Current Affairs: July 21, 2020

Notes:
Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs is implementing the PM SVANidhi (PM Street Vendor’s AtmaNirbhar Nidhi) scheme.
PM SVANidhi was launched by the government on June 1, 2020, to provide working capital loan to street vendors. Recently, the Ministry has launched a mobile application of PM SVANidhi scheme, in a virtual event from New Delhi.

Notes:
P. Praveen Siddharth, a 2001 batch Indian Revenue Service- Income Tax (IRS-IT) officer, P. Praveen Siddharth, has been appointed Private Secretary to President Ram Nath Kovind.
He has replaced Vikram Singh, who has recently been appointed as the Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Shipping. The new Private Secretary is serving as the Officer on Special Duty (OSD) in the President’s Secretariat.

Notes:
The Chairman of the Railway Board VK Yadav has recently announced that the Government has deferred the timeline for introducing private trains to March 2024.
Earlier, the timeline was fixed at April 2023. It has deferred because the major infrastructure upgradation of the railway network is expected to be completed only in the year 2024. The Board also said that North Eastern state capitals will be connected via rail network by 2023.

Notes:
According to a survey by Projects Today, an online database of projects, Tamil Nadu is the top investment destination in India in first quarter of 2019-20.
The investment flow in the state amounts to Rs 18,236 crore, which is around 18.63 per cent of the total fresh investment. The state has signed as many as 17 agreements in May 2020. It is followed by Maharashtra with investment flow of Rs 11,229 crore.

Notes:
The Supreme Court of India has extended the tenure of the chairperson and members of the Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT) by three months.
The chairperson of TDSAT is former Supreme Court judge Justice Shiva Kirti Singh. His tenure was to end on July 20 this year and the tenure of other members of the tribunal has already ended. TDSAT has recently set aside TRAI’s order that blocked Vodafone-Idea’s premium tariff plan RedX.