Cap on subsidised LPG cylinders raised to 12
1.The Cabinet Committee on Political Affairs on Thursday raised the subsidised LPG cylinder quota from nine to 12 per year per household and also decided to put on hold the “game changer” direct benefit transfer scheme for LPG which linked payment of subsidy directly into the bank accounts of the consumers under the Aadhaar platform.
2.Addressing a press conference after the meeting of the CCPA in New Delhi, Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Veerappa Moily said the hike in quota of cylinders would result in extra outgo of Rs. 5,000 crore in shape of additional subsidy annually. The scheme comes into effect from February 1, 2014 and entitles households to get one cylinder each, in addition to the quota of nine cylinders, in February and March of 2014. From April onwards, they will be entitled for 12 cylinders — one cylinder per month at subsidised rates, he added.
3.Further, Mr. Moily said the direct benefit transfer for LPG (DBTL) scheme, where consumers in as many as get 289 districts in 18 States got the subsidy amount directly credited to their bank accounts so that they could buy cooking gas at market rate, has been put on hold.
4.Mr. Moily said there were large number of complaints about implementation of the scheme and a committee has been formed to look into them. “Pending the committee examining the issues, the Aadhaar-linked DBTL subsidy transfer has been put on hold,’’ he announced. DBTL, under which consumers got Rs. 435 advance money in their bank accounts so as to help them buy a LPG cylinder at market price, was this month extended to 105 districts including Delhi and Mumbai. Currently, a subsidised LPG cylinder costs Rs. 414 while the market price comes to Rs. 1,021. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Satish, Rahul shine as Karnataka take control of Ranji final
1.Ganesh Satish slammed an unbeaten 117 and shared 216 runs with opener Lokesh Rahul (94 batting) as Karnataka took control of their Ranji Trophy summit clash against Maharashtra on the second day, in Hyderabad on Thursday.
2.After bundling out Maharashtra for 305, an addition of just 33 runs to their overnight 272 for five, in the first hour of the morning session on Thursday, Karnataka ended the second day on 230 for no loss in 68 overs.
3.Karnataka are now only 75 runs behind their opponents with all their wickets intact.
4.Everything, including luck, went in favour of Karnataka except that their opener Robin Uthappa retired hurt on 10 on team’s score of 14 in the fifth over after being hit on the left elbow by a delivery from Samad Fallah.
5.But the other opener Rahul and one-down batsman Satish played some fine strokes and also capitalised on poor bowling and fielding by their opponents to place Karnataka in a strong position in the final match at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium.
6.Maharashtra bowlers toiled hard for two and half sessions on a pitch from which they did not get much purchase except in the first session during which they got some movement of the ball. They erred in line and length often and Rahul and Satish capitalised on them.
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115 communities included in Scheduled Tribes list
1.The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved amendments to the Central List of Other Backward Classes (OBCs) to include or delete 115 castes in the List from 13 States and three Union Territories.
2.Amendments have been approved from proposals received by Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Goa, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal and three Union Territories — Chandigarh, Delhi and Puducherry.
3.The changes in the List by way of inclusion / correction / deletion of castes/communities have been approved as per the advices received from the National Commission for Backward Classes (NCBC). The amendments will notify 115 changes recommended by the NCBC.
4.The proposed changes will enable persons belonging to these castes/communities to avail benefits of reservation in government services and posts as well as in central educational institutions according to existing policy. They will also become eligible for benefit under various welfare schemes, and scholarships, being administered by the Central Government, which are at present available to persons belonging to the OBCs.
5.The NCBC was set up in pursuance to the Supreme Court judgement in the Indira Sawhney case. As per the NCBC Act 1993, Section 9, the Commission is mandated to examine requests for inclusion of any class of citizens as a backward class in the lists and hear complaints of over-inclusion or under-inclusion of any backward class in such lists and tender such advice to the Central Government as it deems appropriate and the advice of the Commission is ordinarily be binding upon the Central Government.
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Federer to open Davis Cup series against Serbia
1.Roger Federer will open Switzerland’s Davis Cup first-round match against Serbia by playing Ilija Bozoljac on Friday, while Australian Open champion Stanislas Wawrinka faces Dusan Lajovic.
2.Switzerland is an overwhelming favourite against Serbia, last year’s finalist and the 2010 Davis Cup champion, which will be without Novak Djokovic. The second-ranked Serb decided to rest after losing to Wawrinka in the Australian Open quarterfinals. Lajovic at No. 102 is Serbia’s highest-ranked team member.
3.Federer was a surprising inclusion in the Swiss team, having played only one first-round match since 2004. He last represented Switzerland in September 2012, helping win a relegation playoff against the Netherlands.
4.The series opens on Friday on indoor hard court. Doubles are on Saturday and reverse singles on Sunday.
5.The winner plays Belgium or Kazakhstan in the quarterfinals in April.
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A surprise from the RBI
In its third quarter review of monetary policy, the Reserve Bank of India sprang a big surprise by hiking the policy repo rate by 0.25 percentage points to 8 per cent. All other rates — the bank rate, the reverse repo and the marginal standing facility rates — stand adjusted upwards. Unprepared as the financial markets might have been to the hike, the central bank’s justification is unassailable. In the mid-quarter review on December 18, 2013, the rates were kept unaltered, anticipating a cool-off in vegetable prices. With the subsequent fall in food prices, especially of vegetables, headline inflation has fallen significantly and might stay subdued well into the next round of data compilation. However, excluding food and fuel prices, CPI inflation has remained stubbornly high while core WPI inflation has risen, although only marginally. As RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan said subsequently, behind its logic has been the CPI inflation which remains close to 10 per cent and is the prime cause for the hardening inflation expectations among consumers. Besides, there is evidence to show that notwithstanding the tight monetary policy, aggregate demand pressures are still exerting upward pressure on overall inflation. A rate hike is justified, though the growth momentum is weak and there has been much fiscal tightening in the last quarter of this year.
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SBI raises over Rs. 7,000 cr in share sale via QIP
1.Nation’s largest lender State Bank of India has raised over Rs. 7,000 crore in a mega share sale programme launched through a qualified institutional placement, largely aided by the LIC.
2.Sources said the bank has completely met its capital needs for this fiscal as well as the next fiscal, with this issue.
3.The bank which has the board mandate to raise up to Rs. 9,500 crore, also has the option to raise the same in multiple tranches.
4.On the role of LIC in the bids, the source said the Corporation has put in the maximum bid in the current share sale programme, but noted that LIC has been one of its largest investors.
5.The QIP was launched on Wednesday and is one of the largest share sale by the bank in the recent past.
6.Though the bank has set the floor price at an upper limit of Rs. 1,629.35 and a lower limit of Rs. 1565, most of the bids were in the lower limit only.
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Google selling Motorola Mobility for $2.9 bn to Lenovo Group
1.Google is selling its Motorola Mobility cell phone unit to China’s Lenovo Group for $2.91 billion — less than two years after it paid $12.5 billion for the company.
2.“This move will enable Google to devote our energy to driving innovation across the Android ecosystem, for the benefit of smartphone users everywhere,” said Google chief Larry Page in a statement Wednesday.
3.Analysts said that the deal did not represent much of a loss for Google, since it will keep the majority of Motorola’s patents. It also pocketed $2.9 billion of Motorola’s cash when it originally acquired the company.
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India better prepared to weather Federal Reserve taper storm: Fin Min
1.The US Federal Reserve’s decision to taper its bond-buying programme by another $10 billion to $65 billion a month, beginning in February, was on expected lines and should not in any way surprise or affect the Indian markets.
2.There should be no undue concern over external factors and the Indian economy is better prepared for the consequences, if any, of the taper, the Finance Ministry said in a statement on Thursday.
3.“We have added to our foreign exchange reserves which stand at $295 billion. FDI and FII inflows continue to be robust, liquidity is comfortable, stronger regulations have been put in place in the capital markets, the investment cycle appears to have turned positive, credit demand from key sectors is strong, and WPI inflation has moderated,” the statement added.
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Make milk adulteration punishable with life imprisonment: Apex court
1.The Supreme court today expressed concern over milk adulteration in the country and sought response from all the states on providing harsher punishment of life imprisonment to people indulging in production and marketing of spurious milk.
2.A bench headed by Justice K S Radhakrishnan said that the issue is very “serious” and asked the governments to take immediate steps to control the menace of milk adulteration.
3.It sought detailed affidavits from all the state governments on what steps they are taking to tackle the issue of adulteration and on amendment in law to make the offence punishable up to life imprisonment as has been done by Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal and Odisha.
4.The bench also pulled up the UP government for not prosecuting people indulging in milk adulteration under the stringent provision and sought details of the pending cases on the issue in the state.
5.The bench granted three weeks time to states to file their responses.
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IT sector urged to focus on domestic market
1.The IT industry should reach out to the domestic market in a big way rather than focusing on overseas business, according to R. Chandrashekar, president, Nasscom.
2.There are tremendous opportunities on the domestic front with new technologies, social media, cloud computing etc and the partnership between the government and the industry is essential to provide better e-governance, he said while addressing the 17th national conference on e-governance here on Thursday.
3.According to Chandrashekar, the IT industry has not looked at the domestic market intensely and seriously because of the overseas markets. Health, education and financial inclusion are some of the areas that need more attention from the IT industry.
4.He also emphasised the need for creating a platform jointly by the government and the industry in order to enable the administration to enter into number of social issues. It can be done with minimal expenses and will be a big impact on the government’s e-governance programmes. If implemented, this will be the first of its kind in the world, he added.
E-kranti
1.J. Satyanarayana, Secretary, DeitY, said the government is in the process of implementing the next phase of e-governance programme called e-kranti for transforming the e-governance mechanism as part of providing citizen centric services.
2.Earlier, inaugurating the function, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said the government is going ahead with the implementation of e-office in order to bring in more administrative effectiveness and transparency. This will be introduced on a pilot basis in the Finance department.
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BHEL, 5 PSUs to set up 4,000 MW solar plant in Rajasthan
1.In a first of its kind venture, six public sector undertakings (PSUs) including state-run Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) and Power Grid Corporation of India Limited (PGCIL) on Wednesday announced joining hands to set up world’s largest 4,000 MW ultra mega solar power project in Rajasthan.
2."The MoU signed today will be put up for Cabinet approval and then things will move forward at a fast pace. The land is already there and the basic infrastructure like roads is also available at the site. We hope to get cracking on the project after the approval," Minister of Heavy Industries and Public Enterprises Praful Patel said at the pact signing ceremony in New Delhi.
3.Also present on the occasion was the New and Renewable Energy Minister, Farooq Abdullah who termed it as a giant step towards unleashing a revolution for achieving bigger goals in solar energy.
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Anand Kumar, founder of Super30 classes, gets Ramanujan Mathematics award
1.Leading mathematician and founder of Super30 classes Anand Kumar was conferred this year's prestigious Ramanujan Mathematics Award at the Eighth National Mathematics Convention organised by a Rajkot-based school.
2.Scientists Pitamber Patel and JJ Rawal presented the cash award of Rs. 20,000 to Mr Kumar. The annual award is given to a person who has at least three papers published in international journals and is involved in teaching mathematics.
3.The 41-year-old mathematician from Patna is better known as the founder of Super30 - an institute that offers free residential mentoring on how to crack the entrance test for IITs to 30 students selected from underprivileged families each year.
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RBI ups foreign investors' sub-limit in govt bonds to $10 bn from $5 bn
1.The Reserve Bank today doubled the sub-limit for investment in government securities to $ 10 billion by long-term investors like sovereign wealth funds and foreign central banks, with a view to attract more funds.
2."It has now been decided, in consultation with government to enhance, with immediate effect, the existing sub-limit of $ 5 billion available to long-term investors registered with SEBI-- SWFs, multilateral agencies, pension and foreign central banks for investment in government securities to $ 10 billion...," RBI said in a notification.
3.However, the total limit of $ 30 billion available for foreign investments in government securities has not been tinkered with.
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India's first monorail to roll out in Mumbai on Feb 1
The country's first monorail service will commence operations next month on the 8.9 km Wadala-Chembur section in the central-eastern suburbs of the metropolis after a delay of over two years.
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Kiwi umpire Kathy Cross appointed to ICC panel
1.New Zealander Kathy Cross has become the first woman appointed to an International Cricket Council umpire panel.
2.Cross, 56, has been added to the third-tier associate and affiliate panel of international umpires for 2014 following the annual review and selection process.
3.The panel comprising 11 umpires - which sits below the elite and international panels - officiates in ICC World Cricket League matches for teams ranked in divisions three to six and other associate and affiliate tournaments.
4.Taumarunui-born Cross has umpired for 16 years, having stood at three women's World Cups.
5.In 2002 she became the first woman to be selected in a men's Test umpiring team when she was named as fourth umpire for a match between New Zealand and England in Wellington.
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