Current Affairs Aug 19, 2015

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1. Ranil to return as Prime Minister of Srilanka: The former Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s attempt to make a political comeback suffered a huge blow as parliamentary election results showed a surge in support for rival Ranil Wickremesinghe’s United National Party (UNP) got the Majority. Ranil is to become a Prime Minister of Srilanka.

2. Marine police station for Chennai: This is the first marine police station of India. The station is situated in Anna Memorial at Marina Beach in Chennai and will keep a check on terrorism, smuggling and human trafficking. After the Mumbai attack it has become all the more important to secure the coastline.

3. Putin dives in mini-sub to shipwreck off Crimea: Russian President Vladimir Putin burnished his action man image on 13th August by diving down in a mini-submarine to explore a shipwreck off the coast of the Crimea peninsula that Moscow seized from Ukraine last year.

4. Moodys lowers India's growth forecast: Global rating agency Moody’s lowered India’s growth forecast for 2015 to 7 per cent from earlier projected 7.5 per cent over monsoon concerns. It retained the forecast for 2016 at 7.5 per cent but cautioned that the slow pace of reforms of the Modi Government pose further risks to growth.

5. Country set for a start-up revolution: Arun Jaitley: Mr. Arun Jaitley has launched two funds by Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI), a fund of funds with total corpus of Rs.12,000 crore. The funds are Rs.2,000-crore India Aspiration Fund (IAF) and SIDBI Make In India Loan For Enterprises (SMILE) scheme with an investment size of Rs.10,000 crore.

6. SBI Mobile Wallet: Mr. Jaitley launched State Bank of India’s ‘Buddy’ — a Mobile Wallet. The App will be available in 13 languages and for all customers irrespective of the bank the customer is banking with or the card customer is using. It is currently launched on the Google Play Store and will soon be available in the Apple app Store.

7. ICICI Bank launches digital locker: ICICI Bank launched the first of its kind fully automated digital locker, which would be available to customers even on weekends and post banking hours. Named ‘Smart Vault’, the locker is equipped with multi-layer security system, including biometric and PIN authentication and debit cards, among others. Customers can access it without any intervention by the branch staff, ICICI Bank said in a statement.

8. Navi Mumbai girl strikes gold at Special Olympics: Sneha Verma, a 21-year-old girl suffering from Down syndrome, has made the country proud by winning a gold medal in the 50m freestyle event at the Special Olympics World Summer Games held in Los Angeles last month.

9. August 19 is Photo day: On August 19, 1839, the French government gave the creation away as a free gift to the world. That invention of Louis-Jacques-Mande Daguerre, a painter and printmaker, inspired the celebration of the first World Photo Day on August 19, 2010.

10. Cochin becomes world’s first solar-run airport: Kerala’s Cochin International Airport Ltd (CIAL) has become the first airport in the world that would be running fully on solar power. The airport officially commissioned a 12 MW solar Project.

11. NSE files Rs 100-crore suit against India Samvad: The National Stock Exchange (NSE) has filed a Rs 100-crore criminal defamation suit against yet another online news portal India Samvad for publishing articles on algorithmic and high frequency trading (HFT).

12. Tata Group plans to appoint chief digital officers at all its consumer-facing companies: The Tata Group, one of the oldest and largest conglomerates in the country, plans to appoint chief digital officers at all its consumer facing companies to help them use new technologies in all aspects of business.