News for Mar 2013

• Educational researcher Sugata Mitra has been awarded the million-dollar TED Prize for pursuing his idea for building the schools in the Internet.
• “Hole in the wall” experiment
• India’s national capital Delhi has been ranked last in the Environmental Performance Index (EPI) evolved by the Planning Commission which makes it worst performer in the country when it comes to all key environmental parameters.
• Astronomers measured the spin rate of the super-massive black hole at the center of

Mar 2013 : General Knowledge

•  Philippine President  : Benigno Aquino III
•  India is the largest importer of gold in the world
• Chinese President : XI jinping
• Chinese Premier : Li Keqiang
• President of Zimbabwe : Robert Mugabe
• Sarus caranes — the tallest flying birds in the world.
• Chief Election Commissioner : T.S. Krishnamurthy
• Karnataka Chief Minister  : Jagadish Shettar.
• Installed capacity of power generation in the country is about 2,12,829 MW which includes 26,920 MW from renewable sources. This constitutes 12.5% contribution of renewable.
• National Commission for Denotified, Nomadic and Semi-Nomadic Tribes (NCDNT) Chairman : Balkrishna Sidram Renke
• FDI limit is below 100 per cent. While in multi-brand retail it is 51 per cent, in telecom and banking it is 74 per cent 
• Anurag G Thapliyal: Director General of Indian Coast Guard
• Nagaland CM : Neiphiu Rio

16-22 Mar 2013

• Indian journalist Bobby Ghosh has been named the new editor of Time International.
• History was made in Pakistan on Saturday with its Lower House — the National Assembly — and Pakistan Peoples Party-led coalition government, both completing a full five-year term — a first in the 66-yearsof the nation’s existence. The National Assembly was scheduled to be dissolved late at night after a televised address to the nation by Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf. 
• While India’s Grievance Redressal Bill was forged in the fire of public protest, Ethiopia chose to incorporate anti-corruption provisions in its criminal code(“Article 416 of the criminal code deals with Undue Delay of Matters").
• US is to continue to engage internationally with Iran.
• Sita temple construction to begin soon in Sri Lanka in Divurumpola.
• US has announced that it is abandoning a key part of its European missile defence plan - an interceptor that had been strongly opposed by Russia.
• Zimbabwe votes in a referendum on new Constitution.
• The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has listed Sarus Crane as ‘vulnerable’
• HDFC hires Deloitte to conduct forensic audit in accordance with money laundering case by CobraPost in sting Operation Red Spider.
• Sahara to launch Q shops(retail stores) in Maharashtra.
• Infosys Technologies has announced that it has been selected by the BMW Group as its worldwide partner for application-basis infrastructure management services. 
• After phones and the Net, now hard drives go wireless.
• Ghulam Muntaqa, a senior photojournalist, died of a heart attack.He was a Karnataka Rajyotsava and Karnataka Media Academy award winner.Another one of his achievements was the nine-foot-long negative that included pictures of the Gateway of India and the Taj hotel in Mumbai in a single frame, shot with a rotating camera. It was one of the several innovations that Mr. Muntaqa came up with.
• EC to retain toll-free helpline for State polls.People can dial 1950 to register election-related complaints.
• The Mumbai police on Saturday inaugurated the country’s first ‘Social Media Lab’ to monitor the happenings on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
• The Revenue Department in Andhra Pradesh has been building a digitalised system for delivery of services in land and real estate transactions. The State stakes claim to being the first in facilitating land transactions through a Computer Aided Registration of Documents (CARD) project
• Bollywood director Kamal K.M. has been chosen for the 16 Gollapudi Srinivas National Award for his bilingual I.D.
• Mayanakollai festival comes to an end in Puducherry.
• Former Supreme Court Judge B. Sudershan Reddy was  sworn-in as Goa’s first Lokayukta
•  Kerela : Big boost for Health : 
• Free generic drugs till taluk hospitals.
• De-addiction centers in all taluks.
• Medical Cities in Thiruvananthapuram,kochi and Kozhikode.
• New medical college in Thiruvananthapuram.
• CHIS for APL families also.
• All Airports alerted to prevent Italian Ambassador Daniele Mancini from leaving the country.
• Kallam Anji Reddy, Founder and Chairman of Hyderabad-based pharma major Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories (DRL) passes away.
• The first Satellite of Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS) constellation, IRNSS-1 will be launched by PSLV-C22.IRNSS provides two basic services -- standard positioning service for common civilian users and restricted service for special authorised users.
•  Infosys will facilitate India Post’s Rural Systems Integration (RSI) programme. This initiative will increase adoption of the department’s services, and enhance the reach of postal services to the country’s rural population, streamlining the distribution of social benefits.Project is a  part of the ‘India Post 2012’ modernisation programme that aims to bring transparency, agility, flexibility and scalability to its business operations.
• Air Chief Marshal (retd.) S.P. Tyagi became the first IAF Chief to be booked by the CBI — along with 12 others — for alleged cheating, corruption and criminal conspiracy in the VVIP Chopper deal.
• The Office of Controller General of Patents, Designs and Trade Marks (CGPDTM) has launched the comprehensive online patent filing system with effect from 15th December, 2012.
• Papal Moniker : When Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio took the name Francis on being elected the 267th Pope of the Catholic Church.
• Haj Committee rules restrict male relatives, who had already performed the pilgrimage, from accompanying them.
• India provides new immigration system for Maldives.
• As per the Red Data Book of International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), five species of reptiles viz., Batagur baska (Four-toed Terrapin), Batagur kachuga (Red-crowned Roofed Turtle), Dermochelys coriacea (Leatherback), Eretmochelys imbricata (Hawksbill Turtle) and Gavialis gangeticus (Fish-eating Crocodile) are listed as critically endangered species.
• Transfer of defence land takes place only with the sanction of Ministry of Defence.
• 962-km roads to be laid in Visakha Agency area.(tribal area in Vishakhapatnam)
• 60th National Awards List.
• Cabinet clears revised food security bill :
• Entitlement cut from 7 kg to 5 kg a month under PDS
• entitlement of 35 kg under Antyodaya Anna Yojna to stay
• Centre to move resolution on Sri Lanka : DMK quits UPA
• India, Egypt sign seven pacts.
• Shri Dinsha J. Patel confers National Geoscience Awards-2011 .
• SC Diktat on admission to medical and dental colleges.
• Kerala to map marine biodiversity 
• 
  

Short Terms : Mar 2013

Tax Residency Certificate (TRC)

• Section [90 A (4)] intends to say is, if you produce a TRC that is a complete answer to your status as a resident. But whether you are the beneficial owner is a separate issue.
• The TRC certifies that you are a resident. It does not certify you are a beneficial owner.

Indian Depository Receipt(IDR)

• IDRs are generally instruments denominated in rupees  created by a Domestic Depository (custodian of securities registered with the Securities and Exchange Board of India)  nd allow overseas companies to raise funds from the Indian market.
• So far only the UK-based banking major Standard Chartered PLC was listed as an IDR. 

Operation Red Spider

• Operation Red Spider is a sting operation of an online magazine, Cobrapost in which it released hidden video footage showing high ranking officials and some employees of top three Indian banks(ICICI , HDFC , AXIS)suggesting to an undercover reporter methods to launder money and offering safe deposit lockers to stash away the black money and offered to open accounts without adhering to Reserve Bank of India guidelines and use ‘benami’ accounts to facilitate the conversion of the black money and keep the identity of the depositor a secret.
• The editor of Cobrapost.com Mr. Aniruddha Bahal his brought these video footage into the public domain on March 14, 2013.

Jhum/Jhoom Cultivation

• Tribal groups in the northeastern states of India like Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Nagaland, and also in the districts of Bangladesh like Khagrachari and Sylhet refer to slash and burn agriculture as "Jhum" or "Jhoom cultivation".
• This system involves clearing a piece of land by setting fire or clear felling and using the area for growing crops of agricultural importance such as upland rice, vegetables or fruits. After a few cycles, the land loses fertility and a new area is chosen.
• It is typically part of shifting cultivation agriculture.
• Shifting cultivation is an agricultural system in which plots of land are cultivated temporarily, then abandoned.In shifting agriculture a plot of land is cleared and cultivated for a short period of time; then it is abandoned and allowed to revert to its natural vegetation while the cultivator moves on to another plot.
• Slash-and-char is an alternative to slash-and-burn that has a lesser effect on the environment. It is the practice of charring the biomass resulting from the slashing, instead of burning it as in the slash-and-burn practice.

Copyright Bill 2013

• The Copyright Rules, 2013 provide new rules for statutory licence for cover versions and broadcasting of literary and musical works and sound recording; compulsory licences for works withheld from public, unpublished and published works, for benefit of disabled; registration of Copyright Societies and Performer’s Right Societies; storage of transient or incidental copies of woks; making or adapting the work by organisations working for the benefit of persons with disabilities; importation of infringing copies and technological protection measures.
• The minimum fee has been increased for registration from Rs. 50/- per work to Rs. 500/- per work and the maximum fee has been increased from Rs. 600/- per work to Rs. 5,000/-.  

1-7 Mar 2013

• Syria crisis: Assad sends top aide Bouthaina Shaaban to meet Manmohan.
• Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa has denied that the Army killed LTTE chief Prabakaran’s 12-year-old son Balachandran. 
• President Barack Obama has signed an order authorising the government to begin cutting $85 billion from federal accounts.Mr. Obama has insisted on replacing the cuts, known as a “sequester” in government budget language, with tax increases and cuts spread out over time. Republicans have rejected any plan that included tax revenue.Affecting everything from military expenditure to school and hospital services. 
• Dharamsala-based Tibetan Lhamo Je authored ‘self-immolation guide’: China
•  U.S.-Russia compromise formula on defence co-operation ,pledging to cooperate on missile defences and not to use them against each other.
•  Russia will re-establish its permanent naval presence in the Mediterranean, more than two decades after it withdrew from the region 
• Maldives girl faces flogging (100 lashes i.e. whips)for premarital sex.
•  Russia backs France’s Syria plans. 
• Pranab visits Bangladesh amid violence 
• Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline work to start on March 11 and agreements for opening two more border crossings at Gabd and Pasni and for setting up an oil refinery in Gwadar will also be signed .
• Demolition of Berlin Wall stretch stalled by protests.
• The Philippine President on Saturday urged members of a Muslim royal clan from the southern Philippines who occupied a village Lahad Datu in Sabah State in eastern Malaysia three weeks ago to surrender.The Filipino group is led by a brother of Sultan Jamalul Kiram III.
• Obama nominates Wal-Mart's Sylvia Mathews Burwell(President of the Walmart Foundation) as budget chief.
• FinMin said Tax Residency Certificate (TRC) would not be enough to claim benefits under the DTAAs (Double Taxation Avoidance Agreements).It is proposed to amend Sections 90 and 90A [of the Income-Tax Act] in order to provide that submission of a tax residency certificate is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for claiming benefits under the agreements referred to in Sections 90 and 90A.The amendments will take effect retrospectively from April 1, 2013.
• FinMin propose to levy a final withholding tax at the rate of 20 per cent on profits distributed by unlisted companies to shareholders through buyback of shares.Also proposed to increase the rate on payments by way of royalty and fees for technical services to non-residents from 10 per cent to 25 per cent.
• Proposed acquisition of majority stake by UK-based Diageo in UB group’s United Spirits Ltd.
• Malaysian carrier Air Asia announced it had sought the government’s nod to launch a new airline under a joint venture with Tata Group and an Indian investor.
• Importers must take permission from the Directorate General of Foreign Trade.The government has imposed restrictions on import of second hand goods and re-conditioned spares of personal computers and laptops, a decision that could boost domestic manufacturing.  
• Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) on Friday issued detailed guidelines allowing shareholders to convert their Indian Depository Receipts(IDR) into equity shares of the issuer company and vice-versa. 
• The German Parliament passed a law, which will force search engines such as Google and other news aggregators, to pay royalties to publishers for posting extracts of their articles.Still to be approved by upper house.
• Microsoft launched its Office 365 for businesses in India, which will provide seamless sharing of data across PCs and mobiles using cloud computing technology.
• The Government said that the one-man committee headed by former Chief Justice of Punjab and Haryana High Court Mukul Mudgal would submit its report on the alleged corruption charges against U.S. retail giant Walmart by April 2013