Important Current Affairs 1st June 2018

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  • India improves its childhood index ranking
    • India has improved its ranking in the world childhood index but stays at a poor 113th position in the list of 175 countries indexed by global child rights group, Save the Children.
    • The report, titled “End of Childhood”, commends India’s achievements in reducing the rate of child marriages.
    • Nutrition, infant mortality and child labour remained issues of grave concern in India.

  • FIFA lifts suspension on Guatemala
    • FIFA lifted a suspension imposed on Guatemala over its failure to comply with anti-corruption rules.
    • The suspension prevented Guatemalan teams from participating in international competitions such as the Gold Cup, the Central American Games and the CONCACAF Champions League.
    • FIFA imposed ban on Guatemala in October 2016.

  • Manufacturing PMI growth slows in May
    • Activity in India’s manufacturing sector grew at a weaker pace in May according to the Nikkei India Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI).
    • This index is based on the survey conducted among purchasing executives in over 400 companies.
    • The report also mentioned that the latest upturn signalled a marginal improvement in the manufacturing sector.

  • Railways Organizes Workshop ‘Mission Raftar’
    • Ministry of Railways conducted a one day workshop “Mission Raftaar” aimed at raising the average speed of freight trains and coaching trains in New Delhi.
    • Issues such as punctuality, rolling stock, removing bottlenecks in terms of traffic, elimination of unmanned level crossings were discussed at the workshop.
    • Mission Raftaar’ aims at doubling the average speed of freight trains.

  • First IAF Commanders’ Conference inaugurated
    • The First biannual IAF Commanders’ Conference of 2018 was inaugurated today by Raksha Mantri Nirmala Sitharaman at Air Headquarters.
    • Commanders will discuss the operational, maintenance and administrative takeaways identified during the Exercise and the way ahead.
    • The commanders’ conference was also attended by Minister of State for Defence Subhash Bhamre and Defence Secretary Sanjay Mitra.

  • Home Minister launches Online Analytical Tool
    • Union Home Minister launched an Online Analytical Tool to facilitate closer monitoring of the flow and utilisation of foreign contributions received by various organisations.
    • This web-based tool enables decision-makers in various Departments of Government to scrutinise source of foreign funds and their actual use in India.
    • It has analytical features to conduct data mining and exploration.

  • Flight Test of SFDR conducted successfully
    • The technology demonstrator flight test of ‘Solid Fuel Ducted Ramjet (SFDR)’ propulsion based missile has been carried out successfully from Chandipur, Orissa on May 30.
    • The SFDR is a surface-to-air missile developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation in collaboration with Russia.
    • The new technology will help both surface-to-air and air-to-air missiles perform better.

  • India, Singapore announce 14 agreements
    • India and Singapore announced 14 business-to-business and business-to-government agreements.
    • The agreements include on supporting India’s innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem and promoting Indian innovation abroad, to set up Indian institutes of skills on waste water management and recycling.
    • It also included the promotion of ‘Make-in-India’ in Singapore and ASEAN.

  • Haryana to have one-stop centres for women
    • Each district of Haryana will now get one-stop centres (OSCs) to facilitate integrated services for women affected by violence.
    • The aim of these centres is to facilitate integrated services for women affected by violence.
    • These services would include police assistance, medical aid, psycho-social counselling etc.
    • One stop centre is 100% centrally sponsored scheme under the Nirbhaya Fund.

  • Kerala cartoonist wins international award
    • Kerala cartoonist Thomas Antony has won an international award, in the best caricature category.
    • Antony, currently working as Executive Artist of Malayalam daily ‘Metro Vaartha’, is among the nine winners at the 13th edition of the World Press Cartoon awards.
    • The awards are given to the best works published in 2017 in newspapers and magazines from around the world.

  • Intra-State e-waybills to be implemented
    • The e-waybill system for intra-State movement of goods will be implemented for the final eight States.
    • The new system would be implemented for intra-State transport in Chhattisgarh, Goa, Jammu & Kashmir, Mizoram, Odisha, Punjab, Tamil Nadu and in West Bengal.
    • E-way bill operations are compulsory for inter-state movement of goods throughout the nation and intra-state movement.

  • Methane dunes found on Pluto
    • Pluto is covered with surprising dunes made of methane ice, which have formed relatively recently despite the frigid dwarf planet’s very thin atmosphere, international researchers have said.
    • Pluto’s atmosphere has a surface pressure 100,000 times lower than Earth.
    • The dunes were spotted with NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft.

  • Govt approves construction of 1.5 lakh houses
    • The Centre has approved construction of 1.5 lakh houses for urban poor under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban).
    • The approval was given in the 34th meeting of the Central Sanctioning and Monitoring Committee.
    • Under the PMAY(U), the Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry targets construction of 1.2 crore houses for urban poor by 2022.

  • Government meets fiscal deficit target
    • Government has met its fiscal deficit target for 2017-18 at 3.53% of the Gross Domestic Product.
    • Government in the Budget had revised the fiscal deficit target for 2017-18 to 3.5% from the earlier estimate of 3.2%.
    • For the current fiscal year, government estimates to trim the deficit to 3.3% of GDP.
    • Fiscal deficit is the difference between total revenue & total expenditure of the government

  • PM Modi launched 3 Indian digital payment apps
    • Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the International Rupay Card, Bhim app and UPI enabled remittance App by State Bank of India in Singapore.
    • The RuPay digital payments system was linked up with Singapore’s 33-year-old Network for Electronic Transfers (NETS).
    • Singapore branch of the SBI is the first to launch this new mode of remittance in collaboration with NPCI

  • Indian economy grew 7.7%
    • The Indian economy grew 7.7% in the January-March quarter of 2017-18 on account of robust performance in manufacturing, construction and service sectors as well as good farm output according to the Central Statistics Office.
    • However, the economic growth slowed to 6.7% in 2017-18 compared to 7.1% in 2016-17.
    • The previous high GDP growth of 8.1% was recorded in April-June quarter of 2016-17.

  • Facebook to offer digital literacy programme
    • Facebook has partnered with National Commission for Women (NCW) to launch a digital literacy programme in collaboration with the Cyber Peace Foundation (CPF).
    • As part of the digital literacy programme pilot, awareness training will be conducted for 60,000 women.
    • The training will be conducted in local languages.

  • Press Council of India reconstituted
    • The government has reconstituted the Press Council of India for a three-year term.
    • According to the Press Council Act, the council shall consist of a chairman and 28 other members.
    • The Press Council of India is a statutory body with a mandate to act as a watchdog to oversee the conduct of the print media.
    • It was reconstituted for 3 years in October 2014 and its term ended in October 2017.

  • India’s most profitable PSU
    • Indian Oil Corporation has for the second year in a row beaten ONGC to become India’s most profitable state-owned company.
    • IOC which has for decades been India’s biggest company by turnover posted a record net profit of Rs 21,346 crore in the fiscal year ended March 31, 2018.
    • Reliance Industries retained the crown of being India’s most profitable company for the third year in a row.

  • India, World Bank signed $500 million loan
    • India has signed a USD 500 million loan pact with World Bank to provide additional financing for PMGSY rural road projects.
    • Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana will build 7,000 km of climate resilient roads, out of which 3,500 km will be constructed using green technologies.
    • World Bank has supported PMGSY since its inception in 2004 & so far it has invested over $1.8 billion in loans & credits.

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