September 2019 Daily News Current Affairs

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Sep 30, 2019
1. Visits from India (Sep 21 - 30, 2019)
  1. Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change Prakash Javadekar Visited Russia, to attend First meeting of Heads of Environment Ministers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization member Nations.
  2. Piyush Goyal, Minister of Railways and Commerce & Industry Visited UAE, to attend 7th meeting of UAE-India High Level Joint Task Force on Investments.
    1. He also unveiled design of India pavilion at World Expo 2020 in Dubai, to take place for 6 months between 20th October 2020 up to 10th April 2021.
  3. Navy Chief Karambir Singh visited Bangladesh.
  4. PM Narendra Modi Visited US -
    1. He attended Howdy Modi event in Texas, which was attended by Over 50000 Indian-Americans. Notably, It was also attended by US President Donald Trump.
    2. PM Modi attended 74th session of United Nations General Assembly in New York City. 74th UNGA is presded by Tijjani Muhammad-Bande (Nigeria).
    3. UN Climate Change Summit 2019 was held in New York City. It was hosted/convened by UN Secretary-General António Guterres. Theme of Climate Summit was Climate Action Summit 2019: A Race We Can Win. A Race We Must Win.
    4. PM Modi atended India- CARICOM ( Caribbean Community and Common Market) Meeting. India announced 14 million USD grant for community development projects in region. Another 150 million Line of Credit was annouced for solar, renewable energy and climate- change related projects.
    5. PM Modi attended India-Pacific Islands Developing States (PSIDS) Leaders’ Meeting in New york City.
      1. PM Modi announced allocation of USD 12 million grant (USD 1 million to each PSIDS) towards implementation of high impact developmental projects.
      2. Another 150 million Line of Credit was annouced for solar, renewable energy and climate- change related projects.
    6. SAARC Council of Ministers meeting held on sidelines of 74th UNGA Session.
    7. PM Narendra Modi gifted 1 Million USD ‘Gandhi Solar Park’ to UN in New York. The 50 kilowatt hour (kWh) roof-top solar park has 193 solar panels—each representing a member of the multilateral body. Gandhi peace garden was also inaugurated.
    8. Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation awarded "Global Goalkeeper" award to PM Minister Narendra Modi for Swachh Bharat Abhiyan launched by his government.
    9. Rajasthan’s Payal Jangir became first Indian to receive Changemaker Award 2019 at Goalkeepers Global Goals Awards 2019 presented by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. She hails from Hinsla village, Rajasthan and was awarded for her work towards abolition of child marriage in her village and other neighboring areas.
    10. A UN postage stamp of M K Gandhi was launched event titled Leadership Matters: Relevance of Gandhi in the Contemporary World.
    11. India and US will hold their first tri-services exercise code-named as ‘Tiger Triumph’ at Visakhapatnam and Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh, in November 2019. This will 2nd time that India will deploy assets and manpower from its Army, Navy and Air Force together for an exercise with a foreign country, after similar tri-service exercise ‘Indra wargames’ with Russia in 2017.
    12. Members of Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT) met at 74th UN General Assembly, to discuss progress on steps taken to implement Christchurch Call to Action. It has been led by 4 founding companies - Microsoft, Facebook, Youtube and Twitter.
    13. PM Modi met CEOs of 17 global energy companies in Houston and signed MoU for Indian investment of $ 2.5-billion LNG supply from US for four decades.
    14. Prime Minister Narendra Modi gave a big push to securing India’s energy interests when he met CEOs of 17 global energy companies.
      1. An MoU was signed between US natural gas company Tellurian and India’s Petronet LNG, under which Petronet will invest $2.5 billion in Tellurian’s proposed Driftwood LNG export terminal, in exchange for rights to 5 million metric tonnes of LNG per year for over 40 years.
    15. PM Modi launched global Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) at UN Climate Action Summit in New York. CDRI will support countries to build climate and disaster resilient infrastructure. Coalition’s secretariat, supported by UNDRR and based in Delhi, will facilitate knowledge exchange, provide technical support and support capacity building.
      1. India will provide support of Rs 480 crore to CDRI to support research projects, setting up secretariat and covering recurring expenditure between 2019-20 to 2023-24.
    16. Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina conferred with ‘Vaccine Hero’ award 2019 in recognition of the country’s outstanding success in vaccination, especially for her role in eliminating polio, cholera and various communicable diseases.
    17. 2019 United Nations Climate Change Conference (also known as COP25) will be held in Santiago (Chile) in December 2019.
2. Visits to India (Sep 21 - 30, 2019)
  1. Deputy Prime Minister of Indonesia, Jurin Laksanawisit Visited India -
    1. He launched Agri-Trade Supply Chain Alliance (ATSCHA) which will increase trade commodity supply between two countries.
    2. A MOU was signed to create an online platform for SMEs (Small and Medium-sized Enterprises) from both countries.
    3. Thailand and India signed agreements worth Rs 2,400 crore to boost trade ties.
  2. President of Mongolia Khaltmaagiin Battulga visited India -
    1. 4 MOUs signed - Cultural Exchange Protocol from 2019-2023, Disaster Management and Disaster Risk Reduction, Cooperation and Usage of Outer Space for peaceful and civilian purposes AND Comprehensive Work Plan for cooperation in the field of Animal Health and Dairy.
    2. India announced additional 236 million dollars Line of Credit for ongoing Petrochemical Refinery Project in Mongolia.
    3. PM Narendra Modi and Mongolia President Khaltmaagiin Battulga jointly unveiled a statue of Lord Buddha and his two disciples, installed at historic Gandan Tegchenling Monastery in Ulaanbaatar (Mongolia’s Capital) via videoconferencing.
  3. Governor of US State New Jersey Phil Murphy Visited India -
    1. New Jersey and Gujarat signed ‘sister state agreement’ MoU for cooperation several areas.
3. General Events / Conferences (Sep 21 - 30, 2019)
  1. 6th India Water Week 2019 observed between September 24 -28, 2019 with theme Water Cooperation – Coping with 21st Century Challenges
  2. Kargil to Kohima (K2K) Ultra-Marathon- “Glory Run” flagged off by Indian Air Force from Kargil War Memorial, To commemorate 20th year of Kargil Victory”. Kohima and Kargil are forward most outposts of India in East and in North where two of fiercest battles were fought in 1944 and 1999 respectively. Distance over 4500 Km will be covered in 45 days.
  3. 16th Global SME Business Summit 2019 held in New Delhi, organized by Ministry of MSME and Confederation of Indian Industries (CII). 2019 theme is Making Indian MSMEs Globally Competitive. National Conclave on Enhancing Energy Efficiency in MSME sector was also held in New Delhi.
  4. 2nd edition of joint hackathon with Singapore, ‘Singapore India Hackathon 2019’ held at IIT Madras. It is first of its kind joint International hackathon between India and any other country.
  5. 9th India-China Financial dialogue held in New Delhi. Chinese delegation led by Zou Jiayi, Vice Minister of Finance of China.
  6. Ministry of Health and Family Welfare launched ‘TB Harega, Desh Jeetega’ campaign in New Delhi, aiming to reach out to every tuberculosis (TB) patient. ‘National TB Prevalence Survey’ was also launched. India aims to become TB-free by 2025, ahead of global target of 2030.
  7. 21st session of Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and World Health Organisation (WHO) Coordinating Committee of Asia 2019 held in Panaji (Goa).
  8. 5th edition of India International Science Festival (IISF) will be held in Kolkata in November 2019, with theme RISEN India – Research, Innovation, and Science Empowering the Nation’.
  9. National Conference on Agriculture for Rabi Campaign 2019 organized at NASC, Pusa in New Delhi.
  10. Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal launched “Champions Campaign” to fight dengue and urged citizens to become ‘champions’ and encourage friends to check their homes for mosquito larvae. Earlier, he had launched 10Hafte 10Baje 10Minute campaign.
  11. Bangladesh Government will allow 500 tons of Hilsa fish to be exported to India, lifting the ban on the same. Bangladesh accounts to nearly 75% of world Hilsa production.
  12. Delhi HC launched official mobile app named “Delhi High Court” for lawyers and litigants (person involved in a lawsuit).
  13. Minister of State (MoS) in Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions Jitendra Singh launched Centralised Public Grievances Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS) reforms in Department of Posts. CPGRAMS 7.0 version monitors grievances from public which can be accessed through www.pgportal.nic.in.
  14. Vice President Venkaiah Naidu inaugurated 150th birth anniversary celebrations of noted Ayurvedic physician Vaidyaratnam P.S. Varier At Kottal in Kerala. He founded Kottakal Arya Vaidyasala in 1902 for manufacture and sale of Ayurvedic medicines in India. He also established a Ayurvedic Patasala in 1917 that is now operating as an Ayurveda college.
  15. Kerala Govt. launched Kerala edition of WING-Women Rise Together, an initiative by Startup India, Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) for capacity development of women entrepreneurs in country at 2nd edition of Huddle Kerala 2019.
  16. Andhra Pradesh government banned private practice by doctors working in government hospitals.
  17. 6th ‘MASCRADE 2019’- Movement Against Smuggling and Counterfeit Trade scheduled’, an annual flagship FICCI held in New Delhi. 2019 theme is ‘Containing Counterfeiting, Smuggling and Piracy: A Winning Strategy’.
  18. World Sindhi Congress (WSC) hosted a 31st international conference on Sindh in London. It slammed Pakistan over its failure to respect democratic rights and curbs on by country’s military.
  19. Longest hindu festival of Nepal named as Bada Dashain formally began in Nepal.
  20. 7th World Hindu Economic Forum (WHEF) 2019 held in Mumbai, with theme Prosperous Society: Stronger Society.
  21. India hosted 2nd Lead Author Meeting of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Working Group III Sixth Assessment Report at New Delhi.
  22. Midnapore railway station of West Bengal became 5000th railway station to be enabled with Wi-fi, under Railtel' Project which began in 2016. Mumbai central was first railway station to get wifi implementation.
  23. Pakistan invited former Indian PM Manmohan Singh for inauguration of Kartarpur corridor on November 9, 2019.
  24. Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari inaugurated Delhi-Meerut Package-3 connecting Dasna in Ghaziabad to Hapur, the 22 kilometre-long stretch. Delhi-Meerut Expressway is 82 kilometre-long project connects Delhi with Meerut in western UP, being implemented in four packages.
  25. Indian Consulate in Dubai stated that Bureau of Immigration (BoI) will now accept PIO cards as valid travel document till 31 March 2020 along with valid foreign passport. Government had earlier advised all PIO card holders to convert their cards to Overseas Citizenship of India (OCI) cards by 30 September 2019.
4. Sep 30 is observed as World Translation Day, marked by UN in 2017 to pay tribute to language professionals.
5. 64th Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference 2019 held in Kampala (Uganda) with theme Adaption, engagement, and evolution of parliaments in a rapidly changing Commonwealth. Indian delegation was led by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla.
6. 2019 Challenger de Buenos Aires Men's tennis tournament (Buenos Aires, Argentina) -
  1. Singles - Sumit Nagal (India). He defeated Facundo Bagnis (Argentina).
  2. Doubles - Argentina' Guido Andreozzi AND Andrés Molteni
7. 2019 Korea Open Badminton -
  1. Men's Singles - Kento Momota (Japan)
  2. Women's Singles - He Bingjiao (China)
  3. Men's Doubles - Indonesia' Fajar Alfian AND Muhammad Rian Ardianto
  4. Women's Doubles - South Korea's Kim So-yeong AND Kong Hee-yong
  5. Mixed Doubles - Thailand' Dechapol Puavaranukroh AND Sapsiree Taerattanachai
8. Book Lal Bahadur Shastri: Politics and Beyond authored by Sandeep Shastri will soon be released.
9. A documentary on Srinagar-based football club Real Kashmir FC has nominated in British Academy Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Awards. Its director Greg Clark has picked up for ‘Director Factual’ category, while show will compete in ‘Single Documentary’ category.
10. 2019 Wuhan Open Women's Tennis (Wuhan, China)-
  1. Singles - Aryna Sabalenka (Belarus). She defeated Alison Riske (US)
  2. Doubles - Duan Yingying (China) AND Veronika Kudermetova (Russia)
11. Railways Subsidary Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) launched its Initial Public Offer (IPO), with 645 crores value, as largest IPO issued by all subsidiaries of Indian Railways.
  1. Investments can be made by 3 October. IRCTC will be listed on NSE and BSE on October 14.
  2. Price band is between 315 to 320. Bid size is minimum 40 shares.
  3. Government is going to launch 2,01,60,000 shares priced at Rs 10 under offer in the market. After this, Govt stake in IRCTC will come down from 100 % to 87.4 %.
12. NITI Aayog released SEQI (School Education Quality Index), evaluating performance of States / UTs in school education (For 2016-17).
  1. 18 of 20 large states improved in overall performance, with highest performance recorded in Kerala, followed by Rajasthan and Karnataka. Uttar Pradesh ranked last in list of 20 large states.
  2. Among small states - Manipur (1), Tripura (2) and Goa (3).
  3. UTs - Chandigarh (1), Dadra and Nagar Haveli (2), Delhi (3).
13. Indian journalist Kallie Puri honoured with “India’s Most Powerful Women in Media” award, at Confluence Excellence Awards at the British Parliament.
14. As a turning point in cultural historiography of ancient Sangam Age, Tamil Nadu Archaeology Department (TNAD) stated that cultural deposits unearthed during excavations at Keeladi in Sivaganga district could be dated to period between 6th century BCE and 1st century CE.
15. National eGovernance Division (Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology) and National Law Institute University (NLIU) Bhopal signed MoU to implement an ‘Online Capacity Building Programme on Cyber Law, Crime Investigation and Digital Forensics through NeGD Learning Management System (LMS)’.
16. Telugu Poet K Siva Reddy has beeen awarded Saraswati Samman award for his collection Pakkaki Ottigilite in 2018. Saraswati Samman is considered highest recognition in field of Indian literature, with cash prize of INR 15 lakhs. It is instituted by the KK Birla Foundation.
17. RBI superseded Board of Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative Bank and appointed Jai Bhagwan Bhoria as Administrator of bank. It is done by RBI after defaults surging in PMC Bank and some lumpy loans to real estate companies that made it difficult for bank to meet its commitments.
  1. RBI has also put restriction on amount of withdrawal allowed to depositors to 10000 (up from 1000 put earlier).
  2. Directives of RBI shall remain in force for a 6 months.
18. BRAHMOS supersonic cruise missile featuring several major indigenous components has been successfully test fired for its full range of 290-km. Jointly developed by India and Russia, BRAHMOS has been operationalised in all 3 services of Indian Armed Forces.
19. SEBI eased norms for buyback (repurchase) of shares by listed companies, especially those having subsidiaries in housing finance and Non-Banking Financial Company (NBFC) segments .
  1. Ministry of Corporate Affairs earlier permitted government companies carrying out non-banking finance and housing finance activities to launch buybacks resulting in up to 6:1 debt to equity ratio post share repurchase.
  2. Buyback offer cannot exceed 25% of aggregate paid-up capital and free reserves of company and an approval from the shareholders is required through a special resolution in case the size exceeds 10%.
  3. At present, post-buyback debt-to-equity ratio is up to 2:1, except for companies for which a higher ratio has been notified. If debt to equity ratio exceeds 2:1 threshold, buybacks would be allowed after excluding subsidiaries that are NBFCs and HFCs.
  4. Standalone debt to equity ratio of all such excluded subsidiaries should not exceed 6:1. Earlier, Sebi had proposed to keep this threshold at 5:1.
20. SEBI) eased its norms to allow smart cities to raise funds through ‘Muni Bonds‘. Entities in areas of city planning and urban development work, including municipalities, special purpose vehicles (SPVs) under ‘Smart Cities Mission’ can also raise funds through debt securities.
  1. SEBI had issued its Issue and Listing of Debt Securities by Municipalities (ILDM) Regulations 5 years ago and since then 7 municipalities have raised nearly Rs 1,400 crore by issuing their debt securities, which are commonly known as ‘Muni Bonds’.
  2. Several Requirements have been withdrawn and Rules pertaining to creation of escrow accounts were eased.
  3. SEBI allowed this route for other structures where a group of municipalities pools their resources together to jointly raise funds through the issuance of bonds, generally known as Pooled Finance Development Funds (PFDF).
  4. In case of private placements, minimum subscription amount per investor currently at Rs 25 lakh has been reduced to Rs 10 lakh, to align it with regulations for corporate bonds.
21. Persons Resigned / Retired (September 2019) -
  1. Government accepted resignation of Anshula Kant as Managing Director (MD) of State Bank of India (SBI), after her appointment as the MD and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of World Bank Group.
  2. Indian women cricketer Mithali Raj announced her retirement from T20 Cricket.
  3. Zimbabwe Cricketer Hamilton Masakadza announced his retirement from international cricket.
  4. Cameroon footballer legend Samuel Eto announced retirement from all forms of football.
  5. Madras HC Chief Justice Vijaya Kamlesh Tahilramani resigned from her post, after being transferred to Meghalaya HC.
  6. Brazilian tennis player Diego Matos has been banned for lifetime because of match-fixing.
  7. Chinese E-Commerce Firm Alibaba's Chairman Jack Ma announced his retirement from the post. Daniel Zhang, Alibaba's CEO, will replace Jack Ma as Executive Chairman of group.
  8. Asian Development Bank President Takehiko Nakao resigned, which will be effective from January 16, 2020.
  9. Indian Cricketer Dinesh Mongia announced retirement from all formats of cricket.
  10. Kim Ji Hyun (South Korea) resigned as India’s women’s singles badminton coach. She coached World Championship gold medalist PV Sindhu.
  11. England women cricketer Sarah Taylor announced retirement from international cricket.
22. Misc. Sports Events (September 2019) -
  1. 36th National Games will be held in Goa from October 20 – November 4, 2020. Hosting of games has been delayed several times since las year.
  2. Shotputter Tejinderpal Singh Toor won silver medal at athletic meet at Decin, Czech Republic.
  3. For the 1st time, 25th Senior Women’s National Football Championship 2019 held in Pasighat (Arunachal Pradesh).
  4. Nadubhagam Chundan, snake boat of Pallathuruthy Boat Club won 67th Nehru Trophy Boat race at Punnamada Lake in Alappuzha in Kerala.
  5. Indian swimmers Rujuta and Virdhawal Khade won 73rd Glenmark National senior aquatics championships 2019 in Bhopal (MP), in Female and Male categories respectively.
  6. Indian woman athlete Anupama Swain won bronze medal in World Martial Arts Mastership Jiu-Jitsu 2019 in Chungju (South Korea). She has qualified for 2022 Asian Games.
  7. Indian Cricketer Rohit Sharma launched Rohit 4 Rhinos campaign, in partnership with WWF India and Animal Planet. It aims to build awareness for need to conserve Greater One-Horned Rhinoceros or Indian Rhino.
  8. Asian Games gold medallist Jinson Johnson broke his own 1500m national record while winning a silver in ISTAF Berlin event.
  9. Afghanistan's Rashid Khan became youngest captain in test cricket (at age 20 years and 350 days).
  10. Bangladesh Krida Shiksha Prothishtan (BKSP) defeated Nilmani English School (Manipur) to win U17 Girls Subroto Cup International Football 2019 title in New Delhi.
  11. Afghanistan Cricketer Mohammad Nabi announced his retirement from test cricket.
  12. 8th edition of Ladakh Marathon held in Leh, as highest marathon in world, held at over 11,000 feet above sea level.
  13. Sri Lanka's Lasith Malinga become first T20I bowler to take 100 wickets.
  14. Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) won 93rd All-India MCC-Murugappa Gold Cup hockey tournament, defeating Punjab National Bank (PNB).
  15. Kenya's Brigid Kosgei completed fastest half-marathon ever ran by a woman as She won Great North Run in a time of 1 hour, 44 minutes and 28 seconds.
  16. South Africa appointed Former Indian Cricketer Amol Muzumdar as interim batting coach for series against India.
  17. Sports Ministry recommended names of 9 Female sportspersons for India's Civilian Honors Padma Awards 2020 -
    1. Boxer Mary Kom became first female sportsperson to be recommended for Padma Vibhushan, India’s second-highest civilian award. PV Sindhu’s name has been suggested for the Padma Bhushan Award.
    2. Recommended for Padma Shri - - Harmanpreet Kaur (Cricket), Rani Rampal (Hockey), Manika Batra (TT), Suma Shirur (Shooter) and mountaineer twin sisters Tashi and Nungshi Malik.
  18. Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium in Delhi was renamed as Arun Jaitley Cricket Stadium in the memory of former DDCA President and Finance Minister.
  19. 25th Edition of Asian Junior and Cadet Table Tennis Championships 2019 held at Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Indian team clinched 2 silver medals.
  20. In International Billiards Snooker Federation (IBSF) World Under-16 Snooker Championship 2019 in Tyumen (Russia), Ranveer Duggal from Chandigarh won bronze medal.
  21. Belgian female tennis player Kim Clijsters (former World no. 1 and four-time Grand Slam Winner) announced her return to professional tennis, seven years after her retirement.
  22. Indonesian golfer Rory won Classic Golf and Country Club International Championship 2019 at Nuh city in Haryana. Indian golfer Rashid Khan and Korea’s Byungjun Kim secured second position.
  23. 1st edition of Western Asian Youth and Junior Chess Championships 2019 held in New Delhi. India won 125 medals and stayed at top.
  24. Meghalaya’s Hopewell Elias Higher Secondary School won 60th Under-17 Junior Boys Subroto Cup International Football Tournament 2019 by beating Bangladesh Krida Shiksha Protisthan (BKSP).
  25. Smiling panda, named Bing Dwen Dwen was revealed as the official mascot for Beijing Winter Olympics 2022. A walking Chinese lantern Shuey Rhon Rhon was declared as the official mascot for Winter Paralympics 2022.
  26. Minister of State for Finance and Corporate Affairs Anurag Thakur announced that a cricket and sports academy will be set up in Leh, Ladakh.
  27. ICC banned Sri Lankan Cricketer Akila Dananjaya from bowling in international games for 1 year, after his bowling action was found illegal.
  28. American Golfer Nelly Korda won Ladies European Tour Title at Lacoste Ladies French Open. India’s Aditi Ashok was the best Indian, finishing 26th.
  29. Indian chess player Koneru Hampi won Fide World Grand Prix 2019 title in Skolkovo, Russia.
  30. Indian team of Pankaj Advani and Aditya Mehta won “IBSF World Snooker” title, defeating Thailand in Mandalay (Myanmar).
  31. Indian wrestler Deepak Punia clinched top spot in rankings released by United World Wrestling (UWW) in 86 kg category.
  32. Indian fencer CA Bhavani Devi won silver medal in women’s sabre individual category in 2019 Tournoi Satellite Fencing competition at Ghent (Belgium).
  33. Indian junior boys Raegan Albuquerque and Yashansh Malik paired with Netherlands' Lode Hulshof to win bronze medal at the Serbia Junior and Cadet Table-Tennis Open 2019.
23. Misc. Appointments (September 2019) -
  1. Sanjiv Ranjan has been appointed as new Indian Ambassador to Ecuador.
  2. Anil Chauhan took over as chief of eastern command of Indian Army.
  3. Jaideep Sarkar has been appointed as Indian Ambassador to Kingdom of Lesotho.
  4. Government appointed B. Bala Bhaskar as New Indian Ambassador to Kingdom of Norway.
  5. International Cricket Council (ICC) appointed Jonathan Hall as its General Counsel and Company Secretary.
  6. Govt. extended Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC) chairman Vinai Kumar Saxena's tenure for 3 years.
  7. Microsoft appointed Rajiv Kumar as Managing Director(MD) of Microsoft India Research & Development (R&D) Private Ltd (MIRPL).
  8. Government appoined Sanjay Tyagi as Director General of Health Services (DGHS).
  9. Former England Cricketer Andrew Strauss appointed as chairman of the England and Wales Cricket Board’s cricket committee.
  10. Indian Air Forece's Anjali Singh became India’s first female military diplomat posted on an Indian mission abroad after joining Indian Embassy in Russia as Deputy Air Attache.
  11. Madhya Pradesh government appointed actor Govinda as brand ambassador of Madhya Pradesh to promote state’s traditional and tourist places.
  12. Alison Rose has been appointed as First Female Chief of Royal Bank of Scotland, One of Britain’s biggest banks.
  13. IDBI Bank appointed Samuel Joseph Jebaraj as Deputy Managing Director (DMD) for 3 years.
  14. Government appointed Anil Kumar Jain as Secretary in Ministry of Coal.
  15. Government appointed Godavarthi Venkata Srinivas as New Ambassador of India to Republic of Guinea Bissau (West Africa).
  16. RBI approved re-appointment of Shyam Srinivasan as MD and CEO of Federal Bank for 1 year.
  17. Rupa Gurunath appointed as first woman president of Tamil Nadu Cricket Association (TNCA).
  18. India's Suresh Chitturi has been appointed as new Chief of International Egg Commission, being First asian to be appointed for this post.
  19. Election Commission appointed Sushil Kumar Lohani as new Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of Odisha.
24. Indian GDP Growth Forecasts (September 2019) -
  1. DBS bank (formerly Development Bank of Singapore) reduced India’s GDP to 6.2% from its previous forecast of 6.8%.
  2. Rating agency CRISIL revised India’s fiscal year 2020 GDP growth forecast to 6.3%.
  3. International Monetary Fund(IMF) reduced India's GDP growth rate to 7% from 7.3% earlier.
  4. Asian Development Bank (ADB) in its Asian Development Outlook (ADO) 2019 updated India’s GDP growth to 6.5% from 7% for FY 2019-20, after growth slowed down to 5% in Q1 April–June FY 2019-20, which is six-year low in the first quarter.
  5. United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in its Trade and Development Report 2019 forecasted India’s GDP growth rate at 6% in FY 2019-20, down from 7.4% in FY 2018-19.
25. Obituaries (Sepetembr 2019) -
  1. LaShawn Daniels - Grammy Winning US songwriter, known as Big Shiz.
  2. Robert Mugabe - Zimbabwe's former President. He was country's first post-independence leader and also considered as Zimbabwe's founding father. He served for 37 years.
  3. Kiran Nagarkar - Sahitya Akademi Award-winning writer. He wrote in Marathi and English.
  4. Kottakkal Chandrasekhara Warrier - Noted Kathakali maestro (Kerala).
  5. Veeru Krishnan - Bollywood actor and Noted Kathak dancer.
  6. Abdul Qadir - Pakistan’s Noted Cricketer (leg-spinner). He had taken total 368 wickets in his international career.
  7. Ram Jethmalani - Former Union Minister and Senior Lawyer. He served as Minister of Law and Justice In office (1996).
  8. Dilip Satpathy - Noted Odisha Journalist.
  9. Heeralal Sharma - Rajasthan born freedom fighter.
  10. Raja Sekar - Tamil Film Director, Actor and Cinematographer.
  11. Robert Frank - Switzerland born Noted documentary Photographer.
  12. Akilisi Pohiva - Noted Climate Change campaigner. He was also former PM of Oceanic nation Tonga.
  13. Sivaraman Cheriyanad - Noted Malayalam Writer from Kerala.
  14. Jusuf (B.J.) Habibie - Former Indonesian President, who permitted democratic reforms.
  15. B.N. Yugandhar - Former bureaucrat and Secretary to PMO. He was father of Microsoft’s CEO Satya Nadella.
  16. Sanjib Kumar Datta -Noted Film editor.
  17. Edward Smith - Noted American historianm, Known for his writings on American Presidents.
  18. Sathar - Noted Malayalam actor (Kerala).
  19. Robert Skinner Boyd - Noted American Journalist (Pulitzer Prize winner).
  20. S.K. Padmadevi- Noted Kannada actor.
  21. Fernando Ricksen - Former Dutch (Netherlands') footballer.
  22. Shyam Ramsay - Noted Bollywood producer.
  23. Madhav Apte - Former India Cricketer and entrepreneur.
  24. Venu Madhav - Noted Telugu actor.
  25. Davo Karnicar - Slovenian Climber Who Was First Person to Ski Down Mount Everest.
  26. Jacques René Chirac - Former French president. He was first leader to accept France’s role in the Holocaust (World War II genocide).
  27. J. Michael Mendel - American television producer & a four-time Emmy Award winner.
  28. KPS Menon (junior) - Former Foreign Secretary of India. He was son of K P S Menon (Senior), who was first foreign secretary of Independent India.
  29. Viju Khote - Bollywood Actor, manly known for his role in Sholay as Kalia.
26. Industrial Awards (September 2019) -
  1. Odisha State Disaster Management Authority (OSDMA) won the 2019 “IT Excellence Award” by Express India, for designing the app SATARK. The app tracks and alerts during disasters based on dynamic risk knowledge in real time.
  2. Vedanta Resources Chairman Anil Agarwal was conferred lifetime achievement award at 19th Annual Asian Achievers Awards in London (UK), with Theme ‘Inclusivity’. Other Notable winners -
    1. Vipul Vadera: Businessperson of the Year
    2. Kush Kanodia: Entrepreneur of the Year
    3. Harjit Singh Bhania: Sports Personality of the Year
    4. Neeta Patel: Woman of the Year
  3. Hero MotoCorp Chief Pawan Munjal inducted into 2019 Asia Pacific Golf Hall of Fame, for his support to “Golf” in India and around world.
  4. 5 Indian women police officers honoured by United Nations for their services in UN’s mission in South Sudan. Women officers - Reena Yadav, Gopika Jahagirdar, Bharati Samantray, Ragini Kumari and Kamal Shekhawat.
  5. National Geoscience Awards 2018 for outstanding contributions in the field of geosciences, mining and allied areas were presented to 22 scientists from across country. Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, Coal and Mines, Pralhad Joshi conferred the awards.
  6. Kerala tourism has won 3 PATA gold awards at Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) awards 2019 held in Astana (Kazakhstan). Awards are given for an ethnic food restaurant run by women at Kumarakom(Kerala) under its Responsible Tourism(RT) mission, for Kerala tourism campaign advertisement ‘ Come Out and Play’ and third was for its website www.keralatourism.org.
  7. Flipkart Co-founder Binny Bansal become youngest to be recognized as a distinguished alumnus by IIT Delhi, for his contribution in entrepreneurship.
  8. Cochin International Airport Limited selected as best airport in terms of services, based on a survey conducted by the Airport Council International (ACI) in 5-15 million passenger-category airports in the Asia-Pacific region for 2018.

Sep 29, 2019

Joint Military Exercise MAITREE-2019 between India and Thailand Armies conducted at Foreign Training Node, Umroi (Meghalaya). It is being held since 2006.
Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation (Ministry of Jal Shakti) launched 10 Year Rural Sanitation Strategy (2019-2029), which focus on sustaining sanitation behavior change that has been achieved under Swachh Bharat Mission Grameen (SBM-G).
1. Since launch of SBM-G in 2014, over 10 crore toilets have been built in rural areas and over 5.9 lakh villages, 699 districts, and 35 States/UTs have declared themselves Open Defecation Free (ODF).
Gujarat Government launched India’s 1st trading program called “Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS)” in Surat, to combat particulate air pollution.
1. ETS is a market-based system where government sets a cap on emissions and allows industries to buy and sell permits (in kilograms) to stay below the cap.
2. Surat is chosen for implementaion of ETS as it is densely populated industrial center where textile and dye mills emit large amounts of air pollution & it is equipped with Continuous Emission Monitoring Systems which can track mass of Particulate Matter being released.
Nepal’s Central Bank (Nepal Rastra Bank) released 3 coins (100, 1000 and 2500 Nepali rupees) bearing Sikh symbol to commemorate 550th Birth Anniversary of Guru Nanak Dev. Book titled “Sikh Heritage of Nepal” was also launched.
Researchers discovered a new mineral named ‘Goldschmidt’ inside a diamond from a mine- Koffiefontein pipe in South Africa run by De Beers. It is named goldschmidt in honor of Victor Moritz Goldschmidt, the founder of modern geochemistry.
1. It has high concentrations of niobium, potassium and rare earth elements lanthanum and cerium. Mineral was formed about 170 kilometers beneath Earth’s surface, at temperatures reaching 1200 C.
Book Game of Votes: Visual Media Politics and Elections in Digital Era written by Farhat Basir Khan (Jamia Millia Islamia) has been released.
NSDL Payments Bank (subsidiary of National Securities Depository Ltd) will soon start operations, as 6th Active Payments Bank in India.
1. Others are - Airtel Payments Bank, India Post Payments Bank, Fino Payments Bank, Jio Payments Bank and Paytm Payments Bank.
2. NSDL was one of 11 applicants that received in-principle approval from RBI in August 2015 to set up payments banks.
Noted Indian Classical Singer Pandit Jasraj will have a minor planet (2006 VP32 (number -300128), located between Mars and Jupiter) named after him by IAU (International Astronomical Union), which was discovered 13 years ago by NASA. Pandit Jasraj is first Indian artist to receive such an honour.
9 Day long flower festival of Telangana, Bathukamma began in Telangana’s Warangal district. It marks beginning of Sharath Ruthu.
India won SAFF Under-18 football Championship by defeating Bangladesh in Kathmandu (Nepal), as India’s First SAFF U-18 trophy.
Physicist and Cosmologist Thanu Padmanabhan has been conferred M P Birla Memorial Award 2019 for his contributions to cosmology. M P Birla Memorial Award award recognises excellence in space science, astrophysics, astronomy and related areas. It comprises prize of INR 251000.
President Ram Nath Kovind presented President’s Colours to the Corps of Army Air Defence, on occasion of 25 years of Army Air Defence College. President’s Colours is highest military honour for the armed forces bestowed in recognition of exceptional services, both during war and in peace times.
Sep 29 is observed as World Heart Day.
Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi recommended former Delhi HC Chief Justice Rajendra Menon as next chairman of Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT).

Mercedes Racer Lewis Hamilton of UK won Formula 1 Russian Grand Prix 2019 -

Formula 1 Season 2019 -

Round	Grand Prix	Winner	date
1	Australian Grand Prix	Valtteri Bottas (Finland)	17 March
2	Bahrain Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	31 March
3	Chinese Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	14 April
4	Azerbaijan Grand Prix	Valtteri Bottas (Finland)	28 April
5	Spanish Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	12 May
6	Monaco Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	26 May
7	Canadian Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	9 June
8	French Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	23 June
9	Austrian Grand Prix	Max Verstappen (Belgian-Dutch)	30 June
10	British Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	14 July
11	German Grand Prix	Max Verstappen (Belgian-Dutch)	28 July
12	Hungarian Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	4 August
13	Belgian Grand Prix	Charles Leclerc (Monaco)	1 September
14	Italian Grand Prix	Charles Leclerc (Monaco)	8 September
15	Singapore Grand Prix	Sebastian Vettel (Germany)	22 September
16	Russian Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	29 September
17	Japanese Grand Prix		13 October
18	Mexican Grand Prix		27 October
19	United States Grand Prix		3 November
20	Brazilian Grand Prix		17 November
21	Abu Dhabi Grand Prix		1 December

To contain price rise of onions, Government imposed stock limits on traders and banned exports. It asked State Governments to take strict measures to prevent hoarding by traders including organising raids.
1. Stock limit of 100 quintal on retail traders and 500 quintals on wholesale traders has been imposed across country.
2. Earlier, Minimum Export Price of US$ 850 F.O.B. per metric ton was imposed on export of onions.

2019 World Weightlifting Championships held in Pattaya (Thailand) -

588 competitots from 97 nations participated.

Medals table (all medals - Big (Total result) and Small (Snatch and Clean & Jerk))

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	China	29	14	10	53
2	North Korea	7	12	5	24
3	Georgia	5	0	2	7
4	Armenia	4	4	4	12
5	US	3	3	2	8

7 Indian weightlifters participated, but India remained medal-less at the event.

Sep 28, 2019
1. Harjit Singh Arora appointed as new Indian Air Force (IAF) Vice Chief, succeeding Rakesh Kumar Singh Bhadauria who will take over as New Chief of Indian Air Force.
2. Bank of International Settlements (BIS) launched a dollar green bond fund enabling central banks around the world to invest in “green bonds”. Aim is to let central banks incorporate environmental sustainability into reserve management without destroying assets & reserves.
  1. Bonds which have eligible for inclusion in fund should have a minimum rating of A- and adhere to the International Capital Market Association’s (ICMA) Green Bond Principles or the Climate Bond Standard published by the Climate Bonds Initiative (CBI).
  2. Green Bond is a bond whose proceeds are used to fund environment-friendly projects. First entity to issue green bonds was the World Bank, which began the practice in 2008.
3. RBI has put Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) Framework against Lakshmi Vilas Bank (LVB), limiting business activities of LVB.
  1. RBI has put LVB in PCA due to high NPA, insufficient capital to risk-weighted assets ratio (CRR) and Common Equity Tier 1 (CET1) negative RoA (Return on assets) for two consecutive years. Bank’s net NPA is 7.49%, capital adequacy ratio was at 7.72% and its RoA was -2.32% as on March 2019.
4. Geologists from Utrecht University Netherlands discovered a new continent named “Greater Adria” in the mediterranean region under Europe, after successful analysation of mountain ranges from Spain to Iran in detail for 10 years. The discovery is published in ‘Gondwana Research’.
  1. Greater Adria island is a piece of continental crust in the size of Greenland. It once separated from North Africa and plunged into the Earth’s mantle under Southern Europe. Only remaining part of this continent is a strip that runs from Turin, Italy via the Adriatic Sea in the Italian peninsula, hence the name “Greater Adria”.
  2. Millions of years ago, Earth consisted just one massive chunk of land called Pangea, which fragmented into smaller portions, giving rise to continents as they are now. During this , lost eighth continent Greater Adria slipped underneath what now forms Southern Europe. It took Greater Adria 120 million years to be found by mankind.
5. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh commissioned India’s second Scorpene-class attack submarine INS Khanderi, India’s first P-17 Shivalik-class frigate INS Nilgiri and the largest aircraft carrier drydock into Indian Navy.
  1. INS Khanderi is 2nd attack submarine under Project 75, first being INS Kalvari. It is built by Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders in Mumbai. India aims to build 6 Scorpene-class submarines under P-75 in collaboration with France. Other 4 ships - INS Karanj, INS Vagir, INS Vagsheer and INS Vela.
  2. INS ‘Nilgiri’ is 1st of Indian Navy's 7 new stealth frigates under Project -17A, a design derivative of the Shivalik class stealth frigates with much more advanced stealth features and indigenous weapons and sensors. Its cost is over 45000 crores. 5 ships of Nilgiri-class (P-17A frigates) are named after famous hill ranges - Himgiri, Udaygiri, Dunagiri, Taragiri and Vindhyagiri. Last frigate (7th) will be named Mahendragiri.
6. Indian writer (primarily Malayalam), V. J. James’s novel ‘Nireeswaran’ (Atheist) selected for the Vayalar Ramavarma Memorial Literature Award 2019. It carries cash prize of Rs 1-lakh.
7. Noted Archaeologists G.B. Deglurkar was conferred with Punyabhushan Award for his long-standing contribution to the field of Indian Archaeology. Award is announced every year by Punyabhushan Foundation on 23 March, to commemorate Indian revolutionary martyrs Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, and Rajguru.
8. China and Kiribati formally re-established their diplomatic relations, a few days after Kiribati called off its ties with Taiwan.
  1. China and Kiribati were allies till 2003 but after that Kiribati established relations with Taiwan and recognised its country status, leading China to break off its diplomatic ties with Pacific island nation.
  2. China considers Taiwan its territory and opposes Taiwan building diplomatic relations with other nations.
9. Sep 28 - International Day for the Universal Access to Information (commonly called Access to Information Day), being held since 2016.
  1. Sep 28 is also observed as World Rabies Day (Diesease caused by Dog Bites).
10. Andhra Pradesh government will impose a green tax besides banning single-use plastic, To keep a check on pollution by industrial houses.
11. Rajasthan became first state to be awarded for water conservation and efficient use practices by National Water Mission of Government, under category 2 - Promotion of citizen and state action for water conservation, augmentation and preservation.
  1. Use of micro-irrigation in Narmada Canal Project in Sanchore and in Tejpur Minor of Indira Gandhi Nahar Project stage-II were declared winners.
12. Railways and Department of Science & Technology partnered with IIT Kanpur for taking up a unique project on ‘Industry 4.0’ by launching a Pilot Project for implementation at Modern Coach Factory, Raebareli.
  1. ‘Industry 4.0’ commonly referred to as the fourth industrial revolution, is a name given to the current trend of automation, interconnectivity and data exchange in manufacturing technologies to increase productivity.
  2. Industry 4.0 is a complex Cyber-Physical Systems which synergizes production with digital technologies, the Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence, Big Data & Analytics, Machine Learning and Cloud Computing.
13. New Book Titled Loss written by author Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi has been released.
14. ISRO initiated ‘Project NETRA’ (NETRA-Network for space object Tracking and Analysis), in-order to detect debris in space and other hazards in Indian satellites which would act as a step for Space Situational Awareness(SSA).
  1. NETRA is a network of observational tools which can track objects/debris in range 10cm - 3400km. NETRA’s goal is to capture geosynchronous equatorial orbit(GEO) at 36,000 km where communication satellites operate.
Sep 27, 2019
1. International Institute for Management Development’s (IMD) World Digital Competitiveness Rankings (WDCR) 2019 -
  1. India moved up by 4 places from 48th rank in 2018 to rank at 44th position in 2019. China was ranked 22nd, up from 30th last year.
  2. Top 5 - US (1), Singapore (2), Sweden (3), Denmark, Switzerland (5)
  3. Evaluation was done based on 3 factors - knowledge, technology and future readiness.
2. Saudi Arabia will offer tourist visas for the first time, opening up conservative kingdom to holidayers as part of a push to diversify its economy away from oil.
3. Indian IT Firm Infosys won United Nations (UN) Global Climate Action Award 2019 in the ‘Climate Neutral Now’ category for its efforts to combat climate change. It will be given this award during the UN Climate Change Conference (COP25) in Santiago, Chile in December 2019.
  1. Through its carbon offset drive, Infosys implemented energy efficiency proceedings and transitioned to renewable energy for all its electricity needs. Since 2008, It has decreased its per capita energy consumption by over 51 %.
4. New species of snake called Thackeray’s Cat Snake (scientific name Boiga thackeray) named after Tejas Thackeray, younger son of Shiv Sena chief Uddhav Thackeray, has been found in Sahyadri tiger reserve in Koyna area of Satara district in Maharashtra after 125 years.
5. Govt. appointed C.K. Abdul Rehim as acting Chief Justice of Kerala High Court and Vineet Kothari has been appointed as acting CJ of Madras High Court (HC).
6. Government has approved the construction of 1.23 lakh houses under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban). With this, over 90 lakh houses have so far been sanctioned against the target of 1.12 crore by 2022 under PMAY (Urban).
7. Sep 27 - World Tourism Day, marked in 1970. 2019 Theme is Tourism and jobs: a better future for all. India is host nation for Tourism Day 2019. On this Occasion, Govt. presented National Tourism Awards 2018 -
  1. Total 76 awards were given under various categories.
  2. Andhra Pradesh state won the first prize for Best State for Comprehensive Development of Tourism.
  3. Goa and Madhya Pradesh were announced as joint winners in Adventure Tourism category.
  4. Uttarakhand won best film promotion friendly state.
  5. Telangana won best state in innovative use of IT category.
8. Uttar Pradesh Govt. announced annual support of INR 6,000 to the victims of triple talaq till their rehabilitation and they will get free legal aid.
9. International Cricket Council signed agreement with Facebook, under which Facebook will get exclusive digital content rights for select cricket matches in Indian subcontinent including the Women’s T20 World Cup 2020-22, Men’s T20 World Cup 2020-21 and Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023.
10. Madhya Pradesh CM Kamal Nath announced that name of Bhopal metro will be ‘Bhoj Metro’, after late king Raja Bhoj. It will be built at a cost of about Rs 6,941.4 crore rupees. First phase of the metro project will be completed by 2023 with 2 corridors.
11. On the occasion of 77th Foundation day of CSIR on Sep 26, President Ram Nath Kovind presented Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prizes 2019 to 12 Scientists -
  1. Biological Sciences - Kayarat Sai Krishnan (IISER Pune), Soumen Basak (NII New Delhi)
  2. Chemical Sciences - Raghavan B Sunoj (IIT, Bombay), Tapas Kumar Maji (JNCASUR Bengaluru)
  3. Earth, Atmosphere, Ocean and Planetary Sciences - Subimal Ghosh (IIT, Bombay)
  4. Engineering Sciences - Manik Varma (Microsoft Research Bengaluru)
  5. Mathematical Sciences - Dishant Mayur Bhai Pancholi (IMSC Chennai), Nina Gupta (ISI Kolkata)
  6. Medical Sciences - Dheeraj Kumar (ICGEB New Delhi), Mohammad Javed Ali (LV Prasad Eye Institute, Hyderabad)
  7. Physical Sciences - Aninda Sinha (IISc, Bengaluru), Shankar Ghosh (TIFR, Mumbai)
12. Department of Women & Child Development and Mission Shakti, Government of Odisha, in collaboration with United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) unveiled a mascot named ‘Tikki Mausi’, to spread awareness about nutrition of children and women.
  1. Mascot has been named so in reference to second mother of a child. Tikki Mausi is gregarious character and is an empathetic protagonist with extensive knowledge on all issues related to women and children.
13. Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and IIT Delhi signed MoU for cooperation in research, education and technology developments in science and other disciplines. This collaboration will also facilitate access to each other’s libraries and central research facilities. It will intensify joint research projects and other related academic activities.
14. China launched its first amphibious assault ship, which would enable ground forces to carry out attacks on enemy territory from sea. It is first in Type 075 class of amphibious assault ship, which is also defined as a type of landing helicopter dock.
15. National Library of Israel unveiled an 80 – year old handwritten letter by M K Gandhi on day World War II broke out (September 1, 1939). He had wished the Jewish people an era of peace in his letter. He addressed this letter to Bombay Zionist Association that was struggling to turn support of Indian leaders in favor of movement to establish a home for Jews.
16. An unusual object originated outside our solar system has been spotted as 2nd Interstellar visitor to our solar system, named 2I/Borisov by International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center. It's anywhere between 1.2 and 10 miles in diameter.
17. Competition Commission of India approved acquisition of 70 % stake in Saudi Basic Industries Corporation by Saudi Arabian Oil Company for $69.1 billion. In India, SABIC is engaged in supply of petrochemical and agro-nutrients while Saudi Aramco supplies crude oil, liquefied petroleum gas, base oil and petrochemical products.
  1. In August 2019, Saudi Aramco has announced acquisition of 20% stake in oil to chemicals (OTC) business of Reliance Industries, for around $15 billion.
18. Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu suggested several reforms in Supreme court including bifurcation of Supreme Court and setting up of four Regional Benches, Expressing serious concern over delays in justice delivery. He Also suggested evolving Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) that limit number of adjournments and timeframe for disposal of cases by courts.

Sep 26, 2019

Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina conferred with ‘Vaccine Hero’ award of Global Alliance for Vaccination and Immunisations (GAVI) in recognition of Bangladesh’s outstanding success in vaccination to immunise children. She was conferred on sidelines of 74th session of UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York City (US).
Government reconstituted Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister (EAC-PM) for 2 years. Bibek Debroy and Ratan P. Watal will continue to be Chairman and Member Secretary respectively of reconstituted EAC-PM. EAC-PM will have two Part-Time Members. While Ashima Goel continues to be one, Sajjid Chinoy has been made another Part-time Member.
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh commissioned Indian Coast Guard Ship (ICGS) ‘Varaha’ into service.
40th Right Livelihood Awards 2019 (known as the ‘Alternative Nobel Prize’) have been announced. 2019 Awardees are -
1. Aminatou Haidar (Western Sahara) - Human rights defender.
2. Guo Jianmei (China) - Lawyer. Honored for her pioneering work in securing women’s rights in China.
3. Greta Thunberg (Sweden) - Climate activist. Honored for inspiring political demands for urgent climate action reflecting scientific facts.
4. Davi Kopenawa / Hutukara Yanomami Association (Brazil).

71st annual primetime Emmy Awards Winners, announced in Los Angeles (US)

Sl. No.	Category	Winner
1.	OUTSTANDING DRAMA SERIES	Game of Thrones (HBO)
2.	OUTSTANDING COMEDY SERIES	Fleabag (Amazon)
3.	LEAD ACTOR, DRAMA	Billy Porter, Pose
4.	LEAD ACTRESS, DRAMA	Jodie Comer, Killing Eve
5.	LEAD ACTOR, COMEDY	Bill Hader, Barry
6.	LEAD ACTRESS, COMEDY	Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Fleabag
7.	SUPPORTING ACTOR, DRAMA	Peter Dinklage, Game of Thrones
8.	SUPPORTING ACTRESS, DRAMA	Julia Garner, Ozark
9.	SUPPORTING ACTOR, COMEDY	Tony Shalhoub, The Marvelous Mrs Maisel
10.	SUPPORTING ACTRESS, COMEDY	Alex Borstein, The Marvelous Mrs Maisel

As per BrandZ Top 75 Most Valuable Indian Brands 2019 rankingreleased by WPP and Kantar Millward Brown -

HDFC Bank named Indias' most valuable brand for the sixth consecutive year with brand value of $ 22.70 billion. LIC 2nd with brand value of Rs 1.43 lakh crore.

Top 5 -

Rank	Brand	Brand value (Rupees)	Change in value
1	HDFC bank	1.61 Lakh Crore	+ 5%
2	LIC	1.43 Lakh Crore	+ 2%
3	TCS (Tata Consultancy Services)	1.29 Lakh Crore	+ 21%
4	Airtel	72,988 Crore	-10%
5	SBI (State Bank of India)	59,640 crores	+ 7%

Japan’s unmanned H-2B rocket lifted off with cargo vessel Kounotori8 also known as HTV 8 towards International Space Station (ISS), considered as the world’s biggest transport spaceship. It intends to deliver about 5.3 tonnes of supplies to astronauts at ISS.
Book Reset: Regaining India’s Economic Legacy written by BJP MP Subramanian Swamy has been released.
Sep 26 is observed as International Day for the total elimination of nuclear weapons.
1. Sep 26, 2019 is also observed as world maritime day, observed on Last Thursday of September. 2019 theme is “Empowering Women in the Maritime Community”.
2. Sep 26 is also observed as World Environmental Health Day (WEHD). 2019 theme is Climate change challenges, time for global Environmental Health to act in unison. It was declared by International Federation of Environmental Health (IFEH) in 2011.
Delhi Govt. led by CM Arvind Kejriwal announced a new scheme under which people residing as tenants in Delhi will be able to avail power subsidy upto 200 units, named Mukhyamantri Kirayedar Bijli Meter Yojna'.
1. Delhi Govt has been announcing several schemes over past year which provide several basic services for free, including free metro and DTC bus rides for females, free electricity upto 200 units, and now free electricity for tenants. This is being done amid upcoming assembly elections in delhi.
Army chief Bipin Rawat will be appointed as New chairman of Chiefs of Staff Committee (COSC).
UAE astronaut Hazzaa al-Mansoori became first Arab to reach International Space Station (ISS), lifting off from Kazakhstan in a Russian spacecraft. He was accompanied by Russia's Oleg Skripochka and NASA astronaut Jessica Meir.
Rajiva Sinha appointed as new chief secretary of West Bengal.
Bulgarian Economist Christina Georgieva has been appointed as new Chief of Washington, D.C. (US) based financing agency International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Punjab National Bank launched a Preventive Vigilance (PV) portal to facilitate its staff members to check procedural lapses as well as promote good practices, to promote vigilance awareness in banking system.
DRDO and Central University of Jammu signed MoU for establishment of Kalam Centre for Science and Technology (KCST) at the university. It aims to facilitate multidisciplinary directed basic and applied research and technology development in Computational System Security and Sensors.
Sep 26 is observed as Foundation day of CSIR (Council of Scientific and Industrial Research), created in 1942. On this occasion, President Ram Nath Kovind unveiled first Indigenous High Temperature Fuel Cell System developed by CSIR under flagship program “New Millennium Indian Technology Leadership Initiative (NMITLI)”.
1. 5.0 kW fuel cell system generates power in a green manner using methanol / bio-methane, with heat and water as bi-products for further use; amounting to greater than 70% efficiency, which is not possible by other energy sources.
2. Fuel Cells are based on High Temperature Proton Exchange Membrane (HTPEM) Technology. It is most suitable for distributed stationary power applications like small offices, commercial units, data centers etc.; where highly reliable power is essential with simultaneous requirement for air-conditioning.
Tripartite mechanism to monitor and assess repatriation process of displaced Rohingya people to Myanmar has been agreed between Bangladesh, Myanmar and China. 7 lakh 50 thousand refugees entered Bangladesh from Myanmar after process of ethnic cleansing was initiated in Myanmar in 2016 & 2017.
According to report burden of child and maternal malnutrition and trends in its indicators in the states of India: the Global Burden of Disease Study 1990–2017 published in Lancet Child & Adolescent Health -
1. Two-thirds of children below 5 years deaths in 2017 are still attributable to malnutrition
2. However, deaths caused by malnutrition have shown a much smaller decrease to 68.2% in 2017 from 70.4% in 1991.
To improve risk management & ensure sufficient liquidity, SEBI tightened rules for mutual funds, in which it make it mandatory forliquid schemes to hold at least 20 % in liquid assets such as cash and cash equivalents like treasury bills and repo on government securities.
New guideline will come into force from April 1, 2020.

Sep 25, 2019
1. 23rd edition of trilateral Navy exercise of India, Japan and US named Malabar 2019 began at Sasebo (Japan).
2. As per IIFL (India Infoline Finance Limited) Wealth Hurun India Rich List 2019, Mukesh Ambani (Reliance chairman) named richest person in India with a wealth of Rs 3.8 lakh crores, staying at top for 8th straight year. He is followed by London based SP Hinduja and family (Rs 1.86 lakh crore), Wipro founder Azim Premji (Rs 1.17 lakh crore), ArcelorMittal CEO L N Mittal (Rs 1.07 lakh crore).
3. Mathematician frm University of Warwick (England), Adam Harper won SASTRA Ramanujan prize for 2019, which contains cash prize of $10,000. It is given to people under the age of 32 working in area influenced by mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan.
  1. Shanmugha Arts, Science, Technology & Research Academy (SASTRA) Ramanujan award was instituted in 2005 by SASTRA University.
4. Noted Former Indian track and field athlete PT Usha presented with Veteran Pin by International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF), for her contribution to growth of sport. It was given by IAAF chief Sebastian Coe at 52nd IAAF Congress in Doha (Qatar).
  1. During event, Britain’s Sebastian Coe was re-elected as the chief of IAAF for his second term.
  2. President of Athletics Federation of India, Adille Sumariwalla also re-elected as member of the Council of IAAF for 2nd four-year term.
5. Pooja Desai from Gujarat named winner of Mrs India – Pride of the Nation 2019 (a beauty pageant for married women).
6. NASA launched a miniature satellite (4 cm x 4 cm x 4 cm) called “RamanSat 2” made by a 17-year old New Delhi-based Indian student Aabhaas Sikka. Satellite will measure radiation from sun and space to make space exploration safer for humans and satellites.
7. 2019 Toray Pan Pacific Open Women's Tennis Title (Osaka, Japan) -
  1. Singles - Naomi Osaka (Japan)
  2. Doubles - Chinese Taipei's Chan Hao-ching AND Latisha Chan
8. 20th Asian Senior Men’s Volleyball Championship 2019 held in Tehran (Iran) -
  1. Iran emerged champions by defeating Australia. Japan & South Korea bagged third and fourth place respectively. India was ranked 8th.
9. New comic book series ‘Professor Ayushman’ created by National Medicinal Plants Board (NMPB) has been unveiled by Ayush ministry. It will raise awareness in children about importance of medicinal plants and their usage.
10. Sep 25 - World Pharmacist Day, marked by FIP Council in 2009. 2019 theme is Safe and effective medicines for all.
  1. Sep 25 is also declared by Indian Govt as Antyodaya Diwas, announced in 2014. It marks Birth anniversary of noted philosopher Pandit Deendayal Upadhyay.
11. Australian capital Canberra became first Australian city to legalise, possessing and growing marijuana for personal use. People aged 18 or above will be allowed to possess 50 grams of marijuana and grow two plants.
12. Hollywood actor Tom Hanks will be honoured with coveted Cecil B DeMille Award at Golden Globe Awards on January 5, 2020. It recognises an individual who has made a lasting impact on the film industry. Oprah Winfrey.
13. Manipur women football team won 25th Senior Women’s National Football Championship 2019 at Pasighat (Arunachal Pradesh), defeating Indian Railways.
14. Assam Government launched Aponar Apon Ghar home loan subsidy scheme and Abhinandan – Education Loan Subsidy scheme.
  1. Under Home loan scheme, subsidy up to 2 lakh 50 thousand rupees will be provided for loan amounts from five lakh to 40 lakh rupees.
15. IT Firm Wipro tied up with Febraban, an industry body representing the Brazil’s financial services industry. Wipro will develop an online platform “Noomis” for the financial services industry in Brazil.
16. SEBI imposed a penalty of over Rs 22 crore on Aurobindo Pharma and its promoters, for violating insider trading norms.
17. Indian Badminton Player Malvika Bansod won Maldives International Future Series, defeating Myanmar’s Thet Htar Thuzar. Also, Vaibhav and Prakash Raj claimed men’s doubles title after beating Thailand’s Pakkapon Teeraratsakul and Panitchaphon Teeraratsakul.
18. Bollywood Actor Amitabh Bachchan will be honoured with India’s highest award in cinema, Dadasaheb Phalke Award for year 2018.
  1. It is India’s highest film honour, introduced by government in 1969. The award was founded to commemorate ‘father of Indian cinema’, Dhundiraj Govind Phalke, popularly known as Dadasaheb Phalke. He directed Raja Harischandra (1913), India’s first feature film.
  2. Award comprises a Swarna Kamal (Golden Lotus), a shawl and a cash prize of Rs.10 Lakh.
19. European Union’s top court ruled that Google does not have to apply “Right to be forgotten law” globally. This means that Google has to remove data links to personal information only in its European version of search results and not elsewhere in world.
  1. Court said there was no obligation for a search engine to carry out de – referencing on all versions of its search results.
  2. Case was filed against google by a French watch dog CNIL demanding fine of 100,000 Euros for Google refusing to de – list sensitive information globally. Demand was to remove satirical photo montage of a female politician and couple of articles referring to public relations officers of Church of Scientology.
  3. Right to be forgotten was laid down by the European Court in 2014. Court ruled that people can ask search engines like Google to remove irrelevant information appearing under searches for their names.
20. Facebook announced that it will acquire CTRL – Labs, a tech company that makes wrist bands capable of reading minds. The band can transmit electrical signals from brain into computers as digital input. Deal is worth 500 million to 1 billion USD.
Sep 24, 2019
1. Nilesh Shah (MD of Kotak Mahindra Asset Management) has been appointed as Chairman of Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI).
2. RBI barred Punjab and Maharashtra Co-operative (PMC) Bank from doing any business for six months and capped depositor withdrawals at Rs 1000 per day.
  1. Defaults appear to have surged in the past six months amid tight economic conditions and some lumpy loans to real estate companies that turned sour, making it difficult for bank to meet its commitments.
3. First Advance Estimates of production of major Kharif crops for 2019-20 released by Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare
  1. Foodgrains – 140.57 million tonnes.
    - Rice – 100.35 million tonnes.
    - Nutri / Coarse Cereals – 32.00 million tonnes.
    - Maize – 19.89 million tonnes.
    - Pulses – 8.23 million tonnes.
    - Tur – 3.54 million tonnes.
  2. Oilseeds – 22.39 million tonnes
  3. Cotton – 32.27 million bales (of 170 kg each)
  4. Jute & Mesta - 9.96 million bales (of 180 kg each)
  5. Sugarcane – 377.77 million tonnes
4. Minister of Health and Family Welfare Harsh Vardhan launched two initiatives to tackle the menace of genetic diseases in newborns - Unique Methods of Management and treatment of Inherited Disorders (UMMID) initiative National Inherited Diseases Administration (NIDAN), Both supported by Department of Biotechnology (DBT).
  1. Objective of UMMID is to make treatment of expensive genetic diseases in newborns within reach of all people. NIDAN kendras are to be established under UMMID initiative. These will provide counselling and management in government hospitals.
  2. Another objective is to produce skilled technicians in Human genetics to screen pregnant women and newborn babies for inherited genetic diseases.
5. Narendra Singh Tomar, Minister for Agriculture and Farmers Welfare launched 2 mobile Apps – ‘CHC Farm Machinery and Krishi Kisan App for Geo Tagging’.
  1. Through CHC Farm Machinery App, farmers can select and order the required machinery at the rates feasible for them from the Custom Hiring Centers located in the radius of 50 Kms.
  2. Krishi Kisan App will provide farmers the information of best demonstration of high-yielding crops and seeds in their nearby area. Any farmer with high quality of crops can utilise this to demonstrate best practices of cultivation to other farmers.
6. Ponung Doming became first lady officer from Arunachal Pradesh in Indian army to be elevated to rank of Lieutenant colonel.
7. Russia formally accepted 2015 Paris agreement on Climate Change. Russia will now allocate financial resources towards developing countries for prevention of and adaptation to climate change.
  1. Paris Agreement is an agreement within UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) that was signed in 2016.
  2. It deals with greenhouse-gas-emissions (GHG) mitigation, adaptation, and finance.
8. Ministry of Sports will set up 20 National Centres of Excellence (NCE) to groom athletes for 2024 Paris and 2028 Los Angeles Olympics. National Centres of Excellence (NCE) scheme will have distinction of having a single scheme running in them for elite athletes.
9. World’s oldest travel company Thomas Cook announced bankruptcy, after failing to secure a bailout package from investors. Collapse of this 178 year old British travel giant also left thousands of travelers stranded across Europe.
10. China based Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) will invest in six projects with 1.09 billion U.S. dollars in countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

Sep 23, 2019

Infosys topped among 17 Indian Companies listed in Forbes World’s best ‘regarded’ companies list 2019, ranked 3rd globally. Top Companies -

Rank	company
1	Visa
2	Ferrari
3	Infosys
4	Netflix
5	PayPal
6	Microsoft

Other Indian Companies in List - TCS (22nd), Tata Motors (31), Tata Steel (105), Larsen & Toubro (115), Mahindra & Mahindra (117), HDFC (135), Bajaj Finserv (143), Piramal Enterprises (149), Steel Authority of India (153), HCL Technologies (155), Hindalco Industries (157), Wipro (168), HDFC Bank (204)

Home Minister Amit Shah laid foundation stone of new building of Registrar General of India (Janganana Bhawan/Census Building) in New Delhi He also announced to conduct first-ever “digital census” in 2021 (16th census of India and 8th since Indian independence).
1. INR 12000 crores will be spent on preparation of National Population Register (NPR) and census 2021. It will be a transformation from paper census to digital census as mobile app will be used to collect data.
2. Home Minister also proposed single multipurpose identity card for citizens, with all utilities such as Aadhaar, driving license, passport and bank accounts merged into one.
3. He also stated that National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID) being set up to track any terror suspect and prevent terrorist attacks with real time data, will start functioning by January 2020. NATGRID is a 3400 Crores project, as a robust intelligence gathering mechanism related to banking, immigration, individual tax payers and travels. It was conceptualised following 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks.
4. He also launched ‘Private Security Agency Licensing Portal’, to help private security agencies get licenses, amid need to increase number of licensed private security.
According to UN report titled United in Science for 2019, average global temperature between 2015-2019 will be the hottest of any five-year period on record. It is estimated to be 1.1 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial (1850-1900) times and 0.2 degrees Celsius warmer than 2011-2015.
1. CO2 grew 2% in 2018 and reached a record high of 37 billion tonnes. Extent of Arctic summer sea ice declined at rate of 12% per decade over past 40 years.
2019 Moselle Open Men's Tennis Title (Metz, France) -
1. Singles - Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (France)
2. Doubles - Robert Lindstedt (Sweden) AND Jan-Lennard Struff (Germany)
2019 St. Petersburg Open Men's Tennis Title ( St. Petersburg, Russia)-
1. Singles - Daniil Medvedev (Russia)
2. Doubles - Divij Sharan (India) AND Igor Zelenay (Slovakia)
New book ‘Girl Power: Indian women who broke the rules‘ written by Neha J Hiranandani has been released.
Book From Leeches to Slug Glue: 25 Explosive Ideas that Made (and Are Making) Modern Medicine authored by Roopa Pai has been released.
2019 China Open Badminton -
1. Men's Singles - Kento Momota (Japan )
2. Women's Singles - Carolina Marín (Spain)
3. Men's Doubles - Indonesia's Marcus Fernaldi Gideon AND Kevin Sanjaya Sukamuljo
4. Women's Doubles - China's Chen Qingchen AND Jia Yifan
5. Mixed Doubles - China's Zheng Siwei AND Huang Yaqiong
Sep 23 is observed as International Day of Sign Languages (IDSL), observed first in 2018. It aims to raise awareness of importance of sign language in the full realization of the human rights of people who are deaf. 2019 theme is Sign Language Rights for All.
1. Sep 23 is also observed as Saudi National Day, to commemorate name changing of what was previously known as Kingdom of Nejd and Hejaz to Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
NDTV Journalist Ravish Kumar received the 1st Gauri Lankesh Memorial Award 2019 by Gauri Lankesh Memorial Trust (founded in memory of journalist Gauri Lankesh). He is known for his anti-NDA Government approach, which is led by PM Narendra Modi.
Book India in the Persianate Age: 1000-1765 by US based author Richard M Eaton has been released.
UIDAI announced that Non-resident Indians (NRIs) with valid Indian passport could apply for Aadhaar on arrival, without the need to wait for 182-day period by scheduling a prior appointment.
Government hiked family pension for govt. employee who dies within 7 years of service, now to be 50% of last pay drawn from previous 30% for a period of 10 years.

Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) Awards 2019 (Milan, Italy) -

Award	Winner	Club
Men’s Player	Lionel Messi (Argentina)	Barcelona FC
Women’s Player	Megan Rapinoe (America)	Reign FC
Men’s coach	JurgenKlopp (Germany)	Liverpool FC
Women’s coach	Jill Ellis (America)	–
Men’s goalkeeper	Alisson Becker (Brazil)	Liverpool FC
Women’s goalkeeper	Sari van Veenendaal (Netherlands)	Atlético Madrid Femenino
Puskás Award	Daniel Zsori (Hungary)	Fehérvár FC

Jammu and Kashmir become first state to distribute highest number of golden cards under Ayushman Bharat-Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY), showing positive intent of People of Jammu and Kashmir towards government schemes.
1. Sep 23 also observed as 1st edition of Ayushman Bharat Diwas. Ayushman Bharat Yojana or Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY) was launched from Ranchi on Sep 23, 2018.

Sep 22, 2019

Sep 22 is observed as World Rhino Day, as an international ecological observance to raise awareness on protection of 5 existing species of rhinoceros - white rhino, black rhino, Indian rhino, Javan rhino, and Sumatran rhino.
1. Sep 22 is also observed as World rose day, for welfare of cancer patients.
2. Sep 22, 2019 is also observed as Daughters' Day observed on 4th Sunday of September every year.

World Wrestling Championships 2019 held in Nur-Sultan (Kazakhstan) -

Wrestlers from 101 nations participated. It was first qualification event for Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympic Games and first Senior World Championships in Kazakhstan.
Russia named champions in Men's Freestyle and Men's Greco-Roman Categories, while Japan named champions in Women's freestyle.

Medal table -

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Russia	9	5	5	19
2	United States	5	0	2	7
3	Geordia	4	0	2	6
4	Japan	3	3	3	9
5	Azerbaijan	1	3	2	6

India ranked 17th with 5 Medals (1 Silver and 4 Bronze). Indian Medalists -
1. Silver -
  1. Deepak Punia. He settled for silver after pulling out of 86kg final Deepak Punia due to Injury. He was to face Hassan Yazdani of Iran in 86Kg Category.
2. Bronze -
  1. Bajrang Punia won bronze, by defeating Mongolia’s Tulga Tumur Ochir in 65 kg.
  2. Vinesh Phogat won bronze medal by defeating Maria Prevolaraki of Greece in 53 kg freestyle event.
  3. Rahul Aware won bronze medal after defeating Tyler Lee Graff in 61kg category.
  4. Ravi Kumar Dahiya won bronze by beating Iran's Reza Atrinagharchi in 57kg men's Freestyle.

Digital infrastructure provider Tata Communications partnered with Cisco for a secure, fully-managed, multi-channel, cloud-based Cisco Webex Contact Center solution. It is an end-to-end managed solution and gives contact centre users a seamless user experience across up to 150 countries on the back of Tata Communications’ global network, expanding the global reach of Cisco Webex Contact Center.
Wipro Consumer Care and Lighting has launched “Wipro Consumer Care–Ventures” startup venture fund to invest in startups in the consumer brands space.
Indian Army and Indian Air Force conducted exercise ‘Chang Thang’ in Eastern Ladakh bordering China, as first such exercise in the region.
Taiwan has cut off its ties with Kiribati (Oceanic Nation), amid Taiwan’s tensions with China. China claims Taiwan to be its territory and says that it has no right to having formal ties with any country.
NASSCOM’s Data Security Council of India (DSCI) collaborated with Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) and Google India to launch nationwide awareness campaign ‘Digital Payment Abhiyan’, launched by Communications and Electronics & IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad at ‘Google for India’ event in New Delhi.
Bollywood singer Sonu Nigam has been honoured with ‘Magnificent Performing Arts Award’ at 21st Century Icon Awards in London(UK). These annual awards are brainchild of UK-based Indian-origin entrepreneurs Preeti Rana and Tarun Ghulati.
Ministry for Civil Aviation directed setting up a mechanism to regularly monitor airfares in country, to enable monitoring of airfares by Ministry of Civil Aviation and Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
Election Commission announced polling schedule for Assembly elections in – Haryana and Maharashtra. Polling will be done on October 21 and results to be announced on October 24.
1. Election Commission appointed Madhu Mahajan and B Murali Kumar as Special Expenditure Observers for forthcoming Elections to Legislative Assembly of Maharashtra. Actress Madhuri Dixit has been appointed as a goodwill ambassador for Maharashtra Assembly polls.

37th GST Council Meeting Held in Panaji (Goa) under Chairmanship of F inance & Corporate Affairs Minister Nirmala Sitharaman. Key Recommendations Include -

Goods -

GST Council recommends lower 12% cess on 1,500 cc diesel, 1,200 cc petrol vehicles with capacity to carry up to 13 people..
Rate levied on cut and polished semi precious stones has been dropped from 3% to 0.25%. Jewellery exports to now attract zero GST.

Reduction in GST rates -

Goods	Original Rate	Reduced rate (new)
Parts of Slide Fasteners	18%	12%
Marine Fuel 0.5% (FO)	18%	5%
Wet Grinders(consisting of stone as a grinder)	12%	5%
Dried tamarind & Plates and cups made up of leaves/ flowers/bark	5%	Nil
Cut and polished semi- precious stones	3%	0.25%
Specified goods for petroleum operations undertaken under Hydrocarbon Exploration Licensing Policy (HELP)		5%

Exemptions from GST/ IGST -
- Imports of specified defence goods not being manufactured indigenously (upto 2024).
- Supply of goods and services to FIFA (International Federation of Association Football ) and other specified persons for organizing the Under-17 Women’s Football World Cup 2020 in India.
- Supply of goods and services to Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) for specified projects in India.

Increase in GST rates -

Goods	Original Rate	Increased rate (new)
Goods falling under chapter 86 of tariff like railway wagons, coaches, rolling stock (without refund of accumulated ITC-Indian Tariff Code)	5%	12%
Caffeinated Beverages	18%	28% + 12% compensation cess

Services -
1. GST Rates Reduced on Hospitality Services - NIL (Under 1000), 12 % (1001 - 7500), 18 % (Above 7500)
2. BANGLA SHASYA BIMA crop insurance scheme of West Bengal Government has been exempted from GST.
3. Group insurance schemes for paramilitary forces under the Home Affairs ministry to be exempted from GST.

Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel of Germany won Formula 1 (F1) Singapore Grand Prix 2019. He became first to win Singapore Grand Prix 5 times -

Formula 1 Season 2019 -

Round	Grand Prix	Winner	date
1	Australian Grand Prix	Valtteri Bottas (Finland)	17 March
2	Bahrain Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	31 March
3	Chinese Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	14 April
4	Azerbaijan Grand Prix	Valtteri Bottas (Finland)	28 April
5	Spanish Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	12 May
6	Monaco Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	26 May
7	Canadian Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	9 June
8	French Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	23 June
9	Austrian Grand Prix	Max Verstappen (Belgian-Dutch)	30 June
10	British Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	14 July
11	German Grand Prix	Max Verstappen (Belgian-Dutch)	28 July
12	Hungarian Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	4 August
13	Belgian Grand Prix	Charles Leclerc (Monaco)	1 September
14	Italian Grand Prix	Charles Leclerc (Monaco)	8 September
15	Singapore Grand Prix	Sebastian Vettel (Germany)	22 September
16	Russian Grand Prix		29 September
17	Japanese Grand Prix		13 October
18	Mexican Grand Prix		27 October
19	United States Grand Prix		3 November
20	Brazilian Grand Prix		17 November
21	Abu Dhabi Grand Prix		1 December

Sep 21, 2019

Russia held its annual TSENTR 2019 International Command Exercise involving six other nations. Forces from China, India, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan joined Russia’s annual exercise.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman stated that to overcome slowdown and increase business activities, government has asked banks not to declare stressed loans of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) as Non Performing Assets (NPAs) until March 31, 2020.
1. Public Sector Banks will organise ‘loan melas’ or “Shamiana meetings” in 400 districts, to provide loans to NBFCs and retail borrowers, including homebuyers and farmers.

Biennial AIBA World Boxing Championships 2019 held in Ekaterinburg Expo, Yekaterinburg (Russia)

Indian boxers won 2 medals, as Best Indian show in these championships. Amit Panghal lost to Olympic champion Shokhobidin Zoirov of Uzbekistan and won silver in 52kg category. India’s Manish Kaushik defeated Andy Cruz Gomez from Cuba in 63 kg category and won bronze medal. 2021 AIBA World Boxing Championships will be held for first time in New Delhi (India).

Medal Tally -

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Uzbekistan	3	1	1	5
2	Russia	3	0	1	4
3	Kazakhstan	1	1	4	6
4	Cuba	1	1	1	3
5	England	0	1	2	3
6	India	0	1	1	2

Home Affairs Minister Amit Shah launched 3 citizen centric services of Chandigarh Police, including Emergency Response Support System (ERSS - Dial 112), ‘E-Beat Book’ System and the ‘E-Saathi App’.
1. ERSS project under Nirbhaya Fund, providing a single emergency number (112), preventing escalation of crime, especially against women and children. ‘Dial 112’ emergency response service is an initiative to strengthen proactive community policing that would end confusion amongst distress callers.
2. ‘E-Beat Book’ is a web and mobile based application which will ease collection, updation and analysis of the information related to crime and criminals in a real time.
3. ‘E-Saathi’ App would help the general public, including senior citizens, to remain in touch with the police and also give suggestions to facilitate participative community policing.
Indian School of Business (ISB) Hyderabad ranked 7th globally and 1st in Asia in Forbes Best International 1-Year Business Schools 2019 rankings. ISB participated in the ranking for the first time. Top institutes -
1. International Institute for Management Development (IMD) Lausanne, Switzerland
2. Insead Fontainebleau (France) & Singapore
3. Judge Business School Cambridge, United Kingdom
4. SDA Bocconi School of Management Milan, Italy
5. Said Business School Oxford, United Kingdom
Misc. Corporate News (September 209) -
1. Health Insurer Max Bupa signed bancassurance corporate agency agreement with Indian Bank, Under which bank will distribute Insurer's products and services to its customers.
2. Repco Home Finance Ltd signed corporate agency agreement with SBI Life Insurance, to provide SBI Life’s range of products to its customers.
3. Merchant platform Pine Labs partnered with Federal Bank, to offer EMIs for offline debit card transactions. Federal Bank customers will be able to instantly avail loans on EMI at Pine Labs terminals.
4. Hyundai Motors signed agreement with Bank of Baroda to be preferred financier for its dealers and consumers.
5. Airtel Payments Bank partnered with HDFC ERGO General Insurance Company to offer unique Mosquito Diseases Protection Policy (MDPP) to protect against 7 mosquito-borne diseases - Dengue, Malaria, Chikungunya, Japanese Encephalitis, Kala-azar, Lymphatic Filariasis (Elephantiasis) and Zika virus. It will be offered to Airtel Payments Bank customers at a nominal cost of Rs 99 per annum.
6. IDBI Bank and Life Insurance Corporation of India Credit Cards Services (LIC CSL) will launch co-branded credit card.
7. Life insurance provider Aegon Life Insurance signed Corporate Agency Agreement with Paytm, to offer life insurance products.
8. Indian Army and Bank of Baroda signed to lay down basis of banking services to be provided by Bank of Baroda to personnel of Indian Army.
9. Paisalo Digital (Formerly S.E Investments) signed its second co-origination of loan agreement with Bank of Maharashtra (BoM), to necessitate joint contribution of credit flow by BoM and Paisalo. 1dst such agreement was signed by PAISALO with SBI, to pay out 200,000 loan applications in 2019.
10. Telecom frim Bharti Airtel has tied up with Bharti AXA Life Insurance, to offer prepaid plan for its users along with insurance protection plan. Airtel has launched a special prepaid plan of Rs 599, in which customers will get 2GB data per day, unlimited calling and life insurance cover of Rs 4 lakh from Bharti AXA Life Insurance with validity of 84 days.
Madhukar Kamath (chairman emeritus of advertising firm DDB Mudra group) is elected as chairman of Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC) for 2020.
NTPC will set up a 5-gigawatt solar park in Gujarat, as Biggest solar park in India. It will cost approx $3.5 billion and wll begin operations by 2024.
Book titled “Being Gandhi” written by Paro Anand has been released.
Sep 21 is observed as UN International Day of Peace. 2019 theme is Climate Action for Peace. It was first observed in 1981.
1. Sep 21 is observed as World Alzheimer’s Day, first observed in 2012.
2. Sep 21 is also observed as International Coastal Cleanup Day, observed annually on third Saturday of September.
Google announced to open an artificial intelligence (AI) based research lab “Google Research India“, in Bengaluru, to be led by Manish Gupta.
Digital Communication Commission (Department of Telecom) approved multiple projects worth over Rs 8,500 crores, to provide improved connectivity by setting up mobile towers and laying of optical fibre.
Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY) partnered with Cab Aggregator Ola, to extend PMJAY benefits to its drivers. Eligible drivers and Ola employees will be able to avail benefits of programme and obtain an Ayushman Bharat card at a minimal cost of Rs 30.

Sep 20, 2019 -
1. General Events / Conferences (Sep 11 - 20, 2019) -
  1. New luxurious Sri Lankan train Pulathisi Expressm produced under ‘Make in India’ project of Indian Railways has been launched. Train was supplied under Line of Credit (LoC) by Rail India Technical and Economic Service (RITES), manufactured by Integral Coach Factory (ICF) in Chennai.
  2. Ministry of Home Affairs will set up world-class National Police University (NPU) in Greater Noida (Uttar Pradesh), to provide state-of-the-art learning and working environment for dissemination of education in policing science and related areas.
  3. White water Rafting Expedition christened ‘RUDRASHILA’ being undertaken by Kalidhar Battalion under Battle Axe Division Flagged Off at Jaisalmer Military station (Rajasthan).
  4. 15th Indo-US Economic Summit 2019 organized by Indo-American Chamber of Commerce- North India Council in New Delhi. World Bank announced to provide Rs 3000 crores aid for food parks In Indiam, particularly in Northeast, and help boost farmers' income.
  5. Ministry of Jal Shakti will develop National Water Museum, To enhance awareness among public about dwindling water resources and need for their conservation. An International Workshop on Water museum was held in New Delhi.
  6. Madhya Pradesh government launched online service for those wanting to adopt a cow and provide sheds to them at gaushalas (cow shelters) across State. People can adopt a cow for a minimum period of 15 days and can go on supporting it till animal’s lifetime.
  7. Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) launched Plastic Waste Management Campaign, under Swachhta Hi Sewa 2019 which began from 11 September.
  8. Central Public Works Department organized National Seminar on “Emerging Trends in Public Architecture, in New Delhi.
  9. 5th International Ramayan Festival organized by Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) in New Delhi, Home Affairs Minister Shah as Chief Guest.
  10. Renovated Jayakar Bungalow, a classic heritage site situated inside National Film Archives of India (NFAI) in Pune, Maharashtra has been inaugurated. Classified as a Grade I Heritage structure, it was built in 1945 with a distinct Tudor style of architecture.
  11. Defence PSU BEML and Wipro Infrastructure Engineering (WIN) signed an MoU to work together in areas of aerospace, industrial automation, 3-D printing, artificial intelligence and hydraulic system engineering.
  12. India’s first National Antimicrobial Resistance Hub inaugurated in Kolkata, as a hub for research on antibiotic resistance for entire South Asia.
  13. Traditional Neermahal Jal Utsav concluded in Tripura. Neermahal is a water palace built at the middle of Rudrasagar lake by Maharaja Bir Bikram Kishore Manikya in 1930.
  14. Karnataka Govt. renamed Hyderabad-Karnataka region region as Kalyana Karnataka Region. It comprises six north-eastern districts of Karnataka - Bidar, Kalaburagi, Koppal, Ballari, Yadgir and Raichur.
  15. 16th Session of Joint Economic Commission (JEC) between India and Belgium Luxembourg Economic Union (BLEU) held in New Delhi.
  16. First International Conference on Sustainability Education (ICSE) 2019 held at India Habitat Centre in New Delhi, organised by Mobius Foundation in partnership with UNESCO New Delhi.
  17. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh became first Defence Minister to fly indigenously-built fighter aircraft Tejas. Defence Minister also approved starting work of writing history of India’s borders.
  18. UK Returned antique 12th century Bronze Idol of Buddha that was stolen from Archaeological Survey of India’s (ASI) Nalanda site museum in 1961. Bronze statue of Buddha is documented as ‘Seated Buddha in Bhumisparsha Mudra’. It was amongst 19 bronze statues that were stolen from ASI Museum at Nalanda in August 1961.
  19. India commenced special training programme for Maldivian and Bangladeshi civil servants at Mussoorie in Uttarakhand, under Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation programme.
2. Visits from India (Sep 11 - 20, 2019) -
  1. President Ram Nath Kovind Visited European Nations of Iceland, Switzerland and Slovenia.
    1. Iceland -
      1. India and Iceland signed 3 agreements in fields of fisheries collaboration, cultural cooperation and visa waiver for holders of diplomatic and official passport.
    2. Switzerland
      1. India and Switzerland signed 3 agreements for Technical cooperation on climate change, Alliance in science and technology AND Renewal of Hindi chair at the University of Lausanne.
    3. Slovenia
      1. Seven MoUs signed Between India and slovenia, about Cooperation in fields of River Rejuvenation (Clean Ganga Mission), Culture, Investment, Science & Technology, Sports and Standards.
  2. 63rd General Conference of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) held at Vienna (Austria). It was attended by K N Vyas, Chairman, of Atomic Energy Commission and Secretary in Department of Atomic Energy, on India's Behalf.
    1. Mr Vyas launched NCG Vishwam Cancer Care on sidelines of 63rd General conference of IAEA in Vienna. Through this, National Cancer Grid (NCG) established by Tata Memorial Centre (TMC) has been made open to cancer hospitals and other relevant institutes from foreign countries. Objective of NCG is to remove disparity in Cancer Care.
  3. Minister of Petroleum & Natural Gas and Steel, Dharmendra Pradhan Visited Saudi Arabia, UAE and Qatar. He participated in 8th Asian Ministerial Energy Roundtable (AMER) at Abu Dhabi (UAE). India will host next (9th) Asian Ministerial Energy Roundtable in 2021.
  4. External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar visited Finland, Poland, Belgium. He also visited ASEAN Nations Indonesia and Singapore.
  5. Chief Minister(CM) of Tamil Nadu (TN) KPalaniswami visited United States(US), United Kingdom (UK) and United Arab Emirates(UAE)
3. Visits to India (Sep 11 - 20, 2019) -
  1. Prime Minister of St. Vincent and Grenadines Ralph Everard Gonsalves Visited India. Saint Vincent and Grenadines became 79th country to join the International Solar Alliance (ISA), an initiative by India aimed at combating the threats of climate change and global warming.
  2. Marcin Przydacz, deputy foreign minister of Poland visited India. He unveiled a memorial pillar in Valivade in Kolhapur district of Maharashtra in memory of 5000 polish refugee families that settled in Valivade during World War II (WWII).
  3. Phillip D. Murphy, Governor of State of New Jersey (US) visited India
4. Central Board of Direct Tax(CBDT) has set up National e-Assessment Centre (NeAC) for electronically assessing the tax returns which would reduce human interventions thereby reducing corruption. CBDT appointed Krishna Mohan Prasad as first Principal Chief Commissioner of Income Tax (Pr.CCIT) of NeAC.
5. Bank of Baroda (BoB) launched an agriculture digital platform called “Baroda Kisan” in Bardoli (Gujarat), to address various needs of farmers. Earlier, BoB signed MoU with 6 firms namely Skymet Weather Services, Weather Risk Management Services, BigHaat, Agrostar India, EM3 Agri Services and Poorti Agri Services to develop “Baroda Kisan”.
6. US based research firm Fidelity National Information Services (FIS)'s 6th Flavours of Fast report 2019 rated India’s Immediate Payment Service (IMPS) as world’s best real-time payment service in comparison to similar facilities of 54 countries. It is rated highest in FISh ‘Faster Payments Innovation Index 2019’ and received 5 star rating.
7. Bollywood Film Gully Boy has been nominated for Oscar 2020 Awards in Best International Feature Film category, starring Ranveer Singh and Alia Bhatt and Directed by Zoya Akhtar.
8. Shondol dance, known as the royal dance performed by artists for King of Ladakh, has created history by entering into the Guinness Book of World Records as largest Ladakhi dance. During annual Naropa Festival 2019, 408 women attired in traditional dresses and beautiful headgears performed it, which broke previous record of 299 artists dance of Shondol in 2018 festival.
9. RBI increased loan sanction limit for small exporters as priority sector lending (PSL) by banks to Rs 40 crore per borrower from Rs 25 crore in order to boost credit to the export sector. Criteria of ‘units having a turnover of up to Rs 100 crore’ was removed.
10. RBI and securities market regulator SEBI will jointly launch a framework that will freely enable exchange of borrower information between banks and credit rating agencies (CRAs) in more accurate manner.
  1. It will bridge gap between default rates divulged by rating agencies that differed from report by RBI’s Central Repository of Information on Large Credits (CRILC), a borrower-level database focusing on systemically important credit exposures.
  2. Divergence is due to banks’ reluctance to exchange on any data about delays in payment of principal/interest to CRAs. Also, CRAs do not have access to CRILC.
  3. RBI also revised guidelines on concurrent audit system, Following recommendations of committee headed by Y.H.Malegam. It Includes that Concurrent auditors will be appointed for upto 3 years, as against earlier tenure of 5 years.
11. IIT Bombay topped among Indian institutes in QS(Quacquarelli Symonds) Graduate Employability Rankings 2020, with band ranking 111-120. IIT Bombay is followed by IIT Delhi (151-160) and IIT Madras (171-180). Birla Institute of Science and Technology (BITS) Pilani for first time entered the Rankings (201-250 band ranking). List was topped overall by Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), United States (US).
12. RBI issued new order for banks and payment system operators regarding failed transactions of customers. Time period has been fixed at 5 days for disposal of grievances and auto reversal of the amount on the failed transaction for the banks, termed as Turn Around Time (TAT).
  1. Banks will have to pay compensation to the customers if there is no settlement or reversal of the transaction within this time period. This compensation will be as per Rs 100 per day after completion of the time period.
13. Home ministry announced a new honour named Sardar Patel National Unity Award to individuals and persons for promoting national unity and integrity. Decoration will be in shape of lotus leaf, with length 6cms and breadth 2cms. The decoration which will be made of fine silver and gold would be of thickness 4mm.
14. RBI directed banks and NBFCs to stop sharing pattern of consumer’s credit information held by credit information companies (CICs) with analytics firms, IT companies, institutional agents and unregulated parties.
  1. RBI states such data sharing actions are against Credit Information Companies (Regulation) Act 2005 (CICRA). Data will be provided by Banks & NBFCs to 4 consumer credit reporting agencies Equifax, Experian , TransUnion CIBIL and CRIF High Mark and it will be confidential manner.
15. SEBI has formed a committee headed by Ishaat Hussain to suggest possible measures and regulations in creating the ‘social stock exchanges’. It will make recommendations for social stock exchanges within securities market domain in order to facilitate the fund raisings by social enterprises and voluntary organizations.
16. Finance & Corporate Affairs Minister Nirmala Sitaraman Introduced Taxation Laws (Amendment) Ordinance 2019 in Goa, with several amendments in Income-tax Act 1961 and Finance (No. 2) Act 2019.
  1. As per a New provision Inserted in Income Tax act, any domestic company will have option to pay income-tax at the rate of 22% from earlier 30% subject to condition that they will not avail any exemption/incentive. Effective tax rate will be 25.17% inclusive of surcharge & cess. They are not required to pay Minimum Alternate Tax (MAT).
    1. Total revenue foregone for reduction in corporate tax rate and other relief is estimated at 145000 crores.
  2. Any new domestic company incorporated on or after October 1, 2019 making fresh investment in manufacturing was given an option to pay income-tax at rate of 15% from earlier 25%.
    1. It is available to companies which do not avail any exemption/incentive and commence production on or before March 31, 2023
    2. The effective tax rate for these companies will be 17.01% inclusive of surcharge & cess.
    3. They are not required to pay Minimum Alternate Tax.
  3. In order to provide relief to companies which continue to avail exemptions/incentives, the rate of Minimum Alternate Tax was reduced from existing 18.5% to 15%.
  4. Enhanced surcharge introduced by Finance (No.2) Act 2019 will not apply on -
    1. Capital gains arising on sale of equity share in a company / unit, in hands of an individual, Hindu Undivided Family (HUF), Association of Persons (AOP), Body of Individuals (BOI) and Artificial Juridical Person (AJP).
    2. It shall also not apply to capital gains arising on sale of any security including derivatives, in the hands of Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs).
  5. To provide relief to listed companies which have already made a public announcement of buy-back before July 5, 2019, tax on buy-back of shares for such companies will not be charged
    1. In July, government, as part of Budget, had announced a 20 % tax on share buyback by listed companies.
  6. Scope of Corporate social responsibility (CSR) 2% fund has been expanded. It can be spent on incubators funded by Central or State Government or any agency or PSU of Central or State Government, and make contributions to public funded Universities, Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), National Laboratories and Autonomous Bodies.
17. Researchers from Zoological Society of London (ZSL) and London’s Natural History Museum discovered a new species of giant Chinese salamander is now considered to be the world’s largest amphibian.
  1. As per journal, there are 3 distinct species of Chinese salamanders which are now considered as critically endangered species. Apart from Andrias sligoli, other salamander species is named as Andrias davidianus while third is yet to be named.
18. Pictorial biography of PM Narendra Modi titled ‘Turbulence & Triumph: The Modi Years’ jointly authored by Rahul Agarwal and Bharathi S Pradhan will release in October 2019.

Sep 19, 2019

Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY) reached one crore beneficiaries. PMMVY is a direct benefit transfer scheme under which cash benefits are provided to pregnant women in their bank account directly to meet enhanced nutritional needs and partially compensate for wage loss.
1. Under this, beneficiaries receive cash benefit of 5000 in three installments, was launched on 1st of January in 2017. Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh are top States in implementation of the scheme. Odisha and Telangana are yet to start its implementation.
Government appointed RKS Bhadauria as New Chief of Indian Air Force (presently Vice Chief of IAF).
HRD Ministry announced a new PPP Scheme, National Educational Alliance for Technology (NEAT) for using technology for better learning outcomes in Higher Education. Objective is to use Artificial Intelligence to make learning more personalised as per requirements of learner.
1. MHRD would create a National NEAT platform that would provide one-stop access to these technological solutions. EdTech companies would be responsible for developing solutions and manage registration of learners through NEAT portal.
East Coast Railway under signed MOU with Government of Odisha for development of Bhubaneswar station as Multi-Model Transport Hub. Under this, Bhubaneswar station will be redeveloped as Multi-modal transport hub, jointly by Railways and Government of Odisha.
Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment Thaawar chand Gehlot launched a Management Information System (MIS) under Accessible India Campaign. MIS portal will bring nodal ministries and States / UTs on a single platform for monitoring progress in each target of Accessible India Campaign (AIC). The portal is made fully accessible for Divyangjans.
1. Accessible India Campaign was launched on 3 December 2015, on occasion of International Day of People with Disabilities (PwD), as a nation-wide campaign for achieving universal accessibility for PwDs.
Indian Air Force (IAF) inaugurated resurfaced runway at Vijaynagar Advance Landing Ground (ALG) in Changlang District in Arunachal Pradesh, which will enable operations by military transport aircraft at the base near China border. This has also re-established military transport aircraft connectivity at this Eastern most hamlet of India.
Telangana government declared 2020 as Year of Artificial Intelligence and will organize various activities related to AI throughout the year.
US President Donald Trump named Robert C. O’Brien as new US National Security Adviser (NSA).
Govt. approved appointment of four new judges to Supreme Court, taking strength of Judges in SC to 34 (highest ever so far). Newly appointed SC judges - Krishna Murari, V. Ramasubramanian, S Ravindra Bhat, Hrishikesh Roy.
1. Supreme Court Judges strength was increased from 31 to 34 after enactment of Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Bill of 2019 into law.
2. Originally, Supreme Court (Number of Judges) Act 1956 provided for a maximum number of 10 judges (excluding CJI). This has been increased to current nunber after several phases of enhancements.
IIFA Cinema Awards 2019 -
1. Best Actor (Male): Ranveer Singh for Padmaava
2. Best Actor (Female): Alia Bhatt for Raazi
3. Best Film: Raazi
4. Best Director: Sriram Raghavan for Andhadhun
5. Best Story Award: AndhaDhun.
6. Best Supporting Actor (Female): Aditi Rao Hydari for Padmaavat
7. Best Supporting Actor (Male): Vicky Kaushal for Sanju
8. Best Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya for Dhadak
9. Best Playback Singer (Male): Arijit Singh for Ae Watan from Raazi
10. Best Debut Award (Female): Sara Ali Khan for Kedarnath
11. Best Debut Award (Male): Ishaan Khatter for Dhadak
12. 20 Years Best Actor (Female): Deepika Padukone
13. 20 Years Best Actor (Male): Ranbir Kapoor.
14. Best Playback Singer (Female): Harshdeep Kaur and Vibha Saraf for Dilbaro from Raazi
15. Best Music: Sonu Ke Titu Ki Sweety
16. Best music in the last 20 years: Pritam
17. Best film of the past 20 years: Kaho Na Pyaar Hai
18. Lifetime Achievement Award: Legendary actor and comedian Jagdeep Jaffery
Super 30 founder noted mathematician Anand Kumar has been felicitated in US with a prestigious Education Excellence Award 2019. Anand has been running highly innovative Super 30 programme for last 18 years. He mentors 30 students free off cost through a year-long residential coaching for India’s premier engineering enrance exam IIT-JEE.
Delhi Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal launched ‘Tatpar’ app, developed by Delhi Police, which is a one-stop destination for access to over 50 citizen-centric services. It amalgamates all websites / mobile applications of Delhi Police into one.
Book The Cousins Thackeray: Uddhav, Raj and the Shadow of their Senas written by journalist Dhaval Kulkarni has been released.
Scientists from Canterbury Museum(England) discovered world’s oldest bird species’ fossils in Waipara, New zealand that lived 62 million years ago. It was a sea bird, and is named as Protodontopteryx.
To boost foreign investment in infrastructure sector, Govt. waived off 3-year lock-in period for investments made by Non-Resident Indians (NRI) in Infrastructure Debt Funds (IDFs).
1. To accelerate flow of long-term debt in infrastructure projects, amendments in tax laws were made to provide exemption from income tax to infrastructure debt funds (IDFs) in 2011.
2. Also, Recently govt has planned to invest Rs 100 lakh crore in the infrastructure sector by 2024-2025, suggested by task force headed by Atanu Chakraborty.
Researchers from US's NANOGrav Physics Frontiers Center discovered is a rapidly-rotating pulsar, using National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Green Bank Telescope (GBT). Its the most massive neutron star ever measured, called J0740+6620, and it’s 2.17 times as massive as our Sun. All its mass is jammed into a tiny sphere only about 30 km in diameter.
1. Neutron stars are made of ultra-dense matter. They’re tightly-compressed, and they’re the densest objects in the Universe that are made of normal matter. Black holes are actually denser, but they’re not normal.
2. They’re so dense, in fact, that a sugar-cube of neutron star would weigh about a hundred million tons on Earth.

44th Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) held in Toronto (Canada).

Malayalam-Hindi film, Geetu Mohandas’s Moothon (The Elder One) premiered at 44th TIFF.

Winners -

Award	Film	Director
People’s Choice Award	Jojo Rabbit	Taika Waititi
People’s Choice Award: Documentary	The Cave	Feras Fayyad
People’s Choice Award: Midnight Madness	The Platform	Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia
Best International Short Film	All Cats Are Grey in the Dark	Lasse Linder

Sep 18, 2019
1. Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) will pay 8.65% interest (up from 8.55 %) on the deposits of more than 6 crore subscribers for the period of 2018-19. Its first increase in interest rate of Employees’ Provident Fund (EPF) in past two years.
2. UN report revealed that India is leading country of origin of international migrants in 2019 with a 17.5 million diaspora. Report said that number of migrants globally reached 27 Crores.
  1. After India, Migrants from Mexico makes second largest diaspora (11.8 million), followed by China (10.7 million), Russia (10.5 million), Syria (8.2 million), Bangladesh (7.8 million), Pakistan (6.3 million).
  2. USA is hosting largest number of international migrants (51 million), followed by Saudi Arabia (13 million), Russia (12 million), England (10 million) and France (8 million).
3. Moti Bagh, a documentary based on an Uttarakhand farmer’s life has been nominated for Oscars 2020. It is directed by Nirmal Chander, and is based on the life of a farmer called Vidyadutt.
4. DRDO's Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) called ‘Rustom-2’ crashed during a trial in an agriculture field in Chitradurga district of Karnataka.
5. Sri Lanka unveiled a 356-metre-tall Lotus Tower in Colombo city, which is now South Asia’s tallest tower. The tower costs more than $100 million, out of which 80% is funded by China under controversial Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).
6. Directorate General of Training (DGT) signed agreement with Global IT major IBM, where IBM will carry out a nationwide Train-the-Trainer program in Basic Artificial Intelligence Skills. IBM aims at training 10,000 faculty members from ITIs across country and program will be executed over 1 year.
7. HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ launched several initiatives of All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), including Facilitation through Margadarshan and Margadarshak, Model Curriculum for Diploma Courses, Waste Management Accelerator for Aspiring Women Entrepreneurs (WAWE Summit 2019) and 360-degree Feedback of Faculty.
8. Govt. constituted a Company Law Committee for examining and making recommendations on various provisions and issues pertaining to implementation of Companies Act 2013 and Limited Liability Partnership Act 2008, aimed at improving ease of doing business. It is headed by Secretary in Ministry of Corporate Affairs (Currently Injeti Srinivas).
9. Department of Posts commenced International Speed Post (EMS) Service to 6 New Nations - Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Ecuador, Kazakhstan, Lithuania and North Macedonia. Express Mail Service enables users to send documents / merchandise faster and also enables tracking.
10. Cabinet Approvals (Sep 18, 2019) -
  1. Approved Promulgation of Prohibition of Electronic Cigarettes (production, manufacture, import, export, transport, sale, distribution, storage and advertisement) Ordinance 2019, which completely bans Electronic-cigarettes that are battery-operated devices that produce aerosol by heating a solution containing nicotine, which is addictive substance in combustible cigarettes.
  2. Approved payment of Productivity Linked Bonus (PLB) equivalent to 78 days wages to over 11.52 Lakh eligible non-gazetted railway employees (excluding RPF/RPSF personnel) for 2018-19. This will entail expenditure of 2024.40 crores to exchequer.
11. India US Joint Army Exercise Yudh Abhyas - 2019 conducted at Joint Base Lewis Mc Chord, Washington (USA), as 15th edition of joint exercise between India-USA.
12. USA's Sarah Thomas became first person to swim across the English Channel four times non-stop in a 54-hours, as an amazing feat of endurance. She has survived breast cancer.
13. IIT Kharagpur Researchers developed a unique approach of generating electricity from drying clothes in natural ambiance. By utilizing tiny channels, called nanochannels, in cellulose-based fabric network traditionally woven, electrical power generation has been made possible by guided movement of saline water amidst a continuous evaporation, analogous to water transport across a living plant.
14. Sep 18 is observed as World Water Monitoring Day, established in 2003 by America's Clean Water Foundation (ACWF) as a global educational outreach program. It is also observed as World Bamboo Day.
15. Airtel Payments Bank launched ‘Bharosa savings account’ Scheme -
  1. It will enable customers to withdraw cash, check balance or access a mini statement of their account at over 6,50,000 Aadhaar-enabled payment system (AePS) enabled outlets across India.
  2. It will let customers open a savings account with 500 minimum monthly balance. It offers 5 lakh personal accident insurance on maintaining balance of 500.
16. Swedish Climate change activist Greta Thunberg won Amnesty International Ambassador of Conscience Award. Amnesty International recognised Swedish teenager Greta, and Fridays for Future Movement, for their work in bringing people’s attention to problem of climate change.
17. Tamilnadu Govt unveiled new ‘Tamil Nadu Electric Vehicle Policy 2019’ in state that would attract 50000 crores investment and also create 1.5 lakh jobs. An EV park will also be created, with plug-and-play facilities. 50-100% exemption of road tax will be made for all EVs till the end of 2022.
  1. TANGEDCO will offer public-private partnership (PPP) model for charging port installations, which will be available in every 25 kms of highways.
  2. To distinguish between the EV and other vehicles, EV numbers will be exhibited in yellow colour with a green background for transport vehicle while for all other EVs, number will be exhibited in white on a green background.
18. 10th Asia Pacific Youth Games 2019 held in Vladivostok (Russia). India won 16 gold, 13 silver and 5 bronze medals.
  1. Indian swimming team finished as the overall winners with 8 gold, 5 silver and 1 bronze medal.
  2. Badminton team won team Championship gold.
Sep 17, 2019
1. Noted Indian photographer Raghu Rai chosen as first recipient of the inaugural “Academie des beaux-arts Photography Award – William Klein” for 2019 and will be awarded in Palais de l’Institut de France, Paris, France on October 30.
  1. Award is named in honour of William Klein, the American born French photographer and filmmaker. It carries monetary prize of 1,20,000 euros.
2. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman notified that 2% Tax Deducted at Source (TDS) on cash payments above Rs 1 crore made through Agricultural Produce Market Committees (APMCs) will be exempted, from October 1, 2019. This is aimed to discourage cash transactions and move towards a less-cash economy.
  1. Government also gave 15 percentage points additional depreciation rate to commercial vehicles, taking it to 45 %, available for vehicles bought between August 23 and March 31 in current financial year.
3. Kerala Govt and Regional Cancer Centre (RCC) jointly signed MoU with Maldives to strengthen cancer care in Maldives by training doctors.
4. 2019 Zhengzhou Open Women's Tennis Title (China) -
  1. Singles - Karolína Plíšková (Czech Republic)
  2. Doubles - Nicole Melichar (US) AND Květa Peschke (Czech Republic)
5. Global Payments Firm Visa and Indian payments Firm BillDesk partnered to roll out SI-Hub, a seamless and secure way to make recurring payments using cards with a one-time enrollment.
6. Tata Power Renewable Energy commissioned a 150 MW solar capacity in Pokharan, Rajasthan. With this, TPREL's renewable capacity rose to 2628 MW.
7. India launched initiative to fund 1000 scholars from South East Asian countries to pursue PhD at its 23 IITs, as joint initiative of Ministry of External Affairs and Human Resource Development. It has budget of 300 crores.
8. Bangladesh PM Sheikh Hasina received Dr Kalam Smriti International Excellence Award 2019 in Dhaka, instituted in memory of former President Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam.
9. Indian actor Neena Gupta won 2 awards at Indian International Film Festival of Boston. She was named Best Actress award for ‘Badhaai Ho‘ and her film ‘The Last Color‘ emerged victorious in Best Feature Film category.
10. Meghalaya-based activist Agnes Kharshiing, who survived an assault by coal mafia almost a year ago, received 11th International Hrant Dink Award. She received award along with Turkish activist against male violence, Nebahat Akkoc. The award commemorates Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, who was killed in 2007.
11. DRDO handed over a New-Generation Wargaming Software developed by New Delhi-based Institute for Systems Studies and Analysis (ISSA) to Indian Navy. New-Gen Wargaming Software is aimed at creating an environment that would enable Maritime Warfare Centres (MWCs) to train using latest technological and computing tools.
12. Himachal Pradesh CM Jai Ram Thakur launched Mukhya Mantri Seva Sankalp Helpline ‘1100’ for speedy and time-bound redressal of public grievances. Himachal Pradesh became 4th state to provide this facility, after Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
13. Microfinance Institutions Network (MFIN) and Sa-Dhan along with FIDC (Finance Industry Development Council) jointly launched ‘Code for Responsible Lending’ (CRL) for micro credit industry. Sa-Dhan is RBI recognised self-regulatory organisation and industry association for microfinance industry.
  1. In addition to CRL, a revised industry Code of Conduct (CoC) was also released for Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) that will act as a binding set of principles for lending practices. One of pivotal guidelines in CRL mandates that only three microcredit entities can lend to a client at same time. It also caps size of total lending to Rs.1 lakh per borrower.
  2. A significant development in CRL adoption was signing up of Finance Industry Development Council (FIDC) which makes CRL more inclusive in its coverage. FIDC is self-regulatory organisation for registered NBFCs.
14. RBI expanded coverage of Bharat Bill Payment System (BBPS) to include all categories of billers who raise recurring bills and payments (except prepaid recharges) as eligible participants, on a voluntary basis.
  1. RBI now allows other recurring bill payments like school fees, insurance premiums, EMIs and municipal taxes, which can also be paid through BBPS.
  2. At present, payment of recurring bills through BBPS is available only in five segments - direct to home (DTH), electricity, gas, water and telecom.
15. Science & Technology Minister Harsh Vardhan launched National Centre for Clean Coal Research and Development (NCCCR&D) at Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru.
  1. NCCCR&D is a national consortium on clean coal research and development led by IISc, partnered by IIT- Kharagpur, Madras, Guwahati, Bombay and Hyderabad.
  2. Consortium will identify gaps in clean coal technology, as major problem being faced by Indian power plants is high level of pollutants and low thermal efficiency.
16. ISRO signed a set of MOUs with Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) for development of human centric systems for the Human Space Mission to demonstrate its human space flight capabilities.
  1. Some of critical technologies to be provided by DRDO to ISRO include space food, space crew health monitoring and emergency survival kit, radiation measurement and protection, parachutes for safe recovery of crew module and others.
17. DRDO's all-weather beyond-visual-range air-to-air Astra missile successfully tested from a Sukhoi Su-30MKI combat aircraft, with range of over 70 kilometres.
18. Ministry of Home Affairs notified new rules for NGOs receiving foreign funding, in which all staff members of NGOs receiving foreign funds, will have to declare that they were not prosecuted or convicted for converting anyone from one faith to another.
  1. Ministry also notifified a change in Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act 2010 and Rules 2011 (FCRA), which states that Any individual receiving a personal gift valued up to Rs 1 lakh need not inform government about it anymore (earlier 25000).
19. Sep 17, 2019 is observed as first World Patient Safety Day by World Health Organisation (WHO). 2019 theme is Patient Safety: a global health priority.

Sep 16, 2019

Belgian International Badminton Title 2019 -

India's Lakshya Sen defeated second seed Victor Svendsen of Denmark and clinched the men’s singles title.
Winners -

Category	Winner
Men’s Singles	Lakshya Sen (India)
Women’s Singles	Line Christophersen (Denmark)
Men’s Doubles	Ben Lane & Sean Vendy (England)
Women’s Doubles	Gabriela Stoeva & Stefani Stoeva (Bulgaria)
Mixed Doubles	Ben Lane & Jessica Pugh (England)

Vietnam Open 2019 Badminton Title Winners -

India's Sourabh Verma won Men's Singles Title, defeating Sun Fei Xiang of China.

Category	Winner
Men’s Singles	Sourabh Verma (India). He defeated Sun Fei Xiang of China.
Women’s Singles	Zhang Yi Man (China)
Men’s Doubles	Choi SolGyu & Seo Seung Jae (South Korea)
Women’s Doubles	Della Destiara Haris & Rizki Amelia Pradipta (Indonesia)
Mixed Doubles	Guo Xin Wa & Zhang Shu Xian (China)

IPS officer Chhaya Sharma who led investigation of the 2012 Nirbhaya gangrape was selected for the 2019 Asia Society Game Changers Award along with six others by Asia Society.
Arcadia Education Project in South Kanarchor of Bangladesh won prestigious Aga Khan Architecture Award 2019 in Kajan (Russia). Project is about construction of a floating school in an area which is underwater during monsoon for welfare of marginalised children.
Myanmar International Series Badminton 2019 (Myanmar's First International Badminton series) -
1. Men’s singles - Kaushal Dharmamer (India). He defeated Indonesia's Karono Karono.
2. Women’s singles - Sri Fatmawati (Indonesia)
3. Men’s doubles - Emanuel Randhy Febrito (Indonesia) & Ferdian Mahardika Ranialdy (Indonesia)
4. Women’s doubles - Liu Chiao-Yun (Chinese Taipei) & Wang Yu Qiao (Chinese Taipei)
Noted music director Usha Khanna has been awarded Maharashtra government’s Lata Mangeshkar Award 2019-20. The award was instituted in 1993 and consists of Rs 5,00,000 cash.
Arunachal Pradesh CM Pema Khandu inaugurated 24 MW (Megawatt ) Dikshi Hydroelectric Project on Phudungto river at Dikshi village in West Kameng district, as State’s first community-managed mini-hydro electric project and also first independent power project of its kind in Northeast.
DRDO executed first-ever successful arrested landing of Light Combat Aircraft(LCA) Tejas (Navy) at test facility in Goa, as a step towards aircraft getting operational on aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya.
Anurag Kashyap Directed Gangs Of Wasseypur became only Indian film to feature in “The Guardian” list of 100 Best Films of 21st century, bagging 59th position.
Sep 16 - UN International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone Layer. 2019 Theme is 32 Years and Healing. It celebrates over three decades of remarkable international cooperation to protect ozone layer and climate under Montreal Protocol. Montreal Protocol has led to phase-out of 99 % of ozone-depleting chemicals.
Government signed an Allotment Agreement with West Bengal Power Development Corporation Limited (WBPDCL) regarding Deocha Pachami Dewanganj-Harinsingha coal block, with estimated reserves of 2102 Million Tonnes for generation of power.
Minister of Commerce & Industry and Railways, Piyush Goyal informed about Export Credit Insurance Scheme (ECIS) called Nirvik, which was announced recently by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman as part of measures to boost exports.
1. To facilitate banks further, Ministry of Commerce & Industry has enhanced Insurance cover for Banks up to 90% for working capital loans (from 60 % currently) and moderation in premium incidence for MSME sector. Enhanced cover will ensure that Foreign and Rupee export credit interest rates will be below 4% and 8% respectively for exporters.
2. Scope of cover has been enlarged to cover not only principal outstanding but also for unpaid Interest. Cover percentage has been enhanced to 90% from the present average of 60% for both Principal and Interest.
3. ECIS support shall be in force for 5-years and on conclusion, standard ECGC covers will be available for Banks with its regular features.
4. For accounts with limits below Rs.80 crore the premium rates will be moderated to 0.60 per annum and for those exceeding Rs.80 crore, it will be 0.72 per annum for the same enhanced cover.
Minister of Commerce & Industry and Railways, Piyush Goyal launched Steel Import Monitoring System (SIMS) in New Delhi, developed on pattern of US Steel Import Monitoring and Analysis (SIMA) system. SIMS will provide advance information about steel imports to Government and stake holders, to have effective policy interventions.
Minister of Commerce & Industry and Railways, Piyush Goyal launched Common Digital Platform for Issuance of electronic Certificates of Origin (CoO), as a single access point for all exporters and all agencies concerned. Authorities of partner countries will be able to verify authenticity of certificates from website.
First trilateral exercise of Singapore, Thailand and Indian Navies called SITMEX, commenced at Port Blair (Andaman and Nicobar Islands).
Human Resource Development Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ launched Leadership for Academicians Programme (LEAP) 2019 and Annual Refresher Programme in Teaching (ARPIT) 2019 under Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya National Mission on Teachers and Teaching (PMMMNMTT).
1. To build managerial capabilities of higher education leaders, a National Initiative “Leadership for Academicians Programme (LEAP)” was launched. LEAP is a 3 weeks leadership development training programme (2 weeks domestic and 1 week foreign training) for second level academic functionaries in public funded higher education institutions. LEAP is being implemented through 15 institutions.
2. HRD Ministry launched Annual Refresher Programme in Teaching (ARPIT) in November 2018, as a unique initiative for professional development of 1.5 million higher education faculty using MOOCs platform SWAYAM. For implementing ARPIT, 51 discipline-specific National Resource Centers (NRCs) are identified which are tasked to prepare online training material.
Indian Billiards Player Pankaj Advani won his 22nd IBSF world title by wining IBSF World Billiards Championship 2019 in Mandalay (Myanmar). He defeated Nay Thway Oo of Myanmar.
Spain won its 2nd FIBA basketball World Cup title after defeating Argentina, in Beijing (China). Ricky Rubio (Spain) was named Most Valuable Player of competition.
Mayank Vaid became first Indian to complete Enduroman triathlon in record time. Enduroman triathlon is one of toughest endurance competitions around world, that starts in London and ends in Paris. Mayank Vaid is first-ever Asian who completed the challenge with a world record. He broke previous world record by a big margin of 2 hours 6 minutes.
Survey of India (India’s National Survey and Mapping Organization under DST) will for first time rely on drones to map the country. Objective is to provide good high-resolution foundation maps. Also, High-resolution maps will facilitate digitisation of land titles in villages. It aims to procure about 300 drones for the purpose.

Sep 15, 2019
1. 28th edition of India-Thailand Coordinated Patrol (Indo-Thai CORPAT) between Indian Navy and Thailand Navy held at Bangkok (Thailand).
2. Sep 15 - International Day of Democracy. 2019 Theme is Participation.
3. Rajasthan government launched ‘Jan Soochna Portal’, a portal for quick access to information on government departments. This public information portal has been developed with 23-24 types of information made available pertaining to 13 departments on a single platform.
4. RBI panel headed by RBI Deputy Governor mahesh kumar jain suggested creating an institution like the GST (Goods and Services Tax ) Council to implement reforms in agricultural sector. It also made several other recommendations Including -
  1. Banks are required to develop a management information system (MIS) to sanction loans against gold as collateral in core banking solution (CBS) platform for better monitoring of end-use of funds.
  2. Banks should increase credit supply for agricultural activities and give consumption loans to farmers up to Rs 1 lakh.
  3. Without any intermediaries, limit of 3 lakh for waiving collateral security by the banks in case of tie-up arrangements should be revisited to Rs 5 lakh under existing KCC (Kisan Credit Card ) norms.
5. Exercise codenamed ‘HimVijay’ will be carrid out by India in October 2019 in Arunachal Pradesh, close to borders with China. Indian Armed Forces plan to deploy their latest American weapons systems such as M777 ultra-light howitzers and Chinook heavy-lift helicopters.
6. Uttarakhand Govt. launched a scheme called ‘Mukhya Mantri Dal Poshit Yojana’ to provide state ration card holders two kilograms of two different varieties of pulses available at prices much lower than the market rate.
  1. Under the scheme, State government will offer a subsidy of Rs.15 per kilogram on variety of pulses identified, including chana, malka and masur. Each eligible beneficiary and ration card holders in state will get 2 kgs of pulses at subsidised rates every month.
7. Sep 15 - Engineer's Day in India. It commemorates Mokshagundam Vishweshvaraya (popularly known as Sir MV). In 1955, he was conferred India's highest honour, Bharat Ratna. 15 September is celebrated as Engineer's Day in India, Sri Lanka and Tanzania in his memory.
  1. He was chief engineer responsible for the construction of Krishna Raja Sagara dam in North-West suburb of Mysuru city and chief engineer of flood protection system for city of Hyderabad.
  2. Vinod Kumar Yadav, Railway Board Chairman was presented with Eminent Engineers Award on this occasion. Theme of 52ndEngineers’ Day was “Engineering for change”.
  3. However, Telangana state celebrates Engineers day on July 11th on birthday of Ali Nawaz Jung Bahadur.
8. IIT Madras researchers devised an eco-friendly method to degrade physically stable and chemically inert plastic fluoropolymer — polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE), which is used in making Teflon.
9. Government appointed Justice Meenakshi Madan Rai as acting Chief Justice of Sikkim high court.
10. Book Rethinking Good Governance written by former Comptroller Auditor General (CAG) Vinod Rai has been released.
11. Indian Under 19 Cricket Team won ACC Under-19 Asia Cup 2019 by beating Bangladesh, in Sri Lanka.
12. National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has rationalized merchant discount rate (MDR) on transactions with RuPay debit cards, effective from 20 October 2019. MDR has been revised to 0.60 % on transactions above Rs 2000, with maximum of 150 per transaction. Currently, MDR of 0.90 % is charged on transactions above 2000, with maximum limit of 1000 per transaction.
13. International Energy Agency (IEA) stated that US became top oil exporter in world by overtaking Saudi Arabia and Russia. In June 2019, crude exports grew above 3 million barrels per day (bpd) in US.
14. Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (Meity) framed panel headed by Infosys co-founder Kris Gopalakrishnan to study issues related to non-personal data and suggest ways to regulate non-personal data.
15. Finance and corporate affairs Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced several measures to boost economic growth. Rs 70,000 crore package for the exports and real estate sectors was announced, including setting up of a stressed asset fund.
  1. Scheme for Remission of Duties or Taxes on Export Product (RoDTEP) will replace Merchandise Exports from India Scheme (MEIS). It will come into effect from January 1, 2020. RODTEP will more than adequately incentivize exporters than existing schemes put together. Revenue government will forego on scheme is projected at Rs 50,000 crores.
  2. Fully electronic refund module (FORM GSAT RFD-01) for quick and automated refund of Input Tax Credits (ITC) in Goods and Service Tax (GST) will monitor and speed up ITC refunds.
  3. Export Credit Guarantee Corporation (ECGC) will expand the scope of Export Credit Insurance Scheme (ECIS). It will offer higher insurance cover to banks lending working capital for exports. This will enable reduction in overall cost of export credit including interest rates, especially to MSMEs.
  4. Revised Priority Sector Lending (PSL) norms for Export Credit will release an additional Rs. 36,000 crores to Rs 68,000 crores as export credit under priority sector.
  5. A mega shopping festival similar to the world-famous Dubai Shopping Festival, will be conducted at 4 places in India in March 2020 on themes of gems and jewellery, handicraft/yoga/tourism, textiles and leather.
  6. FTA Utilisation Mission will be set up to work with Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO) and export houses and to utilise concessional tariffs in each FTA.
  7. Goods and Services Tax Network stated that all new dealers will have to mandatorily make Aadhaar verification or physical verification from January 1, 2020. This is aimed at checking malpractices in GST. Earlier, it was optional for the dealers.
  8. An Online “Origin Management System” for exporters to enable them to obtain Certificates of Origin – CoO (under Rules of Origin) will be launched by Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) in collaboration with Exports Inspection Council (EIC).
  9. Housing -
    1. External Commercial Borrowing guidelines will be relaxed to facilitate financing of home buyers who are eligible under Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY) in consultation with RBI.
    2. Government servants contribute to a major component of demand for houses. This will encourage more government servants to buy new houses.
    3. Special Window to provide last mile funding for housing projects which are non- NPA (Non Performing Assets) and non-National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) Projects and are Net worth positive in affordable and middle income category to be set up. Objective is to focus on construction of unfinished units.
    4. Stress fund of Rs 20,000 crore for real estate will provide last-mile funding for housing projects that are not in bankruptcy court or already tagged as bad debt and will benefit nearly 8.5 lakh home buyers. 10000 crores to be contributed by Govt.
Sep 14, 2019
1. 12-day 14th Conference of Parties (COP14) to UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) held at India Expo Centre & Mart, Greater Noida (UP). Theme of conference is Restore land, Sustain future.
  1. India took over COP Presidency from China for upto 2021.
  2. PM Narendra Modi has announced that the central government will spend 3.5 lakh crore rupees in the next five years on 'Jal Jeevan Mission' to deliver potable water at every household across the country. He also raised India’s target for restoring degraded land from its earlier target of 21 million hectares (MH) to 26 million hectares (MH) by 2030.
  3. A Drought Toolbox was launched during the event, as one-stop shop for all actions on drought. It is a kind of knowledge bank that may be used by vulnerable countries, such as India, to reduce drought risk and be better prepared and effectively respond to it.
  4. Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar announced that India has set target to restore 50 lakh hectare of its degraded land by 2030.
2. Report on 2nd edition of perception-based index of mobility of goods and efficiency, the Logistics Ease Across Different States (LEADS) index -
  1. List is topped by Gujarat, followed by Punjab and Andhra Pradesh, while among UTs, Chandigarh topped the list followed by Delhi and Puducherry.
  2. Index is developed by commerce and industry ministry along with the company Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Ltd (Deloitte).
  3. It aims To establish performance of logistics sector based on user and stakeholder perception.
3. P Lakshmana Reddy appointed as first Lokayukta of Andhra Pradesh.
4. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) will translate and publish an anthology of writings of Baba Guru Nanak Dev (founder of Sikhism) in world languages to commemorate his 550th birth anniversary.
5. RBI has cut risk weight of consumer credit, including personal loans from 125 % to 100 %, enabling banks to give more loans for purchasing various consumer products. This will reduce the cost of banks on personal loans, consumer loans and they can reduce the interest rates for them. For all loans considered unsecured, till now there was a provision to keep a risk weight of at least 125 %.
6. RBI framed new guidelines in licensing Small Finance Banks(SFB) under ‘On-tap’ regime, to bring more participants in finance banking. As per the new guideline -
  1. SFBs should have 200 crores minimum capital (doubled from 100 Crores), except for such small finance banks which are converted from Urban Co-operative Banks (UCBs). UCB’s should initially have at 100 crores, and should be enanced to 200 crores within 5 years. Proposed CAR is to be maintained at 15% (up from 9%).
  2. On- tap licencing is a time-efficient feature that will allow eligible parties to obtain license on-demand basis and without the need to wait. RBI allows license to the applicants throughout year.
  3. SFBs will be listed within 3 years of reaching a net worth of Rs 500 crores.
  4. Small private entities, payment banks, NBFCs, Micro Finance Institution(MFI) and cooperative banks to apply for SFB status having run successfully for 5 years.
  5. Only small private entities can apply for SFB and no large industrial and public sector entities will be allowed to become SFB. Business groups, autonomous bodies, joint venture companies and promoters of universal banks will also not be allowed to become SFB.
  6. 10 SFBs were given licence initially in 2015. They were Ujjivan, Janalakshmi, ESAF, Equitas, Au Financiers, Capital Local Area, Disha, RGVN, Suryoday and Utkarsh.
7. RBI stated that a bank’s exposure to a single NBFC (excluding gold loan companies) will be restricted to 20 % of that bank’s eligible capital base. RBI had earlier spoken about harmonisation of single counterparty exposure limit for banks’ exposure to single NBFCs with general single counterparty exposure limit.
  1. Under revised guidelines on large exposure framework (LEF) effective from April 2019, a bank’s exposure to a single NBFC is restricted to 15 % of its Tier I capital, while for entities in other sectors exposure limit is 20 % of Tier I capital of bank, which can be extended to 25%.
8. United Nations appointed former Indian Army Lieutenant General Abhijit Guha to lead UN mission in port city of Hodeida, Yemen. Guha will also hold act as Chairman of Redeployment Coordination Committee (RCC) that is tasked with deploying forces of the Yemeni warring parties in accordance with their agreement.
9. Haryana Government raised the income limit to Rs 1.8 lakh per annum in order to claim benefits under Ayushman Bharat- Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY) scheme. Haryana government will bear cost for free treatment of families with annual income up to Rs 1.8 lakh.
10. Government formed a Standing Committee for Information Technology comprising of 31 Members of Parliament (MP), with Congress MP Shashi Tharoor as Chairperson of committee.
11. Haryana Government appointed cricket legend Kapil Dev as first Chancellor of Haryana's first Sports University in Rai (Sonepat).
12. Sep 14 is observed as Hindi Diwas. On the occasion, International Hindi Conference was organised by World Hindi Council in New Delhi. It commemorates adoption of Hindi written in Devanagari script as one of the two official languages of the Republic of India by Constituent Assembly of India, in 1949.
13. UP Government repealed four-decade-old law that made the state exchequer pay income tax of state’s Ministers. With this, the UP Ministers will now have to start paying their own income tax.
  1. UP Ministers' Salaries, Allowances and Miscellaneous Act 1981 was enacted when Vishwanath Pratap Singh was the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh.
Sep 13, 2019
1. 1st Conference on Military Medicine for Shanghai Co-operation Organisation (SCO) held in New Delhi, as 1st military co-operation event hosted by India under SCO Defence Co-operation Plan.
2. Vietnam inaugurated Southeast Asia’s largest solar power farm which has capacity to produce 688 million kWh of electricity annually, named Dau Tieng Solar Power Complex.
3. India’s ‘Yogi of the Racetrack’ won ‘Best Video’ award for the Asia & Pacific Region in the UNWTO Tourism Video Competition 2019. Its a short promotional film on Yoga, which was produced by Union Ministry of Tourism. It was announced during 23rd session of UN World Tourism Organization’s (UNWTO) General Assembly 2019 in Saint Petersburg (Russia).
4. National Green Tribunal (NGT) has set up a committee to formulate steps required to prevent illegal extraction of groundwater, after a plea filed against depleting groundwater levels in nation and prevention of its illegal extraction.
5. Brief Stand-off occured between Indian and Chinese border troops near Pangong Tso lake in eastern Ladakh. The confrontation began on northern bank of 134-km-long Pangong Tso, two-thirds (nearly 66%) of which is controlled by China as it extends into Tibet.
  1. Patrolling Indian troops were confronted by People’s Liberation Army (China) soldiers, who objected to their presence near Pangong Tso. This led to a scuffle between two sides.
6. Indian Railways signed MOU with Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) for facilitation of green initiatives in Indian Railways, aimed at mitigation of global warming and combating climate change.
7. Thailand and Indian Navies held 28th cycle of Indo-Thailand Coordinated Patrol (INDO-THAI CORPAT), at Phuket (Thailand).
8. Government stated that export of all varieties of onions shall be permitted only on Letter of Credit (LC) subject to minimum export price (MEP) of US $ 850 per Metric Ton, aimed at curbing Onion exports amid price rise.
9. Minister for Communications, Electronics & Information Technology and Law & Justice Ravi Shankar Prasad has launched the maritime communication services at Mumbai. It will enable high-end support to personnel in sea by providing access to Voice, Data and Video services while traveling on sailing vessels, cruise liners, ships in India, using satellite technology.
  1. Nelco is first Indian company to provide quality broadband services to maritime sector.
  2. December 2018, Government announced licenses for In-flight and Maritime Communications (IFMC) that allows voice and internet services while flying over the Indian skies and sailing in Indian waters.
  3. Shri Prasad also launched a web portal for reporting of stolen mobiles for tracing purposes, using International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) numbers of a mobile phone device.
10. Railways announced certain Freight incentives to give a boost to economy.
  1. Busy season surcharge of 15 % on freight, which is levied between 1st of October to 30th June has been deferred.
  2. 5 % Supplementary charges applicable on loading on mini and two-point rakes has also been waived off.
  3. Discount of 25 % in haulage charge of containers has been given.
  4. Railways also reduced fares for Humsafar class of luxury trains, to make them more affordable and comfortable. These trains will now also have sleper class coaches to make travel more affordable.
Sep 12, 2019
1. Sep 12 - UN International Day for South South Cooperation.
2. Karnataka Bank Chief Mahabaleshwara MS has been inducted to managing committee of Indian Banks’ Association (IBA).
3. State Bank of India will sell stake in its life insurance arm to meet minimum public shareholding norms. SBI will sell at least 3.5 % stake in SBI Life Insurance Company Ltd., with an option of oversubscription of 1 percent.
4. Haryana government launched two insurance schemes for registered small and medium traders -
  1. Mukhyamantri Vyapari Samuhik Niji Durghatna Beema Yojana - Insurance cover of Rs 5 lakh would be provided.
  2. Mukhyamantri Vyapari Kshatipurti Beema Yojana - Insurance cover between 5 - 25 lakh would be provided.
  3. Premium under both schemes would be paid by State government.
5. Navdeep Singh Suri, India’s envoy to United Arab Emirates, has been honoured with the First Class Order of Zayed II award. He was awarded by UAE President Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan for his contribution to strengthening friendly relations.
6. Thailand became first Asian nation to unveil plain cigarette packaging to reduce appeal of smoking, compliing with World Health Organisation’s (WHO) guidelines.
7. PM Narendra Modi launched several developmental projects and schemes in Ranchi (Capital of Jharkhand)
  1. He launched Pradhan Mantri Kisan Maan Dhan Yojana. It shall secure lives of 5 Crore Small and Marginal Farmers by providing a minimum pension of Rs 3000 per month, after attaining 60 years of age. Scheme has outlay of 10,774 Crores for 3 years (2019-2022).
  2. He launched National Pension Scheme for Traders and The Self-Employed. It aims at providing a minimum assured pension of Rs 3000, to small traders and self - employed after attaining the age of 60 Years. Around 3 Crore Small traders would be benefitted from the scheme.
    1. It is for traders with annual turnover not exceeding Rs 1.5 crores.
    2. Enrollment is available through 3.50 lakh Common Service Center (CSCs) across country. People can also self-enroll through portal www.maandhan.in/vyapari.
    3. Should be within 18 to 40 years of age group. GSTIN is required only for those with turnover above Rs. 40 lakhs.
    4. Central Government shall give 50 % share of the monthly contribution and remaining 50% contribution shall be made by the beneficiary. Beneficiary is required to contribute as little as INR 100 per month at a median entry age of 29 years.
    5. Estimated 3 crore Vyaparis are expected to be benefitted under this scheme.
  3. He launched 462 Ekalavya Model Schools across the country in Tribal Dominated Areas. The schools would focus to provide quality upper primary, secondary and senior secondary level education to ST Students in these areas.
  4. He inaugurated Multi-Modal Transport Terminal at Sahibganj.
    1. It is India’s second riverine Multi-Modal terminal (MMT), which will open up industries of Jharkhand and Bihar to global market and provide Indo-Nepal cargo connectivity through waterways route.
    2. This is second of the three Multi-Modal Terminals being constructed on river Ganga under Jal Marg Vikas Project.
8. Contract for modernisation of Air Defence Complex Kashmir and Radar Fregat MAE on P-15 (Delhi Class) of ships signed between India and JSC Rosoboronexport, Russian Federation.
9. India become a member of Global Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) Research and Development (R&D) Hub, which now has 16 member nations.
  1. It was launched in May 2018 on sidelines of 71st session of the World Health Assembly. The hub supports global priority setting and evidence-based decision-making on allocation of resources for antimicrobial resistance research and development.
10. 6th Track Asia Cup cycling competition 2019 held in New Delhi -
  1. India topped tally with 10 gold, 8 silver and 7 bronze. India was followed by Uzbekistan and Malaysia.
11. World Bank Group's International Finance Corporation (IFC) and Finance Industry Development Council (representative body of asset and loan Financing NBFCs) signed MoU to train NBFCs in India on “Commercial Credit Reporting”. It wiill train NBFCs to build their capacity to improve reporting and enquiring on Commercial Credit Information Data from Credit Bureaus.
12. India’s first of its kind survey to measure iodized salt coverage conducted by Nutrition International in collaboration with AIIMS and Indian Coalition for Control of Iodine Deficiency Disorders (ICCIDD) -
  1. Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) has topped the list of best performers in iodised salt coverage, followed by Nagaland and Manipur.
  2. TamilNadu was reported to be lowest iodised salt consuming state in country.
  3. Gujarat is top salt producer, producing 71% of nation’s salt, followed by Rajasthan (17%) and Tamil Nadu(11%).
13. Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) commissioned 1320 MegaWatt(MW) power project in Ib Thermal Power Station(ITPS) in Odisha’s Jharsuguda district.
14. Astronomers found water for first time in atmosphere of habitable exoplanet- K2-18b which orbits in its star’s “habitable zone”. Upto 50% of atmosphere of K2-18b consists of water, which could support life. Scientists found unmistakable signature of water vapour with concentrations between 0.1 and 50%.
  1. K2-18b is 111 light-years away from earth. It is first known exoplanet to combine a rocky surface and an atmosphere with water out of discovered 4000 plus exoplanets. K2-18b was initially discovered in December 2015 & spotted by NASA’s Kepler spacecraft.
15. China launched three satellites ( a resource satellite- ZY-1 02D and two small satellites), to help in disaster management, urban construction and monitoring of polar regions and global climate change.
16. DRDO handed over 2nd indigenously developed AWACS (Airborne Early Warning and Control) aircraft, ‘Netra’ to the Indian Air Force(IAF).
17. ONGC signed MoU with Assam state government to invest more than Rs. 13,000 crore in the next 5 years to excavate over 220 oil and gas wells in Assam.
18. According to report in Lancet journal, India is ranked fourth in Global Malaria Cases in 2017, with 4% of cases worldwide behind African countries Nigeria, DR Congo and Mozambique.
19. Times Higher Education World University Ranking 2020 -
  1. Indian Universities -
    1. 11 Indian institutes fatured among top 500 in world, up from 5 last year. IIT Ropar is the new Indian entrant in the list.
    2. No Indian institute featured among the top 300 educational institutes in world.
    3. Top 5 Indian Universities in List - IISc Bengaluru (301 - 350), IIT Ropar (301 - 350), IIT Indore (351 - 400) IIT Bombay and IIT Delhi (401 - 500)
  2. Top 5 Global Universities -
    1. University of Oxford (UK), ranked at top for 4th consecutive year.
    2. California Institute of Technology (US)
    3. University of Cambridge (UK)
    4. Stanford University (US)
    5. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (US)
Sep 11, 2019
1. PM Narendra Modi launched National Animal Disease Control programme and Artificial Insemination Programme in Mathura (UP).
  1. NADC Programme aims at eradicating Foot and Mouth Disease and Brucellosis in livestock. It aims at vaccinating over 500 Million Livestock against Foot and Mouth Disease with 100 % funding from Central Government of 12652 crores till 2024.
  2. PM also launched Swachhata Hi Seva (SHS) 2019 campaign at Mathura, with special focus on ‘plastic waste awareness and management’. It will be organized till October 2nd 2019, aiming to made India Open defecation free by 150th birth anniversary of MK Gandhi.
    1. 2019 Swachhata Hi Seva campaign will see mass awareness generation activities on plastic waste management nationwide for plastic waste collection on 2nd October and recycling and effective disposal of collected plastic waste from 3rd October to 27th October 2019.
2. New York-based media watchdog Committee to Protect Journalists released 10 Most Censored Countries list, that have high press censorship -
  1. List was topped by East African countryEritrea that had shut all media in 2001 and has only 1% of population in internet penetration.
  2. Top 5 - Eritrea, North Korea, Turkmenistan, Saudi Arabia, China.
3. Scientists from Biological science Survey of India (BSI) discovered 2 new species of ginger. Zingiber prenense has been discovered from Peren district of Nagaland and Zingiber dimapurense was found within Dimapur in Nagaland.
4. Andhra Pradesh (AP) government appointed P Lakshmana Reddy as state’s Lokayukta for five years.
5. National Institute of Technical Teachers Training and Research (NITTTR) and Swiss power major ABB India signed MoU to set up a digital simulation lab in Chandigarh, to impart better training quality for the large scale industralisation of the country.
6. England Former cricketers Geoffrey Boycott and Andrew Strauss have been honoured with “Knighthoods” by Former PM Theresa May in her resignation honours list.
7. 4th World Energy Congress commenceed in Abu Dhabi (UAE Capital), to bring together international energy stakeholders. UAE also hosted 8th Asian Ministerial Energy Roundtable (AMER8) alongside 24th World Energy Congress in Abu Dhabi India is co-host along with UAE, represented by Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.
8. Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports (MYAS) derecognised Paralympic Committee of India (PCI) for violating National Sports Development Code of India, 2011.
  1. Govt. letter addressed to Secretary-General of Paralympic Committee of India mentioned that a complaint was received against PCI from Rao Inderjit Singh regarding his removal from President’s post of PCI. Therefore, an explanation was sought from PCI. However, explanation was not found satisfactory and action was taken.
  2. PCI earlier adopted a resolution that barred public servants from getting elected to its executive. Thereby, Rao Inderjit Singh was removed as President.
9. Indian Air Force (IAF) resurrected Air Force Station (AFS) Ambala-based Number 17 Squadron, also known as ‘Golden Arrows’, which will operate 1st squadron of Rafale fighter jets. First batch of Rafale jets are scheduled to be formally handed over to Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on 8 October in France and are set to arrive in India in May 2020.
10. Minister of State for Health and Family Welfare Aswini Kumar Choubey, announced that government will set up a National Genomic Grid, to advance cancer research and make treatment viable for people of different economic classes. It will be in line with National Cancer Tissue Biobank (NCTB) set up at IIT Madras.
11. Govt appointed P.K .Mishra as Principal Secretary to Prime Minister and P.K. Sinha as Principal Advisor to Prime Minister.
12. DRDO successfully flight tested indigenously developed low weight, fire and forget Man Portable Antitank Guided Missile (MPATGM) in ranges of Kurnool, Andhra Pradesh.
13. Government e Marketplace (GeM) and Government of Punjab signed MoUto set up a GeM Organizational Transformation Team (GOTT)Project Management Unit (PMU) in state.
  1. Punjab is first State to establish GOTT PMU for effectively utilising this transformational initiative towards efficient procurement, enabling Punjab to transact 1700 crores as annual Gross Merchandize Value (GMV) on GeM platform in first year and 3000 crores per annum over time.
14. Ministry of skills development and entrepreneurship partnered with Tata Group to set up an Indian Institute of Skills (IIS) in Mumbai. TISS will invest around 300 crores in the project. IIS will be developed on a public-private-partnership (PPP) model.
  1. Fresh batch of newest central government services, Indian Skill Development Services(ISDS) also commenced their training program at Administrative Training Institute (ATI) in Mysuru, Karnataka. These are first batch to join ISDS cadre from Indian Engineering Service Examination conducted by UPSC.
15. Alternative investment firm Blackstone Group (US based) will acquire 50% stake in Indiabulls Real Estate Ltd's office assets for Rs 4,420 crore ($616 million).
  1. Blackstone will buy Indian company's stake in their joint ventures - Indiabulls Properties Pvt. Ltd and Indiabulls Real Estate Company Pvt. Ltd, Yashita Buildcon Ltd and Ashkit Properties Ltd.
  2. Blackstone last year bought a 50% stake in two units of Indiabulls Real Estate.
16. UK won bid to host 26th Conference of the Parties, known as COP26, to be held in 2020.
  1. 2019 United Nations Climate Change Conference, also known as COP25, will held in Santiago de Chile (Chile) in December 2019.
17. South Korean tech Firm Samsung unveiled two apps namely “Good Vibes” a communication tool for deaf and blind people and “Relumino” that helps visually impaired people to see the images clearer.
18. University of Southern California (USC) scientists discovered new reptile species Cryo Drakon boreas from the Azhdarchid group of pterosaurs, which is also called as “frozen dragon of the north”. These species with a wingspan of up to 10 mts and weight of about 250kg were once, one among largest flying animals that lived 77 million years ago during Cretaceous period.
19. Geographical Indication Registry of India approved Geographical Indication tag for delicious ‘Srivilliputtur palkova’, from Virudhunagar district. It is prepared from high quality flavour of milk with sugar.
20. UNESCO Conferred winners of Literacy Prizes 2019, on International Literacy Day - Sep 9, 2019. Winners -
  1. UNESCO King Sejong Literacy Prize awards for mother-tongue literacy education and training, sponsored by South Korea
    1. National Strategy for Multilingual Literacy programme of Algeria’s National Adult Literacy and Education Office.
    2. Senegal’s Textile Fibres and Development Company (SODEFITEX) for its vocational training for farmers in southern Senegal.
  2. UNESCO Confucius Prize for Literacy (Supported by China)
    1. Obras Escuela programme of Camacol Antioquia, Colombian construction industry’s professional organization.
    2. BASAbali Wiki programme of Indonesia’s BASAbali group.
    3. TELL ME - Theatre for Education and Literacy Learning of Migrants in Europe programme.
Sep 10, 2019
1. Visits from India (Sep 1 - 10, 2019) -
  1. Minister of State (MoS) for Commerce and Industry Hardeep Singh Puri participated in 84th Thessaloniki International Fair (TIF) in Greece.
  2. 7th Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) ministerial meeting of 10 members of ASEAN countries and their six FTA (free trade agreement) partners held in Bangkok (Thailand). 7th East Asia Economic Ministers Summit and 16th ASEAN India Economic Ministers (AEM) meeting were also held. Minister of Commerce & Industry and Railways, Piyush Goyal represented India.
  3. Defence Minister Rajnath Singh Visited Japan and South Korea.
    1. Two agreements were signed with South Korea to further defence educational exchanges and extend logistical support to each other’s Navies.
    2. He attended India-Japan Defence Ministerial meeting in Tokyo.
  4. Prime Minister Narendra Modi Visited Russia -
    1. He attended Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok.
    2. PM Modi while addressing Plenary Session of 5th EEF announced LoC worth $1 billion for the development of the Far East region of Russia. This is first-ever region-specific LoC extended by India in a foreign country.
    3. Collaboration aims to expand bilateral trade to $30 billion by 2025.
    4. MOUs -
      1. Joint Statement "Reaching New Heights of Cooperation through Trust and Partnership”.
      2. Joint Strategy for Enhancement of India- Russia Trade and Investments.
      3. Cooperation in production of spare parts for Russian/Soviet military equipment.
      4. Cooperation in Audiovisual Co-production.
      5. Cooperation in road transport and road industry.
      6. Development of Maritime Communications between Port of Chennai, and Vladivostok.
      7. Cooperation for combating customs violations in 2019-2022.
      8. Cooperaton in use of Natural Gas for Transportation.
      9. Cooperate in coking coal mining projects implementation in Russian Far East.
      10. MOU between NOVATEK and PETRONET LNG Limited for development of downstream LNG Business and LNG supplies.
      11. Agreement on Cooperation between Joint-Stock Company Rosgeologia and Srei Infrastructure Finance Limited.
  5. Minister of Railways and Commerce and Industry, Piyush Goyal attended 16th AEM-India Consultations in Bangkok (Thailand). It was attended by Economic Ministers from 10 ASEAN Member States and India.
2. General Events / Conferences (Sep 1 - 10, 2019) -
  1. 22nd edition of India International Seafood Show (IISS) hosted in Kochi (Kerala).
  2. First National Conference on Cyber Crime Investigation and Cyber Forensics held at Central Bureau of Investigation HQ in New Delhi.
  3. Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport gets India’s tallest ATC tower (102 metres height) to enhance safety and boost efficiency of air transport management services.
  4. 3rd India-Australia Cyber Policy Dialogue 2019 held in New Delhi.
  5. Cultural event ‘Namaste Pacific’ held in Neew Delhi, to showcase in India the culture of Pacific countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and Fiji.
  6. 5th edition of Aqua Aquaria India 2019 held at Hitex International Convention & Exhibition Centre, Hyderabad (Telangana) with theme “To take Blue Revolution to India’s hinterland”.
  7. 22nd Session of United Nations Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) held in Geneva (Switzerland). Indian delegation was headed by Shakuntala D. Gamlin, Secretary (DEPwD).
  8. 4th South Asian Speakers’ summit on achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) held in Malé, Maldives.
  9. Hisar, Haryana entered civil aviation map after launch of Spicejet air shuttle service between Hisar and Chandigarh.
  10. 6th India-China Strategic Economic Dialogue (SED) Held in New Delhi. China delegation was led by He Lifeng, chairman of National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).
  11. Khadi and Village Industries Commission (KVIC) launched first ever ‘Terracotta Grinder’ at Sewapuri in Varanasi, Uttar Preadesh. This machine will grind the wasted and broken pottery items for re-using in pottery-making.
  12. National Youth Summit organized in New Delhi, organised by Youth Awakening Mission, a youth wing of Paavan Chintan Dhara Charitable Trust, Ghaziabad.
  13. International conference ANGAN (Augmenting Nature by Green Affordable New-habitat) focussed on Energy Efficiency in Building Sector Held in New Delhi.
  14. 68th Plenary session of North Eastern Council (NEC) held in Guwahati (Assam). During the session, Home Minister Amit Shah asserted that Article 371, which provides special provisions for North Eastern states, will not be tampered with.
  15. A fun zone, the first of its kind in India, has been set up by the Railways at the Visakhapatnam Railway Station, Andhra Pradesh.
  16. Joint India- New Development Bank workshop held in New Delhi. NDB is the first Multilateral Development Bank established by developing countries and emerging economies - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
  17. Ministry of Civil Aviation organised India’s first-ever helicopter summit in Dehradun.
3. Visits to India (Sep 1 - 10, 2019) -
  1. International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) Secretary General Jürgen Stock Visited India.
  2. French president's diplomatic advisor Emmanuel Bonne Visited India.
  3. Australian Minister for Resources and Northern Australia Senator, Matthew Canavan Visited India.
4. Kerala will set up India’s first International Women’s Trade Centre (iTC) in Kozhikode to boost women entrepreneurship and secure gender parity, as an important Gender Park.
5. Credit rating agency India Ratings & Research (Ind-Ra) downgraded growth forecast for Non-Banking Financial Companies (NBFC) to 10-12% from previous estimate of 15% due to slowdown in economic activity.
6. Niti Aayog selected McKinsey & Company to set up India’s first Digital Capability Centre (DCC) in New Delhi. McKinsey & Company supports 5 such centres globally- in Aachen, Chicago, Singapore, Venice and Beijing.
7. President’s secretariat announced recipients of Visitor’s award 2019.
  1. These Awards were constituted in 2014 to create healthy competition among central universities, are provided under four categories. Cash prize of Rs 2.5 Lakh is associated with the award.
  2. Awardees -
    1. Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences - Sibnath Deb (Pondicherry University)
    2. Physical Sciences - Prof. Sanjay (Jawaharlal Nehru University Delhi)
    3. Biological Sciences - Asad Ullah Khan (Aligarh Muslim University) AND Dr Partima (Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi)
    4. Technology Development - Shaon Ray Chaudhuri (Tripura University)
8. Author Vikram Sampath’s New book”Savarkar: Echoes from a forgotten past, 1883-1924" has been released.
9. Telangana Govt. presented annual budget for 2019-20 of 146492 Crores. Expected revenue surplus is 6,564 crores and the fiscal deficit is 27,749 crores.
10. Sep 10 - World Suicide Prevention Day (WSPD).
11. Pharmaceutical company Cipla Chairman Yusuf Hamied has been inducted as an honorary fellow of Royal Society in UK, for his service to the cause of science. Total 51 new Fellows and 10 foreign members were elected to Royal Society in 2019.
12. Government constituted a 3-member committee to oversee the bifurcation of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) into two union territories and look into distribution of assets and liabilities of J&K between two UTs that will come into existence on October 31. Committee will be chaired by Sanjay Mitra (former defence secretary).
13. Agriculture & Farmers Welfare Ministry launched a multilingual Mobile App called ‘CHC Farm Machinery’ for the farmers during a conference on National Conference on Crop residue Management held in New Delhi. With help of the app, farmers can now get affordable access to cutting-edge technology at their doorsteps.
14. PM Narendra Modi inaugurated South Asia’s first cross-border petroleum products pipeline from Motihari in India to Amlekhgunj in Nepal through video conference. 69-km Motihari-Amlekhgunj pipeline, having a capacity of 2 million metric ton per annum, will provide cleaner petroleum products at affordable cost to Nepal. Nepal PM KP Sharma Oli announced to reduce price of petroleum products by 2 per litre.
15. India Meteorological Department(IMD) has released a report titled ‘Mid-Monsoon 2019 Lightning’, as a first of its kind report in India about lighting incidents and lighting hotspots. In last 4 Months, Odisha had more lightning strikes than any other state, followed by Maharashtra and Karnataka.
16. United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) released the first ever Digital Economy Report (DER) titled “Digital Economy Report 2019 – Value Creation and Capture: Implications for developing countries”. DER was formerly known as Information Economy Report.
  1. Global Internet Protocol (IP) traffic has grown from about 100 gigabytes (GB) per day in 1992 to more than 45000 GB per second in 2017. By 2022, global IP traffic is projected to reach 150,700 GB per second.
  2. Estimates of size of digital economy range from 4.5% to 15.5% of the world’s GDP.
  3. Regarding value added in information and communications technology (ICT) sector, US and China account for 40% of world’s total.
  4. India has largest share among developing countries in computer services industry. Also, India ranked fourth in terms of growth in the share of the ICT sector’s value-added in GDP between 2010 and 2017.
  5. In “Share of ICT services in total exports of services: Top 20 countries, 2017”, India ranked 2ndwhich is topped by Ireland.
  6. Google has nearly 90% of market for Internet searches. Facebook accounts for two-thirds of global social media market.
  7. Global value of e-commerce is estimated by UNCTAD to have reached $29 trillion in 2017, which is equivalent to 36% of GDP.
  8. 3 largest producers of telecommunication services are China, India and Brazil.
17. Panel headed by Harsh Vardhan, for development of housing finance securitisation market submitted its report to RBI. It was set up in May 2019.
  1. Panel suggested that National Housing Bank (NHB) should create an intermediary for standard-setting and market-making for instruments. Intermediary could operate either directly through NHB, Indian Mortgage Guarantee Corporation (IMGC), or RBI could set up a new organisation.
  2. New entity will have 51% ownership by government through NHB initially. Government ownership would be reduced to 26% over 5 years.
  3. It will start with Rs 500 crore initial capital and would be allowed to invest in each pool it securitizes to extent of 5% of pool, or 5% of its own capital base, whichever is lower.
  4. Securitisation is needed to widen pool of resources available to Housing Finance Companies (HFCs). Except for top 5 HFCs, which account for over 85% of loans, remaining HFCs are dependent on bank loans and refinancing from NHB. There are over 90 HFCs registered with NHB.
18. India has been declared free from H5N1 avian influenza (commonly known as bird flu) by OIE (Office International des Epizooties)-World Organisation for Animal Health. H5N1 is non contagious but has a mortality rate of 60%, when infected.
Sep 9, 2019
1. India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) launched Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (AePS) Services, becoming single largest platform in country for providing interoperable banking services to customers of any bank, including 34 crore Jan Dhan account holders.
  1. AEPS enables anyone with a bank account linked to Aadhaar to carry out basic banking services, irrespective of bank they hold their account with.
  2. To avail these services, a customer with an Aadhaar linked account can authenticate his identity with fingerprint scan & Aadhaar authentication to complete a transaction.
2. Co-living index 2019 titled Insights on Co-living – An Asia-Pacific Perspective across Asia-Pacific region was released by London based consultancy agency Knight Frank.
  1. Mumbai ranked at the 5th spot, New Delhi ranked at 11thspot and Bengaluru 19th.
  2. Index was topped by Beijing (China), followed by Tokyo(Japan) and Shanghai(China).
3. Vikram Nath has been appointed as Chief Justice of Gujarat High Court.
4. Govt. approved INR 12000 crores capital infusion in 3 state-run general insurance companies, to boost their capital base and meet regulatory norms. Companies include National Insurance, Oriental Insurance and United India Insurance.
5. 76th Venice International Film Festival held at Venice Lido in Venice (Italy). It was 76th edition of the world’s oldest film festival. Winners -
  1. GOLDEN LION for Best Film to: ‘Joker’ directed by Todd Phillips
  2. SILVER LION- Grand Jury Prize to: ‘An Officer and a Spy’ by Roman Polanski
  3. SILVER LION- Award For Best Director to: Roy Andersson for ‘About Endlessness’
  4. VOLPI CUP For Best Actress: Ariane Ascaride in ‘Gloria Mundi’ (a French domestic drama)
  5. VOLPI CUP For Best Actor: Luca Marinelli in ‘Martin Eden’
6. India announced humanitarian assistance of $1 million to help people in Bahamas affected by Hurricane Dorian, the extremely powerful and destructive Category 5 hurricane.
  1. Also, Typhoon Faxai has hit Japan Capital Tokyo, causing woinds upto 216 kilometres per hour.
7. Book ‘Fortune Turners: The Quartet That Spun India To Glory’, written by Aditya Bhushan and Sachin Bajaj has been released. Its about India's 4 spin legends - Bishan Singh Bedi, Erapalli Prasanna, Bhagwat Chandrashekhar and S. Venkataraghavan.
8. India Red beat India Green to win Duleep Trophy Cricket title, at Bengaluru.
9. Noted Odia poet Pradeep Dash selected for 40th edition of 2019 Sarala Puraskar award for his poetry work Charu Chibar O Charjya. This award is foremost literary honour in Odisha, comprises of cash prize of Rs 5 lakh. Apart from Pradeep, Pandit Harmohan Khuntia and Lalat Mohan Patnaik will also be honoured, with Ila Panda Sangeet Samman’ and Ila Panda Chitrakala Samman respectively.
10. Uttarakhand Govt observed Sep 9 as Himalaya Day, being observed since 2010.
11. 2019 US Open Tennis Winners (New York City) -
  1. Men's Singles - Rafael Nadal (Spain). He defeated Daniil Medvedev (Russia). It was 19th Grand Slam title for Nadal, and his 4th US Open.
  2. Women's Singles - Bianca Andreescu (Canada). She defeated Serena Williams (US). It was her 1st Grand slam title.
  3. Men's Doubles - Colombia's Juan Sebastián Cabal AND Robert Farah
  4. Women's Doubles - Elise Mertens (Belgium) AND Aryna Sabalenka (Belarus)
  5. Mixed Doubles - Bethanie Mattek-Sands (US) and Jamie Murray (UK)
  6. Boys' Singles - Jonáš Forejtek (Czech Republic)
  7. Girls' Singles - María Camila Osorio Serrano (Colombia)
  8. India's Sumit Nagal and Prajnesh Gunneswaran participated in US Open 2019.

Sep 8, 2019

Sep 8 is observed as UN International Literacy Day, proclaimned by UNESCO in 1966. 2019 theme is “Literacy and Multilingualism”.
PM Narendra Modi will launch a new initiative in National disease management Programme for Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) and Brucellosis. Under this, Govt. will allocate 13500 crores to control livestock diseases.
Women and Child Development and Textiles Minister Smriti Irani notified that Sex Ratio at Birth (SRB) increased by 13 points nationally since implementation of Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao (BBBP) programme from 918 in 2014-15 to 931 in 2018-19. Kameng District of Arunachal Pradesh has registered a sharp improvement in SRB from 807 in 2014-15 to 1039 in 2018-19.
1. This varies from second Health Index Report released by NITI Aayog in June 2019 which showed decline in SRB in 12 out of 21 states between 2013-15 and 2014-16.
2. Reason for variance - Data compiled by ministry was drawn from the Health Management Information System (HMIS) updated by Anganwadi and Asha workers, which considers home deliveries and births in government institutions only. It lacks information from private hospitals.
RBI will develop a mobile phone-based application for visually impaired people to identify currency notes, along with Daffodil Software Pvt Ltd.
Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved $ 200 million loan to upgrade about 2,100 kilometers of rural roads to all-weather standards in Maharashtra’s 34 districts for better connecting rural areas with markets and services.
Press Trust of India (PTI), India’s premier news agency, appointed Vijay Kumar Chopra & Vineet Jain as its Chairman and Vice Chairman respectively.
Govt. announced that 2 new Union Territories- Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh will have a common high court. 108 Central Laws would be applicable for UTs of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh. 164 state laws would be repealed and 166 state laws will continue to be applicable.
Prakash Javadekar (Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change) presented report card on 100 days of Government Government, also releasing booklet ‘Jan Connect’ and inaugurates Exhibition on ‘Furthering India’s Development - 100 days of Bold Initiatives & Decisive Actions’.

Ferrari Racer Charles Leclerc (Monaco) won Italian F1 Grand Prix 2019 -

Formula 1 Season 2019 -

Round	Grand Prix	Winner	date
1	Australian Grand Prix	Valtteri Bottas (Finland)	17 March
2	Bahrain Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	31 March
3	Chinese Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	14 April
4	Azerbaijan Grand Prix	Valtteri Bottas (Finland)	28 April
5	Spanish Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	12 May
6	Monaco Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	26 May
7	Canadian Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	9 June
8	French Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	23 June
9	Austrian Grand Prix	Max Verstappen (Belgian-Dutch)	30 June
10	British Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	14 July
11	German Grand Prix	Max Verstappen (Belgian-Dutch)	28 July
12	Hungarian Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	4 August
13	Belgian Grand Prix	Charles Leclerc (Monaco)	1 September
14	Italian Grand Prix	Charles Leclerc (Monaco)	8 September
15	Singapore Grand Prix		22 September
16	Russian Grand Prix		29 September
17	Japanese Grand Prix		13 October
18	Mexican Grand Prix		27 October
19	United States Grand Prix		3 November
20	Brazilian Grand Prix		17 November
21	Abu Dhabi Grand Prix		1 December

Sep 7, 2019
1. Government approved procurement of 6 squadrons of indigenous Akash Air Defense missile for the Air Force at a cost of Rs 5,000 crores, taking number of Akash missile systems approved for Air Force to 15.
2. 9th edition of joint naval exercise between India and Srilanka(SL) named SLINEX 2019 began at Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh.
3. United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) conducted 2019 UNICEF South Asian Parliamentarian conference on Children Rights Convention in Colombo (Sri Lanka), to celebrate 30th anniversary of the adoption of convention of the rights of children.
4. RBI barred Equitas Small Finance Bank (ESFB) from opening new, after ESFB missed deadline to list its shares on stock exchanges. RBI also froze salary of ESFB’s MD and CEO Vasudevan PN.
  1. As per RBI’s licensing conditions issued in November 2014, a small finance bank’s shares have to be mandatorily listed on the stock exchanges within 3 years of touching a net worth of Rs 500 crores. 3-year period of ESFB lapsed on September 4, 2019.
5. Sep 1 to 7 - Observed as National Nutrition Week (NNW), to educate people about the importance of their health and well-being. It was launched by Food and Nutrition Board in 1982. Govt. had earlier announced to observe September 2019 as Poshan Maah.
6. Minister of food processing industries Harsimrat Kaur Badal inaugurated first Mega Food Park of Telangana, promoted by Smart Agro Food Park at Lakkampally village, Nizamabad.
7. Indian Space Research Organisation announced that it lost contact with Moon lander "Vikram" which was scheduled to land on the moon between 1.30 a.m. and 2.30 a.m. (IST) of Sep 06, 2019.
  1. Further, roll out of rover "Pragyan" was scheduled between 5.30 a.m and 6.30 a.m.
  2. Lander "Vikram" started its descent at about 1.38 a.m. from an altitude of 30 km at a velocity of 1,680 metres per second, but lost its communication with the Chandrayaan-2 Orbiter when it was at an altitude of 2.1 Km from Moon's surface.
  3. Although, Chandrayaan-2 orbiter continues to fly around the moon. Its mission life is of one year.
  4. ISRO had launched Chandrayaan-2 (on July 22, 2019) India's heavy lift rocket Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle-Mark III (GSLV Mk III). It comprised three segments: the Orbiter, lander 'Vikram' and rover 'Pragyan'.
  5. ISRO Later spotted Vikram Lander on Lunar surface but no connection could be set up with it as yet.
8. Indian Air Force is organising an ultra-marathon named as ‘Kargil to Kohima (K2K): Glory Run’ spanning over 4,500 km from Kargil to Kohima. It commemorates 20 years of ‘Kargil Vijay Diwas’ (named after successful Operation Vijay).
  1. Kohima and Kargil are two forward most outposts of India in east and north where two of the most fierce battles of modern India were fought in 1944 and 1999, respectively.
9. National Green Tribunal (NGT) directed government to prepare a time-bound action plan within two months for protection of Great Indian Bustard, in response to a plea that said 75% of birds have died due to collision with power lines in past 30 years.
10. Finance Ministry constituted a task force headed by Secretary of Department of Economic Affairs (DEA) Atanu Chakraborty for drawing up National Infrastructure Pipeline of Rs 100 lakh crore ($1.4 trillion) from 2019-20 to 2024-25.
  1. National Infrastructure Pipeline will include greenfield and brownfield projects costing above 100 crores. It enables robust marketing of pipeline of projects requiring private investment through India Investment Grid and National Investment & Infrastructure Fund (NIIF).
11. PM Narendra Modi inaugurated first Metro Coach in Mumbai under ‘Make in India’ initiative at Jio World Centre in Mumbai. He also launched 19000 crore worth metro projects and laid foundation stone of 3 Metro lines to be operational from 2031.
  1. Metro coach was made by Bharat Earth Movers in a record time of 75 days with design speed 90 kmph and operational speed 80 kmph.
Sep 6, 2019
1. National Conference on ‘India-Africa Partnership in a Changing Global Order: Priorities, Prospects and Challenges’ held in New Delhi. It was organized by Indian Council of World Affairs (ICWA).
2. 4th Indian Ocean Conference 2019 held in Male (Maldives), attended by External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on India's Behalf. Theme was: ‘Securing Indian Ocean Region: Traditional and Non-Traditional Challenges’.
3. President Ram Nath Kovind presented award to Indian Railways as best ministry for implementation of Swachhata action plan for 2018-19. Award for best Swachh iconic Place was given to Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CST) Mumbai and Mata Vaishno Devi Shrine (J & K).
  1. 3 best stations as per Cleanliness Ranking Survey for 2018 - Jodhpur, Jaipur & Tirupati were also awarded.
  2. Swachhta Pakhwada Award was given to Department of Defence.
4. Asia's first 5th Generation - Virtual Reality based Advanced Driver Training Simulator Centre launched at the Automobile Association of Southern India Centre (AASI) in Chennai.
5. Standard Chartered Bank, a British multinational banking and financial services company launched a DigiSmart credit card, with focus on ever-growing segment of millennials.
6. An Event Horizon Telescope Team consisting of 347 scientists who produced the world’s first image of a black hole were felicitated with Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics, known as “Oscars of science”. Award carries monetary prize of $3 million.
7. New book, “Phoolpur: Indian Flowers, Their Myths, Traditions and Usage” written by Jhelum Biswas Bose has been released.
8. Reliance Jio Infocom commercially launched its fiber-based wired broadband service called JioFiber, which offers a bundle of services such as high-speed internet, landline phone and High Definition (HD) television. It offers minimum internet speed of 100 Mbps and goes upto 1 GBPS.
Sep 5, 2019
1. Sep 5 - National Teachers' Day in India. It commemorates Birth anniversary of Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, who was first Vice President and second President of India. On this occasion, President Ram Nath Kovind presented National Award to 46 Teachers from across nation.
2. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization(UNESCO) partnered with Rajasthan state government to further enhance music, art and craft forms, and other intangible cultural heritage of the state. UNESCO with an NGO, Contact Base will build a special tourist circuit in Jodhpur, Bikaner, Barmer and Jaisalmer for around three-and-a-half years, including 10 cultutal hubs.
3. RBI asked banks to link all new floating-rate loans (home, auto loans & and micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME)) to external benchmark like repo rate from October 1, 2019. With this, benefit of the reduction in policy interest rates will reach consumers relatively fast & all kinds of loans will get cheaper.
4. According to Government Data, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into India grew by 28% to $16.33 billion in the first quarter (Q1)- April-June 2019-20, compared to $12.75 billion in Same Quarter Last year. Singapore emerged largest source of FDI in India during Q1 2019-20 with $5.33 billion investment, followed by Mauritius ($4.67 billion) and US ($1.45 billion).
5. Gujarat Government and Delaware State of America signed sister state MoU, to promote co-operation in developmetal activities.
6. HRD Ministry awarded Institute of Eminence status to 5 public institutions - IIT Madras IIT Kharagpur Delhi University Banaras Hindu University University of Hyderabad. Each of these will sign MoU with HRD Ministry and will lay out its plan to achieve the objective of becoming a world-class institution. Thwy will then be eligible for a grant of 1000 crores.
7. Microsoft and Central Board of Secondary Education partnered to build AI learning for schools, by conducting capacity building programmes for high school teachers with an aim to integrate cloud-powered technology in teaching.
8. Multi Commodity Exchange of India (MCX) and China's Zhengzhou Commodity Exchange (ZCE) signed MoU for co-operation and exchange of information.
9. US's Federal Trade Commission fined Google's YouTube with $170 million, to settle allegations of collecting personal information about children.
10. IT Firm Wipro received strategic contract valued at $300 million from ICICI Bank, to offer comprehensive suite of services to ICICI Bank for 7 years.
11. According to World Gold Council -
  1. India surpassed Netherlands to move into the list of top10 countries in terms of total gold reserves, with 618.2 tonnes gold reserves.
  2. U.S. leads with gold reserves of 8,133.5 tonnes followed by Germany with 3,366.8 tonnes.
12. Former Pakistani Cricketer Misbah-ul-Haq has been appointed as head coach and chief selector of Pakistan's cricket team. Waqar Younis will join as new bowling coach.
13. Sep 5 - UN International Day of Charity. It was declared in 2012 and commemorates anniversary of passing away of Mother Teresa (on Sep 5, 1997).
14. Minister of State for Culture and Tourism (IC), Prahlad Singh Patel flagged off Leh’s 1st ever Mobile Science Exhibition (SCIENCE EXPLORER) of National Council of Science Museums (NCSM) for entire Ladakh Region.
  1. National launch of 25 new Mobile Science Exhibition buses for Aspirational Districts of India was done, to create a scientific awareness among rural children. Buses will travel to schools in Aspirational Districts through out year.
15. MSME Minister Nitin Gadkari launched updated Credit linked Capital Subsidy Scheme (CLCSS) to allow micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) to access capital, during workshop on ‘Credit Linked Capital Subsidy and Delayed Payment of MSMEs’ held at New Delhi.
  1. Credit linked Capital Subsidy Scheme provides 15% subsidy for additional investment up to Rrs.1cr. for technology upgradation by MSMEs in the specified 51 sub-sectors. Now in relaunched scheme, there is an additional 10% subsidy to SC-ST entrepreneurs while special provisions have been made for 117 ‘aspirational’ districts, northeastern region and hill states.
16. Coffee Table Book Glorious Diaspora- Pride of India on Pravasi Bharatiya Samman awardees has been released by Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu, brought out by Indian Diaspora Club.
17. Vatican awarded Bangladesh’s Nobel Laureate Prof Muhammad Yunus prestigious ‘Lamp of Peace of Saint Francis ‘ award for his contribution towards establishing peace and harmony.
  1. Muhammad Yunus was awarded Nobel Peace Prize (2008) for founding Grameen Bank and pioneering concepts of microcredit and microfinance.
18. According to Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Index (TTCI) 2019 released by World Economic Forum(WEF) -
  1. India ranked at 34th spot, improvement by 6 places from 2017 report (40th rank).
  2. Top 4 - Spain (1), France (2) Germany (3) Japan (4th)
  3. Yemen ranked last in the index at 140th position.
Sep 4, 2019
1. Global Liveability Index by Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) -
  1. Delhi ranked at 118th placed, dropping 6 places from last year. Mumbai ranked 119th.
  2. List topped by Vienna (Austria) for 2nd consecutive year. Russia’s St. Petersburg topped list among BRICS nations at 71st spot.
  3. Damascus (Syria) named least liveable city at 140th position.
  4. Top 3 -
    1. Vienna (Austria)
    2. Melbourne (Australia)
    3. Sydney(Australia)
2. IIT Delhi and IIT Kharagpur are selected by Department of Science and Technology (DST) to establish a shared science and technology infrastructure facility named Sophisticated Analytical and Technical Help Institute (SATHI), with 125 Crores assistance over 3 years.
  1. Centre will provide services to meet demands of industry, start-ups and academia which will be accessible to them and to manufacturing units and research & development labs.
3. Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India has set up panel headed by NIACL CMD Atul Sahai, to review its three-year old guidelines on trade credit insurance due to the changing market requirements.
  1. Trade credit Insurance is a risk management product given to business entities by export credit agencies to protect them from loss due to credit risks.
4. RBI taskforce on secondary market for corporate loans, headed by Canara Bank Chairman TN Manoharan submitted its report. Recommendations Include -
  1. Proposed to setting up of a Self-Regulatory Body for standardization of corporate loan documents.
  2. Favoured to set up Central Loan Contract Registry and online loan sales platform, to conduct auctions and sale of secondary market loans.
  3. It called to ease regulations to enable foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) to directly purchase distressed loans from banks.
  4. Proposes to allow wider participation of non-banking firms such as mutual funds, insurance companies, and pension funds in trading securities, to develop secondary market.
5. Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs(CCEA) approved revision of price of ethanol (ethyl alcohol) for sugar season 2019-20 derived from various raw materials under Ethanol Blended Petrol (EBP) programme.
  1. Ethanol from C type heavy molasses has been increased to Rs.43.75/litre from Rs.43.46/litre.
  2. Ethanol from B type heavy molasses has been increased to Rs.54.27/litre from Rs.52.43/litre.
  3. Ethanol price from sugarcane juice/sugar/sugar syrup are to be fixed at Rs.59.48/litre.
  4. EBP availability programme is extended across india except Andaman Nicobar and Lakshadweep islands with effect from 1st April 2019, sold by OMCs blended 10% with petrol.
6. Delhi Govt. will include Other Backward Class (OBC) and General category students in its ‘Jai Bheem Mukhyamantri Yojana’ which was initially meant for Scheduled Caste (SC) category students who were provided financial assistance of Rs 40000 (now hiked to 100000) for coaching for various competitive exams.
7. Haryana govt waived interest and penalty of Rs 4,750 crore on crop loans taken from cooperative banks, Primary Agriculture Cooperative Societies (PACS), District Cooperative Central Banks (DCCB), Land Mortgage Bank (LMB) and Haryana Land Reforms and Development Bank. It will benefit around 10 lakh farmers of state.
8. Income Tax Department announced that it will automatically issue PAN to all taxpayers who do not have a Permanent Account Number and are using Aadhaar for filing income tax returns (ITR).
9. Indian Army team from Mahar Regiment summited Mount Leo Pargyil (6773M), third highest peak of Himachal Pradesh.
10. Ministry of Information & Broadcasting has published ‘Loktantra Ke Swar (Khand 2)’ and ‘The Republican Ethic (Volume 2), to promote and disseminate selected speeches of President of India Shri Ram Nath Kovind.
11. Nehru Yuva Kendra Sangathan under Department of Youth Affairs will prepare Block Level Disaster Response Teams, in collaboration with National Disaster Response Force. trained NYKS Youth Volunteers will work as DRTs and will be called as ‘NDRF- friends’.
12. Health ministry proposed legislation titled The Health Care Service Personnel and Clinical Establishments (Prohibition of Violence and Damage to Property) Bill 2019, To address issue of violence faced by doctors and the damages caused to clinical establishments. It will provision jail term of upto 10 years.
13. Government will invest 25000 crores in different areas of fisheries sector in next 5 years, to help accomplish goals of ambitious Blue Revolution (Fisheries) project. Govt aims to double aquaculture productivity from 3 million to 6 million tonnes, and double seafood exports in 5 years.
14. Panel led by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman will study proposal of Ministry of Health, Government of India(GoI) to ban production and import of electronic cigarettes /electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS), through an ordinance.

Sep 3, 2019

Election Commission hosted 4th General Assembly of Association of World Election Bodies (A-WEB) at Bengaluru. India's Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora took over as A-WEB’s Chair for 2019-21 term.
ICICI Bank become 1st bank in India to deploy industrial ‘robotic arms’ to count millions of notes in currency chests across country, with 14 machines deployed in 12 cities that can count 6 million notes in a day.
India will contribute $22 million to Global Fund for AIDS, TB and Malaria (GFATM) for the 6th replenishment cycle (2020-22), with 10% jump from US$ 20 million contributed in 5th cycle. So far, India has contributed US$ 46.5 million.
Government approved a capital infusion of Rs 9,300 crore in Troubled IDBI Bank. Government (49% stake) will give Rs 4,557 crore, while 4,743 crore will be given by LIC (51% stake).
1. After LIC acquired controlling 51% stake in IDBI Bank in January 2019, RBI placed IDBI Bank in category of private sector bank.
Indian Air Force (IAF) received 8 US-made Boeing Apache AH-64E fighter helicopters at Airforce Station in Pathankot (Punjab). In September 2015, IAF had signed contract with Boeing for purchasing 22 AH-64E Apache helicopters. Boeing delivered first 4 out of 22 helicopters in July 2019.
Book “First They Erased Our Name: A Rohingya Speaks” by journalist Sophie Ansel (France) has been released in India.
Harvest festival of odisha Nuakhai Juhar has been celebrated (appears one day after Ganesh Chathurthi).
1st ASEAN-US Maritime Exercise (AUMX) between Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and US started in Thailand. It will see participation of all 10 members of ASEAN (Thailand, Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam) and US.
Memorandum of Agreement signed between Employees’ State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) and State Bank of India (SBI), in which, SBI would provide e-payment services directly to bank accounts of all ESIC beneficiaries and payees without any manual intervention as an integrated and automated process.
Auto Maker Ashok Leyland become 1st Indian original equipment manufacturer (OEM) to meet the Bharat Stage (BS ) VI emission standards for all its heavy-duty trucks with a gross vehicle weight of 16.2 tonnes and above.
World Bank(WB) approved funding Uttar Pradesh government's ‘pro-poor tourism’ (PPT) development projects with funding worth more than $57 million.

ISSF World Cup 2019 (4th Leg - Rio de Janeiro (Brazil)) (Rifle / Pistol) -

India Ranked at top. Indian Medalists -

Sl No	Event	Winners	Medal
1	Mixed 10m air pistol	Manu Bhaker & Saurabh Chaudhary	Gold
2	Women’s 10m air rifle	Elavenil Valarivan	Gold
3	Men’s 10m Air Pistol	Abhishek Verma	Gold
4	Women’s 10m air pistol	Yashaswini Singh Deswal	Gold
5	Mixed 10M Air Rifle	Apurvi Chandela & Deepak Kumar	Gold
6	Men’s 50m rifle	Sanjeev Rajput	Silver
7	Mixed 10m air pistol	Yashaswini Deswal & Abhishek Verma	Silver
8	Men’s 10m Air Pistol	Saurabh Chaudhary	Bronze
9	Mixed 10m air pistol	Anjum Moudgil & Divyansh Singh Panwar	Bronze

In Previous 3 Legs of ISSF World Cup in New Delhi, Beijing and Munich, India had won 11 Gold and 2 Silver Medals.
India is at top with total 22 Medals - 3 in Leg 1 in New Delhi, 4 in Leg 2 in Bejing, 6 in Leg 3 in Munich and 9 in Leg 4 in Rio De Janeiro.
Location for Final is to be decided.

Medal Tally -

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	India	16	4	2	22
2	China	8	13	15	36
3	United States	5	4	1	10
4	Russia	4	5	3	12
5	Hungary	4	1	1	6

Sep 2, 2019
1. Oleksiy Honcharuk has been appointed as new Prime Minister of Ukraine.
2. IIT Kharagpur partnered with e-commerce giant Amazon’s subsidiary, Amazon Web Services (AWS) in developing National Artificial Intelligence Resource Portal (NAIRP) to develop and promote Artificial Intelligence (AI) learning for all AI learners and Practitioners.
3. Book “India’s Lost Frontier the Story of the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan” written by Raghvendra Singh has been released.
4. NBFC ECL Finance and Central Bank of India (CBI) signed agreement for priority sector lending to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME).
  1. ECL Finance also tied up with State Bank of India for priority sector lending (PSL) to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME).
5. Government appointed Harish Chandra Mishra as Acting Chief Justice of Jharkhand High Court (HC), succeeding Justice Prashant Kumar who passed away recently.
6. Auto major Mahindra and Mahindra will acquire up to 55% stake in radio taxi firm Meru Cabs, by a fresh issue of shares worth up to 103 crores.
7. Bangladesh signed agreement with India's Reliance Power, to set up a 750 MW gas-based power plant in Meghnahat near Dhaka, by 2022.
8. Russia will train four Indian astronauts for India’s ambitious manned mission to space, Gaganyaan. Under Gaganyaan Mission, ISRO has outlined a road map to put a three-man crew in a low earth orbit for 5-7 days by December 2021.
9. PM Narendra Modi will be honoured with Global Goalkeeper Award by US's Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for his work in the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
10. Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu launched India’s longest electrified rail tunnel between Cherlopalli and Rapuru in Andhra Prades, built at cost of Rs. 437 crore and has 44 trolley refuges and 14 cross-passages in a horseshoe design. New Australian Tunneling Method (NATM) was used to construct it. Its total length is 6.3km.
11. 72nd Session of WHO Regional Committee for South-East Asia Held in New Delhi, with participation from 11 countries.
  1. Government is observing September as “Poshan Maah” (Nutrition Month) to sensitize the public towards healthy lifetyle.
  2. India will contribute USD 2,00,000 for WHO South-East Asia region's heath emergency fund meant for rapid response towards both natural disasters and human-generated hazards.
  3. WHO South-East Asia Region also resolved to eliminate measles and rubella by 2023.
12. Rajasthan government has launched a new health insurance scheme called Ayushman Bharat-Mahatma Gandhi Rajasthan Swasthya Bima Yojna (AB-MGRSBY) by integrating Bhamashah Health Insurance Scheme(BSBY) of the State Government and Ayushman Bharat- Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojna of Central Government. Around 1.1 crore families will be covered under this Health Scheme, with cover of 3 lakhs.
13. Steering Committee on Fintech related issues (headed by economic affairs secy Atanu Chakraborty) submitted its Final Report to Finance MinisterNirmala Sitharaman.
  1. Committee recommended that RBI may consider development of a cash-flow based financing for MSMEs, development of an open-API MSME stack based on TReDS data validated by GSTN and a trusted e-invoice infrastructure designed around TREDS-GSTN integration.
  2. Committee recommends modernisation of land records by setting up a dedicated National Digital Land Records Mission based on a common National Land Records Standards.

Sep 1, 2019

Election Commission launched Electors Verification Programme (EVP) across nation, to authenticate voter details and ensure an error-free electoral roll. It was launched at all levels including around 1 million polling stations by BLOs/EROs and will continue till October 15, 2019.
1. Voters can authenticate details by logging on to NVSP portal (www.nvsp.in) or Voter Helpline App or Common Service Centres. Details will be verified by block-level officers, by 36 CEOs at state headquarters level, by 740 district electoral officers at district level and by BLOs and electoral registration officers in around one million polling stations.
Google and Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) launched ‘Build for Digital India’ programme for engineering students, to enable engineering students to develop market-ready tech solutions that address key social problems.
India will explore deep sea region with the 'Samudrayaan' project, to be completed by 2021-22, under National Institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT). It is part of INR 6000 crore 'Deep Ocean’ mission. Under this, 3 men will be sent into deep sea in a submersible vehicle to a depth of about 6000 metres to carry out various deep underwater studies.
West Bengal Assembly passed (Prevention of Lynching) Bill 2019, which aims to protect the constitutional rights of vulnerable persons and prevent incidents of lynching. It provides three years of imprisonment and life imprisonment for the crime of assault and injuring a victim.
India Under-15 team Football team defeated Nepal to win SAFF (South Asian Football Federation) U-15 Championship 2019 in Kalyani Stadium (West Bengal).
Vivek Kumar Johri appointed as Director General (DG) of BSF (Border Security Force).
Automatic Exchange of Information (AEOI) Regime between Switzerland and India began from September 1, 2019. Under this, India will start receiving information on all financial accounts held by Indian residents in Switzerland, for 2018. It is highly significant step in government’s fight against black money.
Indonesia announced moving its current capital from Jakarta to sparsely populated East Kalimantan (on Borneo island). Reasons for shifting Includes earlier capital Jakarta being densely populated and several aress of it being submersed into sea at a slow pace. The relocatoion will cost approx $ 33 Billion.
Gross GST revenue collected in August 2019 was 98202 crores ( CGST - 17733 crores, SGST - 24239crores, IGST - 48958crores and Cess 7273 crores).
As per Global Happiness Survey by market research firm Ipsos -
1. India is ranked 9th with 77% on happiness index among 28 global markets, with 6% drop from 83% in 2018.
2. Top 5 - Australia and Canada (1st), China, Great Britain, France, US
According to Fitch Solutions Macro Research, India will overtake China as the largest importer of coking coal by 2025. India’s coking coal consumption will grow at an annual average rate of 5.4% between 2019 and 2028, driven by an equally robust expansion in steel production.

Ferrari Racer Charles Leclerc (Monaco) won Belgian F1 Grand Prix 2019 - -

Formula 1 Season 2019 -

Round	Grand Prix	Winner	date
1	Australian Grand Prix	Valtteri Bottas (Finland)	17 March
2	Bahrain Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	31 March
3	Chinese Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	14 April
4	Azerbaijan Grand Prix	Valtteri Bottas (Finland)	28 April
5	Spanish Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	12 May
6	Monaco Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	26 May
7	Canadian Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	9 June
8	French Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	23 June
9	Austrian Grand Prix	Max Verstappen (Belgian-Dutch)	30 June
10	British Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	14 July
11	German Grand Prix	Max Verstappen (Belgian-Dutch)	28 July
12	Hungarian Grand Prix	Lewis Hamilton (UK)	4 August
13	Belgian Grand Prix	Charles Leclerc (Monaco)	1 September
14	Italian Grand Prix		8 September
15	Singapore Grand Prix		22 September
16	Russian Grand Prix		29 September
17	Japanese Grand Prix		13 October
18	Mexican Grand Prix		27 October
19	United States Grand Prix		3 November
20	Brazilian Grand Prix		17 November
21	Abu Dhabi Grand Prix		1 December

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