NATIONAL NEWS

Bharat Drone Mahotsav 2022

• On 27 May 2022, Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated India's biggest Drone Festival-Bharat Drone Mahotsav 2022 at Pragati Maidan in New Delhi.

• Bharat Drone Mahotsav will prove to be a game changer in making India a drone hub of the world by 2030.

• Drones have many functions, ranging from monitoring climate change to agriculture, geo mapping, carrying out search operations after natural disasters, photography, filming, and delivering goods.
• Mahotsav will also witness virtual awards presentation ceremony of drone pilot certificates, product launches, flying demonstrations, display of a Made in India Drone Taxi prototype.

Electric Vehicle Policy

• Tripura government has adopted the Tripura Electric Vehicle Policy 2022 to promote electric vehicles to curb vehicular pollution and save fuel.

• There are 60,000 different types of vehicles in Tripura and the government has targeted to convert 10 percent of these into EVs in the next five years

• Transport Department said that Tripura is the 15th state in the country and third in the northeastern region after Assam and Meghalaya to adopt the electric vehicle policy.
• The state cabinet headed by Chief Minister Manik Saha adopted the Tripura Electric Vehicle Policy 2022 to encourage people to use more and more electric vehicles in the state.

Digital India BHASHINI

• Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology and Skill Development & Entrepreneurship inaugurated Startups in the field of Artificial Intelligence and language technology in a brainstorming session.

• It was organized by MeiTY on Mission Digital India BHASHINI (BHASHa INterface for India) the National Language Translation Mission (NLTM).
• A Bhashini Platform will make Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Natural Language Processing (NLP) resources available to MSMEs, Startups and Individual Innovators in the public domain.
• This mission aims to empower Indian citizens by connecting them to the Digital Initiatives of the country in their own language thereby leading to digital inclusion.

National Conference of Woman Legislators

• On 27 May 2022, The President Ram Nath Kovind will address the national conference of woman legislators in Thiruvananthapuram.

• The two-day conference hosted by the Kerala Legislative Assembly is the first national event of this kind to be held in the country.

• It will have various sessions on themes vital to woman legislators.
• Women legislators from the Parliament, Speakers and Legislators from different States were participated.
• He praised that woman have always participated in the freedom struggle of the country starting from the 19th century.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS

Bilateral Cooperation on Climate Action

• India and United Arab Emirates have signed an MoU to establish a framework to facilitate and enhance bilateral cooperation on climate action.

• The agreement was signed between Environment, Forest and Climate Change Minister Bhupender Yadav and UAE Climate Envoy and Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology Dr Sultan Al Jaber in New Delhi.

• The basic objective of this MoU is to establish a framework to facilitate and enhance bilateral cooperation on climate action and also contributes towards implementing the Paris Agreement.

BANKING

IPPB Introduces Service Charges

• India Post Payments Bank (IPPB) has introduced Aadhaar Enabled Payment System service charges (AePS).
• AePS Issuer transaction charges will be in effect from June 15, 2022.
• According to RBI, AePS is a bank led model which allows online interoperable financial inclusion transaction at PoS (MicroATM) through the Business correspondent of any bank using the Aadhaar authentication.
• AePS allows you to do six types of transactions.
• A customer's bank name, Aadhaar number and biometric acquired during enrolment are the only data necessary to complete a transaction.
• AEPS was enabled to perform basic banking transactions like cash deposit, cash withdrawal, intrabank or interbank fund transfer, account balance, and get a mini statement.
• It is done by using Aadhaar as an identity to access respective Aadhaar enabled bank accounts of banking customers through a Business Correspondent.

BOB Financial and HPCL Co-Branded Credit Card

• BOB Financial, wholly owned subsidiary of the Bank of Baroda and Hindustan Petroleum (HPCL) in partnership with National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) announced to launch HPCL BoB co-branded contactless RuPay Credit Card.

• The card comes with various features including rewards for spending on utilities, grocery and departmental stores.

• The card can be used across merchants and ATMs globally through the JCB network.
• Cardholders of HPCL BoB RuPay Contactless Credit Card will be able to earn up to 24 reward points (per Rs 150 spent) at HPCL fuel pumps and on the HP Pay app.
• Customers who spend Rs 5,000 or more within 60 days of card issuance will get 2,000 bonus reward points.

ECONOMY NEWS

SBI Ecowrap Report

• State Bank India has projected India’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth at 8.2 to 8.5 per cent for FY22 in the Ecowrap report.

•  For Q4FY22, the SBI research report expects growth of 2.7 per cent.

• The report announced the Central Statistics Office (CSO) had projected Q4 GDP at Rs 41.04 lakh crore and FY22 real GDP growth of Rs 147.7 lakh crore, an improvement of 1.7 per cent over pre-pandemic levels.
• The report said the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) may hike rates in the June policy meeting and the cumulative rate hike in June and August is likely to be 75 basis points.

AWARDS & PRIZES

VASVIK Industrial Research Award 2020

• A Gopalakrishnan, Director of the ICAR-Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute, has received the VASVIK (Vividhlaxi Audyogik Samshodhan Vikas Kendra) Industrial Research Award.

• He received the award in the category of Agricultural Sciences and Technology for the year 2020.

• The VASVIK research award is given to scientists and researchers who have demonstrated excellence in a variety of fields, including agricultural sciences.
• The award, which includes a cash prize of 1.51 lakh and a citation, is in recognition of his significant contribution to fish genetics research.
• His research projects have included Genetic Stock Identification (GSI), species inventory, taxonomy, breeding, and seed production of threatened and commercially important species for mariculture.
• It has contributed to improved scientific knowledge on Indian fisheries and conservative measures.

First Indian to Win International Booker Prize

• Author Geetanjali Shree's Hindi novel ‘Tomb of Sand' has become the first book in any Indian language to win International Booker Prize.

• American Translator Daisy Rockwell won the prize for ‘Tomb of Sand’.
• Rockwell is a painter, writer and translator living in Vermont, US who has translated a number of works from Hindi and Urdu literature.
• The 50,000-pound ($63,000) prize money will be split between New Delhi-based Shree and Rockwell, who lives in Vermont.
• The International Booker Prize is awarded every year to a translated work of fiction published in the UK or Ireland.
• The book was originally written in Hindi and translated into English.
• Tomb of Sand is the story about an 80-year-old woman, who was into a deep depression when her husband dies, then resurfaces to gain a new life. The woman travels to Pakistan to confront the unresolved trauma of her teenage experiences of Partition and re-evaluates what it means to be a mother, a daughter, a woman and a feminist.

APPOINTMENTS & RESIGNATIONS

Indian Army’s First Female Combat Aviator

• 26-year-old Captain Abhilasha Barak became the first woman combat aviator in the Indian Army.

• Barak from Haryana successfully completed her six-month-long Combat Army Aviation Course to join Army Aviation Corps as a helicopter pilot.
• She was accorded with the Coveted Wings along with 36 Army Pilots by Director General & Colonel Commandant Army Aviation Lt. Gen. A. K. Suri during a valedictory ceremony held at Combat Army Aviation Training School, Nashik.
• Captain Barak has been assigned to the second flight of the 2072 Army Aviation Squadron that operates the Dhruv Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH).

New Chairman of A WTO Committee

• An Indian government officer Anwar Hussain Shaik has been appointed as the chairman of the WTO's committee on Technical Barriers on Trade.

• He will succeed Elisa Maria Olmeda de Alejandro from Mexico.
• The Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) Agreement aims to ensure that technical regulations, standards and conformity assessment procedures are non-discriminatory and do not create unnecessary obstacles to trade.
• TBT Committee work involves two broad areas to review of specific measures and strengthening implementation of the TBT Agreement.
• WTO is a 164-member multilateral body and India is a member since 1995.

President of Indian Olympic Association Steps Down

• Narinder Batra has resigned from the post of Indian Olympic Association (IOA) president.

• The Indian Olympic Association or Indian Olympic Committee is the body responsible for selecting athletes to represent India at the Olympic Games, Asian Games and other International athletic meets.

• It was founded in 1927 and is headquartered in New Delhi.
• He is also the president of the International Hockey Federation (FIH).