CURRENT AFFAIRS 9-10th Oct., 2014

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CURRENT AFFAIRS 10th Oct., 2014

1. Facebook cofounder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg will meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi to discuss how Facebook could participate in the government's Digital India initiative and he is the third American CEO visiting India after Microsoft's Satya Nadella and Amazon's Jeff Bezos.

2. Centre announced the establishment of ‘Japan Plus’ a team to facilitate investments from Japan as promised during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit last month. It will have members from the Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion (DIPP) under the commerce and industry ministry and Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry.

3. Government may give the Reserve Bank of India governor veto power over a new monetary policy council that would focus on price stability as its main mission. The formation of an eight-member committee headed by the RBI governor and a deputy will include one government nominee with no voting rights.

4. An internal committee of the insurance sector regulator IRDA has recommended hiking FDI in all insurance sector intermediaries like brokers, surveyors, third-party administrators (TPAs) and web aggregators to 49 per cent from the present 26 per cent. The panel was headed by Suresh Mathur and has submitted the report to Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (Irda) chairman.

5. Reserve Bank may lift cap on foreign holding of government debt in two years once the economy has reached its potential growth rate. Currently FIIs have reportedly exhaust over 95 per cent of their $ 25 billion investment limit in government debt.

CURRENT AFFAIRS 9th Oct., 2014

1. An electronic surveillance system to keep track of punctuality of government officials will become fully operational by the month end. It displays a dynamic, real-time chart of how many people are at work. It is part of new governments efforts to ensure discipline among government employees.

2. The “model villages” under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Sansad Adarsh Gram Yojana (SAGY) will be launched on October 11. The model village will have smart schools, universal access to basic health facilities, pucca houses for the homeless, universal PDS for eligible families, e-governance, and Aadhaar cards for all. Under the scheme, each MP will adopt a village every year for all-round development, and the implementation will be aided by his/her MPLAD fund.

3. Government is to reconstitute and revive the Prime Minister’s Council on Climate Change. It is an advisory body on climate change issues that has not met in the last three years. The Council was established in 2007 and had framed India’s National Action Plan on Climate Change in 2008.

4. The Select Committee of the Rajya Sabha is considering a proposal for the merger of four PSU general insurance companies- New India Assurance, National Insurance, United India Insurance and Oriental Insurance. The merger will enable them to consolidate their market share and prevent them from becoming sick.

5. The World Bank Group launched a new Global Infrastructure Facility to ensure that billions of dollars are channelised to develop world-class infrastructure in emerging markets like India and developing economies. The Group will work with the proposed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), the New Development Bank (NDB) and Asian Development Bank (ADB) to boost investment in infrastructure projects in the emerging economies.