- Indian-origin minister Leo Varadkar set to become PM of Ireland
Leo Varadkar, an Indian-origin doctor and Ireland’s first openly gay minister, won the leadership race for the ruling party to become the country’s youngest-ever and first homosexual Prime Minister-in-waiting. Varadkar, 38, will officially take over as Taoiseach, as the Irish prime ministerial title is known in Ireland, in Parliament later this month after he was declared the winner in the leadership race for the Fine Gael party.
- UN General Assembly elects Slovakia’s Lajcak as president
The U.N. General Assembly elected Slovakia’s Foreign Minister Miroslav Lajcak as its next president, a job he pledged to use to help reform and strengthen the United Nations, with peace and a decent life for all people as a top priority. The 193-member assembly, the U.N.’s most representative body had been elected by acclamation to lead its 72nd session beginning in September
- Shashi Shekar Vempati is new Prasar Bharati CEO
Shashi Shekar Vempati has been appointed as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Prasar Bharati on the recommendation of the three-member committee headed by Vice President and consisting of Chairman, Press Council of India and the President’s nominee i.e. Secretary, Information and Broadcasting for a period of five years from the date of assumption of office. Vempati is currently serving as a Member (part time) of the Prasar Bharati Board since February 2016.
- Telangana launches T-Wallet for people with and without mobile phones
The Telangana Government has launched a digital wallet, named T-Wallet, which doesn’t charge transaction fee from consumers. The government is planning to use the wallet, available in Google Play, for remittances under job guarantee scheme MNREGA and scholarships for students.
Telangana IT and Industry Minister KT Rama Rao said that the wallet is better than BHIM, the one launched by the Union Government. “T-Wallet is a bi-directional. While consumers use it for public and private transactions, the government can use it to make payments to various beneficiaries.
- Indian Human Microbiome Project launched in NE
The Indian Human Microbiome Project has been launched in the north eastern region to provide a fertile ground for discovery of new drugs and pharmaceuticals.
This will also give a new understanding of the mutual relationship between humans and associated micro-organisms, director of the Institute of Bioresources and Sustainable Development, Manipur, Prof Dinabandhu Sahoo said after inaugurating the project at Imphal.
- Varanasi to get India’s first freight Village
Varanasi will get the country’s first ‘freight village’ spread over around 100 acres. The plan to set up this project close to the upcoming multi-mode terminal along the Ganga has attracted major players including Dubai Port World and IL&FS. A ‘Freight Village’ is a specialised industrial estate which attracts companies that require logistics services and can cluster to improve their competitiveness.
- Odisha to have First automatic Coastal warning for disasters in India
Odisha can warn the vast population residing along its 480 km-long coast by pressing a single button from a control room in the State capital in the event of the occurrence of natural disasters like a tsunami or a cyclone.
The State government is all set to commission the ambitious Early Warning Dissemination System (EWDS) that would enable loud sirens go off simultaneously from towers at 122 locations by July.
Odisha is the first State in India to have developed an automatic public address system that can be activated along its entire coast.
- GST Council clears rules, states agree to July 1 rollout
T he GST Council has cleared the pending rules, including transition provisions and returns, with all the states agreeing to July 1 roll out of the Goods and Services Tax. The GST Council had last month fitted over 1,200 goods and 500 services in the tax brackets of 5, 12, 18 and 28 per cent. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley chaired the 15th meeting of the GST Council which is scheduled to decide on tax rate of 6 items including gold, textiles and footwear.
- SEBI sets up panel to improve corporate governance
Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has set up a committee to help improve corporate governance of listed companies in the light of recent high-profile corporate tussles. n the light of recent high-profile corporate tussles.
The committee, headed by Kotak Mahindra Bank Managing Director Uday Kotak, will also include members from the corporate world, stock exchanges, law firms, investors groups, academicians, and the market regulator itself.
- Road Ministry launches Online platform INAM PRO +
Minister for road transport and highways Nitin Gadkari has launched INAM PRO+—an e-commerce platform for construction and infrastructure raw material for government and private procurement.
The website inampro.nic.in launched by the National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation (NHIDCL), a road ministry public sector undertaking, will act as a repository of all raw materials suppliers and manufacturers in the country from where people and construction companies, along with public sector companies, can buy construction material at competitive rates.
- SBI, World Bank finance 400-cr solar projects
State Bank of India and the World Bank announced that they had financed 100 MW of rooftop solar projects worth Rs.400 crore in India. The World Bank aid helped the public sector SBI lower the lending rate to project developers, according to SBI Deputy Managing Director Karnam Sekar.
The support from World Bank has helped lowering the interest rate by 3-3.5 per cent from the 11-12 per cent lending rate for a medium-sized solar roof top project.
SBI has availed of a loan of $625 million from the World Bank for on-lending to viable Grid-Connected Rooftop Solar PV (GRPV) projects undertaken by developers, aggregators and end-users, for installation of rooftop solar systems.
- India signs Loan agreement with the World Bank for HP
An agreement for IBRD Credit of USD 36 Million from World Bank for “Himachal Pradesh Public Financial Management Capacity Building Program” was signed in New Delhi by Shri Raj Kumar, Joint Secretary (MI), Department of Economic Affairs on behalf of the Government of India and Mr. Junaid Kamal Ahmad, Country Director, World Bank (India) on behalf of the World Bank. The Implementing Entity Agreement was signed by the Additional Director, Treasuries, Accounts and Lotteries, on behalf of Government of Himachal Pradesh (GoHP), and the Country Director (India) on behalf of the World Bank.
- Us to Withdraw from Paris Climate agreement
The Paris climate agreement gives undue advantage to India and China at the cost of the Unite States’ interests, President Donald Trump, announcing America’s withdrawal from the pact.
According to Mr. Trump, the Paris agreement would lead to a redistribution of American wealth to other countries and transfer of American jobs abroad.
His predecessor Barack Obama had argued that by promoting a global climate regime, the U.S would create wealth and jobs at home.
He had showcased the Indian and Chinese endorsement of the Paris accord as a key diplomatic success of his presidency.
- Prithvi-II missile successfully test-fired
India successfully test-fired its indigenously developed nuclear-capable Prithvi-II missile, from a test range in Odisha as part of a user trial by the Army. The trial of the surface-to-surface missile, which has a strike range of 350 km, was carried out using a mobile launcher from launch complex-3 of the Integrated Test Range (ITR) in Chandipur.
The Prithvi-II missile is capable of carrying 500 kg to 1,000 kg of warheads and is thrusted by liquid propulsion twin engines. It uses advanced inertial guidance system with manoeuvring trajectory to hit its target with precision and accuracy.
- NASA names solar mission after UChicago physicist
NASA has named the first mission to fly a spacecraft directly into the sun’s atmosphere in honor of Prof. Eugene Parker, a pioneering physicist at the University of Chicago. The Parker Solar Probe will launch next summer on a mission to fly within 4 million miles of the sun’s surface to study the star with unprecedented precision.
Parker, the S. Chandrasekhar Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus in Physics, is best known for developing the concept of solar wind—the stream of electrically charged particles emitted by the sun. He was honored May 31 at a public celebration on campus that included colleagues and students from UChicago and leaders from NASA and the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.
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