Current Affairs: Top Headlines for September 1, 2013

Curiosity to take pictures of solar eclipse

Mars rover Curiosity took pictures of the planet’s moon, Phobos, eclipsing the sun. NASA’s Curiosity rover landed on the red planet in August 2012 for a 2-year mission to study if the planet similar to Earth in the solar system ever had the chemical ingredients for supporting life.

RBI forbids overseas buying, plus point for Indian realty

In a bid to curb the outflow of capital from the country, the RBI has cut down the annual cap on automatic outflows from $2,00,000 to $75,000 per individual. In addition to this, the central bank has also imposed a ban on overseas real estate purchases with immediate effect. The move expected to benefit the domestic real estate as the capital which otherwise would have been diverted overseas will now remain in the country.

India’s foreign exchange reserves deplete by $1.08 billion

As per RBI’s data, India’s foreign exchange (forex) reserves reduced by $1.08 billion to $277.72 billion for the week ended Aug 23, 2013. The Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) decreased by $4.5 million to $4.38 billion for the same period. Gold reserves remained at the same level at $20.74 billion.

Decline in Rupee may not impact agriculture sector: NABARD

According to National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) head Prakash Bakshi the continuing depreciation of rupee against the dollar is unlikely to make any negative impact on the agriculture sector. In the event rupee decline impacts the prices of fertilizers or diesel it would be compensated either by the way of subsidy or by hiking the minimum support price.

Delhi’s tops in per capita income in India

As per Delhi Development Report 2013, Delhi’s average per capita income stands at more than Rs 2 lakh per year in 2012-13 which makes it the highest in India. It is around 3 times more than the national average per capita income.

India approaching IMF for foreign exchange not imminent: Planning Commission

Planning commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia has assured that India has adequate forex reserves to manage the current situation and ruled out approaching the International Monetary Fund(IMF) for help, saying the economic situation has not reached a point where outside aid is warranted. India’s foreign exchange reserves were up at 278.602 billion $ as of August 9, 2013.

Pakistan unable to qualify for the Hockey World Cup for the first time

Pakistan is aggrieved as the country lost berth for the Hockey World Cup 2014 tournament. It is for the first time in Pakistan’s sporting history that it has been unable to qualify for the World Cup Hockey tournament as it lost to South Korea in the semifinal of the Asia Cup being held in Malaysia, a match they needed to win to qualify.

Pakistan not considering granting MFN status to India

Pakistan’s Finance Minister has communicated that, at present, it is not in talks to grant of Most Favoured Nation (MFN) status to India. The remarks came within days of World Bank suggesting in a report that Pakistan will benefit from granting the MFN status to India. Pakistan already enjoys the MFN status which India extended to it in 1996. The bilateral trade between the countries was at $2.35 billion in 2012-13, as against $1.93 billion in fiscal 2011-12.

RBI not considering to convert idle gold into bullion

Responding to the reports that Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is mulling over multiple measures, including using thousands of tone of idle gold jewellery in temples, to replace for import, the central bank said it did not have any proposal to convert idle gold from temples and individual trusts into bullion.

President confers Khel Ratna on Ronjan Sodhi, Arjuna Award on Virat Kohli

President Pranab Mukherjee conferred country’s highest sporting honor- Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award on the topnotch shooter Ronjon Sodhi. Cricketing star Virat Kohli was among the 15 sports persons honored with Arjuna Award. Among the other Arjuna Awardees were Kavita Chahal, for boxing, Gaganjit Bhullar for Golf, Saba Anjum, for hockey, Rajkumari Rathore, for shooting, PV Sindhu, for badminton and Neha Rathi, for wrestling.
A total of 5 coaches were honoured with Dronacharya awards. KP Thomas was honoured with the Award for their life time contribution to coaching in Athletics and Raj Singh in Wrestling.

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Month: Current Affairs - September, 2013