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NATIONAL AFFAIRS
‘AIM-PRIME’ Launched to support Science-based Deep-tech Startups & Ventures
- Under the initiative, Technology Developers & Incubation managers will be provided Training & Guidance on Deep Technology Entrepreneurship over a period of 12 months.
- Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) will act as the supporting agency for the initiative, while ‘Venture Center’, a non-profit technology business incubator will be responsible for the implementation of the program.
- The program aims to support startups/incubators by providing training & guidance to them for commercializing their deep-tech ideas.
Deep Technology
- It refers to those startups whose business model is based on high tech innovation in engineering, or significant scientific advances.
Government Retains the Interest Rate of Small Savings Schemes for Q1 of FY22 
ii.This is the 4th consecutive quarter, that GoI had retained the Interest Rates of the small saving schemes.
Interest Rates of the Small Savings Schemes are:
| Schemes | Rates of Interest from 1st April, 2021 to 30th June, 2021 | Compounding Frequency |
|---|---|---|
| Post Office Savings Account (SB) | 4.0% | Annually |
| 5 Years National Savings Recurring Deposit Account (RD) | 5.8% | Quarterly |
| 1 Year Time Deposit | 5.5% | Quarterly |
| 2 Year Time Deposit | 5.5% | Quarterly |
| 3 Year Time Deposit | 5.5% | Quarterly |
| 5 Year Time Deposit | 6.7% | Quarterly |
| National Savings Monthly Income Account (MIS) | 6.6% | Monthly and Paid |
| Senior Citizens Savings Scheme Account (SCSS) | 7.4% | Quarterly and Paid |
| Public Provident Fund Account (PPF ) | 7.1% | Annually |
| Sukanya Samriddhi Account (SSA) | 7.6% | Annually |
| National Savings Certificates (NSC) | 6.8% | Annually |
| Kisan Vikas Patra (KVP ) | 6.9%(will mature in 124 months) | Annually |
iii. Ministry of Finance can revise the Interest Rates of Small Savings Scheme, in excise of the power conferred by Rule 9(1) of the Government Savings Promotion General Rules, 2018.
About Ministry of Finance:
Union Minister – Nirmala Sitharaman (Constituency – Karnataka).
Minister of State – Shri Anurag Singh Thakur (Constituency – Hamirpur, Himachal Pradesh).
>>Read Full News
LG Manoj Sinha attended the 4th edition of Purvanchal Festival “Maati”
Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor, Manoj Sinha attended the fourth edition of Purvanchal Festival “Maati” at India International Centre, New Delhi. Purvanchal is “a geographical region of the eastern end part of Uttar Pradesh” and one of the most ancient regions of India. It enjoys a rich heritage and culture, particularly because of its association with some historical places. In popular terms, Purvanchal is well known as ‘The land of warriors’. To celebrate this Purvanchal spirit and strengthen the sense of belonging among Purvanchalis living in Delhi-NCR, an initiative called “Maati” was launched with a grand festival in 2018.
Mansukh Mandaviya Inaugurated Cruise Ship Service between Surat & Diu
Highlights of Minister’s Speech:
i.Between 2014 to 2020, Cruise calls at Indian Ports have increased from 139 calls with around 1 lakh passengers to 450 calls with over 4.5 lakh passengers.
ii.Indian Govt. is planning for 6 International Cruise Terminals:
- 3 at West Coast – Mumbai, Goa & Kochi
- 3 at East Coast – Visakhapatnam, Kolkata, Chennai
iii.India is Planning to develop Ferry, RoRo and ROPAX services between South Gujarat and Gujarat’s Saurashtra region.
Note- In November 2020, PM Modi inaugurated a RoPAX service, “Hazira-Ghogha” between Surat & Bhavnagar in Gujarat.
About the Cruise Service:
i.Planned to conduct 2 round trips in a week, each with one side voyage time of 13 to 14 hours at a marginal cost of Rs. 900.
ii.300 passengers can be accommodated in the 16 cabins.
Facilities – Gaming Lounge, VIP Lounge, with other modern entertainment amenities.
About Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways:
Minister of State – Mansukh L. Mandaviya (Constituency-Gujarat)
National Waterways 1 – “Ganga-Bhagirathi-Hooghly” river system connecting Haldia and Prayagraj.
INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS
India ranked 140th out of 156 Countries, Iceland tops in WEF’s Global Gender Gap Report 2021
- India has slipped 28 places to 140 in 2021 (from 112 in 2020).
- The Global Gender Gap score in 2021 stands at 67.7% (remaining gap to close – 32.3%), the gap has widened by almost 0.6 percentage points.
- The global gender gap has increased by a generation from 99.5 years to 135.6 years (an increase of 36 years), due to the effect of the Pandemic.
- Among the South Asian Countries, Bangladesh was the top performer on the Gender Gap Index with a global ranking of 65.
- India, home to 0.65 Billion women, has widened its gender gap from around 66.8% in 2020 to 62.5% in 2021.
| Rank | Country | Score (0-1) |
|---|---|---|
| 140 | India | 0.625 |
| 1 | Iceland | 0.892 |
| 2 | Finland | 0.861 |
| 3 | Norway | 0.849 |
About World Economic Forum (WEF):
Executive Chairman – Klaus Schwab
Headquarters – Cologny, Switzerland
>>Read Full News
Dr Harsh Vardhan participated on first ever ‘World Immunisation and Logistics Summit 2021’ Virtually
- The two-day summit was inaugurated by H.H. Sheikh Abdullah Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, UAE Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation to focus and enhance the cooperation to tackle COVID-19 across the world.
- The first day panel was discussed on the theme ‘Demand planning, preparedness and overcoming challenges in vaccine administration’.
Dr. Harsh Vardhan in Final panel:-
i.Dr. Harsh Vardhan, Union Minister of India and also Chairman of World Health Organization’s Executive Board was also virtually participated in the final day of the panel discussion which focused on vaccine production and distribution across Asia.The co-panelists are Madhav Kurup, Regional CEO MESA, Hellmann Worldwide Logistics and Dr. Pascal Rey-Herme, Co-Founder and Group Medical Director, International SOS.
Chairman of the Department of Health ,Abu Dhabi – HE Sheikh Abdullah bin Mohammed Al HamedeAbout Consortium
>>Read Full News
Overview of EAM Dr S. Jaishankar’s visit to Tajikistan 
- During the visit, EAM held discussions with Emomali Rahmon, President of Tajikistan; Colonel General Sherali Mirzo, Defence Minister of Tajikistan; Sirojiddin Muhriddin, Foreign Minister of Tajikistan.
- Dr S Jaishankar also attended the 9th Heart of Asia-Istanbul Process (HoA-IP) Ministerial Conference held at Dushanbe, Tajikistan
- EAM attended the inaugural virtual session of the Doha talks.
Key Points
- Heart of Asia-Istanbul Process (HoA-IP) is part of the Istanbul Process – a regional initiative on ‘security and cooperation for a stable and peaceful Afghanistan’. It was established by Afghanistan & Turkey in 2011.
- During the visit, EAM Dr S Jaishankar held talks with Tajikistan Counterpart Sirojiddin Muhriddin in Dushanbe.
- EAM called on Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and discussed India’s perspective on the peace process in Afghanistan.
About Tajikistan:
President – Emomali Rahmon
Capital – Dushanbe
Currency – Tajikistan Somoni (TJS)
>>Read Full News
BANKING & FINANCE
ICICI and AXIS Bank tied up to form NUE with Amazon and Visa as Partners
- ICICI Bank and Axis Bank will be co-leading with each having a 20% stake (40%) and the other partners including Amazon, Billdesk, Pine Labs and Visa will be holding a stake of 15% each (60%)
Background:
- RBI allowed other organisations to set up umbrella entities for payments systems to create an alternate mechanism(rivalry) to the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) for speeding up the cashless payment.
- RBI has fixed March 31, 2021, as the deadline for making application to form NUEs.
Other entities which formed NUEs:
- Reliance Industries along with Facebook and Google
- Paytm with OLA
- Tata Group with Mastercard, Bharti Airtel, Kotak Mahindra Bank and HDFC as its partners
About ICICI Bank:
Establishment – 1995(Incorporated in 1994)
Headquarters – Mumbai, Maharashtra
MD& CEO – Sandeep Bakhshi
Tagline – Hum hai na, Khayal Apka
>>Read Full News
RBI Fixed the WMA limit to Rs 1.2 lakh Crore for the 1st Half of FY22
Background:
- On April 01, 2020, RBI has fixed the WMA limit to Rs 1.2 lakh crore for the first half of the FY21 but by April 20, 2020, in order to tackle the financial crisis arisen due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it has hiked the limit to Rs 2 lakh crore for the remaining months of the first half of FY21.
- For the second half of FY21 i.e. (October 2020 – March 2021), RBI has decided the amount Rs 1.25 lakh crore as the WMA.
- Now for the first half of FY22, the WMA limit has been fixed to the pre-pandemic level of Rs 1.2 lakh crore.
What is WMA?
- The RBI provides temporary loans to the centre & state governments as a banker to the government. This facility is called Ways and Means Advances (WMA) it was introduced in the year1997. Under this facility, the Centre and states can borrow money from RBI for a period of 90 days.
The interest rate for WMA:
- The interest rate on WMA will be the repo rate, currently the repo rate is at 4%. If the WMA exceeds the limit of 90 days, it would be treated as an overdraft (OD). The interest rate on overdrafts would be 2 % more than the repo rate.
About Reserve Bank of India(RBI):
- Key Appointments in RBI – Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) headed by the Prime Minister appoints the governor and deputy governors.
- Section 7 in The RBI Act, 1934, empowers the government to issue directions to the RBI governor in the public interest
- Shaktikanta Das – 25th governor of the RBI from 11 December 2018
RBI Extended the Timeline for AFA Norms on e-Mandate to September 30,2021
Background:
The framework for e-mandate was first issued by RBI in August 2019 and fixed the timeline up to March 31, 2021 however, banks have not developed capabilities to support the new system and hence it is finally extended to September 30.
Framework by RBI on e-mandate Recurring Transactions:
i.For opting e-mandate facility the cardholder should undertake a one-time registration process, with Additional Factor of Authentication (AFA) validation by the issuer.
ii.For auto-debit from cards/wallets above the cut-off ( ₹5,000), an additional one-time password (OTP) should be provided.
iii.The issuer has to send a notification to customers 5 days before the e-mandate payments and it also should send a pre-transaction notification to the cardholder, at least 24 hours prior to the debit from the card and allow it only after the customer has confirmed it.
About Reserve Bank of India(RBI):
Establishment – 1st April 1935
Headquarters – Mumbai, Maharashtra
Governor – Shaktikanta Das
>>Read Full News
ECONOMY & BUSINESS
India’s GDP Estimated to Grow in the range of 7.5% to 12.5% in FY22: World Bank report 
Key points of the report:
- The World Bank has increased the GDP growth rate of India by 4.7% to 10.1% for FY22, due to private consumption and investment growth. It has reported a 5.4% growth in its January report.
- The poverty rate (at the $1.90 line) for the South Asian group is projected to be within 6% and 9% in FY22, and between 4% and 7% by FY24.
- The general government deficit is expected to remain above 10% of GDP until FY22 and which will result in public debt at a peak of almost 90% of GDP in FY21.
- The current account is expected to return to mild deficits of around 1% in FY22 and FY23
About World Bank:
Establishment – 1944 as The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development
President – David Robert Malpass
Headquarters – Washington, D.C., United States
>>Read Full News
GE Power India Signs Maintenance Contract With Reliance Bangladesh LNG & Power
- It is expected to start in early 2023 and the plant will utilize re-gasified liquified natural gas to generate the equivalent electricity needed to supply more than 850,000 homes in Bangladesh.
- The agreement includes equipment maintenance on the gas and steam turbines, and auxiliaries, and implementation of plant-wide digital solutions on cloud asset performance maintenance, operations performance maintenance, performance intelligence, and a base Line security centre.
- GE Digital will provide the digital solution to support the growth of the power sector in Bangladesh.
About Reliance Bangladesh LNG & Power Ltd:
CEO – Ranjan Lohar
Headquarter – Dhaka, Bangladesh
About GE Power India:
Managing Director – Mr. Prashant Jain
APPOINTMENTS & RESIGNATIONS
Subhash Kumar, Finance Director Of ONGC, Assumes Additional Charge as its CMD
i.He had worked as Head Business Development, Finance and Budget and also as Head Treasury Planning and Portfolio Management Group at ONGC Videsh Ltd., from April 2010 to March 2015.
ii.He was also the Chief Financial Officer of Mansarovar Energy Colombia Limited, a 50:50 joint venture of ONGC Videsh and Sinopec of China.
iii.He is a Fellow Member of the Institute of Cost Accountants of India and Associate Member of ICSI. He is an alumnus of Punjab University, Chandigarh.
RBI extends tenure of J&K Bank CMD, R K Chhibber by 6 months
- RBI extended his appointment by exercising its power conferred under Section 10BB(2) of the Banking Regulation Act, 1949.
Key Points:
i.His extension will be effective from April 10, 2021.
ii.R K Chhibber was appointed as the CMD of J&K Bank in the year 2019 for the period of 6 months & after that his tenure was extended numerous times.
Background:
J&K Bank appointed the R K Chhibber as CMD after dissolving the designation, chairman and CEO held by Parvez Ahmed in order to increase the transparency, governance, compliance and profitability of the lender.
About Jammu & Kashmir (J&K) Bank:
Incorporated – 1938
Headquarter – Srinagar, Jammu & Kashmir
ACQUISITIONS & MERGERS
ATL Acquired WKTL from Essel InfraProjects Ltd for Rs 3,370 crore
On 27th March, 2021, Adani Transmission Ltd (ATL) has entered into definitive agreements with Essel InfraProjects Ltd for the acquisition of Warora-Kurnool Transmission Limited (WKTL) for Rs 3,370 Crore.
i.Now, the total network of ATL will stand at 17,200 ckt km, of which 12,350 ckt km is already operational and 4,850 ckt km (including this asset) is in various stages of execution.
Note – ATL is India’s largest private sector power transmission and retail distribution company.
ATL: MD & CEO- Anil Sardana ; Headquarter – Ahmedabad, Gujarat
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
Ministry of Jal Shakti to deploy IoT devices for Monitoring Rural Drinking Water Supply Systems
- For this purpose, The National Jal Jeevan Mission (NJJM) undertook pilot projects in villages of 5 states – Uttarakhand, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Maharashtra & Himachal Pradesh.
- For the pilot project, NJJM partnered with Tata Community Initiatives Trust (TCIT) & Tata Trust (the pilot projects went live in September 2020).
Advantages
- Provides real-time information without any manual intervention & enables real-time visibility to State water supply/PHED (Public Health Engineering Department) officials & citizens.
- It will help in identifying issues that plague the distribution of water – outages, leakages, low pressure and help in monitoring the groundwater levels.
- It will improve operational efficiency, reduce costs & help in better grievance redressal.
Jal Jeevan Mission
- It was launched on August 15, 2019. It comes under the Department of Drinking Water & Sanitation, Ministry of Jal Shakti.
- It aims to provide ‘Functional Household Tap Connection’ (FHTC) to every rural household by 2024.
About Ministry of Jal Shakti:
Union Minister– Gajendra Singh Shekhawat (Constituency- Jodhpur, Rajasthan)
Minister of State– Rattan Lal Kataria (Constituency- Ambala, Haryana)
>>Read Full News
ARIES Solar Physicists develop New Algorithm for Tracking Solar Eruptions 
- The ejections from the sun are technically called Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs).
- A Research team led by Mr. Ritesh Patel, Dr. Vaibhav Pant, and Professor Dipankar Banerjee from ARIES collaborated with the Royal Observatory of Belgium for the development of the Algorithm.
- Aditya-L1 will be observing the inner corona region, hence the implementation of CIISCO on the Aditya-L1 data will provide new insight into the properties of CME.
- The research has been published in the ‘Solar Physics’ Journal.
Aditya-L1
- The First Solar Mission of India is expected to be launched in 2022.
- It is being built in collaboration between the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) & various Indian research institutes.
About Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES):
It is an autonomous institute under the Department of Science & Technology (DST)
Director – Dr. Dipankar Banerjee
Location – Nainital, Uttarakhand
>>Read Full News
SPORTS
FootBall – 9 cities in Australia & New Zealand to Host 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup
Notably, the opening match will be held in Auckland, New Zealand and the Finals in Sydney, Australia. And Two of the semifinals are split between the countries.
Note- Previously, New Zealand & Australia Co-hosted Cricket World Cup in 2015
Host Cities:
- Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney from Australia
- Auckland, Dunedin, Hamilton and Wellington from New Zealand
Speciality of 2023’s Event:
i.For the 1st time in the history of FIFA Women’s tournament, 32 teams will be participating in the 2023 World Cup (Previously, only 24 teams).
ii.This is also the 1st time countries from 2 different confederations co-host a FIFA World Cup.
- Australia – Asian Confederation
- New Zealand – Oceania Confederation
iii.1st time a Senior World Cup is hosted by a country from the Oceania confederation.
About FIFA:
FIFA Men’s World Cup-2022 will be hosted by Qatar.
Headquarters– Zurich, Switzerland
Motto– For the Game. For the World
President– Gianni Infantino
FIFA started to award world player awards in 1991 & Last Awarded in 2009.
Kamalpreet Kaur – India’s Latest Discus Throw Sensation
Kamalpreet Kaur, An Indian women’s Discus thrower qualified for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games set to be held in Japan (from July 23 – 8 August, 2021), after she sent the discus to 65.06 metres at the 24th Federation cup Senior Athletics Championships held in Patiala, Punjab. With this, she set a new national record & breached the Olympic Qualification mark of 63.50 m. She became the 1st Indian women to breach the 65m Barrier in discus throw.
- Kamalpreet Kaur hails from Badal village in the Sri Muktsar Sahib district of Punjab.
- She broke the previous record of 64.76 set by Krishna Poonia in 2012.
OBITUARY
Indian Journalists and author Anil Dharker passed away at 74
Anil Dharker ,a notable journalist and writer from Mumbai,Maharashtra passed away at 74.He was also the founder and director of the Mumbai International Literary Festival which held in November every year and also the founder and director of Literature Live.
i.He said to be a multi-talented in various fields such as an architect ,editor, columnist ,TV anchor and writer.
ii.He was a columnist for The Indian Express newspaper and author The Romance Of Salt, a book on Mahatma Gandhis Dandi March.
iii.Dharker had been the editor of a variety of publications, starting with ‘Debonair’, ‘Mid-Day’; ‘The Independent’ and ‘The Illustrated Weekly of India’.
iv.He was also a member of the Advisory Boards of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations and the Children’s Film Society of India.
STATE NEWS
Amboli in Maharashtra named as Biodiversity Heritage Site
- Schistura Hiranyakeshi comes under the sub-species of rare Schistura, a freshwater loach that lives in water bodies with abundance of Oxygen.
Other Biodiversity Heritage Sites in Maharashtra:
- Glory of Allapalli in Gadchiroli district
- Landor Khori Park in Jalgaon
- Ganesh Khind in Pune
- Myristica Swamp Vegetation in Sindhudurg district
About Maharashtra:
UNESCO World Heritage Site, “Ellora Caves” is located in Maharashtra.
Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport – Mumbai
Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar International Airport – Nagpur
>>Read Full News
Manyamkonda Jatara – Idol shifting festival from Odisha to Andhra Pradesh Held
On 22nd March 2021, Manyamkonda Jatara, the famous idol shifting Tribal festival between the Left Wing Extremism (LWE) affected villages in Odisha & Andhra Pradesh conducted successfully. In the Inter-state festival, 4 Idols of deities – Kannamaraju, Bapiraju, Pothuraju and Muthyalamma, were moved from Malkangiri in Odisha to Polluru village, Mothugudem mandal of Andhra Pradesh.
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Current Affairs Today (AffairsCloud Today)
| S.no | Current Affairs 2 April 2021 |
|---|---|
| 1 | ‘AIM-PRIME’ Launched to support Science-based Deep-tech Startups & Ventures |
| 2 | Government Retains the Interest Rate of Small Savings Schemes for Q1 of FY22 |
| 3 | LG Manoj Sinha attends 4th edition of Purvanchal Festival “Maati” |
| 4 | Cruise Ship Service inaugurated between Surat & Diu |
| 5 | India ranked 140th out of 156 Countries, Iceland top in WEF’s Global Gender Gap Report 2021 |
| 6 | Dr Harsh Vardhan participated on first ever ‘World Immunisation and Logistics Summit 2021’ Virtually |
| 7 | Overview of EAM Dr S. Jaishankar’s visit to Tajikistan |
| 8 | ICICI and AXIS Bank tied up to form NUE with Amazon and Visa as Partners |
| 9 | RBI Fixed the WMA limit to Rs 1.2 lakh Crore for the 1st Half of FY22 |
| 10 | RBI Extended the Timeline for AFA Norms on e-Mandate to September 30,2021 |
| 11 | India’s GDP Estimated to Grow in the range of 7.5% to 12.5% in FY22: World Bank report |
| 12 | GE Power India Signs Maintenance Contract With Reliance Bangladesh LNG & Power |
| 13 | Subhash Kumar, Finance Director Of ONGC, Assumes Additional Charge as its CMD |
| 14 | RBI extends tenure of J&K Bank CMD, R K Chhibber by 6 months |
| 15 | ATL Acquired WKTL from Essel InfraProjects Ltd for Rs 3,370 crore |
| 16 | Ministry of Jal Shakti to deploy IoT devices for Monitoring Rural Drinking Water Supply Systems |
| 17 | ARIES Solar Physicists develop New Algorithm for Tracking Solar Eruptions |
| 18 | 9 Host Cities in Australia & New Zealand announced for 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup |
| 19 |
Kamalpreet Kaur – India’s Latest Discus Throw Sensation
|
| 20 | Indian Journalists and author Anil Dharker passed away at 74 |
| 21 | Amboli in Maharashtra named as Biodiversity Heritage Site |
| 22 | Manyamkonda Jatara – Idol shifting festival form Odisha to Andhra successfully conducted |
