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Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 7 April 2015

:: National ::

Muslim girl felicitated for winning Gita contest

Political parties are now scrambling to felicitate 12-year-old Mariyam Siddiqui, a Class 6 student who won the Bhagvad Gita contest organised by ISKCON International Society last month for 4,500 students.
Maharashtra Finance Minister Sudhir Mungantiwar felicitated Mariyam and her parents at a specially organised function at Vidhan Bhavan.
“A Muslim student winning a competition on a great scripture like the Gita is a praiseworthy achievement,” said Mr. Mungantiwar, who assured the girl’s family of all support in her educational career.
Mariyam, student of Cosmopolitan High School, received the first prize in an inter-school competition for explaining the teachings of the holy book. ISKCON International Society had organised the “Shrimad Bhagvad Gita Champion League” in which 195 schools including 105 private and 90 municipal schools participated.
Mariyam topped the written examination consisting of 100 questions, scoring 100 out of 100 marks. Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam said his party would felicitate Mariyam at the party headquarters on April 8.

Investment worth $5-8 b. to be discussed during PM’s France trip

Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s maiden visit to Europe, where his first stop is Paris, Indian and French officials are discussing a wide range of agreements spanning everything, from preserving heritage buildings to a space mission on Mars.
According to sources, among the agreements that are expected to be signed after the bilateral meetings between Mr. Modi and French President Francois Hollande are memoranda of understanding on space cooperation, tourism, anti-terror training between the National Security Guard and France’s GIGN special ops forces (National Gendarmerie Intervention Group) who were at the forefront during the Charlie Hebdo operations.
During his visit to Airbus headquarters in Toulouse, Mr. Modi is also expected to make a pitch for his ‘Make in India’ project to have more parts sourced from India, while President Hollande is pitching for India to join the climate change convention to be adopted at the COP21 conference in Paris in November.
France wants to commit to assist with about 10 per cent of India’s projected 100 gigawatt solar power planned capacity.
India and France also plan to work together on Mr. Modi’s recently concluded ‘Sagar’ initiative for 40 coastal surveillance radars where they will share scientific information to jointly help the islands of Seychelles, Mauritius, and Reunion.
Officials and businessmen on both sides will also discuss investment and manufacturing deals amounting between $5 billion and $ 8 billion to be finalised over the next five years, an official confirmed.
More than a 1,000 French companies operate in India, according to French Embassy trade figures, totalling an investment of $18 billion, growing at an average of €1 billion each year.
Prominent among the deals being negotiated is one for $500-million port infrastructure in Gujarat to be developed by the joint venture between the Adani group and France’s CMA CGM group.
However, officials close to the negotiations said they didn’t expect much headway on the two big deals that are being negotiated, the commercial contract for the 9,900 MWe Jaitapur nuclear power reactor project, as well as the $20 billion deal for 126 Rafale fighter aircraft to be bought by the Indian Air Force.
Both deals have been a cause for concern at successive bilateral meetings, and were discussed during French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius and Defence Minister Jean Yves Le Drian’s visits in the past year.
The nuclear deal for Jaitapur has been negotiated since 2010 between France’s Areva and the Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NPCIL). NPCIL officials have argued that the rate of Rs.9.18/unit is much higher than the Rs.6/unit they are willing to pay, while Areva officials have contended that the price is pushed up over the high cost of financing the project and the parameters of the European Pressurised Reactors (EPRs) that have higher safety standards.
The Prime Minister will visit France from April 9-12, where he will travel to Paris, Toulouse, and a memorial near Lille, before flying to Germany and Canada.

CPCB officials stress need for uniform air quality data (Register and Login to read Full News..)

:: International :

Pakistan, Sri Lanka ink n-deal

Pakistan and Sri Lanka signed six agreements including one on nuclear cooperation, two months after Sri Lanka inked an atomic deal with India.
The agreements were signed after Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had a meeting with visiting Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena.
According to an official statement, the two countries signed a Memorandum of Understating (MoU) “for cooperation between Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission and Atomic Energy Authority of Sri Lanka”.

Turkey blocks social media websites

Turkey blocked access to Twitter, Facebook and YouTube over the publication of images of a Turkish prosecutor killed by leftist militants last week.
Prosecutor Mehmet Selim Kiraz and his two captors linked to Marxist Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C) were killed after a shootout at a courthouse in Istanbul.

State of Palestine refugee camp ‘beyond inhumane’ (Register and Login to read Full News..)

:: Business and Economy ::

Dena Bank ties up with LIC

Dena Bank signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) of India under the Prime Minister’s Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJBY) scheme to provide insurance cover to all Aadhaar-linked savings account holders of the bank in the age group of 18 to 50 years.
“People who join the scheme before completing 50 years can continue to have the risk of life cover up to the age of 55 years. The scheme will come in effect from June 1, 2015,” said Dena Bank in a press release.
Under the scheme, a risk of Rs.2 lakh will be covered in case of death and a premium sum of Rs.330 per annum will be auto-debited to the account holder’s account. As per the terms of risk coverage, a person has to opt for the scheme every year.

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:: Science and Technology ::

Indian-origin schoolboy wins physics prize

Pratap Singh, 15, an Indian-origin schoolboy in the U.K has been awarded the Institute of Physics Prize for conducting an experiment that verified an effect of Albert Einstein’s theory of special relativity.
More than 200 UK students aged 11-18 competed in the finals, demonstrating their projects to thousands of visitors.

Upgraded interceptor missile test fails

The trial of a newly configured interceptor missile ended in failure. Within seconds of its lift-off at 11.45 a.m. from Wheeler island off the Odisha coast, the missile plunged into the Bay of Bengal without following its designated trajectory and interception of an electronic target missile.
The missile took off after the Mission Control Centre (MCC) gave command for its launch following detection of a simulated target missile by the radar but fell into the sea within three to four seconds, Defence Research and Defence Organisation (DRDO) scientists told.
They attributed the failure to malfunction in one of the sub-systems.

IIIT Delhi opens incubation centre (Register and Login to read Full News..)

:: Sports ::

Shukla made IPL boss again

Rajeev Shukla was re-appointed chairman of the Indian Premier League Governing Council, a post he held in 2013 before quitting following the spot fixing scandal.
Mr. Shukla, a senior member of the Board, was entrusted with the task keeping in mind the new regime’s policy to take everyone along.
In the recent Board elections, Mr. Shukla unsuccessfully contested for treasurer.
Notable inclusions in the GC are former Test captains Sourav Ganguly and Ravi Shastri, apart from Maharashtra Cricket Association president Ajay Shirke, who resigned as the Board’s treasurer in protest against former president N. Srinivasan.
The Madhya Pradesh Cricket Association president, Jyotiraditya Scindia, has been included as a special invitee.