Taiwan's parliament rich mans tax
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh resigned.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar yadav Resigned and accepted his defeat In Election 2014
Taiwan's parliament has approved, what it called, a rich man's tax on nearly 10,000 of the island's wealthiest people in a bid to narrow the widening income gap.
Sikkim Chief Minister Pawan Chamling is set for a consecutive fifth term beating the record set by Jyoti Basu in West Bengal.
Seeking to promote collaborative research in the areas of aviation and railway engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee (IIT-R) has inked an agreement with the University of Southampton based in UK.
Hotel Leelaventure Founder C P Krishnan Nair - known as the grand old man of Indian hospitality industry - passed away.
The BJP Parliamentary Party will meet on May 20 2014 to formally elect Narendra Modi as its leader, a formality before his appointment as Prime Minister.
The Indian men's team completed the formalities with a 108-32 win over Maldives to be crowned the champions of the third South Asian Basketball Association Championship.
Around 60 lakh voters opted for the ‘None of The Above’ (NOTA) option, more than the votes secured by 21 parties, in this Lok Sabha polls where it was introduced for the first time in any parliamentary election.
Olympic legend Michael Phelps stepped up his return to competitive swimming with a 100m butterfly triumph at the Charlotte Grand Prix.
The technology titans behind the top two smartphone platforms in the world called a truce in a long-running patent war.
current affairs 1 december 2012
National:
Former
Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujral passes away
Former Prime
Minister Inder Kumar Gujral, who headed a rickety coalition government in the
late 1990s, died
after a brief
illness. He was 92.Gujral left the Congress to join the Janata Dal in the
late-1980s. He became
Minister of
External Affairs in the V P Singh-led National Front government in 1989. As the
External Affairs
Minister he
handled the fallout of the Kuwait crisis following Iraqi invasion that
displaced thousands of
Indians. Gujral
authored a foreign policy doctrine called the "Gujral Doctrine" (a
set of principles to guide the
conduct of foreign
relations with India's immediate neighbours), which was widely acclaimed not
only in India
but also outside.
Children
of illegally wedded wife entitled to pension: govt
Children born to
illegally wedded wife of a central government employee are entitled to get
family pension,
according to a new
order. The Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, in an order
issued,
decided that
pensionary benefits will be granted to children of a government servant or
pensioner from "void
or voidable"
marriages. Earlier, children born out of such a wedlock of a government servant
had no claim on
family pension and
the legally wedded wife was the sole recipient of the post-retirement benefit.
However,
the matter was
re-examined in consultation with the Ministry of Law and Justice and Ministry
of Finance and
it was decided to
amend the Central Civil Services (Pension) Rules, 1972. The share of children
from illegally
wedded wife in the
family pension shall be payable to them along with the legally wedded wife.
Joint
naval exercise with Russia
INDRA, joint
military exercise with Russia, is being held in Mumbai from November 28 to
December 3.
Destroyer Marshal
Shaposhnikov, replenishment oiler Irkut and rescue tug Alatau of the Russian
Federation’s Navy
Pacific Fleet (PF) Task Unit and India’s INS Mysore and INS Tabar are
participating in the
exercise. INDRA
began in year 2003 and is being conducted every two years. “The main objective
of this
exercise is to
enhance interoperability, which will be useful if both the navies are working
against the
common threat like
the pirates in the Gulf of Aden. It will be helpful for wider cooperation and
mutual
understanding
between two navies,” said Captain Krishna Swaminathan, Commanding Officer of
INS
Mysore.
Urban
renewal mission a failure: CAG
From basic
guidelines to implementation and subsequent monitoring of projects, the Union
Ministry of Urban
Development’s
flagship programme the Jawaharlal National Urban Renewal Mission has failed on
all counts,
says the
Comptroller and Auditor General in its latest report. Tabled in Parliament the
performance audit of
the Mission shows
huge deficiencies. The CAG recommended that the government consider suitable
incentives to
states that have implemented the reforms envisaged under JNNURM guidelines. The
Ministry
of Urban
Development and the Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation should
introduce a zerotolerance
policy at all
levels with respect to irregular expenditure and diversion of funds. It also
recommended
identifying the deficiencies in the monitoring of the scheme, at both Central
and State levels.
The Comptroller
and Auditor General's (CAG) audit into Centre's urban renewal programme.
Jawaharlal
Nehru National
Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) has shown that 40% of states and Union Territories
have
failed to
rationalize stamp duty to 5% for property registration. The defaulting states
include Delhi, Haryana,
West Bengal,
Karnataka, Kerala and Chhattisgarh. High stamp duty discourages property
registration at
actual or market
value and thereby increases scope of black money in the realty sector. As per
JNNURM
norms, stamp duty
was to be brought down to 5% or less, including surcharges by local municipal
bodies,
during
implementation of the programme.
T.N.
tops the list in dengue deaths
The number of
deaths in the country this year till November 15 due to dengue has touched 216,
with Tamil
Nadu topping the
list with the death of 60 people. It is followed by Maharashtra 59, Karnataka
21, Punjab 15,
Kerala 13, West
Bengal 9, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh 6 each and Delhi 4. A total of 35,066 cases
were
reported in the
country till mid-November 2012.
Maila
Mukti Yatra launched
Union Rural
Development and Panchayati Raj minister Jairam Ramesh launched a programme
"Maila Mukti
Yatra" under
Rashtriya Garima Abhiyan. He informed that the Centre has earmarked Rs 1,500
crore to
convert dry
toilets into flush toilets under the Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan. Sikkim is the first
state in the country
where the practice
of open-area defecation has been eradicated and states like Kerala, Haryana and
Himachal Pradesh
also have done well.
Tamil
Nadu tops in domestic violence cases
Tamil Nadu has got
the dubious distinction of having the highest number of domestic violence cases
in the
country with the
state recording 3,983 such cases in 2011. According to the latest data of the
National Crime
Records Bureau, a
total of 9,431 domestic violence cases were reported across the country during
the
period, Women and
Child Development Minister Krishna Tirath informed the Lok Sabha. Tamil Nadu
reported
the highest number
of such cases against women with 3,983 cases followed by Gujarat with 3,266 and
West
Bengal with 1,661.
In 2010, 11,718 cases were registered under the Protection of Women from Domestic
Violence Act while
in 2009, 7,803, cases were registered.
HIV
claimed 60,000 less lives in India in 2011
India recorded
around 60,000 fewer deaths due to HIV in 2011 compared to 2007 while the
overall number of
people living with
HIV has fallen by almost 1.7 lakhs during the same period. There has been a 57%
reduction in new
HIV infections in India during the last decade with HIV prevalence among adults
(15-49
years) dipping to
0.27% (2011) compared to 0.33% (2007). The total number of people living with
HIV/AIDS
(PLHIV) in India
is estimated at 21 lakhs last year. Children (below 15 years) account for 7% of
all infections,
and 86% are in the
15-49 age bracket. Worryingly, of all the HIV infections, 39% (8.16 lakhs) are
among
women, most of
whom being housewives. In 2011, among the states, Manipur has shown the highest
estimated adult
HIV prevalence of 1.22%, followed by Andhra Pradesh (0.75%), Mizoram (0.74%),
Nagaland
(0.73%), Karnataka
(0.52%), Goa (0.43%) and Maharashtra (0.42%). Besides these, Odisha, Gujarat,
Tamil
Nadu, and
Chandigarh have shown estimated adult HIV prevalence greater than the national
prevalence at
0.27%.
Bihar
second most poor state: Plan panel
Uttar Pradesh had
the highest number of poor population at 7.37 crore, followed by Bihar and
Maharashtra in
2009-10. Bihar and
Maharashtra had poor population of 5.43 crore and 2.7 crore respectively in the
year
2009-10 based on
poverty line fixed using the Tendulakar Committee formula, as per data provided
by the
Planning
Commission in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha.
According to the
Tendulkar Committee formula, besides traditional method of fixing poverty line
on the basis
of calorie intake,
the expenditure on health and education is also factored in. The data also
showed that the
number of poor in
the entire country during 2009-10 was 35.46 crore using the Tendulkar Committee
formula
for fixing the
poverty line. In 2009-10, the commission estimated the number of poor in Madhya
Pradesh at
2.61 crore, West
Bengal 2.4 crore, Andhra Pradesh 1.76 crore, Rajasthan 1.67 crore, Odisha 1.53
crore,
Karnataka 1.42
crore, Gujarat 1.36 crore and Jharkhand 1.26 crore in accordance with the
formula. Tamil
Nadu and
Chhattisgarh had poor population of 1.21 crore each followed by Assam at 1.16
crore and
Haryana at 49.96
lakh.
International
Obama
appoints blind Indian-American to key post
The Obama
administration has announced to appoint a blind Indian-American to a key
administrative post in
an independent US
agency devoted for people with disabilities. Sachin Dev Pavithran has been
appointed as
Member,
Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board, the White House
said, as it
announced several
other key administration appointments. Pavithran is Program Director of the
Utah
Assistive Technology
Program at Utah State University's Center for Persons with Disabilities, a
position he
has held since
2011. Pavithran has more than 12 years of experience as a consultant on
disability police and
developing and
training users of assistive technology and accessible websites. In 2007, the
National
Federation of the
Blind awarded him the Kenneth Jernigan Scholarship. He received a BA, BS, and
an MS
from Utah State
University.
Imperial
palace found at first Chinese emperor's cemetery
The remains of a
massive "imperial palace" have been uncovered at the mausoleum of
China's first emperor,
Qinshihuang, in
the tourist city of Xian. Based on its foundations, the courtyard-style palace
was estimated to
be 690 meters long
and 250 meters wide. Covering an area of 170,000 cubic meters, the palace was
nearly
one fourth the
size of the Forbidden City in Beijing, the imperial palace of China's last two
feudal dynasties of
Ming and Qing
(1368-1911). It is the largest complex ever found at the cemetery of
Qinshihuang, known as
China's first
emperor as he united the country. The palace included 18 courtyard houses and a
main building
that overlooked
the houses. The palace could shed light on the architectural styles of the Qin
Dynasty (221
BC-207 BC) and
showed emperor Qinshihuang's wish to continue to live in imperial grandeur even
during his
afterlife. The
56-square-km Mausoleum of Qinshihuang is the world's largest underground
mausoleum and is
famous for its
terracotta warriors.
Technology
NASA
spacecraft discovers 'ice' on Mercury
A NASA spacecraft
has confirmed the presence of abundant 'icy' water along with other frozen
volatile
materials within
'burning hot' Mercury's permanently shadowed polar craters. NASA's MErcury
Surface,
Space ENvironment,
GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft has been studying Mercury, the
nearest planet to
the Sun, in unprecedented detail since its historic arrival there in March
2011. Scientists
have seen clearly
for the first time a chapter in the story of how the inner planets, including
Earth, acquired
their water and
some of the chemical building blocks for life. Spacecraft instruments completed
the first
measurements of
excess hydrogen at Mercury's north pole, its reflectivity of polar deposits at
near-infrared
wavelengths and
enabled the detailed models of the surface and near-surface temperatures of the
planet's
north polar
regions. Given its proximity to the Sun, Mercury would seem to be an unlikely
place to find ice.
However, the tilt
of Mercury's rotational axis is less than 1 degree, and as a result, there are
pockets at the
planet's poles
that never see sunlight. Scientists suggested decades ago there might be water
ice and other
frozen volatiles
trapped at Mercury's poles.
Business & Economy
Employees’
Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) launches its e-Passbook service
Over 50 million
provident fund subscribers can now access their account statements online as
the
Employees’
Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) has launched its e-Passbook service. Active
subscribers
whose electronic
challan-cum-return is already uploaded, can download their e-Passbook every
month under
the service
launched by the EPFO’s Central Provident Fund Commissioner RC Mishra. The
facility shall be
available on www.epfindia.gov.in.
Also, the online downloading of PF account statement is not available as of
now for members of
PF trusts which are set up employers to manage their employees’ retirement
benefit.
Members can
register themselves on the portal by using photo identification number, such as
PAN, Aadhaar,
National
Population Registry, driving licence, passport, voter ID, ration card. They can
use their mobile
phone numbers as
passwords.
BSE
launches carbon-based thematic index
The Bombay Stock
Exchange (BSE), has launched BSE Carbonex, the first carbon-based thematic
index in
the country, which
takes a strategic view of organisational commitment to climate change
mitigation. This
index has been
launched with the aim of creating a benchmark, and increasing awareness about
the risks
posed by climate
change. The British High Commission in India through the British Foreign &
Commonwealth
Office’s Prosperity Fund supported the development phase of the index. ENDS
Carbon, a
specialist in
environment, social and governance (ESG) ratings and benchmark services
provider, has
provided its
expertise in assessing the companies with data sourced from the carbon
disclosure project
(CDP), a
not-for-profit organisation which holds the largest and most continuous set of
climate change data
in the world.
Ranbaxy
stops production of generic Lipitor
Ranbaxy
Laboratories has stopped production of its generic version of cholesterol
lowering drug Lipitor until
it investigates
the issue of potential glass particles in certain lots. The Indian drug major,
had informed its
customers of a
voluntary recall of certain lots of the company’s 10mg, 20mg, and 40mg dosage
strengths of
atorvastatin
tablets (generic version of Lipitor), the U.S. Food and Drug Administration
(USFDA) said in a
statement. The
lots of atorvastatin packaged in bottles of 90 tablets and 500 tablets are
being recalled due to
possible
contamination with very small glass particles similar to the size of a grain of
sand (less than 1 mm in
size).
Infosys
to list its ADS on NYSE
Infosys has
announced that it will be transferring the listing of its American Depository
Shares (ADS) to the
New York Stock
Exchange (NYSE) from the Nasdaq Global Select Market (Nasdaq). The company is
also
seeking to list
its ADS on the Paris and London Exchanges of NYSE Euronext. NYSE Euronext is a
leading
global operator of
financial markets and its equity markets represent one third of the world’s
equities trading.
Infosys ADS will
begin trading on the NYSE Euronext markets on December 12. Until the transfer
is
complete the ADS
will continue to trade in the U.S.
Sport
Lee
is AFC Player of the Year
South Korean
footballer Lee Keun Ho was named the AFC Player of the Year.
Andrew
Flintoff survives knock down to win debut fight
Former England
cricketer Andrew Flintoff beat American Richard Dawson on points after
surviving a
knockdown in his
first professional fight at the MEN Arena in Manchester. The 34-year-old got a
rousing
reception from the
5,000 fans and won the first of four two-minute rounds before being caught by a
left hook
early in the
second that sent him to the canvas. However, Flintoff got up to receive a
standing eight count
and battled back
with a more composed performance against a flagging opponent for a 39-38 win on
the
referee's
scorecard. Flintoff, coached by former world champion Barry McGuigan, had
weighed in at 216lbs
(97.98kg), 25lbs (11.34kg) lighter
than Dawson, 23, who had won his previous two professional fights.
No comments:
Post a Comment