Current Affairs of 9th July 2019

Current Affairs of 9th July 2019

• A bicycle-sharing scheme will be introduced in Puducherry in the upcoming months. The scheme has been conceived under the Puducherry smart city development plan.

• To commemorate the 20th anniversary of Kargil Vijay Diwas(26th July 2019), the Indian army has released a special Kargil Tribute Song' to honor, salute and pay homage to the Kargil martyrs and the war veterans who sacrificed and fought for the country. The song titled 'Tujhe Bhulega Na Tera Hindustan' has been written by renowned Bollywood lyricist Sameer featuring Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan, Olympic bronze medallist boxer Mary Kom, actors Salman Khan, Vicky Kaushal, Anupam Kher, Kangana Ranaut, and Suniel Shetty.

• The Minister of State for Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying, Pratap Chandra Sarangi informed that the facility of Kisan Credit Card (KCC) has been extended to fisheries and animal husbandry farmers to assist them to meet their working capital needs. Extension of KCC facility will help to meet the short term credit requirements of farmers in the rearing of animals, poultry birds and other aquatic organisms and capture of fish. The credit limit for the existing KCC holders is Rs 3 lakh including animal husbandry and fisheries activities and KCC holders for animal husbandry and fisheries have the credit limit of Rs. 2 lakh to meet their working capital requirements for animal husbandry and fisheries activities.

• The Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi approved the Code on Wages Bill 2019. It enables the Centre to fix minimum wages for the entire country and to subsume existing laws related to workers' remuneration. It replaces the Payment of Wages Act, 1936, Minimum Wages Act, 1948, Payment of Bonus Act, 1965, and the Equal Remuneration Act, 1976. Description: The Code on Wages is one of the four codes that would subsume 44 labor laws with certain amendments to improve the ease of doing business and attract investment for spurring growth. The four codes will deal with wages, social security, industrial safety and welfare, and industrial relations.

• Social Justice and Empowerment Minister Thawar Chand Gehlot informed that the budget for drug de-addiction measures was increased to Rs 135 crore from Rs 33 crore in 2014. It is provided to the National Drug Dependence Treatment Centre (NDDTC) for the year 2019-20. The punishment to drug peddlers includes imprisonment of 6 months to 15 years and imposition of fines. The Government has prepared a National Action Plan for Drug Demand Reduction (NAPDDR) for the period 2018-2025 in which the ministry will undertake focused intervention programs in 127 high-risk districts.

• The Reserve Bank of India board has finalized a three-year roadmap 'Utkarsh 2022'. It is a three-year road map for medium-term objectives to be achieved for improving regulation and supervision of the central bank.

• India's first Indigenous Aircraft Carrier (IAC) Vikrant will be delivered to the Indian Navy in 2021 for advanced trials. IAC Vikrant is in the advanced stage of construction and is being built by Cochin Shipyard Limited.

• Santosh Yadav, an Indian mountaineer is the first woman in the world to climb Mount Everest twice. Within twelve months, she became a member of an Indo-Nepalese Women's expedition and scaled Everest the second time, thus setting the record as the only woman to have scaled the Everest twice.

• Odisha government decided to provide Rs 10,000 per month to Padma award winners of the state facing financial problems. Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik approved this proposal made by the state Culture department.

• BCCI announced that former Indian captain Rahul Dravid was appointed as Head of Cricket at the National Cricket Academy (NCA). Rahul Dravid was supposed to take over as NCA head from July 1 but his job at the India Cements caused the delay. Rahul Dravid will also work closely with the National Men's and Women's Head Coaches and Cricket Coaches for India Developmental teams - including India A, India Under 19, India Under 23 teams, in the identification of key training and development objectives. He will also be responsible for monitoring progress against these objectives for the developmental teams and provide necessary inputs on the same to the Senior Men's and Women's Head Coaches

• As per the analysis by environmental Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) Greenpeace India, transport and industrial clusters were giving rise to the country's worst Nitrogen Oxide (NOx) hotspots like Delhi, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, and Hyderabad. They have a high vehicular population and diesel consumption. The data was collected between February 2018 and May 2019. Coal consumption and industrial clusters like Sonbhadra-Singrauli in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, Korba in Chattisgarh, Talcher in Odisha, Chandrapur in Maharashtra, Mundra in Gujarat and Durgapur in West Bengal were polluting the environment with Nitrogen Oxide emissions.

• The upgraded version of the homegrown BrahMos missile with an enhanced range of up to 500 km is ready. BrahMos missile, which cruises at almost three times the speed of sound at Mach 2.8, is the heaviest weapon to be deployed on the Su-30 fighters.

• Elavenil Valarivan(19) Tamilnadu, a three-time junior World Cup medallist strikes her silver medal in 10m Air Rifle event in the 30th World University Summer Games 2019 held in Napoli, Italy. After qualifying at the top with a University record of 630.8 finished ahead of Lin Ying-Shin (629.8) and Lucie Brazdova (628.A), the Tamilnadu shooter(Elavenil) shot 249.0 in the final and was beaten by 1.3 points by Lucie Brazdova (Czech Republic). She will be next participating in ISSF(International Shooting Sport Federation) Junior World Cup 2019, Suhl which is scheduled to start from July 12, 2019.

• Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman stated that India's central bank, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) will now be given power to takes over as the regulator of Housing Finance Firms(HFFs) instead of NHB (National Housing Bank). The government will also provide a one-time six-month partial guarantee to state-run banks for the acquisition of up to 1 trillion rupees ($14.6 billion) of highly-rated assets from NBFCs(Non-Banking Financial Company ). The financial crisis emerged from Dewan Housing Finance Corporation (DHFC) and Reliance Capital Ltd led to this decision for giving fresh fund. The cash crunch at such firms could weaken the financial system and economy given their large lending role and ties with banks, mutual funds, and insurers.

• An Arab country on the Persian (Arabian) Gulf, Kuwait that completes its two-year term as the non-permanent member in the UNSC (United Nations Security Council) has played a major role in declaring JeM chief Masood Azhar a global terrorist and in UNSC condemnation of Pulwama terror strike. It also assured that to support India's global ambitions including investments. In the 8543rd United Security Council meeting which was held on June 11, 2019, Kuwaiti proposed draft resolution 2474 to protect civilians that deals with the matter of persons reported missing during armed conflicts.

• Sri Lanka has inaugurated the first model village built with Indian assistance. The village is a part of a housing project meant for war-affected people. India has partnered with the ministry of housing and construction and cultural affairs of Sri Lanka to build 100 model villages with an Indian grant of Rs 1,200 million.

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi shared a blog on his Twitter account on water conservation titled 'A Daughter, A Tree, and A Teacher'. PM Modi has discussed an age-old process to conserve water in his blog.

• Kyriakos Mitsotakis was sworn in as the prime minister of Greece. Mitsotakis is the son of former prime minister Constantine Mitsotakis, one of the country's longest-serving parliamentarians.

• Tunisia has banned face-covering veils (niqaab) in state-run buildings "for security reasons" following three terror attacks in the space of a week. After this restriction, nobody can cover the face and go to the government office. Earlier, Sri Lanka, Cameroon, and Algeria have banned wearing niqaab in public places.

• The highways of Delhi-Jaipur and Delhi-Agra are India's first highway corridors that will get charging stations for electric vehicles by March 2020. The total distance of the corridors on Yamuna Expressway (between Delhi and Agra) and National Highway 48 (between Delhi and Jaipur) will be 500 km and 18 charging stations will be set up near toll plazas on both these highways routes to charge &change batteries. The e-corridor was first proposed under the Ease of Doing Business Programme of the Advance Services for Social and Administrative Reforms (ASSAR), a private firm backed by the central government. The 500-km of the expressway will be converted into electric corridors with facilities for charging electric vehicles and each of the 18 stations will have eight to 10 chargers and 20 charging points. About two crore rupees would be spent on the development of a single charging station and the electricity tariff.

• Former Uttarakhand Governor Sudershan Agarwal passed away in New Delhi at the age of 88. He was born in Ludhiana, Punjab. He served as the second Governor of Uttarakhand between 2003 and 2007 during which he also established a Him Jyoti School in the Sahastradhara. He was appointed as Governor of Sikkim in 2007. He had also been the Secretary-General of the Rajya Sabha from 1981 to 1993. He served as a Member of the National Human Rights Commission for three years.