Current Affairs - May 2014

Miscellaneous

• India's First Voter - Shyam Sharan Negi.
• Lt.General Suhag - Ministry of Defence recommended him to be appointed as the next Army Chief.
• ONGC began to drill well in the palar basin to extract natural gas.
• Mukul Rohatgi appointed as the 14th Attorney general of India.
• Ranjit Kumar to be appointed as the next Solicitor General of India

Polity

• Article 15(5) - Mandates all unaided schools to admit 25% from weaker sections of their total strength excepting minority institutions.
• Supreme Court held that compulsion of mother tongue as the medium of instruction in the primary classes even for linguistic minorities is unconstitutional. Instead the child should be given the choice of selecting the medium of instruction as any language under the Article 19(1)(a). 
• The National commission for backward Classes NCBC passed a resolution recommending the inclusion of transgender community in the Central OBC List. 
• President Pranab Mukherjee gave his assent to the Whistle Blowers Protection Bill, which provides a mechanism to protect and encourage, those who disclose information on corruption and abuse of powers by the government officials.

Economics

• India is the third largest economy replacing Japan in the list. A recent report published by the International comparison programme which is hosted by the Development data group at the world bank group.The top 3 countries are as follows
1. USA
2. China
3. India
• The High level working group set up earlier to suggest measures for strengthening of resolution regimes recommended setting up of a single Financial Resolution Authority(FRA).
• FRA - Mandates
• To resolve failed financial institutions and financial infrastructures other than those owned and operated by RBI.
• Providing Deposit insurance and protection to insurance policy holders and investors.
• The consumption expenditure calculated by National Income Accounts is almost twice the consumption expenditure calculated by NSSO. The C.Rangarajan Committee on Poverty estimation to submit its report soon.
• Plastic Currency Notes to be launched from 2015. Field Trails to commence from 2014.
• The RBI had now allowed the import of gold through Star Trading Houses which had been banned earlier in the month of August 2013.
• The annual GDP Growth rate for the year 2012-2013 is 4.5 and for the year 2013-2014 is 4.7.
• SEBI increased the cash transaction  limit from Rs.20000 to Rs.50000 in Mutual Fund.

Science and Technology

• Antimicrobial resistance is the resistance to medicines and drugs used against microorganisms, which makes the medicines ineffective.
• PaMZ (Pyrazinamide) - a medicine in trail to treat both drug sensitive TB and MDR-TB.
• Astra - Air to Air Missile Test fired Successfully from an Aircraft the Sukhoi 30 MKI.
• K- 4 - Underwater launched missile was successfully tested. India is the fifth country in the world to have such a kind of missiles.
• E-Fan - World's First Electric Aircraft completely powered by electricity.
• ProtonMail - a new encrypted email service which helps to send and receive end to end encrypted messages.
• Rail Track Rocket Sled (RTRS) - a new facility to do captive flight testing inaugurated at the Terminal Ballistics Research Laboratory (TBRL), Chandigarh.
• e-nose also called as peres, a new device allows user to detetermine the quality and freshness of the food items.
• Aakash (Surface to air missile) tested successfully by IAF. 
• Dragon 2 - a space capsule developed by SpaceX to send astronauts and supplies to International space station and to return back to earth.

Environment

• The government of India has introduced a draft notification to ban the import of animal tested Cosmetics from others countries. It is to be noted India has already banned the animal tested cosmetics within the country.
• India achieved only 3640 mw clean energy out of the targeted 4325 mw this year. Out of the achieved 3640 mw, wind energy tops with 2083 mw and the solar in the second place with the contribution of 962 mw. 
• Uttar Pradesh government to impose Green Tax on vehicles to re-register.
• An Earthquake with Magnitude: 6.0 happened with epicentre at a depth of 10 Km below the sea level, 275 Km away from the Paradwip coast(Bay of bengal).
• Tamil Nadu tops in the number of tiger deaths this year.

World

• Ahmed Matiq - Elected as the new Prime Minister of Libya.
• USA signed a 20 year lease treaty on its military base with the country Djibouti (It is located in African Continent).
• Gao Yu - A Chinese journalist was arrested on charge of providing state secrets to sources outside the state.
• Luis Guillermo Solis - Elected as the new President of Costa Rica.
• 24th ASEAN Submit held in Nay Pyi Taw (Myanmar) from 10th to 11th May 2014.
• Jacob Zuma appointed as the President of South Africa for the second term.
• In Thailand the military regime took control over the government and disbanded the seanate.
• The Panchsheel Agreement to reach its 60th anniversary this year 2014.

Sports

• Upcoming FIFA - Football Hosting Countries
• 20th FIFA World Cup 2014 - Brazil
• 21st FIFA World Cup 2018 - Russia
• 22nd FIFA World Cup 2022 - Qatar
• Serena Williams - Won the Rome Masters trophy by beating Sara Errani of Italy in the final.

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