NATIONAL NEWS

17th Foundation Day of SPMCIL

• Security Printing and Minting Corporation of India Limited (SPMCIL) celebrated its 17th Foundation Day programme on February 11, 2022 through the virtual mode.

• During the occasion, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman launched the first colour souvenir coin on “Panchtantra”.

• She emphasized to increase the quality of products and to brand SPMCIL as lead producers of currency and other sovereign products
• Tripti Patra Ghosh, CMD, SPMCIL highlighted the achievements and the innovative initiatives of the Company.
• Secretary, Department of Economic Affairs (DEA), Ministry of Finance (MoF), Senior Economic Advisor, DEA, MoF and other senior officials from Ministry and Director (HR) & Director (Finance) of SPMCIL were also present in the event.

14-digit Unique ABHA Numbers from the Aarogya Setu App

• Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission (ABDM) under the ownership of the National Health Authority (NHA) announced collaboration with Aarogya Setu to generate 14-digit unique Ayushman Bharat Health Account (ABHA) number to the Aarogya Setu app users.

• Aarogya Setu is a health app governed by Government of India.

• Under the ABDM, a user can generate their own unique ABHA number, using their Aadhaar number. If the user does not wish to use their Aadhaar, they can use their Driving License or Mobile Number to generate the ABHA number.
• With this ABHA number they can link their existing and new medical records including doctor prescriptions, lab reports, hospital records to share these records with registered health professionals and health service providers.

Jammu & Kashmir’s single-window system with the NSWS

• Lt Governor Manoj Sinha integrated Jammu & Kashmir with the national single-window system (NSWS) and launched the J&K single-window portal.

• By doing this Jammu & Kashmir became the first UT in India to launch Single-Window system.

• This helps to increase in Ease of Doing Business in the UT.
• NSWS linked with India Industrial Land Bank to help investors identify available land parcels in J&K.
• Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal launched the national single-window system in September 2021, that aims to reduce the bureaucracy involved in establishing businesses, through a centralized portal that enables investors to identify and obtain relevant permits, licenses and clearances.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

India and Australia sign MoU on Tourism cooperation

• On 11th February 2022, India and Australia have signed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Tourism cooperation in the field of Tourism in New Delhi to enhance cooperation and promote expansion of bilateral relations in tourism.
• The agreement was signed between Shri Piyush Goyal, Minister of Commerce & Industry, Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution and Textiles, India and The Hon Dan Tehan MP, Minister of Trade, Tourism and Investment, Australia.
• India and Australia had previously signed a Memorandum of Understanding on tourism cooperation in the field of tourism on 2014 which expired in the year 2019.
• Australia ranked 4th in terms of Foreign Tourist Arrivals to India in 2019 and accounts 3.4% in total tourism share of foreign tourists.
• At present, Ministry of Tourism has MoUs with 45 countries.

Sri Lanka to Implement Unitary Digital Identity Framework

• India has agreed to provide a grant to Sri Lanka to implement a ‘Unitary Digital Identity framework’, that is modelled on the Aadhaar card.

• The framework will be launched on the lines of bilateral talks between the Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2019.

• The personal identity verification program is a digital tool based on biometric data, that can represent the identities of individuals in cyberspace.
• The identification of individual identities that can be accurately verified in digital and physical environments by combining the two devices.

BANKING

SBI Partners with NSE Academy

• State Bank of India with NSE Academy, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of National Stock Exchange of India announced to launch five online courses.
• This partnership is to promote financial literacy as a necessary life skill.
• Learners can enroll for five inaugural Massive Open Online Courses of SBI on the NSE knowledge and the courses will be offered to provide an understanding of different aspects of banking -to-banking professionals, students and other learners.

RANKS, INDICES AND REPORTS

TomTom Traffic Index Ranking 2021

• The ranking covers 404 cities across 58 countries on 6 continents.
• Mumbai has been ranked 5^th in terms of the most congested citied in the world 2021.
• According to the TomTom Traffic Index 2021, the Turkish city of Istanbul become the most congested city and Moscow of Russia came second in the list.
• Bengaluru which came sixth in the index in 2020 improved its ranking to 10th in 2021.
• Delhi and Pune ranked 11^th and 21^st in the ranking.

Highest Penetration in Digital Payments

• Comscore report reveals Paytm, continues to lead digital payments over 45 per cent penetration in Fintech.
• It followed by Google Pay (mobile App) at 43 per cent penetration.
• Paytm’s revenue from operations grew 89 per cent year-on-year (Y-o-Y) in Q3FY22 to ₹ 1,456 crore. Revenue from financial services and payments grew 98 per cent Y-o-Y in Q3FY22 to ₹1,116.8 crore.
• Paytm’s monthly transacting users (MTU) grew consistently to 64.4 million, by 37 per cent Y-o-Y and 12 per cent quarter-on-quarter (Q-o-Q).

The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor Report

• The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) 2021/2022 report, unveiled at the Dubai Expo India ranked 4^th in overall category of Ease of Starting Business.

• India is among the top five easiest places to start a new business. The report gathered data through a survey of at least 2,000 respondents across each of 47 high, medium and low-income economies.

• The report was topped by Saudi Arabia. It is followed by Netherland and Sweden.
• India secured second place in the category for good opportunities to start a new business. Saudi Arabia topped in that category. Sweden ranked third.
• India secured 4^th place in the category for They have skills and knowledge to start a business. Saudi Arabia placed first in the category.
• India secures second place in the fear of failure as a reason for not planning to start a new business for next three years. Belarus topped in the category.
   

• APPOINTMENTS AND RESIGNATIONS

Chandrasekaran gets 2nd term as Tata Sons chairman

• Tata Sons has reappointed N Chandrasekaran as its executive Chairman for the period of another five year (2022-2027).

• He joined the Tata Sons Board in October 2016 and served as Chief Operating Officer and executive director of TCS.  He is also the chairman of Tata Steel, Tata Motors, Tata Power and TCS.

IMPORTANT DAYS

World Unani Day

• World Unani Day is observed on February 11,2022.

• This day was celebrated to mark the birth anniversary of Hakim Ajmal Khan, who is an Unani Physician of India and Central Research Institute of Unani Medicine (CRIUM), Hyderabad celebrated celebrated the first Unani Day in 2017.

International Day of Women and Girls in Science

• International Day of Women and Girls in Science is observed every year on February 11,2022.
• This year marks the 7^th International Day of Women and Girls in Science.
• Theme of the Day is “Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion: Water Unites Us”.
• UNESCO and United Nations for Women in collaboration with institutions and civil society partners with an aim to promote women and girls in science.

BOOKS & AUTHORS

‘India-Africa Relations: Changing Horizons’

• India-Africa Relations: Changing Horizons is authored by Rajiv Kumar Bhatia.

• The book is published by Routledge India.

• The book describes the historical backdrop and shared colonial past to focus on and contextualize the evolution of the India and Africa partnership.

Atal Bihari Vajpayee

• Journalist, Sagarika Ghose authored a book titled “Atal Bihari Vajpayee”.

• This book is a biography of the former Prime Minister of India.

• The book is about his political history and author took three years to complete the biography.