News Highlights : 25 September 2016

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CURRENT AFFAIRS SEP 25, 2016

01. IT merger of SBI, associates to conclude by end-December :

The integration of IT backbone, a key component in the merger of State Bank of India (SBI) with six other smaller banks, will be completed by the end of this December -- well before the March 31, 2017, target for full-fledged amalgamation, a top official has said. "We have already started the IT integration with our five associate banks and Bharatiya Mahila Bank. We are in readiness. This will get over by the end of the current year," said SBI Chief Information Officer and Deputy Managing Director D. Mrutyunjay Mahapatra. "We need to do what is called data-duplication and some other schemes that need to be merged. But all entities are already on the same software platform. The plan is to complete IT merger by end of December," Mahapatra told IANS on the sidelines of Oracle Open World 2016 conference. The IT infrastructure of the associates is run from the SBI data-centre, so merging the software processes shouldn't be a challenge and neither will it cost much. "For database integration and database tuning, IT major Oracle Corp is working with us. Banks are like technology companies".

02. New Zealand’s central bank stands pat but keeps door open to easing:

New Zealand’s central bank kept its benchmark interest rate at a generous 2.0 percent on 22nd Sept 2016, remaining an outlier in a world of ultra-low or negative interest rates, but the high New Zealand dollar and tepid inflation may soon spur it to cut. Economists polled by Reuters had widely expected the Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s decision, with only one of the 18 surveyed expecting a rate cut. The RBNZ left the door wide open for a cut later this year, knocking the New Zealand dollar off a two-week high to 0.7316 versus 0.7374 ahead of the decision. It has since pared some of those losses and is trading at 0.7364. The decision came hot on the heels of the Bank of Japan overhauling its policy focus and the U.S. Federal Reserve standing pat at ultra-low interest rates.

03. GST Council: Tax exemption threshold fixed at Rs 20 lakh

The first session of the GST Council that concluded on 23rd Sept 2016 made good progress in ironing out some of the contentious issues between the Centre and states: The exemption threshold for the goods and services tax (GST) has been fixed at Rs 20 lakh for all states except the northeastern ones and the three hill states of Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh, in whose case this limit would be Rs 10 lakh; states will have the assessment powers for units with annual turnover up to Rs 1.5 crore while in the case of bigger businesses too, the one-taxpayer-one-authority principle will be retained and either the Centre or the state concerned will be accorded the assessing power based on risk profiling.

04. Five-Year Plans officially declared dead from FY18 :

It is official: Five-Year Plans will come to an end with the conclusion of the 12th Five-Year Plan on March 31, 2017, closing another chapter in India’s Nehruvian legacy. Budget circular issued by the finance ministry said, “There will henceforth be no Five-Year Plan post the 12th Plan.” The circular basically justified the need for doing away with Plan and non-Plan classification of government expenditure and replacing it with revenue and capital break-up. There were indications that the Five-Year Plans would be scrapped once the Planning Commission was replaced with the Niti Aayog from January 1, 2015. However, Niti Aayog will come up with a review of the 12th Five-Year Plan. It will not be a mid-term review, but an assessment of the first four years of the Plan, which means a period between 2012-13 and 2015-16, sources said. The Niti Aayog is already preparing 15-year vision document that will replace the Five-Year Plan from the next financial year. This will be framed keeping in mind the country's social goals and the sustainable development agenda. There will also be a seven-year National Development Agenda which will lay down the schemes, programmes and strategies to achieve the long-term vision. Officials said the National Development Agenda will be reviewed after a gap of every three years to ensure that it was aligned with financial needs and requirements.

05. With Rs 21,000 crore in its bag, government confident of hitting divestment target this year :

The government's ambitious disinvestment target for the year is within easy grasp as more than a third of the receipts are expected to be in the bag by the end of the month and for the first time, a government top official said. The government expects disinvestment proceeds to add up to Rs 21,000 crore by the end of September, most of it coming via share buyback by cash-rich state-run companies. Economic Affairs Secretary Shaktikanta Das told ET that the disinvestment target for the fiscal should be achieved. "Around Rs 21,000 crore will come into the government account by the end of September...so against Rs 56,000 crore about Rs 21,000 crore is already done through buyback and all...we should be able to meet the target," he said.

06. ABB links 648 MW solar project at Kamuthi with national grid :

Engineering firm ABB has commissioned five sub-stations to integrate 648 MW solar project at Kamuthi in Tamil Nadu to the national transmission grid. The project was awarded by independent power producer Adani Group in 2015 and completed on schedule, the company said in a BSE filing. According to statement, the solar photovoltaic project - made up of five plants in a single location - is the largest of its kind in the world. The 360 MW from the solar project is currently grid-connected, and at full capacity this facility will account for nearly 10 per cent of the country's current solar potential of around seven gigawatts (GW). The project contributes to India's vision of achieving 100 GW of solar power by 2022, with overall aim of diversifying its energy mix to meet growing demand, while minimising environmental impact. As part of this plan, the Centre has issued a proposal to implement 25 ultra-mega solar power projects with capacity of 500 to 1,000 MW over a period of five years.

07. It’s scientifically validated now; Ganga water is ‘holy’!:

Indian scientists have validated the scientific basis of the mysterious ‘special power’ of the water of Ganga, which Hindus consider as “Brahm Dravya” or divine elixir. Microbiologists from the Chandigarh-based Institute of Microbial Technology (IMTECH), who had studied the special characteristics of Ganges water have found, for the first time, several Bacteriophages, which keeps it non-putrefying. Bacteriophage is a type of virus that eats bacteria. This resolves the mystery for the self-purifying properties of Ganga water. “Analysis of the fresh water sedimentary metagenome-viromes revealed that the holy river Ganges not only house novel viromes, but also include unexplored double stranded DNA viruses,” The Indian Science Journal quotes Dr Shanmugam Mayilraj, Senior Principal Scientist at the CSIR-Institute of Microbial Technology, Chandigarh, as saying. It is for the first time, scientists have come across new viruses.Dr Mayilraj said, the fresh water sediments from the Ganges house several novel viruses, which were never reported earlier. These bacteriophages are active against certain clinical isolates, or viral strains and can be used against multi-drug resistant or MDR infections. Dr Mayilraj and his team has identified 20-25 interesting viruses, which can be used for treatment of tuberculosis (Mycobacterium), typhoid (Salmonella), pneumonia (Klebsiella and Acinetobactor), cholera (Vibrio), dysentery (Shigella), diarrhoea (Aeromonoas) meningitis (Cronobacter), etc

08. E-insurance from Oct 1 will help bridge the gap between policyholders and their insurers:

From October 1, insurance companies will be required to offer electronic policies as an option to customers. According to the new Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority norms, motor and travel insurance policies will be issued only as e-Policies. The adoption by insurers can help reduce paperwork in the long run, improve convenience and turnaround times for customers during the time of application and claims. In the long run, the repository for e-policies, would also help insurers reduce their servicing cost thus positively impacting their bottom lines. According to a recent report by Nasscom (The National Association of Software & Services Companies, India is expected to have 730 million internet users by 2020, with 75 per cent of new user growth expected to come from rural area. Hence the move towards e-policies is in keeping with people’s preferences. E-policies will help bridge the gap between policyholders and their insurers.

09. California eyes 4.4 lakh Indian visitors by 2020 :

California is betting big on Indian travellers and expects to receive 4.4 lakh visitors from the country by 2020 on the back of more outbound travel from India and better flight connectivity. Indians are a valuable target for California’s tourism business, Alex Vigil, Manager, Europe and India Marketing, of the non-profit Visit California, told BusinessLine. “In 2015, California received 2,91,000 visitors from India, which was an 11 per cent year-on-year growth compared with 2014. We are projecting 9.4 per cent growth this year,” Vigil added. Currently, of all Indian travellers coming to the US, California gets a 27.5 per cent market share, he stated. Vigil is here as part of Visit California’s delegation in the fifth annual Brand USA India Mission. Brand USA is the public-private partnership set up to promote the US as a travel destination. On the importance of the India market, Vigil said: “India is the sixth largest market in terms of spending in California. Indians spend $1,785 per trip, which makes a total of $523 million in spends by Indians in California each year. By 2020, it should reach $802 million.” China, the UK and Australia are the top overseas source markets for California.

10. EU may re-engage with India on free trade talks:

European Union (EU) hopes to soon re-engage with India on negotiations regarding the proposed Free Trade Agreement (FTA), which, it said, will also include an investment protection pact. The EU is seeking an “ambitious, comprehensive and balanced” FTA with India, Tomasz Kozlowski, Ambassador of the EU to India, said at a ‘CII Invest North conclave.’ The EU hopes to establish circumstances that are conducive to help it re-engage with India resolutely regarding the FTA talks. The EU Ambassador said the FTA will not only cover (lowering/eliminating) tariffs but will also look at harmonisation of standards. He said there are more than 6,000 European firms in India providing direct employment to 1.2 million people and indirect employment to 5 million people, adding that an investment protection pact is important for these firms towards stability and certainty.