Modi inaugurates India's first international stock exchange at Gift city
- Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated India's first international exchange-India INX- at International Financial Services Centre (IFSC) in Gujarat International Financial Tech City (GIFT) located in Gandhinagar
- India International Exchange (INX), the wholly-owned subsidiary of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), through its global bourse, will start trading initially in equity derivatives, currency derivatives, commodity derivatives including Index and Stocks.
- Subsequently, depository receipts and bonds would be offered once the required infrastructure for the same is in place.
- India INX is one of the world's most advanced technology platforms with a turn-around time of 4 micro seconds. It will operate for 22 hours a day to allow international investors and Non Residents Indians to trade from anywhere across the globe
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UAE’s Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed to be chief guest at 2017 Republic Day celebrations
- In a first, Arab soldiers will be marching in New Delhi during the parade.
- Visiting dignitary will bring a marching band from the UAE's defence forces at the parade on Republic Day.
- It would be the second time when any foreign contingent will be participating in the parade on January 26.
- Last year, the French marching band had joined the parade in honour of Francois Hollande, who was the chief guest.
- India has, however, nixed the UAE's proposal to send a military paratrooper team for live display during Republic Day Parade, citing security concern.
Cyber Pathshala:A for ATM, B for BHIM, C for Cashless
- A for ATM, B for BHIM (Bharat Interface for Money), C for cashless, D for Demonetisation is the new way alphabets have been associated to popular terms related to demonetisation in a new book "Cyber Pathshala" authored by former Rajya Sabha MP Tarun Vijay.
- The book by the ex-parliamentarian from Uttarakhand was launched by Union HRD Minister Prakash Javadekar at the ongoing World Book Fair here.
- The book relates H to Honest Money and describes demonetisation decisiosn as "NDA government's initiative to get rid of dishonest money".
IBM becomes first company to get 8,000 US patents in a year
- American technology company IBM has become the first company to receive more than 8,000 US patents in one year in 2016. With 8,088 patents.
- IBM received an average of 22 patents per day last year.
- IBM was followed by Samsung and Canon with 5,518 and 3,665 patents respectively.
- Technology major Google received the fifth most number of patents at 2,835.
Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit 2017
- Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit 2017was inaugurated by PM Narendra Modi.
- He also met Nobel Laureates at maiden Nobel Prize Series.
- This meeting is held at the Science City in Ahmedabad where the Nobel Media is holding the first Nobel Prize Series in the country in conjunction with the biennial summit of Vibrant Gujarat.
- Nobel Prize Series is a unique programme combining a conference, lectures, roundtables, and exhibitions. By bringing together Nobel Laureates, other experts and lifelong learners the programme aims to stimulate innovation and creative thinking
8-year-old Manipur boy breaks limbo skating world record
- Tiluck Keisam, an 8-year-old boy from Manipur, set a new world record in limbo skating in Delhi, for the farthest distance in limbo skating under bars.
- Tiluck covered 145 metres in 41 seconds with cones under bars, set at a height of 30 cm.
- Tiluck bettered his previous record of 116 metres in 31.87 seconds, set in 2015.
Pankaj Advani wins Kolkata Open National Snooker C'ship
- Indian cueist Pankaj Advani won the 3rd Kolkata Open National Invitation Snooker Championship.
- The 16-time world champion defeated Aditya Mehta 5-1, who won the previous two editions of the tournament in 2015 and 2016.
- Notably, this was Advani's maiden title win at the Kolkata Open.
World Hindi Day: 10 January
- Every year, the World Hindi Day is celebrated on January 10, marking the anniversary of the first World Hindi Conference held in 1975. The first World Hindi Conference was inaugurated by the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi.
- Since 1975, the World Hindi Conference has been organised in different countries like India, Mauritius, United Kingdom, Trinidad and Tobago, United States etc.
Indian, French space agencies ink pact on satellite launch technology
- Indian Space Research Organisation and French Space agency (CNES) today signed a partnership agreement in satellite launch technology.
- The agreement was signed between ISRO Chairman Kiran Kumar and CNES President Jean-Yves Le Gall in the presence of visiting French Minister of Foreign Affairs Jean-Marc Ayrault.
- ISRO is the second partner of CNES, in terms of volume, after NASA. Of comparable size and sharing similar objectives, the space programmes of both countries are complementary, it was noted.
China launches 1st commercial space mission with new rocket
- China successfully sent three satellites into space in its first commercial mission using an updated version of the low-cost Kuaizhou-1A rocket, amidst the Communist giant's determined bid to expand its ambitious space programme.
- The rocket, carrying the satellite JL-1 and two CubeSats XY-S1 and Caton-1, blasted off from northwestern China's Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Gansu province at around 12:11 pm Beijing Time, according to a statement from the center.
Pakistan test-fires first nuclear-capable submarine cruise missile Babur-3
- Pakistan on Monday successfully test-fired its first Submarine-Launched Cruise Missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead up to 450km from an undisclosed location in the Indian Ocean, giving the country a "credible" second-strike capability
- The missile, Babur-3, was fired from an underwater, mobile platform and hit its target with precise accuracy, the Inter Services Public Relations, the media wing of the Pakistani military
- Babur-3, which has a range of 450km, is a sea-based variant of Ground Launched Cruise Missile (GLCM) Babur-2+ , which was successfully tested earlier in December, last year.
Shreyas bags Scottish Junior Open title
- India U-13 squash player Shreyas Mehta scripted a remarkable comeback to win the Scottish Junior Open title.
- Shreyas,, who had earlier won the US junior open, added another title to his kitty with a comeback from the jaws of defeat to post a five game win over Colombia's Juan Jose Torres Lara. The 9/12 seeded Indian won 8-11, 8-11, 11-5, 11-6, 11-7.
Eight-year-old Kashmiri boy becomes national boxing champion
- An eight-year-old boy from Jammu and Kashmir's Rajouri has won gold medal in Thai Boxing Championship at the national level.
- Abbu Ammaz, a class 2 student was felicitated by the district authorities and the civil administration as well as by the police.
Obama selects four Indian-Americans for presidential awards
- US President Barack Obama on Tuesday chose four Indian-American scientists for the highest honour given by the US government to science and engineering professionals in the early stages of their independent research careers. The honour is recognition for keeping the US on the cutting edge with their innovations.
- The four are part of the list of 102 scientists and researchers who are recipients of the Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE).
- These scientists are Pankaj Lal from Montclair State University, Kaushik Chowdhury from Northeastern University, Manish Arora from Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Aradhna Tripati from University of California, Los Angeles.
Axis Bank becomes third lender to offer block chain service
- Private sector Axis Bank on Monday became the third lender in the country to announce usage of block chain solutions for its operations, after its peers ICICI Bank and Yes Bank.
- Block chain solutions is a distributed database that maintains a continuously growing list of ordered records called blocks. It is said to reduce turnaround times, is transparent and also ensures zero errors. Axis Bank has tied up with fintech firm Ripple to offer the solution.
Gurgaon admin gets e-governance award for using GIS technology
- The Gurgaon district administration was conferred with a national e-governance award for its innovative use of Geographic Information System (GIS) technology in solving land disputes.
- Deputy commissioner TL Satyaprakash received the award in a function held at the 20th National Conference on e-Governance at Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh.
- The award has been given to the district administration for its G-Triangulation project awarded gold under category 4 for innovative use of GIS. G-Triangulation is a concept in which a minimum of three points on a map are required to identify an area.
First student startup fund has Rs 200 crore
- Gujarat government has come up with India's first student startup and innovation policy, which aims to provide Rs 200 crore in the form of grants to ideas developed by them. The policy aims to support over 1,000 innovation per year and create pre-incubation support in all universities of the state.
- Under the pre-incubation support, it would help convert ideas of students from proof of concept (PoC) upto minimum viable proto-type (MVP), besides providing support for patent filing.
- Under the policy, Gujarat government would provide Rs 200 crore as State Innovation Fund during the next five years, of which Rs 100 crore will be allocated by the state government and the remaining amount will be created by internal sources, like university funds and CSR funds.
