers from Bharti Foundation network will be encouraged to use research-based solutions through scientific approach, and showcase their efforts taken at the grass-root level in improving learning outcomes.
- The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 also recognises and identifies teachers and faculty as the heart of the learning process.
- It recommends that teachers will be recognised for novel approaches to teaching that improve learning outcomes in their classrooms.
- NEP recommends to develop platforms so that teachers may share ideas and best practices for wider dissemination and replication.
- Teachers over the years have been coming up with innovative solution to help support students and even more during lockdown. Through Convoke they can now share their micro research papers.
- These research papers will be analyzed by a panel of Educationists. The shortlisted Research Papers will be presented during ‘National Research Symposium’ scheduled in January,2022.
About NITI Aayog:
- Objectives: Foster involvement and participation in the economic policy-making process by the State Governments of India
- Formed: 1 January 2015
- Headquarters: New Delhi
- Chairperson: Narendra Modi
CURRENT AFFAIRS: INTERNATIONAL NEWS
8th Foreign Office Consultations between India, Slovenia held virtually:
- The 8th Foreign Office Consultations between India and Slovenia were held virtually.
- Secretary (West) in the External Affairs Ministry, Reenat Sandhu and State Secretary of Slovenian Foreign Affairs Ministry, Dr. Stanislav Rascan reviewed India – Slovenia bilateral relations.
- Regional and global issues of mutual interest were also discussed.
About Slovenia:
- Capital: Ljubljana
- President: Borut Pahor
- Currency: Euro
- Prime Minister: Janez Jansa
India and the UAE to wrap up the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) by next month:
- The Union Minister of Commerce & Industry, Consumer Affairs & Food & Public Distribution and Textiles, Shri Piyush Goyal had, India and the UAE will wrap up the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) by next month.
- “Hopefully by the end of this month or next month, we hope to conclude them (the negotiations) so that this would probably be one of the fastest trade agreements between two countries ever made,” addressing the India Global Forum, UAE-2021 through video conference.
- The agreement will be a mutually beneficial win-win solution for both countries, “provide market access to each other. Some of the elements of the agreement are the first of its kind, particularly for both countries.”
- This year Indian economy has been able to “largely recover” from what it had contracted last year due to the “very severe lockdown” we had imposed to tackle the Covid.
- “We have been able to look at very attractive growth rates, – Second quarter, that’s July-Sep, we grew at 8.4% which is one of the fastest growing growth rates in the world.
- Our investments are at an all-time high, we are getting some of the highest FDI or FPI in recent months. Indian businesses are showing more compliant growth, more profitability growth.
- In the last few months our exports have been at an all-time high, – both merchandise and in services.
AIM NITI Aayog, & Embassy of Denmark launches 2nd edition of water innovation challenges to address global water woes:
- Atal Innovation Mission, NITI Aayog and the Royal Embassy of Denmark to India announced the second edition of water innovation challenges here to address the global water woes through innovations as part of the Indo-Danish Bilateral Green Strategic partnership.
- Doubling down on the efforts to scale up innovations in the water sector, the AIM-ICDK water challenge is being rolled out under the year-old ambitious partnership of AIM, NITI Aayog and Innovation Center Denmark (ICDK) under the aegis of Denmark Embassy in India, and the Denmark Technical University (DTU).
- The initiative aims to identify innovative & next-gen solutions to solve proposed challenges in collaboration with corporate and public partners.
- The initiative will engage young talents from leading universities and innovation hubs across the nation to build their skills and apply their technical disciplines and innovation capacity.
- The winners of the challenges will also represent India at the International Water Congress 2022.
- The Denmark Embassy in India, and the DTU will be preparing the Indian participants for the Global Next Generation Water Action (NGWA) program to be hosted by DTU.
- The applications are live now and participants can apply through the link https://aimapp2.aim.gov.in/icdk2021/login.php also given on the AIM, NITI Aayog’s official website.
- The participants will receive awards in different categories and will be able to network with innovators across the globe.
India co-chairs Global Methane Initiative Steering Leadership Meeting:
- A Steering Leadership meeting of Global Methane Initiative (GMI) has been held virtually in which the Additional Secretary,Ministry of Coal, V.K. Tiwari as the Vice Chairman of this global initiative informed the participants about the work being carried out by India to mitigate the emission of methane.
- Emission of methane is a big concern as it is a greenhouse gas having 25-28 times harmful effect than carbon dioxide
- Global Methane Initiative (GMI) is a voluntary Government and an informal international partnership having members from 45 countries including the United States and Canada.
- The forum has been created to achieve global reduction in anthropogenic methane emission through partnership among developed and developing countries having economies in transition.
- The forum was created in 2004 and India is one of the members since its inception and has taken up Vice-Chairmanship for the first time in the Steering Leadership along with USA.
- The Chairperson of the Steering Leadership is from Canada.
- Several decisions including holding of next round of meeting in near future were taken.
- Both Canada and the US appreciated the actions taken by India in reducing and harnessing methane gas
CURRENT AFFAIRS: BUSSINESS NEWS
India’s pharmaceutical exports to Pakistan increase from USD 129.32 million in 2016-17 to USD 152.32 million in 2020-21:
- Minister of State for Commerce and Industry Anupriya Patel, India’s pharmaceutical exports to Pakistan have increased from 129.32 million US dollars in 2016-17 to 152.32 million dollars in 2020-21.
- The few instances of non-receipt of payments are being taken up with relevant authorities concerned for resolution.
Govt receives about Rs 19 Cr from Cotton Corporation of India Ltd:
- Secretary, Department of Investment and Public Asset Management Tuhin Kanta Pandey, the government has received about 19 crore rupees from Cotton Corporation of India Ltd and 59 crore rupees from KIOCL as dividend tranches.
- The Government has also received about 56 crore rupees from RCFL, 59 crore rupees from Indian Rare Earth Ltd and 9 crore rupees from MSTC as dividend tranches.
CURRENT AFFAIRS: BANKING AND ECONOMY
IPPB partners NPCI Bharat BillPay for recurring payments:
- India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) and NPCI Bharat BillPay have partnered to facilitate cash-based assisted bill payments at the doorstep of customers.
- The bill payments service will benefit millions of unbanked and underserved customers in remote locations, who will now be able to access payment solutions at their doorstep.
- With this collaboration, NPCI Bharat BillPay and IPPB are set to empower citizens by enabling bill payments at the doorstep through our ubiquitous network of Gramin Dak Sevaks and postal staff.
- Both IPPB and non-IPPB customers will be able to make recurring transactions such as mobile postpaid, D2H recharge, school fees, and other utility services by using the bank’s mobile banking service.
- Transactions on Bharat Bill Payment have been growing rapidly, and payments on its Central Unit touched 60.62 million by volume and ₹10,530.2 crore by value for more than 20,349 billers in October.
About IPPB:
- CEO: J. Venkatramu
- Headquarters location: New Delhi
- Founded: 1 September 2018
- Tagline: Aapka Bank, Aapke Dwaar.
Fintech industry expected to be valued over $150 billion by 2025:
- India’s fintech industry has raised a cumulative funding of $27.6 billion and is expected to be valued at over $150 billion by 2025, Amitabh Kant, CEO, NITI Aayog.
- India’s fintech ecosystem has reached here because of a systematic approach, with the government playing a key role as a facilitator.
- The growth story of the fintech ecosystem to India’s larger Digital India initiative and the development of UPI and India Stack.
- A collaborative approach to UPI allowed the private sector to build apps on the top of the underlined digital infrastructure to enable payment services.
- This has allowed the whole ecosystem of payment start-ups to flourish. With payments problems solved, the fintech ecosystem would shift focus towards lending where there has been emphasis towards both consumers as well as MSMEs-based lending
- Fintech has allowed innovations in the space allowing for new models to come up such as flow-based lending. Now there is greater intention that is directed towards personal finance and money management.
- A plethora of entities have come up recently in the space, with wider acceptance of wealth-management products, their ecosystem is also able to tackle some of the more traditional financial products which are more complex, capital intensive and have a longer innovation cycle.
- Initially, aggregator startups emerged which helped other retailers. Now the new insurance tech companies are manufacturing as well as distrubuting products covering the end to end.
CURRENT AFFAIRS: APPOINTMENTS AND RESIGNATION
Indian-American political advisor Gautam Raghavan as the head of the White House Office:
- US President Joe Biden has elevated Indian-American political advisor Gautam Raghavan as the head of the White House Office of Presidential Personnel.
- White House Presidential Personnel Office (PPO), also written as Office of Presidential Personnel, is the White House office tasked with vetting new appointees.
- The PPO is one of the offices most responsible for assessing candidates to work at or for the White House.
- President Biden elevated Raghavan, who was currently posted as the PPO Deputy Director, to the key White House post after UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres announced his intent to appoint Cathy Russell as the next executive director of UNICEF.
- Russell is currently the head of WH PPO.
- During the Obama-Biden Administration, Raghavan served in the White House Office of Public Engagement as liaison to the LGBTQ community as well as the Asian American & Pacific Islander community, as acting White House liaison for the US Department of Defence, and as Outreach Lead for the Pentagon’s ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ Working Group.
UNION GOVERNMENT SCHEME
ATMANIRBHAR BHARAT ABHIYAN:
- AatmaNirbhar Bharat which translates to ‘self-reliant India’ is a phrase used and popularized by the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi and the Government of India in relation to the economic vision and economic development in the country.
LAUNCHED ON;
- On May 12, 2020, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a new scheme called “Atma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan”.
OBJECTIVE:
- The aim of the AatmaNirbhar Bharat Abhiyan is to make the country and its citizens independent and self-reliant in all senses.
- AatmaNirbhar Bharat will make India self-reliant by creating an eco-system that will allow Indian companies to be highly competitive on the global stage.
- To support key sectors and also help achieve measures undertaken by Reserve Bank of India.
- To focus on strengthening local markets and supply chains.
CORPUS:
- 20 lakh crores of package
- The economic package is 10% of the GDP.
BENEFITS:
- Collateral free loans for businesses
- Increase in borrowing limits
- Credit boost to farmers
- Debt for MSMEs
- Schemes for Street vendors
- The scheme gives attention on tax payers, farmers, labourers, cottage industries and MSMEs.
- The main aim of the scheme is to become self-reliant.
- The Scheme focus on Vocal for Local
FIVE PILLARS OF ATMANIRBHAR BHARAT:
- Economy, which brings in quantum jump and not incremental change
- Infrastructure, which should become the identity of India
- System, based on 21st century technology driven arrangements
- Vibrant Demography, which is our source of energy for a self-reliant India
- Demand, whereby the strength of our demand and supply chain should be utilized to full capacity.
FOUR TRANCHES OF THE ECONOMIC RELIEF PACKAGE AS ANNOUNCED BY THE FM:
The first tranche contained 16 specific announcements and they spanned across the MSME, NBFC, real estate, power sectors, etc.
| Category | Measures |
| Employees/taxpayers |
|
| MSMEs |
|
| NBFCs |
|
| Discoms |
|
| Real Estate |
|
Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan – Tranche 2
The second tranche focuses on providing free food grains to migrant workers who do not possess ration cards.
| Provision | Details |
| Free food grains |
|
| Credit facilities |
|
| Subvention relief |
|
| Affordable rental housing |
|
| One Nation One Ration Card Scheme |
|
| MGNREGA |
|
AatmaNirbhar Bharat Abhiyan – Tranche 3
The third tranche of the economic relief package focuses on agricultural marketing reforms. Many of the reforms announced are long pending and are expected to have a positive impact on both the farmers and the consumers.
| Provision | Details |
| Inter-state trade |
|
| Contract farming |
|
| Deregulating produce |
|
| Agriculture infrastructure |
|
AatmaNirbhar Bharat Abhiyan – Tranche 4
The final tranche focuses on the sectors of defense, aviation, power, mineral, atomic, and space. There is a huge emphasis on privatization.
| Sector | Provisions |
| Defense |
|
| Minerals |
|
| Space |
|
| Aviation |
|
| Power |
|
| Atomic |
|
Self-reliant India, the way forward:
- in order to fulfil the dream of making the 21st century India’s, the way forward is through ensuring that the country becomes self-reliant.
- PPE kits N-95 masks, whose production in India has gone up from almost being negligible to 2 lakh each, on a daily basis is a good example of turning a crisis into an opportunity
- The definition of self-reliance has undergone a change in the globalized world and clarified that when the country talks about self-reliance, it is different from being self-centred.
DAILY CA ON DEC 15:
- International Mountain Day is celebrated annually on December 11th, to promote awareness for mountain communities around the globe. The theme of 2021 International Mountain Day on 11 December is “sustainable mountain tourism”.
- Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu will inaugurate an exhibition on Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat in Hyderabad city.
- North Eastern Development Finance Corporation Ltd. (NEDFI) has launched the Atma Nirbhar Hastshilpkar scheme which will provide financial assistance to the grass root Artisans of the region
- Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address the function on Depositors First-Guaranteed Time-bound Deposit Insurance Payment up to 5 Lakh rupees in Vigyan Bhawan.
- Ministry of Defence (MoD) has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Indian Institute of Teacher Education (IITE) Gandhinagar to facilitate training to teachers of Sainik Schools.
- NITI Aayog in partnership with Bharti Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Bharti Enterprises, launched Convoke 2021-22.
- India and the UAE to wrap up the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) by next month, says Shri Piyush Goyal
- ABU Robocon 2022 comes to New Delhi
- Chairperson, Lokpal of India, Justice Pinaki Chandra Ghose inaugurates Digital Platform for Management of complaints- ‘Lokpal Online
- AIM NITI Aayog, & Embassy of Denmark launches 2nd edition of water innovation challenges to address global water woes
- The 8th Foreign Office Consultations between India and Slovenia were held virtually.
- A Steering Leadership meeting of Global Methane Initiative (GMI) has been held virtually in which the Additional Secretary, Ministry of Coal, V.K. Tiwari as the Vice Chairman of this global initiative informed the participants about the work being carried out by India to mitigate the emission of methane.
- Minister of State for Commerce and Industry Anupriya Patel, India’s pharmaceutical exports to Pakistan have increased from 129.32 million US dollars in 2016-17 to 152.32 million dollars in 2020-21.
- Secretary, Department of Investment and Public Asset Management Tuhin Kanta Pandey, the government has received about 19 crore rupees from Cotton Corporation of India Ltd and 59 crore rupees from KIOCL as dividend tranches.
- India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) and NPCI Bharat BillPay have partnered to facilitate cash-based assisted bill payments at the doorstep of customers.
- India’s fintech industry has raised a cumulative funding of $27.6 billion and is expected to be valued at over $150 billion by 2025, Amitabh Kant, CEO, NITI Aayog.
- US President Joe Biden has elevated Indian-American political advisor Gautam Raghavan as the head of the White House Office of Presidential Personnel.
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