Current Affairs Updates - 9th May 2018

Current Affairs Updates - 9th May 2018

Current Affairs Updates for 9th May includes New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman's Resignation, New Committees Formed to Review Rajya Sabha Workings, Cabinet Secretary PK Sinha Gets Another One-Year Extension and other such similar news all mentioned under different sections such as National, International, Schemes, Obituary, Rankings, Indexes and other similar news. These are important for the upcoming government examinations of Bank, Rail, SSC, IBPS PO, IBPS CLERK, SSC CGL, SSC CHSL. Aspirants should go through these in details to have a better understanding of all the points. One may also follow the Daily Current Affairs Quiz and Static GK and Note Down Points.

Committees in News

New committee to be formed to review conduct of everyday business in Rajya Sabha

• The Secretary General of the Rajya Sabha, D. D. Verma, revealed on Monday that the Vice President of India and the Chairman of the Rajya Sabha- Venkaiah Naidu has directed the formation of a two-member committee to review the rules of the procedures and conduct of business in the House.

Banking, Economic & Financial Affairs

BSE will launch trading in the commodity derivatives segment from October 1, and to start with, it will focus on non-agri products.

• The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) had on December 28 last year announced that from coming October, the country would have a unified exchange regime wherein stock exchanges would be allowed to offer trading in commodities derivatives.

The National Stock Exchange of India on Monday introduced a facility of managed colocation service, which has been named, ‘Colocation as a Service’ (CaaS). 

• The exchange said the initiative will facilitate small and medium sized members, who otherwise find it difficult to avail colocation facility, due to various reasons including high cost, lack of expertise in maintenance and troubleshooting, etc. 

Rankings & Indexes

India has ranked fourth out of 25 nations in the Asia-Pacific region on an index that measures their overall power 

• The Lowy Institute Asia Power Index measures power across 25 countries and territories in the Asia-Pacific region, reaching as far west as Pakistan, as far north as Russia, and as far into the Pacific as Australia, New Zealand and the US. 

National Affairs

India’s total export of finished steel increased by 16.7% to 9.621 million tonnes (MT) in 2017-18

• Export of total finished steel was up by 16.7 per cent in April-March 2017-18 at 9.621 MT over same period of last year, in which contribution of the non-alloy steel segment stood at 8.727 MT, while the rest was the contribution of the alloy steel segment including stainless steel

Central government has laid down guidelines for labelling genetically modified food

• All packaged food with at least 5% content from genetically engineered sources need to be labelled so. Moreover, foods that exceed norms of sugar and fat should carry ‘red’ and ‘green’ labels specifying the extent to which they do so, according to draft regulations by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI).

India has launched a flood and earthquake early warning systems in Myanmar.

• The aim is to help the country mitigate the effects of natural calamities.
• These systems will provide the government with more information on mitigating the effects of disasters that affect millions of people every year.

Cabinet secretary PK Sinha gets another one-year extension

• Cabinet secretary Pradeep Kumar Sinha has got another one-year extension as the country’s top bureaucrat.

As many as 100 additional districts would have One Stop Centres (OSC) aimed at supporting women affected by violence, as part of plans to cover all districts of the country in due course, an official statement said on Monday.

• The OSCs aim to facilitate integrated services for violence-affected women like police assistance, medical aid, psycho-social counselling, legal aid/counselling and temporary stay for five days under one roof.

International Affairs

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has resigned following allegations of assault by four women.

• Mr Schneiderman has been a vocal supporter of the #MeToo movement against sexual harassment and a fierce opponent of President Donald Trump.

Israel Pulls Out of Race for Seat on U.N. Security Council

• Facing an uphill struggle in an election next month, Israel announced  it was pulling out of a race for a seat on the U.N. Security Council.

U.S. and Philippine forces began their largest annual military exercises since President Rodrigo Duterte came to power and vowed to scale down America’s military presence in the country as he sought closer ties with China and Russia.

• The Balikatan exercises opened with a ceremony at the main Philippine military camp in Manila, and will to feature about 8,000 American and Filipino personnel and small contingents from Japan and Australia.

Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Secretary -General Rashid Kutbiddinovitch Alimov arrived here on Monday to hold talks with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and other Union ministers.

• External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj will hold a bilateral meeting with Alimov at the Jawahar Lal Bhawan.
• Alimov is scheduled to hold talks on a wide array of matters.

Science & Technology

Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) has developed an atomic clock that will be used in navigation satellites to measure precise location data.

• The space agency currently imports atomic clocks from European aerospace manufacturer Astrium for its navigation satellites.

Researchers tracking the evolution of the remote access trojan GravityRAT warn that developers behind the malware have made key changes to the RAT’s code in an attempt to decrease antivirus detection.

• For the past 18 months, Cisco Talos researchers said they have been tracking GravityRAT with the latest “G2” version spotted two weeks ago.  The location of the developers, known as “The Invincible” and “TheMartian,” are unknown. However, researchers said documents used to test anti-virus detection via VirusTotal were submitted from Pakistan.

Schemes / Programme

After the launch of the Van Dhan Vikas Kendra atBijapur by the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi on 14th April, 2018 and his call to converge Jan Dhan, Van Dhan and Govardhan Schemes, the Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoTA), Government of India proposes to expand Van Dhan Vikas Kendras in Tribal Districts across the country. 

• This initiative is aimed at mainstreaming the tribal community by promoting primary level value addition to MFP at grassroots level.
• The scheme will be implemented through Ministry of Tribal Affairs as Nodal Department at the Central Level and TRIFED as Nodal Agency at the National Level.

Agreements/ MoUs Signed

The National Small Industries Corporation Limited (NSIC) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) for the year 2018-19.

• The said MoU envisages provision of enhanced services by NSIC under its marketing, financial, technology and other support services schemes, for MSMEs in the country.

NITI Aayog and Google on May 7, 2018 signed a Statement of Intent (SoI) to work on a range of initiatives to help build the Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) ecosystem across the country.

• The SoI was signed by Anna Roy, Advisor, NITI Aayog and Rajan Anandan, Vice President of Google India and South East Asia.

The World Bank will provide a USD 200 million loan to help the government achieve its goal of reducing stunting in children 0-6 years of age from 38.4 per cent to 25 per cent by the year 2022 

• The Government of India signed a loan deal worth USD 200 million with the World Bank today for the National Nutrition Mission (POSHAN Abhiyaan) 

India and Guatemala signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for expanding cooperation in the area of diplomatic training.

• Vice President Naidu further underscored that there was a tremendous scope for intensifying bilateral trade and investment partnership in pharmaceutical, automobile, textile and apparel, education, Information Technology (IT), infrastructural-building and port development sectors.

The tax department has notified the amendments of Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA) between India and Kuwait, which enables sharing of information with other law enforcement agencies. 

• India and Kuwait had on June 15, 2006, signed an agreement for the avoidance of double taxation and for the prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income. 

Summit /Conference / Events

The third edition of the United Nations Peacekeeping Course for African Partners (UNPCAP) was inaugurated to build and enhance the capacity of the African Troop Contributing Countries to the UN.

• The course is conducted by the Centre for United Nations Peacekeeping in India (CUNPK) in partnership with the US. 
• The first and second editions of the course were held in New Delhi in 2016 and 2017.

India will host the 15th Asia Media Summit from May 10-12 in which representatives from nearly 40 countries will delve on issues related to the media sector

• With the theme, Telling Our Stories Asia and More', India is hosting the annual summit of the Asia-Pacific Institute for Broadcasting Development (AIBD) Kuala Lumpur for the first time.

The two-day conference ‘First Apex Conference for the CEOs of Smart Cities' will be held in Bhopal

• Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri will inaugurate the first of its kind conference of the CEOs of the 'Smart Cities' on May 8 which aims for cross-sharing of knowledge among the cities

The ‘1st Sensitization Meeting of Stakeholders to make Delhi a Model Accessible City’ Held 

• Secretary, DEPwD said that Delhi being the capital city of the country is proposed to be selected for this drive.
• The rationale for selecting Delhi is that it is assuming increasing eminence among the great cities of the world. 
• Growing at an unprecedented pace, the city needs to be able to integrate its elegant past as well as the modern developments into an organic whole, which demands a purposeful transformation of the socio-economic, natural and built environment.