genesis-october 2015 issue i.pdf

Endeavor Careers – Dream … Endeavor… Achieve

www.endeavorcareers.com October 2015-Issue-I THE GENESIS

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The Genesis October 2015-Issue-I

Current Affairs

Nobel Prizes‐Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature & Peace 3

India, States 8, 11

World 13

Sports 16

Economy 18

Corporate 20

Cyber Buzz 23

Science & Technology 24

People

Faces: Shashank Manohar 15

Business Biography: Fred DeLuca 19

Knowledge Corners

Recent Releases: Forging Capitalism in Nehru’s India & No Regrets 29

GD: BCCI must be brought under government regulation 26

Crossword 27

Sudoku 35

Do you remember? 28

Corporate Knowledge Quiz 31

Point‐Counterpoint 34

Nobel Prizes: 3

The Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded to Takaaki Kajita and Arthur B. McDonald “for the discovery of neutrino oscillations, which shows that neutrinos have mass” while the Chemistry Prize went to Tomas Lindahl, Paul Modrich and Aziz Sancar “for mechanistic studies…

Business Biography: 17

The sandwich shop opened by Fred DeLuca at the age of 17 to help pay for college fees has grown into fast food giant Subway - one of the world’s biggest restaurant chain by locations with more than 44,000 outlets worldwide…

Ahmedabad CO & Centre: 101, Suyojan Towers, Nr. Hotel President, Off. C.G. Road Ahmedabad– 09☎:079 – 26464053/26420509 Vallabh Vidya Nagar: 3rd Floor, Diwaliba Chambers, Near ICICI Bank, Bhaikaka Statue VV Nagar – 388120☎:02692-326065/230826 Baroda: 316, Atlantis,Opp Vadodara Central, Sarabhai Road, Vadodara – 390016☎:0265-2341992, 9033100222 Mumbai: Vashi: ☎:022-65652221/7666587770; Vile Parle (W): ☎:022-65568888/65567788; Borivali: ☎:022-65354535/65354515 Rajkot: 3rd floor, Kings, Opp Punjab Honda, Near G T Seth School, Kalawad Road, Rajkot, ☎:02813051475 Gandhi Nagar: 302, Swagat Rain Forest - I, Block A ,Nr. City Pulse, Gandhinagar – 382007☎:079 - 23600050/32449313 Surat: UL/45-48, Pooja Abhishek, Opp S.P.B. College, Athwa Lines☎:0261 - 313 4418/3992675 Bhopal: RMJ Educational Services, 174, Modi Complex, M P Nagar Zone II, Bhopal – 462011; ☎:0755 - 4009501 Jaipur: 302, Ganga Heights, Opp. Apex Mall, Lal Kothi, Tonk Road, Jaipur☎:01414044315 Kanpur: 117/H-1/368, Ist Floor, Above SBI Bank, Pandu Nagar, Near Neer Ksheer Chouraha, Kakadeo, Kanpur – 208025; ☎:8808017100, 8808011100 Thane: 501, 5th Floor, “Thakor Niwas”,Opp. Thane Station (West), Near Thane Post Office, Thane (W) – 400 601☎:022-25444600/41009898 Rajahmundry: 46-7-26/1,Sri Sai Venkateswara Complex,Opp: Green Park Restaurant,Danavaipet, Rajahmundry– 533101☎:0883 - 6557777 Bangalore: No. 23, 1st floor, Vasavi Plaza,Near Cool Joint,11th main, 4th block Jayanagar,Bangalore – 560011.☎:080-41310888/41550888

“Whether you prevail or fail depends more on what you do to yourself then on what the world does to you.” – Larry Collins



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Takaaki Kajita and Arthur McDonald win Nobel Physics Prize The discovery that neutrinos switch between different “flavours” has won the 2015 Nobel Prize in physics.

Takaaki Kajita of Japan and Arthur McDonald of Canada won the Nobel Prize in Physics on October 6 for discovering the

“chameleon-like” nature of neutrinos, work that yielded

the crucial insight that the tiny particles have mass. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said the two researchers had made key contributions to experiments showing that neutrinos change identities as they whiz through the universe at nearly the speed of light. Neutrinos are miniscule particles created in nuclear reactions, such as in the sun and the stars, or in nuclear power plants. There are three kinds of neutrinos and the laureates showed they oscillate from one kind to another, dispelling the long-held notion that they were massless. “The discovery has changed our understanding of the innermost workings of matter and can prove crucial to our view of the universe,” the academy said. Kajita, 56, is director of the Institute for Cosmic Ray Research and professor at the University of Tokyo. McDonald, 72, is a professor emeritus at Queen’s University in Kingston, Canada. The winners will split the 8 million Swedish kronor (about USD 960,000) prize money. Each winner also gets a diploma and a gold medal at the prize ceremony on December 10. Kajita and McDonald made their discoveries while working at the Super-Kamiokande detector in Japan and Sudbury Neutrino Observatory in Canada, respectively. Kajita showed in 1998 that neutrinos captured at the detector underwent a metamorphosis in the atmosphere. Three years later McDonald found that neutrinos coming from the sun also switched identities. McDonald said that the eureka moment was when it became clear that his experiment had proven with great accuracy that neutrinos changed from one type to another in traveling from the sun to Earth.

First proposed by the Austrian Wolfgang Pauli in 1930, neutrinos are among the 17-odd irreducible building blocks of the world around us. They’re also wallflowers in the world of sub-atomic particles, rarely interacting with the other matter around them. Scientists estimate that a neutrino is capable of passing through a light-year (about 10 trillion km) of lead without hitting a single atom. Yet these ghostly particles are ubiquitous. Though we may not be aware of them, many billions of them flow through our bodies every second. There was a quarter of a century between Pauli’s original proposal and the actual discovery of neutrinos by the American physicists Frederick Reines and Clyde Cowan. But in another demonstration of the adage that good things come to those who wait, neutrinos appear to be absolutely vital to understanding many other mysteries in modern physics - perhaps even why the Universe looks the way it does today. The prevailing theory of particle physics, known as the Standard Model, assumes that neutrinos, like photons, are massless. But “flavour flipping” depends on the particles having mass. The discovery of neutrino masses and of neutrino oscillations are the first cracks in the Standard Model of particle physics. The ability to change stripes may also be the key to understanding why the Universe is predominantly made of matter and not its shadowy counterpart antimatter. The Big Bang is thought to have generated equal amounts of matter and antimatter. But when a matter particle meets its antiparticle, they disappear in a flash of energy. If antimatter and matter had kept on colliding, the Universe might consist of photons and little else.But the shape-shifting behaviour of neutrinos and anti-neutrinos might have tipped the scales in favour of matter.Perhaps, just like a comic book superhero, the humble neutrino saved us from certain annihilation.



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Tomas Lindahl, Paul Modrich and Aziz Sancar win Nobel Chemistry Prize The 2015 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded for discoveries in DNA repair.Their findings have provided fundamental insights into how cells function, knowledge that can be used, for instance, in the development of new cancer treatments. Tomas Lindahl and Paul Modrich and Aziz Sancar were

named as the winners of the 2015 Nobel Prize in Chemistry on October 7 in Stockholm, Sweden.Their work uncovered the mechanisms used by cells to repair damaged DNA - a fundamental process in living cells and important in cancer. Prof Lindahl is Swedish, but has worked at UK’s Francis Crick Institute for more than three decades.The prize money of eight million Swedish kronor ($970,000) will be shared among the winners. The Nobel Committeesaid the recipients had “explained the processes at the molecular level that guard the integrity of our genomes”. Each day our DNA is damaged by UV radiation, free radicals and other carcinogenic substances, but even without such external attacks, a DNA molecule is inherently unstable. Thousands of spontaneous changes to a cell’s genome occur on a daily basis. Furthermore, defects can also arise when DNA is copied during cell division, a process that occurs several million times every day in the human body. The reason our genetic material does not disintegrate into complete chemical chaos is that a host of molecular systems continuously monitor and repair DNA. The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2015 awards three pioneering scientists who have mapped how several of these repair systems function at a detailed molecular level.

“Cigarette smoke contains small reactive chemicals, which bind to the DNA and prevent it from being replicated properly - so they are mutagens. And once there is damage in the DNA this can cause diseases including cancer,” said Prof Lindahl, who for 20 years ran the Clare Hall laboratories in Hertfordshire - now part of Cancer Research UK. To address those defects, a host of molecular systems continuously monitor and de-bug our genetic information. The three new laureates mapped in detail how some of these mechanisms worked. In the 1970s, scientists had thought that DNA was a stable molecule, but Prof Lindahl demonstrated that it decays at a surprisingly fast rate.

This led him to discover a mechanism called base excision repair, which perpetually counteracts the degradation of DNA. Understanding the ways in which DNA repairs itself is fundamental to our understanding of inherited genetic disorders and of diseases like cancer. The important work that Lindahl has done has helped scientists gain greater insight into these essential processes. Turkish-born biochemist Aziz Sancar, professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, US, uncovered a different DNA mending process called nucleotide excision repair. This is the mechanism cells use to repair damage to DNA from UV light - but it can also undo genetic defects caused in other ways. People born with defects in this repair system are extremely sensitive to sunlight, and at risk of developing skin cancer. The American Paul Modrich, professor of biochemistry at Duke University in North Carolina, demonstrated how cells correct flaws that occur as DNA is copied when cells divide. This mechanism, called mismatch repair, results in a 1,000-fold reduction in the error frequency when DNA is replicated.



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3 scientists win Nobel Prize for medicine The Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine has been split two ways for groundbreaking work on parasitic diseases.

Three scientists have been named winners of this year’s

Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine – William Campbell and Satoshi Omura for their work on a therapy against roundworm, shared with Youyou Tu, for a therapy against malaria Their researchhas led to drugs to treat diseases affecting more than 3.4 billion people around the world. One of them, malaria, most people have heard of. But the other two illnesses, onchocerciasis or “river blindness” and lymphatic filariasis or “elephantiasis” - both caused by roundworm parasites - are lesser known. People catch these worms from bites from infected insects such as flies or mosquitoes. Left untreated, the worms grow and multiply, causing disabling symptoms in their host.The drug ivermectin kills the first larval stage of the parasite - the babies of adult female worms William C Campbell discovered this by studying bacteria living in soil samples obtained by Satoshi Omura from a Japanese golf course in Ito City, in the Shizuoka region. One particular strain of bacterium, Streptomyces avermitilis, caught his eye because of its potent anti-parasitic properties.Working with drug company Merck and Co, he then set about purifying this agent. Since 1987, Merk (MSD) has given ivermectin away free to those countries that need it most. Last year, it donated more than 300 million doses to treat river blindness and elephantiasis. Meanwhile, Chinese scientist Youyou Tu had been focusing her attentions in the 1960s and 70s on finding a new treatment for malaria.The staples quinine and

chloroquine were failing because the parasite that causes malaria - Plasmodium falciparum - had learned how to evade their attack. Disheartened by the lack of effective drugs to tackle this mosquito-borne disease, the professor turned to traditional medicine to hunt for a new option. She found that an extract from the sweet wormwood plant Artemisia annual was sometimes effective - but the results were inconsistent, so she went back to ancient literature, including a recipe from AD350. This ancient document - Ge Hong’s A Handbook of Prescriptions for Emergencies - recommended a handful of qinghao [the Chinese name for the plant extract] immersed in two litres of water, “wring out the juice and drink it all”. This she did (with a few tweaks), testing it on herself as well as animals in her lab.She said: “During the Cultural Revolution, there were no practical ways to perform clinical trials of new drugs. So, in order to help patients with malaria, my colleagues and I bravely volunteered to be the first people to take the extract. “After ascertaining that the extract was safe for human consumption, we went to the Hainan province to test its clinical efficacy, carrying out antimalarial trials with patients,” she wrote in Nature Medicine. Her discovery eventually led to the creation of an antimalarial drug - artemisinin - that is still relied upon today. The WHO credits the expanding access to artemisinin-based combination therapies in malaria-endemic countries as a key factor in driving down deaths in recent years. Between 2000 and 2013, malaria mortality rates decreased by an estimated 47% worldwide and by 54% in Africa. Among babies and children under five, the main target group. death rates have declined by 53% globally, and by 58% in Africa, although the disease still killed 453,000 in 2013. But artemisinin-resistant strains of malaria are emerging. As of February 2015, artemisinin resistance had been confirmed in five countries – Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar,Thailand and Vietnam. And so the quest for new drugs continues.



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Svetlana Alexievich wins Nobel Prize for Literature The Swedish Academy described her work as “monument to suffering and courage in our time”

Belarusian writer and journalist Svetlana Alexievich has won the 2015 Nobel Prize for literature. The prize committee called her writing “a monument to courage and suffering in our time”. The award - presented to a living writer - is worth eight million kronor. She becomes the 14thwoman to win the prize since it was first awarded in 1901. The last woman to win, Canada’s Alice Munro, was handed the award in 2013.French historical author Patrick Modiano won in 2014. Alexievich, 67, is a political writer who is critical of her home country’s government. Announcing the prize in Stockholm, the chair of the Swedish Academy, Sara Danius, said Alexievich had spent nearly 40 years studying the people of the former Soviet Union, but that her work was not only about history but also “something eternal, a glimpse of eternity” and a “monument to suffering and courage in our time”. Danius said she was very pleased Alexievich had won the prize, calling her work “absolutely brilliant”. It has been half a century since a writer working primarily in non-fiction won the Nobel - and Alexievich is the first journalist to win the award. Her best-known works in English translation include Voices From Chernobyl, an oral history of the nuclear catastrophe; and Boys In Zink, a collection of first-hand accounts from the Soviet-Afghan war. “By means of her extraordinary method - a carefully composed collage of human voices - Alexievich deepens our comprehension of an entire era,” the Swedish Academy said. The author was born in 1948 in the Ukrainian town of Ivano-Frankivsk, to a Belarusian father and Ukrainian mother. The family moved to Belarus after her father completed his military service, and Alexievich studied journalism at the University of Minsk between 1967 and 1972. After graduation, she worked as a journalist for several years before publishing her first book – ‘U vojny ne ženskoe lico’(‘War’s Unwomanly Face’, 1985) – which saw her credited with devising “a new kind of literary

genre”.The book is based on interviews with hundreds of women who participated in the second world war. It’s an exploration of the second world war from a perspective that was, before that book, almost completely unknown. It tells the story of the hundreds and hundreds of women who were at the front in the second world war.

Almost one million Soviet women participated in the war, and it’s a largely unknown history. It was a huge success in the Soviet Union when published, and sold more than 2m copies. It’s a touching document and at the same time brings you very close to every individual, and in a few years they all will be gone. The book set a template for her future works, constructing narratives from witnesses to the world’s most shattering events. Alexievich has written short stories, essays and reportage but says she found her voice under the influence of the Belorusian writer Ales Adamovich, who developed a genre which he variously called the “collective novel”, “novel-oratorio”, “novel-evidence”, “people talking about themselves” and the “epic chorus”. On her personal website, Alexievich explains her pursuit of journalism: “I chose a genre where human voices speak for themselves.” She has previously won the Swedish PEN prize for her “courage and dignity as a writer”. Alexievich’s new book, ‘Second-hand Time’, is scheduled for release in 2016. Reviews suggest it’s an oral history, as are all her books, about nostalgia for the Soviet Union. She went around Russia interviewing people after the fall of the Soviet Union, in an attempt to surmise what the collective post Soviet psyche is. As with all her books, it’s really harrowing – a story about loss of identity, about finding yourself in a country which you don’t recognise any more. It’s a micro-historical survey of Russia in the second half of the 20th century, and it goes up to the Putin years. Alexievich was the bookies’ favourite to win the award, according to Ladbrokes. She beat other hot favourites Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami and Kenyan novelist Ngugi Wa Thiong’o. She is the 14th woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature in its history. A total of 112 individuals have won it between 1901 and 2015.



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National Dialogue Quartet wins Nobel Peace Prize Tunisia’s National Dialogue Quartet has been credited with aiding the country’s transition to democracy

The Norwegian Nobel Committee decided on October 9 that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2015 is to be awarded to the Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet for its decisive contribution to the building of a pluralistic democracy in Tunisia in the wake of the Jasmine Revolution of 2011. The Quartet was formed in the summer of 2013 when the democratization process was in danger of collapsing as a result of political assassinations and widespread social unrest. It established an alternative, peaceful political process at a time when the country was on the brink of civil war. It was thus instrumental in enabling Tunisia, in the space of a few years, to establish a constitutional system of government guaranteeing fundamental rights for the entire population, irrespective of gender, political conviction or religious belief. The National Dialogue Quartet has comprised four key organizations in Tunisian civil society: the Tunisian General Labour Union (UGTT, Union Générale Tunisienne du Travail), the Tunisian Confederation of Industry, Trade and Handicrafts (UTICA, Union Tunisienne de l’Industrie, du Commerce et de l’Artisanat), the Tunisian Human Rights League (LTDH, La Ligue Tunisienne pour la Défense des Droits de l’Homme), and the Tunisian Order of Lawyers (Ordre National des Avocats de Tunisie). These organizations represent different sectors and values in Tunisian society: working life and welfare, principles of the rule of law and human rights. On this basis, the Quartet exercised its role as a mediator and driving force to advance peaceful

democratic development in Tunisia with great moral authority. The Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to this Quartet, not to the four individual organizations as such. The Arab Spring originated in Tunisia in 2010-2011, but quickly spread to a number of countries in North Africa and the Middle East. In many of these countries, the struggle for democracy and fundamental rights has come to a standstill or suffered setbacks. Tunisia, however, has seen a democratic transition based on a vibrant civil society with demands for respect for basic human rights. An essential factor for the culmination of the revolution in Tunisia in peaceful, democratic elections last autumn was the effort made by the Quartet to support the work of the constituent assembly and to secure approval of the constitutional process among the Tunisian population at large. The Quartet paved the way for a peaceful dialogue between the citizens, the political parties and the authorities and helped to find consensus-based solutions to a wide range of challenges across political and religious divides. The broad-based national dialogue that the Quartet succeeded in establishing countered the spread of violence in Tunisia. The course that events have taken in Tunisia since the fall of the authoritarian Ben Ali regime in January 2011 is unique and remarkable for several reasons. Firstly, it shows that Islamist and secular political movements can work together to achieve significant results in the country’s best interests. The example of Tunisia thus underscores the value of dialogue and a sense of national belonging in a region marked by conflict. Secondly, the transition in Tunisia shows that civil society institutions and organizations can play a crucial role in a country’s democratization, and that such a process, even under difficult circumstances, can lead to free elections and the peaceful transfer of power. The National Dialogue Quartet must be given much of the credit for this achievement and for ensuring that the benefits of the Jasmine Revolution have not been lost. More than anything, the prize is intended as an encouragement to the Tunisian people, who despite major challenges have laid the groundwork for a national fraternity which the Committee hopes will serve as an example to be followed by other countries.



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Current Affairs: India HAPPENINGS

HRD Ministry approval must for tie-ups with foreign institutions: All major Central educational institutions will now have to take the HRD Ministry’s approval for signing MoUs with foreign partners in case the agreements have financial implications on the government. “Institutions coming under the MHRD should seek prior approval of the Ministry before signing MoU with foreign institutions in case it has financial implications on the Government of India,” the PMO order said in September. The order further said the decision for mandating the approval was taken as the PM had expressed his displeasure about the practice of institutions delaying the process of taking the post facto approval. Shyama Prasad Mookerjee RURBAN Mission approved: The government approved a scheme in September to spur social, economic and infrastructure development in rural areas. The government has earmarked over 5,000 crore rupees for the scheme named as Shyama Prasad Mookerjee Rurban Mission. Under this mission, 300 Gramin clusters that will include Gramin Panchayat and nearby villages will be developed with an expenditure of over 5,000 crore rupees. The Cabinet also gave approval for 150 days employment per household under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in the drought hit areas of the country. AWARDS

National Tourism Awards 2013-14 were presented in New Delhi in September. List of Awardees includes: • Best State/UT for Comprehensive Tourism Development in Rest of India category: Gujarat (first), Madhya Pradesh (second), Rajasthan (third) • Tourist Friendly Railway Station: Railway Station Habibganj–MP • Best Heritage Walk: India City Walks for Mehrauli Archaeological Park, Delhi • Best Heritage City: Heritage City Gwalior, MP • Rural Tourism Project: Rann Utsav, Gujarat • Best Tourism Film: ‘The Great Backwaters of Kerala’ Submitted by Kerala Tourism • Best Tourism Promotion Publicity Material: ‘Gujarat’s 50 Golden Destinations’ • Best Film Promotion Friendly State/Union Territory: Gujarat • Most innovative use of Information Technology/Best Website: Deptt. of Tourism, Govt. of Kerala/Portal Saakshar Bharat Awards: President Pranab Mukherjee presented the Saakshar Bharat Awards 2015 on the International Literacy Day in New Delhi on September 8. As many as 11 Saakshar Bharat Awards were presented to States, Districts, Blocks, Gram Panchayats, State Resource Centre (SRC) and Jan Shikshan Sansthan (JSS) for best performance in the field of adult education and skill development. The awardees are: Best Performing State-Tamil Nadu; Best Performing District- 1. Bastar, Chhattisgarh, 2. Dharampuri, Tamil Nadu 3. Haveri, Karnataka; Best Performing Gram Panchayat-1. Palamalai, Salem District, Tamil Nadu 2. Giroud, Raipur District, Chhattisgarh 3. Poosarlapadu, Srikakulam District, AP 4. Ankireddygudem, Nalgonda District, Telangana 5. Khanggabok Part - II, Mayai Leikai, Thoubal District, Manipur; Best Performing Resource Support Organisation 1. State Resource Centre (SRC), WB 2. Jan Shikshan Sansthan, Allahabad, UP. FICCI Water Awards: In a bid to recognize efforts and leadership in the area of water efficiency, the India Industry Water Conclave and the 3rd Edition of FICCI Water Awards was launched by FICCI in association with HSBC in New Delhi in September. The award giving ceremony was attended by JyotsnaSuri, President, FICCI and Naina Lal Kidwai, Chairperson, FICCI Water Mission amongst others. Some of the award categories were industrial water Use efficiency, community initiatives by the industries and initiatives by NGOs. The top three award winners in category of Industrial Water Use Efficiency were bagged by ITC Munger, Ambuja group and Infosys Limited. Ambuja Cements Ltd and Ultratech Cement Ltd were winners among the category Community initiatives by the Industries. VishwakarmaRashtriyaPuraskar: The Minister of State for Labour& Employment (Independent Charge) BandaruDattatreya gave away VishwakarmaRashtriyaPuraskar and National Safety Awards for the Performance Year 2013, in New Delhi in September. VRP is awarded in recognition of outstanding suggestions given by a worker or group of workers and implemented by the management in the form of cash prize and a certificate of merit. The NSA is given in



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recognition of outstanding safety performance of industrial establishments, construction sites, ports and installations under AERB. Gandhi Peace Prize 2014: President Pranab Mukherjee presented the Gandhi Peace Prize for the year 2014 to Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in New Delhi in September. The award was received by A. S. Kiran Kumar, Chairman, ISRO on behalf of the organization. The Gandhi Peace Prize was instituted by the Government in 1995 on the occasion of the 125th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi. This annual award is given to individuals and institutions for their contributions towards social, economic and political transformation through non-violence and other Gandhian methods. The Award carries an amount of Rupees one crore in cash, a plaque and a citation. Royal Aeronautical Society medal: Scientific Adviser to Defence Minister G. Satheesh Reddy has been conferred the prestigious Silver Medal of the Royal Aeronautical Society (RAeS) in London in September. RAeS has been honouring outstanding achievers in the global aerospace industry since 1909, when Wilbur and Orville Wright came to London to receive the society’s first Gold Medal. Reddy, an eminent missile scientist, has made pioneering contributions to navigation and avionics technologies. PERSONS IN NEWS

APPOINTMENTS: P. V. Chandran of the Mathrubhumi group was elected President of the Indian Newspaper Society (INS) for 2015-16 at its AGM held in Bangalore in September. Hormusji N. Cama, Managing Director of Bombay Samachar, the oldest continuously-published newspaper in India from 1855, was elected Chairman of the Press Trust of India at its AGM in New Delhi in September. IPS officer Binita Thakurwas appointed as Director of NATGRID (National Intelligence Grid), a robust intelligence gathering mechanism set up to track any terror suspect and incident, in September. Agriculture expert Professor Ramesh Chand, who headed a government panel on Minimum Support Price and has been working as Director of National Institute of Agricultural Economics and Policy Research (NIAP) in New Delhi since 2010, was appointed as one of the full-time members in the NITI Aayog. RESIGNATIONS: LokJanshakti Party (LJP) LokSabha MP from Vaishali in Bihar, Rama Singh, tendered his resignation from the party and has quit from all the posts. The resignation of the Director of Nehru Memorial Museum and Library (NMML), Prof Mahesh Rangarajan was accepted by the government in September. OTHERS: Finance Minister ArunJaitley received a cheque of Rs.100 crore for the Swachh Bharat and NamamiGange projects from the spiritual leader Mata Amritanandmayi, in Kollam, Kerala in September. Bhubaneshwar’sAnanyaSritam Nanda, 14, won the “Indian Idol Junior” title in Mumbai in September. The National Investigation Agency (NIA) declared a cash reward for information on S.S. Khaplang and included the 75-year-old Naga militant leader in a list of wanted terrorists in September. OBITUARIES

Lance Naik Mohan NathGoswami, a Special Forces Commando of the Army, eliminated 10 militants in a short span of 11 days before he laid down his life while battling militants in Handwara Jammu & Kashmir in September. Music director AadeshShrivastava passed away in Mumbai at the age of 49 on September 5. Samajwadi Party MLA from Bikapur seat in Faizabad parliamentary constituency, MitrasenYadav died in Lucknow on September 7 at the age of 81. Veteran Congress leader and former MP from Jammu Poonch parliamentary constituency, Janak Raj Gupta, passed away in Jammu on September 13 at 79. Well-known Mohiniyattam dancer and Padma Shri-awardee choreographer KalamandalamSatyabhama died in Palakkad (Kerala) on September 13 at the age of 77. EXTERNAL RELATIONS

CHINA: After a fresh face-off, the armies of India and China had two meetings at two places in Ladakh in September during which the two countries agreed to maintain peace and tranquillity along the 465-km long Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Ladakh sector. The meetings of senior officers of Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and the Indian Army took place in Chushul, located 202 km southeast of Leh and Daulat Beg Oldi (DBO), 250 km northeast of Leh.



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CAMBODIA, LAOS: India and Cambodia signed two MoUs, one relating to Tourism and another an umbrella project under Mekong Ganga Cooperation initiative during the visit of Vice President M. Hamid Ansari in capital Phnom Penh in September. During his meeting with Prime Minister Hun Sen, Ansari emphasised India’s growing economic ties with CLMV countries, i.e. Cambodia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Myanmar and Vietnam. Later Ansari also visited Laos, where he met President ChoummalySayasone and Prime Minister ThongsingThammavong in capital in Vientiane. SRI LANKA: In his first overseas trip after assuming the top office for the fourth term, Sri Lankan Prime Minister RanilWickremesinghe came on a three-day visit to India on September 14-16 where he held extensive talks with the Indian leadership including on the fishermen issue. NEPAL: Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar met senior leaders of Nepal including CPN-UML chairman K P Sharma Oli in Kathmandu as special envoy of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in September and discussed the latest political situation in the country amid protests by Madhesi groups over the country’s new Constitution. Jaishankar also called on President Yadav and Prime Minister SushilKoirala and meet UCPN-Maoist chief Prachanda as well as senior leaders of the Madhes-based political parties, who are launching agitation over the issue of adopting a federal model in the new constitution. PAKISTAN: Amid a growing war of words and firing from across the border, a 15-member team of Pakistani Rangers led by Major General Umar Farooq Burki, Director General, held talks with the Border Security Force (BSF) headed by DG Pathak in New Delhi in September. During the conference, discussions were held on important issues like cross-border firing, infiltration and smuggling etc. BANGLADESH: In a first of its kind, India will conduct a joint marine research with Bangladesh in its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) to understand the ecology of the Bay of Bengal that affects the climatic conditions of the region. A team of scientists from the CSIR’s National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) will head to the Bay of Bengal in October-November along with its Research Vessel (RV) SindhuSadhana. INDONESIA: India and Indonesia have signed a pact for repatriation of each other’s wanted prisoners and cooperate in all criminal matters, including gathering evidence. Under the agreement, India will execute summons to an accused person or to any person requiring to attend and produce documents or a search-warrant issued by an Indonesian court. Indonesia will reciprocate with similar action if there is any request from any Indian court. AUSTRALIA: A key Australian parliament panel has overridden expert criticism to back a deal inked with India in 2014 under which New Delhi can import uranium from Canberra for its nuclear power plants, triggering relief in the foreign policy establishment in New Delhi in September after months of tense waiting. The inaugural Bilateral Maritime Exercise between India and Australia, AUSINDEX-15 as conducted off the East Coast of India at Visakhapatnam in September. GERMANY: An English news channel of Deutsche Welle (DW), Germany’s Public Service Broadcaster, was launched at an event in New Delhi by German Ambassador to India Martin Ney and PrasarBharati CEO JawharSircar in September. The German broadcaster said that the cornerstone of the channel will be news from Europe and the world, along with a programming focus on regional news and events from Asia. BELARUS: India and Belarus have set a trade target of USD 1 billion by 2018, besides agreeing to enhance cooperation in sectors including pharmaceuticals and energy at the meeting held in Minsk in September between Commerce and Industry Minister NirmalaSitharaman and her Belarussian counterpart VitaliMikhailovichVovk. Sitharaman also called on President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko. BRITAIN: The Indian Navy and Britain’s Royal Navy hold KONKAN series of exercises in UK in September.



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Current Affairs: States KARNATAKA

With support from Janata Dal (Secular) and Independents, Congress clinched the coveted Bangalore Mayor post as it edged out BJP by a slender three vote margin in the keenly contested city civic body poll in September. At least two passengers died and seven people were injured after nine coaches of Secunderabad-LokmanyaTilak Terminus Duranto Express derailed near Gulbarga on September 12.Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar commissioned INS ‘Vajrakosh’, the latest establishment of the Indian Navy, in Karwar in September.Noted Kannada writer ChandrashekharPatil, popularly known as Champa, returned the prestigious Pampa Award conferred on him by the Karnataka government in 2009, protesting against what he said was “an effort to stifle the voice of dissent and freedom of expression” in September. TAMIL NADU

The Department of Posts launched a savings scheme in Tamil Nadu for the male child – ‘PonmaganPodhuvaippuNidhi’ – on the lines of the successful SukanyaSamriddhi Account scheme in Chennai in September. CM Jayalalithaa has launched the ‘Amma Baby Care Kit’ scheme in September, wherein the government will provide accessories meant for the newborn and its mother. ANDHRA PRADESH

CM N. Chandrababu Naidu formally interlinked the waters of the Rivers Godavari and Krishna at the Ibrahimpatnam Ferry village, which is located about 20-kilometers from Vijayawada, on September 16 thus fulfilling a long cherished dream of farmers of the Krishna and Guntur Districts. The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation will implement the ambitious Vijayawada Metro Rail Project, the CM announced in September. MAHARASHTRA

Chief Minister DevendraFadnavis announced the setting up of a ‘Japan Desk’, a one-stop shop in the state for all Japanese companies, in September. Ahmed Javed was appointed the new Mumbai Police Commissioner while incumbent Rakesh Maria was promoted and posted as the Director General of Police (Home Guards) in September.Senior Congress Leader and former Maharashtra LokSabha MP BalkrishnaRamchandraWasnik passed away on September 10 in Nagpur at the age of 86. Voicing concern over heavy bags carried by school children, the Bombay High Court on September 23 asked Maharashtra Government to issue a circular within a month fixing a date for implementing recommendations of an expert committee that looked into the issue.The World Bank has assured support for developing Mumbai’s mass transit system during the meeting its MD MulyaniIndrawati had with the CM in Mumbai in September. GUJARAT

The state Government announced a MukhyamantriYuvaSwavlambanYojana for meritorious students of the non-reserved categories in September. Students, who secure 90 percentile in 12th Standard and whose annual family income is below Rs. 4.50 lakh are eligible to get various benefits like 50 percent waiver of fee, scholarships, hostel expenses etc. Meritorious students pursuing his Medical and Engineering and other higher studies will get 50 percent assistance with maximum limit of Rs.2 lakh per year under this scheme. MADHYA PRADESH

The government constituted a one-member commission to enquire into the Petlawad explosion incident when At least 89 people were killed and nearly 100 injured after a massive blast caused by mining explosives stored in a building ripped through a crowded area in Petlawad town in Jhabua district on September 12. The state government launched M-Shiksha-Mitra mobile app to provide various services and teaching-related work to teachers in simple and easy way in September. The Tenth World Hindi Conference concluded in Bhopal on September 12 where a resolution was passed to organize the Eleventh edition in Mauritius in 2018. Also US based Hindi Sangam Foundation will be organising the Third International Hindi Conference at Rutgers University, New Jersey in March 2016 to promote Hindi in America. Home minister Rajnath Singh felicitated 38 scholars with Hindi Samman on this occasion.



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UTTAR PRADESH

Eminent writer KashiNath Singh, best known for his novel ‘KashiKaAssi’ -- an adaptation of which has inspired the Bollywood film ‘MohallaAssi’, was awarded the Bharat Bharti award by the CM in Lucknow in September. PM Modi launched the Rs.45,000 crore nationwide Integrated Power Development Scheme (IPDS) in his parliamentary constituency of Varanasi in September to ensure 24-hour power supply to every house. BIHAR

Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that Bodh Gaya would be developed as a spiritual capital of the Buddhist world in his address at the concluding ceremony of a three-day International Buddhist conclave there in September. RAJASTHAN

The Rajasthan government has announced a new ‘informer’ scheme to contain illegal sex determination tests in expecting mothers at private clinics or hospitals under which a cash reward of Rs 2 lakh will be given to informer (40%), decoy woman (40%) and her accomplice (20%). The state Assembly passed a bill amending the Right to Education act, to do away with the “no detention policy” up to class 8 in government recognized schools.Eminent Dogri poet and the recipient of SahityaAkadamiPuraskar, Capt. (Retd.) Randhir Singh popularly known as ‘KunwarViyogi’, passed away on September 16 in Jaipur at the age of 75.

DELHI

The AamAadmi Party (AAP)-led government said it will install CCTV cameras in all classrooms of government schools of the national capital.

JAMMU & KASHMIR

Jammu & Kashmir government approved a social assistance scheme for girl child ‘LadliBeti’ in September which will be implemented in six districts with low child sex ratio. The state will contribute Rs 1,000 per month towards the birth of every girl child for the next 14 years and the she would receive a sum of Rs 6.5 lakh upon reaching the age of 21. PUNJAB

To commemorate the 150th birth anniversary of leading freedom fighter LalaLajpatRai, popularly known as “Punjab Kesari”, the Punjab government announced that his birthplace at Dhudike village in the state’s Moga district would be given a complete facelift. The AAP, which has all four of its MPs in LokSabha from Punjab, suspended Dharamvira Gandhi (Patiala) and Harinder Singh Khalsa (Fatehgarh Sahib) from primary membership of the party and initiated disciplinary proceedings against them. WEST BENGAL

Sixty-four secret files relating to NetajiSubhas Chandra Bose that could help throw light on his mysterious disappearance--an enduring enigma for seven decades --were released in Kolkata in September by the state government in the presence of Bose’s family members who have been demanding that information on the leader of the Azad Hind Fauj (Indian National Army-INA) be made public.

MEGHALAYA

Chief Minister MukulSangma launched the Meghalaya Livelihood and Access to Markets Project (Megha LAMP) aimed at providing market linkages to farmers and improve their earnings in Shillong in September.

MANIPUR

The Manipur government has handed over 336.93 acres of land to the Union Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports for building a National Sports University in the state in Thoubal district.



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Current Affairs: World HAPPENINGS

More than 1000 die in Haj tragedies: A massive construction crane crashed into the Grand Mosque in Mecca, Saudi Arabia in stormy weather on September 12, killing at least 87 people and injuring 184. Saudi Arabia’s King Salman has sanctioned the construction firm Binladin Group for the crane collapse. The construction firm belongs to the family of the late al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. On September 24, more than 1000 people including more than 50 Indians were killed in a stampede at the annual Hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia. Mina is where pilgrims carry out a symbolic stoning of the devil by throwing pebbles. The stoning ritual is done over at least two days. The incident is the deadliest disaster at Mina since 1990, when 1,426 people died. Germany and Czech Republic tighten border controls: The German Railway company Deutsche Bahn halted train services with Austria after Berlin announced that it was reinstating border controls as the authorities buckles under the strain of a record refugee influx. Germany’s Vice Chancellor has said that the country is at the limit of its capabilities as more than 13 thousand migrants arrived in Munich on September 12. Even, the Czech Republic said that it will boost controls on the border with Austria over the refugee crisis. Meanwhile, Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban has welcomed Berlin’s decision to reinstate border controls as a necessary move in the face of a record migrant influx. Nepal’s Constituent Assembly endorses new constitution: In a landmark step to culminate a prolonged transition after Nepal became republic in 2008, the country’s Constituent Assembly on September 16 endorsed a much-awaited new constitution of Nepal with an overwhelming two-thirds majority. President Ram BaranYadav unveiled the Constitution on September 20 in Kathmandu. This is the first full-fledged constitution in the Himalayan nation. Earlier, the country got an interim constitution in 2007 following the people’s movement in 2006 that toppled the 240-year monarchy. Japan allows its military to fight abroad: Japan’s Parliament passed contentious security bills into law in September, in a move that could see Japanese troops fight abroad for the first time in 70 years. The new law loosens post-World War II constraints on use of force by the military to its own self-defence only. The legislation sparked debate about whether the nation should shift away from its pacifist ways to face growing security challenges. The law will allow the military to defend Japan’s allies even when the country isn’t under attack. They will also be able participate more fully in international peacekeeping. UN General Assembly opens 70th session: The UN General Assembly (UNGA) opened its 70th session on September 15. The 70th session, a regular yearly event, was declared open by President MogensLykketoft of Denmark. The UNGA unanimously adopted a document for reform of the Security Council. It will boost India’s bid for a permanent seat in the revamped world body. External Affairs Ministry spokesman VikasSwarup described the development as significant and said now text-based negotiations can be commenced after more than two decades of discussions. Swiss select new national anthem: The Swiss public have voted online to choose the song they would like to see replace their current national anthem in September. The winning song - whose English translation is ‘Hoisted up there in the wind, our red and white flag’ - was composed by Werner Widmer. The result concludes the competition that was launched in 2014 to replace the current national anthem, known as the Swiss Psalm, which is often criticised for its overly religious lyrics. PAP retains power in Singapore polls: Singapore Premier Lee HsienLoong’s People’s Action Party (PAP) retained power after scoring a landslide victory in general elections in September. The PAP won an absolute majority of 83 seats in the 89-member Parliament. The opposition Workers’ Party won six seats. The PAP has increased its percentage of the votes to over 70%, up from 60.14% in the 2011 general elections, when the party won 81 of the 87



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constituency elected. Politics in the city-state since its independence in 1965 has been dominated by the ruling PAP founded by Lee Kuan Yew, father of Lee and it has won every election. AWARDS

Venice Film Festival: Director Lorenzo Vigas’ Spanish movie “From Afar” bagged the coveted Golden Lion award for the Best Film at the 72nd Venice Film Festival in September, becoming the first Latin American film to receive the honour. “From Afar” or “Desdealla”, the first ever entry from Venezuela to the festival, follows a wealthy middle-aged man who falls for a street thug, changing both their lives. It is based on a story by writer Guillermo Arriaga. Pablo Trapero’s“El Clan” (“The Clan”), an Argentine true-crime thriller that has broken box-office records in its homeland, took the Silver Lion for Best Direction. French drama “L’Hermine” or “Courted” won FabriceLuchini the Volpi Cup for the Best Actor and the film also received the Best Screenplay award for Christian Vincent’s work. Actress Valeria Golino received the Volpi Cup for Best Actress for her role in the Italian movie ‘Per Amor Vostro’ (For your love). The Grand Jury award, often considered as the runner-up honour, went to Charlie Kaufman and Duke Johnson’s American animated film, “Anomalisa”. CPJ Awards: Paraguay’s CandidoFigueredo Ruiz is one of the media professionals being honoured by the Committee to Protect Journalists for their commitment to defending freedom of the press, the New York-based organisation said in September. Also selected for the same honour are cartoonist Zulkiflee Anwar Ulhaque of Malaysia, Zone 9 group of bloggers in Ethiopia and a journalist collective from Syria – Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently. The prizes will be awarded at a CPJ dinner in New York on November 24. Asia Game Changer awards: ICICI bank CEO ChandaKochhar is among three Indians selected for this year’s Asia Game Changer awards given by Asia Society to honour“true leaders making a positive contribution to the future of Asia.” Indian-American actor AasifMandvi, 49, and designer KiranBirSethi, 49, also made it to the list besides Kochhar, 53. Champion boxer and philanthropist from the Philippines Manny Pacquiao is the 2015 Asia Game Changer of the Year “for using his sport and his star power as forces for good,” Asia Society announced in New York in September. The other seven honorees include 2014 Nobel Laureates in Physics and inventors of a new energy- efficient light source - the blue LED Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamura “for lighting our world in a ground-breaking and sustainable way. Champions of the Earth award: Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina was awarded the annual ‘Champion of the Earth’ award by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in New York in September. According to UNEP, she has proven that investing in climate change is conducive to achieving social and economic development. The other winners are the National Geographic Society (Science and Innovation); Brazilian cosmetics firm Natura (Entrepreneurial Vision); and South Africa’s Black Mamba Anti-Poaching Unit (Inspiration and Action). PERSONS IN NEWS

OBITUARIES: Jackie Collins, the renowned British-born novelist who penned best-selling novels such as ‘Hollywood Wives’ and ‘The Stud’, died Los Angeles on September 19 at the age of 77. Spain’s Carmen Balcells, a literary agent who represented some of the biggest names in 20th-century Spanish language literature including Nobel-winning authors Mario Vargas Llosa and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, died in Barcelona on September 20 at the age of 85. Frank D Gilroy, whose play about a veteran’s fraught return home, “The Subject Was Roses,” won him a Pulitzer Prize died in Monroe, New York on September 12 at the age of 89. Max Gesner Beauvoir, the supreme chief of the voodoo religion, died at the age of 79 in the Haitian capital Port-Au-Prince on September 13. APPOINTMENTS: Malcolm Turnbull was sworn in as Australia’s new Prime Minister in September after an internal revolt in the ruling Liberal Party forced Tony Abbott to quit. Former Egyptian oil minister Sherif Ismail took oath as the new Prime Minister in September after President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi accepted the resignation of the cabinet headed by PM Ibrahim Mehleb.



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Faces Shashank Manohar: Shepherding the gentleman’s game The challenge for the new BCCI president is to make the BCCI transparent and tackle conflicts of interest

Lawyer-turned-administrator Shashank Manohar, 58, was on October 4 elected unopposed as the BCCI President for a second time after a gap of four years and vowed to clean up the mess in the Cricket Board by announcing a slew of reforms to restore the credibility of the game. The reforms announced by him

includethe appointment of an ombudsman to deal with contentious issues like conflict of interest. Decrepit BCCI

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is a cosy club of insiders. It is as corrupt an institution as any in India. If cricket is no longer a gentleman’s game, then those who run the game in India reflect the game’s fallen state. The board owes its standing to the commercial pull cricket enjoys in the country. But the riches have also made the administration complex, with vested interests adding to the problem. Even Manohar’s rise to the top cannot be counted as a democratic success for the BCCI, nor can it be put down to meritocracy. It’s obvious that powerful politicians are still the ones pulling the strings. Only that can explain how a board that seemed riddled with factions till a few days ago can suddenly be united, and end up with an unopposed candidate. The BCCI can only claim to have embraced true democracy when the president is picked on the basis of who he is and what he has done for the game, not who he’s being backed by. There are formidable obstacles to the cleaning -up job that Manohar faces. The presence of factions that made possible his presidency will also hamper Manohar’s activities to change things for the better in the BCCI. There are too many vested interests and too many individuals trying to vicariously fulfil their political ambitions. Agenda

The Nagpur lawyer has vowed to make BCCI’s functioning transparent and root out the conflict of

interest that became the central focus following the 2013 Indian Premier League spot-fixing scandal. His 11-point agenda shows that he is well aware of the challenges the board faces. Manohar said he wants to have discussions with central government authorities to find out whether an investigating agency can be attached to the BCCI. The move has been planned as the BCCI does not have investigating powers on matters of corruption. His other priorities include independent auditing of state unit spending of annual BCCI grants, greater transparency by putting up the BCCI constitution online and a commitment not to use arbitrary powers as chairman. Manohar announced the hiring of M/S Gokhale&Sathe, a reputed firm based in Mumbai as BCCI’s advisor on Direct Tax matters and as an Internal Auditor, in replacement of a Chennai-based firm. His other important decisions included central contracts of women cricketers, common auditor to monitor expenses of all the state units and putting BCCI’s balance sheet on the Board website to promote transparency. This is the first time that the opaque board has agreed to open itself for outside scrutiny. Manohar has the reputation of being honest. He is also known to be a person who speaks his mind without caring too much for niceties. His reputation is certainly better than that of his predecessors but Manohar did not have a blemish-free tenure in his first stint as BCCI President. It was during his earlier term that the IPL kicked off and the controversial decision to tweak the BCCI constitution to allow N. Srinivasan to own a team also took place under his watch. As a legal expert, he could have seen the conflict of interest issue inherent in allowing Srinivasan’s India Cements to own the Chennai Super Kings. Manohar has signalled his intent for ushering in reform. As someone who argued last year that the “Board’s reputation is the lowest that it has been in the 80 years since it was founded,” Manohar knows how high the stakes are as millions of cricket lovers watch. It’s up to him to deliver now.



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Current Affairs: Sports CRICKET

Bangladesh replace West Indies in 8‐team 2017 ICC Champions Trophy

Bangladesh’s breakout year in one-day cricket has earned them a place in the ICC Champions Trophy for the first time since 2006, the International Cricket Council confirmed on September 30, 2015. Bangladesh has replaced the West Indies among the eight sides to contest the 2017 tournament, which will be played in England. An excellent show in the 2015 World Cup saw Bangladesh defeat England to advance to the quarter-finals. Since, they have won One-Day International series against Pakistan, India and South Africa, helping them jump from ninth to seventh in the ICC’s ODI rankings.

The West Indies have not played a one-day match since the World Cup, with a lack of matches denying them a chance to rise up the rankings, with September 30 the cut-off date for qualification. The 2017 Champions Trophy will be a 15-match tournament, with teams split into two groups of four. The top two teams in each group will advance to the semi-finals. The ICC also confirmed the cut-off date for direct qualification to the 2019 World Cup, also to be held in England. The top eight ranked sides in the ODI rankings on September 30, 2017, will automatically qualify for the tournament. The teams ranked 9-12 will have a second chance to qualify, playing off against other associate sides for the final two places in the 10-team tournament. PERSONS IN NEWS: Former India captain SouravGanguly, 43, was appointed the president of the Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB), following the death of JagmohanDalmiya in September. Former Sri Lankan cricketer RoshanMahanama (49), who has refereed in 58 Tests, 222 ODIs and 35 T20Is to date, has decided to step down from the elite panel of ICC match referees at the end of the year. Former England cricketer Brian Close, who made his debut against NZ in 1949 and went on to play 22 tests, passed away on September 14 at the age of 84. TENNIS

India fail to enter Davis Cup World Group: Czech Republic defeated hosts India 3-1 in the Davis Cup World Group Play-off tie in New Delhi in September when Yuki Bhambri lost to Jiri Vesely 3-6, 5-7, 2-6 in the fourth match of the best of five tie. The inconsequential fifth match was not played. Bhambri had lost the first match to Lukas Rosol 2-6, 1-6, 5-7. SomdevDevvarman levelled the tie 1-1 by beating Jiri Vesley 7-6(3), 6-4, 6-3 in the second match. Czechs went 2-1 up when their doubles pair of Adam Pavlasek&RadekStepanek beat Leander Paes& Rohan Bopanna 7-5, 6-2, 6-2

in the third match. The result means that India will remain in the Asia–Oceania Group 1 for next year’s competition while the Czechs regained their place in the elite-16 nation World Group. Belgium to face Britain in Davis Cup final: Hosts Belgium entered the Davis Cup final by defeating Argentina 3-2 in the semi-final 3-2 in Brussels while Britain got the better of Australia 3-2 in Glasgow to set up title clash in November. While David Goffin (2 singles) and Steve Darcis (1 singles) won for the Belgians, Argentina’s wins came from Leonardo Mayer (Singles) and Carlos Berlocq and Leonardo Mayer (Doubles). At Glasgow, Andy Murray won 2



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Singles and the Doubles with his brother Jamie. Australia’s two wins came from Bernard Tomic and Thanasi Kokkinakis in Singles. BADMINTON

Korea Open: India’s Ajay Jayaram lost in the final of BWF World Superseries Korea Open Badminton to World No.1 Chen Long of China Jayaram 21-14, 21-13 at Seoul in September. Other title winners were South Korea’s Sung Ji Hyun in Women’s Singles, South Koreans Lee Yong-Dae&YooYeon-Seong in Men’s Doubles, Indonesian pair GreysiaPolii&Nitya Kris Maheswari in Women’s Doubles and China’s Zhang Nan & Zhao Yunlei in Mixed Doubles. MISC: SainaNehwal presented her racquet, with which she became the first Indian to win a silver medal at the Badminton World Championships, to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the occasion of his birthday (September 17) in New Delhi. Sports

equipment manufacturer Yonex founder Minoru Yoneyama was conferred the Badminton World Federation’s highest honour - the President’s Medal - for his “truly exceptional contribution” to the sport in Tokyo in September. The Sports Ministry has included women’s badminton doubles players JwalaGutta&AshwiniPonnappa in the TOP (Target Olympic Podium) scheme which provides funding for training in preparation for Rio Olympics 2016. FOOTBALL

The Indian football team has climbed up a place to occupy 155th spot in the latest FIFA rankings released in September while Copa America runners-up Argentina continued to be at the top ahead of Belgium, in second position, and third-placed World Champions Germany. The 2022 Football World Cup in Qatar will start on November 21 and finish on December 18. FIFA confirmed in September. Mizoram’s Government Chawngfiang Middle School lifted the 56th Subroto Cup Sub-Junior(Under-14)Boysfootball trophy, beating Esteqalal School from Afghanistan 3-2 in the final at Ambedkar Stadium in New Delhi in September. Former India footballer and member of the 1962 Asian Games’ gold medal winning squad Prashanta Sinha passed away in Kolkata on September 22 at the age of 77. EVENTS

The Olympic Council of Asia has included Kurash, a folk wrestling style practiced in Central Asia, in the sport program of the 2018 Asian Games in Indonesia at its General Assembly meeting in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan in September. Veteran Indian sports administrator Randhir Singh stood down as Secretary General of the Olympic Council of Asia after occupying the post for 24 years. The South African city of Durban has officially been announced as host of the 2022 Commonwealth Games in September by the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) while the 2018 Games will be held at Australia’s Gold Coast. MISC

LevonAronian of Armenia won the Sinquefield Cup Chess tournament in St. Louis (USA) while India’s ViswanathanAnand finished ninth in September. India’s Spaniard Borja Golan defeated India’s SauravGhosal 11-6, 11-4, 10-12, 11-5 in the final to win the USD 35,000 CCI Open Squash Championships in Mumbai in September. Indian Air Force (IAF) beat Army XI 2¬–1 to lift the 24th All India Baba Farid Gold Cup hockey title at Faridkot in September. Formula 1 team Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel won the Singapore Grand Prix race at Marina Bay on September 20 followed by Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo in second and his Ferrari

team-mate KimiRaikkonen in the third spot.PankajAdvani won the IBSF World Billiards Championship by beating beat Singapore’s Peter Gilchrist by 1168 points in the final at Adelaide (Australia) in September.JyotiGawate and Bhanupratap Singh won the Women’s and Men’s races respectively at the ‘Airtel Hyderabad Marathon’ on August 30.



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Current Affairs: Economy Full MAT relief for FIIs: Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) and foreign institutional investors (FIIs) have been exempted from paying minimum alternate tax prior to April 1, 2015. Finance minister ArunJaitley said in September that the government had accepted the recommendations of the Justice A.P. Shah panel and would now amend section 115JB of the income tax act. Pending the amendment, the government will issue a circular directing income-tax officers not to collect MAT from FPIs. In the last budget, Jaitley had exempted FIIs from paying MAT with effect from April 1, 2015, necessitating the case for MAT prior to this date. Over 300 cities identified for Housing for All scheme: The Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation ministry government has identified over 300 cities and towns across nine states for implementing the Housing for All initiative, under which two crore houses are targeted to be built for the poor in urban areas by 2022. The selected cities and towns are in Chhattisgarh (36 cities/towns), Gujarat (30), Jammu and Kashmir (19), Jharkhand (15), Kerala (15), Madhya Pradesh (74), Odisha (42), Rajasthan (40) and Telangana (34). CBDT issue guidance notes on FATCA implementation: Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has issued guidance notes on implementation of reporting requirements for the US law FATCA. Under Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA), foreign financial institutions that fail to give information about their American clients to US authorities would face 30 per cent withholding tax. The Inter-Governmental Agreement (IGA) between India and US, signed as part of FATCA implementation, requires the Indian FIs to provide necessary information to Indian tax authorities, which will then be transmitted to the US automatically. Economic growth down to 7% in April-June quarter: The GDP growth slowed to 7% in the April-June quarter of 2015-16, from 7.5% in the January-March quarter of 2014-15, according to data from the Central Statistics Office (CSO). Meanwhile the fiscal deficit in the first four months of current financial year stood at Rs 3.85 lakh crore, or 69.3% of Budget estimates for 2015-16, as government stepped up its expenditure. The fiscal deficit during April-July 2014-15 was 61.2% of the Budget estimates. The fiscal deficit -- gap between expenditure and revenue -- for the entire current fiscal has been pegged at Rs 5.55 lakh crore, or 3.9% of the GDP. The fiscal deficit was Rs 5.01 lakh crore, or 4% of GDP, in 2014-15. TRAI proposes compensation to consumers for calls drops: Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, TRAI has proposed that service providers should compensate mobile subscribers for call drops and poor quality of services. The Telecom regulator released a paper, stating that any call which gets dropped within five seconds would not be charged, and in case a call gets dropped any time after five seconds, the last pulse of the call should not be included for the purpose of charging. TRAI Chairman Ram Sewak Sharma also floated a consultation paper seeking public view on the proposal. Spectrum trading allowed: The Government approved telecom spectrum trading norms in September, allowing mobile operators to buy or lend airwaves from one another. The telecom companies will now be able to trade un-utilised spectrum, in all bands. Spectrum trading will be allowed only between two access service providers. Only outright transfer of right to use the spectrum from the seller to the buyer shall be permitted. This will be is especially helpful for those companies that had bid and won airwaves but couldn’t expand their customer base. The move is likely to ease the recent spurt in call drops. Defence industrial licence validity extended: To improve ‘ease of doing business’ and boost defence manufacturing, government decided to increase the validity of industrial licence to 15 years with a provision to further extend by up to 18 years. The Commerce and Industry Ministry said in September that this is being done in view of the long gestation period of defence contracts to mature. Currently, the initial validity of industrial licence for defence sector is seven years, further extendable up to 10 years. In 2014, the government raised the foreign direct investment policy in the defence sector to 49 per cent, from the earlier 26 per cent.



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Business Biography Fred DeLuca: Food fiesta The sandwich shop opened by him at the age of 17 to help pay for college after graduating high school has grown into one of the world’s largest fast food franchisees

Subway co-founder Fred DeLuca died on September 14 at the age of 67. DeLuca’s death came weeks after the 50th anniversary of Subway, which is the world’s biggest restaurant chain by locations with more than 44,000. Subway, which sells made-to-order sandwiches, including foot-long “submarines” — so called for their oblong buns — and salads, beverages and desserts, grew phenomenally in the 1970s, when it began using franchises to expand. It undercut its competitors with relatively low start-up costs, lower prices and marketing that emphasized fresh ingredients and lower-calorie, reduced-sodium foods. Starting Subway

DeLuca was born in Brooklyn on October, 3, 1947 to Salvatore and Carmela Ombres DeLuca. His father was a factory worker.After he graduated from high school in Bridgeport Connecticut, DeLuca had planned on becoming a doctor. That was why he started the sub shop with Buck — to support his college education.

He only opened up the sandwich store after his job at a hardware store failed to provide him enough wages to pay for school. ‘I knew nothing about making sandwiches, nor the food industry,’ DeLuca recalls in his book‘Start Small Finish Big: Fifteen Key Lessons to Start — and Run — Your Own Successful Business’. ‘It wasn’t intended to support me forever,’ DeLuca, who gave up plans for a medical career and received a degree in psychology from the University of Bridgeport in 1971, wrote in his book. At a family barbecue Buck, a family friend and nuclear engineer with General Electric, and DeLuca talked shop about the sandwich venture.Buck provided start-up money and became a full partner. That’s when DeLuca rented a small store for $165 a month in downtown Bridgeport where he built a takeout counter and opened on August 28, 1965 and sold a various assortment of Italian subs.

His first sandwich shop, named Pete’s Submarines to acknowledge the loan Buck, was not a success. Its name had to be changed after his local radio advertisements,

delivered in his native Brooklyn accent, confused many listeners, who thought he was saying “Pizza Marines.” The name was changed to the snappier ‘Subway’ in 1968, and the pair decided to fuel growth by franchising, or letting others open Subway stores in exchange for fees.

Legacy

Today Subway has more locations (44,268) than McDonald’s(36,000) and KFC (18,000)combined. The gregariousDeLuca was hands-on chief executive, personally signing company checks, making corporate decisions, traveling the country in an old car and stopping at Subway outlets incognito to sample the food and service and talk with franchise owners and customers. In a statement, the company said DeLuca ‘was an extremely ambitious businessman’ and ‘bright and analytical thinker’ who thought of Subway’s worldwide workforce as ‘members of his extended family.’‘He was always very proud of the work of his HQ staff,’ the statement said, ‘and thousands of developers, franchisees, Sandwich Artists, suppliers and partners who he often and affectionately called “The Greatest Team in Franchising History.”‘ While DeLuca’s success story was often portrayed as inspirational, Subway’s extraordinary growth was achieved with aggressive, sometimes questionable, tactics and despite sometimes unflattering publicity. Subway’s business tactics drew lawsuits, government investigations, run-ins with regulatory agencies, disputes with landlords and complaints by franchisees of being misled or defrauded. Over the years, the fast food giant settled many claims, paid fines and reviewed and modified some of its business practices. But it also produced thousands of success stories among franchise owners, many with no previous commercial experience, who profited from the company’s training, marketing and guidance.



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Current Affairs: Corporate RANKINGS & INDEXES

Hurun Report’s India Rich List: The population of the super-rich continues to grow in India, reveals the latest edition of Hurun Report’s India Rich List 2015. There are 296 high net-worth individuals (that is, whose assets are valued above Rs. 1,600 crore). Reliance Industries boss MukeshAmbani continues to be the richest Indian with assets valued at Rs. 1,60,951 crore followed by pharmaceuticals tycoon DilipShanghvi of Sun Pharma and Britain-based SP Hinduja. Others in the list include DhirajRajaram of data analytics firm Mu Sigma, Sameer Gehlaut of India Bulls, BalakrishnaGoenka of Welspun, AnkitBhati&Bhavish Aggarwal of Ola Cabs. Indu Jain (Bennett, Coleman & Co Ltd) is the richest woman in the list.

Global Innovation Index: India has slipped to 81st position in the Global Innovation Index (GII) 2015 report, a decline by five positions as compared to 2014. Switzerland topped the GII followed by the United Kingdom and Sweden securing number two and three positions respectively. The GII, co-published by Cornell University, INSEAD and the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO), surveyed 141 economies around the world, using 79 indicators to gauge both innovative capabilities and measurable results. Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) was a knowledge partner in the initiative. BrandZ Top 50 Most Valuable Indian Brands: HDFC Bank Ltd retained its top position in a list of India’s 50 most valuable brands released in September. The bank has a brand value of $12.6 billion, according to the BrandZ rankings compiled by research agency Millward Brown and commissioned by WPP. Airtel is No: 2 followed by State Bank of India, ICICI Bank Ltd and Asian Paints Ltd. The valuation methodology combines financial data with the perceptions of Indian consumers. Fortune’s Most Powerful Women in Business: PepsiCo CEO IndraNooyi is the sole Indian-origin executive in Fortune’s list of 50 Most Powerful Women in Business, which has been topped by General Motors CEO Mary Barra. India-born Nooyi is ranked 2nd on the list. The list also includes IBM CEO GinniRometty on the third rank, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg on 8th, and Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer at 18th. Fortune’s Most Powerful Women in Asia-Pacific: Indian Bankers have been ranked as top two in a list of most powerful women in Asia Pacific prepared by the global magazine Fortune. ChandaKochhar, 53, who heads the country’s largest private sector lender ICICI Bank has been ranked at the top. She is followed by Arundhati Bhattacharya, the Chairperson of the country’s largest lender State Bank of India. State-run oil marketing company Hindustan Petroleum Corporation’s CMD Nishi Vasudeva made it to the list at fifth rank. Country’s third largest private sector lender Axis Bank’s MD & CEO Shikha Sharma comes in at the ninth spot in the list. HAPPENINGS

GM fined $900 million over faulty ignition switches: General Motors Co on September 17, 2015 agreed to pay $900 million and admit to misleading the government and the public about the safety of its vehicles to end a U.S. criminal investigation into its handling of defective ignition switches linked to 124 deaths. The ignition switch defect caused some Chevrolet Cobalts, Saturn Ions and other GM vehicles to stall, preventing airbags from deploying during crashes. Wipro to provide ambulances for Delhi: The AAP government signed an MoU with tech giant Wipro in September for procuring and maintaining 110 modern ambulances, besides setting up and operating a modern control room, under its “Home to Hospital Care” Scheme to provide free ambulance services in the national capital. HCL, Wipro get contracts from EPL clubs: Wipro bagged contract to become a digital partner of a English Premier League’s Chelsea Football Club as its official digital and IT partner in September. Also HCL Technologies,



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bagged a three-year contract to enable Manchester United in the club’s digital transformation journey. As part of this, HCL would create a United Xperience Lab to be housed within Old Trafford stadium. Meanwhile Infosys signed a deal with ATP, the governing body for professional men’s tennis, to become the Global Technology Services Partner and Platinum Sponsor of the ATP World Tour. Sony, BBC to set up Sony BBC Earth: Multi Screen Media Private Ltd, part of Sony Corporation, has entered into a joint venture with BBC Worldwide to set up Sony BBC Earth -- a new premium factual channel -- in India. Sony BBC Earth will combine information and entertainment in real surroundings and would cater to Indian audiences looking for thrill and adventure of exploring natural environments. MSM comprises of Sony Entertainment Television, Sony MAX, SAB, Sony Pix and AXN, among others. Bharat Dynamics test fires Amogha: Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL) announced that it had successfully test-fired an indigenously developed second generation, 2.8 km range, anti-tank guided missile called Amogha-1. The test firing was carried out on September 10 at Babina Army Range in Madhya Pradesh. Federal Brands sues Levi’s India over Live In jeans: Federal Brands, the owner of Live In jeans, has filed a suit against Levi’s India for infringement of copyright and sought damages of Rs 75 crore after the US apparel company launched a global marketing campaign - the Live In Levi’s Project. The suit is listed in the Bombay High Court, according to the court’s website. The Indian denim maker sought the court’s intervention to stop Levi Strauss & Co from using the prefix ‘Live In.’ PERSONS IN NEWS

APPONTMENTS–Public Sector: State-run power equipment maker Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL) appointed AtulSobti as its next chairman and managing director in September. Durgapur Steel Plant’s CEO P.K. Singh was appointed new Chairman of the Steel Authority Of India Ltd (SAIL) in October. D.K. Likhi was appointed Chairman and Managing Director of Hyderabad-based Mishra Dhatu Nigam Limited, a ‘Mini Ratna’ PSU under the Defence Ministry, in September. Prabhat Kumar Singh took over as the new Managing Director and CEO of Petronet LNG Ltd, India’s biggest liquefied natural gas importer, in September. APPONTMENTS–Private Sector: HT Media Executive Director BenoyRoychowdhury was appointed as the Chairman of Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) in September. Realty major DLF announced appointment of its two whole-time directors Rajeev Talwar and MohitGujral as co-CEOs of the company in September. BRAND AMBASSADORS: World No. 1 ranked Badminton player SainaNehwal has been roped in as the brand ambassador of Edelweiss Financial Services which has Rashesh Shah as its Chairman & CEO. Hollywood star Hugh Jackman has landed a new role as a global ambassador for his native Australia’s national airline Qantas. OTHERS–I: Kumar Mangalam Birla has purchased the iconic Jatia House in the plush Malabar Hill area in Mumbai for a whopping Rs 425 crore -- making it the priciest property deal in the megapolis. Cyrus Poonawalla, chairman of paediatric vaccine maker Serum Institute of India belonging to the Poonawalla Group, has purchased Lincoln House at Breach Candy in South Mumbai for a whopping Rs 750 crore from the US government in September. OTHERS–II: Paul Polman, the CEO of Unilever, is the winner of this year’s United Nations Champions of the Earth Award in the Entrepreneurial Vision category in September. Fred DeLuca, the CEO and co-founder of Subway who helped build his sandwich shops into the world’s largest restaurant chain, died at age 67 on September 14. SanjeevBikhchandani, founder and promoter of Info Edge, which runs portals naukri.com and jeevansathi.com, has transferred 12,900 personal shares to employees in September. LAUNCHES

GADGETS: Apple announced the launch of 12.9 inch iPad Pro, the largest iPad Apple has ever made, along with iPhone 6S, iPhone 6S plus in September. Micromax subsidiary Yu unveiled its 4G device Yuniquepriced at Rs 4,999 on



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e-commerce portals in September. Domestic handset-maker Lava launched the Pixel V2 smartphone at a price of Rs.10,750 in September. Samsung launched phabletGalaxy Note 5 starting at Rs. 53,900. Indian handset-maker Intex Technologies launched Aqua Glam - a new smartphone exclusively for women - at a price of Rs.7,690 in September. Micromax co-founder Rahul Sharma’s Yu Televentures has launched a portable printer called YUPix compatible with Android and iOS smartphones and priced at Rs 6999. Motorola launched smartphone Moto X Play for Rs 18,499 in September. Philips Lighting has launched its Philips Hue web-based LED lighting solution, which allows users to control home lighting anytime, anywhere, in India. Navigation technology company MapmyIndia launched a match box size equivalent GPS enabled tracking device, SafeMate, in September that continuously transmits the live location of person to be tracked on mobile phone and computer. AUTOMOBILES: Automaker Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) plans to roll out Jeep brand next year in India. The company plans to showcase Jeep in the Auto Expo in 2016; both Grand Cherokee and Wrangler brands would be launched. Tata Motors-owned Jaguar Land Rover launched its latest SUV, the seven-seater‘Discovery Sport’ in September in four variants with a starting price of Rs 46.1 lakh. Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) launched compact SUV TUV300 at an introductory price starting at Rs 6.9 lakh in September as it aims to take on the likes of Ford EcoSport and Renault Duster. Maruti Suzuki India launched a limited edition version of its popular model WagonR, named Avance, with prices starting at Rs 4.30 lakh in September. Mercedes-Benz launched its new sub-brand Maybach inIndia. FINANCIAL SERVICES: Axis Bank launched LIME, a mobile phone application offering wallet, shopping, payments and banking facilities in September. Public sector lender Indian Bank launched IndPay, a mobile application service that enables its customers to operate bank accounts from anywhere, anytime, in September. Infosys launched two new financial products -- Finacle Payments Bank and Finacle Small Finance Bank solutions -- to tap opportunity in the newly announced payments banks segment in September. SBI Card rolled out an online specific credit card branded SimplyCLICK in association with seven partners including Amazon India, BookMyShow and Cleartrip in September. FOOD: Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), the owner of brand Amul, re-launched its whey-protein based sports drink Stamina in PET bottles in September to compete with Gatorade of PepsiCo, Glucon D Isotonik of Heinz India and Lucozade from Glaxo SmithKline. Coca-Cola is rolling out its Fuze range of tea, a $1 billion global brand, in India in a move aimed at widening its portfolio of healthier beverages to compete with Hindustan Unilever’s Lipton ice tea, which is sold in a tie-up with PepsiCo. Creating a new category of branded sugar to expand its portfolio, E.I.D. Parry (India) Ltd has launched Parry’s Amrit in September. E-COMMERCE: E-commerce giant Amazon.in announced expansion of its consumer electronics store in India in September with the launch of AmazonBasics. Times Group launched a realty and property news channel ‘Property Now’ in September. Union Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on August 30 launched Sahaj, the online release of new liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) connections, through the portal mylpg.in. HOTELS & FMCG: Budget hotels marketplace OYO Rooms has launched a new brand called OYO WE, a Women’s Exclusive for women travelers with all-women staff and special amenities for women. Luxury chain ITC Hotels was the first to conceptualize Eva rooms exclusively for women travellers in the 1990s. Arvind Lifestyle signed deal to launch cosmetics brand Sephora owned by LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton in India in September. MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS

FOOD: The Minneapolis-based General Mills, which owns brands like, agreed to sell its Green Giant and Le Sueur vegetable businesses to B&G Foods Inc for about $ 765 million in cash in September. FMCG major Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL) sold the bread and bakery business under ‘Modern’ brand to Everstone Group’s Nimman Foods Pvt Ltd for an undisclosed sum in September. VEHCILES: Hero Cycles bought Delhi-based Firefox Bikes in September for an undisclosed sum to expand its presence in the country’s premium cycle market. JK Group announced a deal to acquire BK Birla flagship firm Kesoram Industries’tyre manufacturing plant at Haridwar for up to Rs 2,200 crore in September.



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Cyber Buzz

Office 2016 launched: Microsoft has released its latest Office 2016. Microsoft had added real-time co-editing to its Web apps in 2013. It has now added it to the desktop app so the users can

collaborate without opening their browser. Skype for Business is now incorporated into the apps so the users can video chat, instant message or share files within documents themselves. Also, Office 2016 has added search and integrates with Cortana to provide contextual results. The users can ask about their calendar for the day, search in documents and more. Outlook now with a new Office 365 Groups feature allows the users to see shared inboxes, calendars and notebooks within the app and the app has received a big performance bump for ‘live search’ which is much faster. In addition, a new app, Office 365 Planner is included with Office 2016 which is a task tracking style app for getting projects done on time. Wikipedia blocks paid edits: Wikipedia said in September that it has blocked more than 300 accounts being used by people being paid to create or tweak entries at the communally sourced online encyclopedia. Investigations revealed 381 accounts being used at the English version of Wikipedia for “black hat” editing in which people took money to promote outside interests without disclosing they were on someone’s payroll. Wikipedia is powered mostly by volunteers and bars paid advocacy that is not disclosed. Along with blocking the 381 “sockpuppet” accounts, Wikipedia editors deleted 210 articles created by people using those accounts.

Cyberbullying expert gets FB grant: Sameer Hinduja, an Indian-American cyberbullying expert has received a grant of USD 188,000 from Facebook in September to study cyberbullying and dating violence among teenagers in US. The overarching goal of this study is to illuminate the nationwide prevalence, frequency and scope of cyberbullying and electronic dating violence among a population of youth in US. Hinduja is Co-Director of the Cyberbullying Research Centre and a professor of criminology and criminal justice at Florida Atlantic University. Jawbone introduces new devices: US-based Jawbone has introduced three new devices, priced between Rs 4,999 and Rs 14,999, that will be available through e-commerce firm Amazon. The company said its ‘UP’ app and Smart Coach system can help people better understand their health and well-being by tracking sleep,

activity and nutrition. The UP app, powered by Smart Coach, turns user data into personalised guidance, giving them actionable insights and challenges to help improve their sleep, activity and diet. Instagram opens for advertisers: Popular photo-sharing platform Instagram has opened up its platform for advertisers. Starting this month it will allow advertisers, large and small, to run ads on the platform in India. This will allow Facebook to further increase its reach to garner better revenue from advertisers targeting mobile users. Instagram will offer a new suite of features, including more action-oriented ad formats, landscape images and videos, and the ability to reach the right group, leveraging Facebook’s ad management technology. FB launches Mentions for journalists: Facebook has released its live streaming app called Mentions an iOS app, which will now be available also to the journalists with verified Facebook profiles or pages. The iOS app was exclusive earlier only for the celebrities. The social networking portal said it wanted to make Facebook a better experience for journalists whether it is used for newsgathering or better connecting with their readers or to drive distribution to their content. MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS: Snapdeal has acquired Reduce Data, a Silicon Valley startup, for an undisclosed amount to strengthen its discovery platform in September. Bangalore-based table reservation platform Dineout has acquired inResto Service. Car portal CarDekho has acquired Times Internet owned auto portal Zigwheels. Doctor discovery platform Practo Technologies concluded a deal to acquire healthcare startup Qikwell Technologies. Payments services provider Suvidha Infoserve (founded by Paresh Rajde) acquired AasaanPay (founded by Sainath Gupta, Pruthvi Sabbu and Shashank Sahni), the first Indian mPOS (mobile Point Of Sale) platform.

Hindi Twitter‘Mooshak’ launched: A Hindi networking site ‘Mooshak’ envisaged on the lines of popular English social media platform Twitter was launched in Bhopal in September. This new networking site is targeted at Hindi language buffs. The word limit on Twitter is 140, while in ‘Mooshak’ it is 500 words. ‘Mooshak’ can be accessed on smart-phones by downloading it from Google Play Store or visiting its website of the same name.



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Science & Technology

M‐dose Diclofenac banto save vultures

The Centre has banned the sale of multi-dose vials of common painkiller diclofenac over its reported misuse in the veterinary sector, which resulted in vultures deaths. Acting on a recommendation from the Environment Ministry, the Health Ministry banned the sale of diclofenac vials containing more than one dose, said an Environment Ministry official. Only single-dose vials will now be available in medicine shops. Though use of diclofenac to treat cattle was banned in 2006, the ministry fears multi-dose vials available in the market for human use could be widely misused for veterinary purpose. This, in turn, has a severe impact on the country’s vulture population. Populations of three vulture species declined markedly in the Indian subcontinent since the mid-1990s as they were killed after ingesting diclofenac. The Bundelkhand region continues to be one of the problem areas. The scavenger birds ingest the drug when feeding on carcasses of domesticated ungulates treated with the drug shortly before death. Diclofenac is harmless to cattle, but fatal for vultures. Studies have shown the drug causes kidney and liver failure in them. All the vulture species are now endangered. A 2011 Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) study showed the proportion of cattle carcasses in India contaminated with diclofenac declined by over 40 per cent between 2006 and 2008 after the ban. The drug’s concentration in the carcasses also came down. Another BNHS report in 2007 showed the population of oriental white-backed vultures in India dropped by an average of more than 40 per cent per year from 2000 to 2007, and 99.9 per cent since 1992 to just about 11,000. The populations of long-billed and slender-billed Vultures also fell about 97 per cent over the same period, to around 45,000 and 1,000, respectively, in 2007. A new research by conservationists from Cambridge University, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and BNHS documented signs of change.

PSLV‐C30 places Astrosatin orbit

ISRO’s reliable work horse Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), in its 31st flight (PSLV-C30), launched the indigenous 1,513 kg Astrosat into a 650-km orbit on September 28. Along with Astrosat, six satellites from international customers were launched in this PSLV flight. The PSLV-C30 rocket had a precise lift off at 10 a.m. from the first launch pad of Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SHAR) in Sriharikota (AP). The successful launch was also a milestone for ISRO, which has now over 50 foreign satellites into their intended orbit. Apart from Astrosat, the PSLV-C30 carried LAPAN-A2, a micro-satellite from Indonesia; NLS-14 (Ev9), a nanosatellite from Canada; four Lemur nano satellites from the US. Till today’s launch, ISRO has so far launched 45 foreign satellites on a commercial basis. AS Kiran Kumar, Chairman, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said that It took nearly a decade to develop a full-fledged astronomy satellite as multiple research institutions were involved in the programme along with ISRO. Astrosat is India’s first dedicated astronomy satellite or a space observatory to look at objects in the sky from multiple wavelengths. Astrosat now joins the elite group of three other space observatories – Hubble of the US, Spektr R of Russia and Suzaku of Japan – in astronomical observations. In contrast to the satellites launched by India so far, Astrostat is the first one that is dedicated to space observation and unlocking the mysteries of the universe. India has ground-based telescopes such as the Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope near Pune and the Indian Astronomical Observatory in Ladakh. However, without a space telescope, scientists so far relied on resources of NASA and the European Space Agency to study ‘radiation bands’ that carry information about neutron stars, newly born or exploding stars and the spiralling hot gases around black holes. Now, the indigenous Astrosat will help in understanding high energy processes in binary star systems containing neutron stars and black holes, estimate magnetic fields of neutron stars and study star birth regions and high energy processes in star systems lying beyond the galaxy.



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RECENT RELEASES

Forging Capitalism in Nehru’s India

The prospects for industrial development in the early years of independent india were plagued by a number of interrelated issues. indian industrialists of the post-independence era had either evolved from the ranks of merchants and moneylenders of the colonial period or from wartime speculators and hoarders. in general, their interests lay in

short-term speculative gains rather than in sustained industrial growth. In addition, the impoverished condition of the peasantry resulted in the prospects of attractive returns through the diversion of urban resources to the rural moneylending market. let alone preventing fresh industrial investment, this diversion bled the industrial sector of funds to cover even the replacement costs of plant and machinery. finally, because of the nexus long established between some sections of the owners of capital and the congress party, decisive corrective intervention by the government after independence became a problematic political task. In ‘Forging Capitalism in Nehru’s India: Neocolonialism and the State (1940-1970)’, Nasir Tyabji examines the processes by which these problems, exacerbated by colonial nonchalance, were comprehended by the political executive in independent india, and shows how measures of social engineering were attempted in order to reform the more extreme cases of capitalist cupidity.

Tyabji is an economic historian with interests in the areas of technology, innovation, and the social aspects of industrialization. After some years spent at the Madras Institute of Development Studies, Chennai, and the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, New Delhi, he taught at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Subsequently, he moved to Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi, and retired as the Director and Professor from the Centre for Jawaharlal Nehru Studies. He continues to edit the centreâs journal History and Sociology of South Asia.

No Regrets

The dramatic build-up to the overnight nationalization of fourteen banks in a single legislative sweep sets the stage for No Regrets. In this book, bureaucrat extraordinaire D.N. Ghosh offers an eyewitness account of perhaps the most important event in India’s banking history post-Independence, baring the manoeuvrings behind the enabling ordinance and the pickle over fair

compensation for the dispossessed bank owners. But that’s not all. Years later, Ghosh enters the portals of the State Bank of India as its chairman, at a time when the stirrings of change have just begun to be felt in the Indian economy. Anticipating the future, he goes for a paradigm shift: to rid ‘profit’ of its ‘dirty word’ tag and place it at the core of the bank’s operating strategy. Gradually, he takes SBI into the capital markets, establishes its credit standing globally, launches India’s first mutual fund and, above all, cajoles the trade unions into accepting full computerization. Post-retirement, Ghosh steps into the corporate world. During this period he deals with scarcely veiled threats from a mighty corporate house and even finds himself verbally assaulted by the promoter of an erstwhile bank. In between, the could-have-been-academic tills the soil for certain reputable management institutes (IIM-L) to bloom and grow even as he sets up the credit rating agency, ICRA. Full of untold stories, No Regrets is an honest-to-goodness account of a glorious career spanning over six decades and covering some epochal events whose reverberations continue to be felt in the corridors of bureaucracy, banking and business to this day. An authority in banking and financial history, D.N. Ghosh was associated with the evolution of banking in India for over three decades as a policy maker and as administrator.



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Group Discussion BCCI must be brought under government regulation

FOR

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is neither greater than the government nor is it above the law and the Constitution. The revenues coming from sale of TV rights, sponsorships and ticket sales has made cricket India’s only sport that is a money spinner. The Board has shown itself to be an unreliable custodian of these funds. The BCCI and its self-serving administrators have been sullying the image of the sport by their unethical conduct and getting away for years. The cabal of politicians, cutting across party lines, holding top positions in the BCCI and its state level affiliates are the root cause of this problem. The huge sums of money and influence involved in the management of the sport have created a fertile ground for political interference. These politicians gang together and thwart any attempts to bring transparency in the administration of the game. Many of them own large stakes in the teams playing in the lucrative IPL. When there was calls for bringing the BCCI under the purview of the Right to Information Act, senior ministers manning top positions in the Board opposed the move tooth and nail. As a first step in the cleansing operation, the government has to intervene and the BCCI should be immediately brought under the RTI. The accounts of the BCCI must be subjected to independent audit. The Board has been known to have evaded tax and violated RBI norms on Foreign Exchange Management Act. The action for reform is unlikely to come from the state cricket associations which are at the beck and call of the Board that that has been doling out huge sums money to them annually for development of the sport in their respective states. Their spending has never been subjected to any scrutiny. At least six state associations are battling charges under the Prevention of Corruption Act. Obviously, these associations cannot think of opposing the BCCI which shields them from any blame. The BCCI selects players to represent India, and it uses the country’s flag and anthem. It discharges functions that are normally carried out by a sovereign state. Yet, it refuses to play by the rules. Who has given it such privileges?

AGAINST

The BCCI has been projected as the source of all ills plaguing the administration of the game in the country. Controversies such as spot-fixing and betting will continue, no matter who is in charge of administration of the game. The problems facing the Board’s functioning should be resolved within the four walls of the board. The men who matter there are wise enough not to let others put question marks over the future of a body that has put Indian cricket on the world map. In terms of finances, the BCCI is not facing any problem. It has given players around the country the best possible facilities in the world and the players have responded in the best possible manner. As a cricketing nation, we have won the 50-over and the 20-over World Cups. This shows that the board has been running the game well. Then why should there be any talk of the need for the government to take control? The credibility of cricket in India had taken a beating because of a few who betrayed the noble principles of the game during the last IPL. It’s not just the players but also few administrators as well who networked with bookies to make a quick buck.But the BCCI has been hard on those indulging in bringing disrepute to the sport. Justice has been swiftly meted out to the guilty and they have been barred from the game for long periods. It promptly slapped life bans on S. Sreesanth and Ankeet Chavan for their involvement in the IPL spot-fixing scandal. In the betting case the law has started taking its course. What else could the board do to check corruption? In fixing the match fixers the board has hit the nail on the head. Money lures youngsters into wrong deeds, but from now on all will know the consequences. It’s hard to put a lid on every bad deed. People may be ambitious about higher earnings, but you can’t go over to the wrong side of the road to earn a quick buck. For now, the BCCI has got its act right with regard to handling the men who had been caught red-handed. The fixing saga shall peter out eventually and the justice will prevail. There is no need for the government — that doesn’t understand or know about the sport and has a poor record of managing other sports — to enter the fray and take on the job of the BCCI. After all cricket is the only sport where India calls the shots on the world stage.



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Crossword(Solution on page No: 35)

ACROSS 1. Capital of Rajasthan (6) 4. Akbar’s grandfather (5) 7 & 47 across: He bagged a 2.4 million dollar contract with the Kolkata Knight Riders (6.7) 13. Swindle or double-cross (3,4) 14. Place where there’s a spring (3) 15. Withdraw, fall back or rescind (7) 16. Liver secretion or ill-temper? (4) 17. Assoc in App Science (3) 18. One of top 16 at Wimbledon, e.g. (4) 21. Avoid humiliation, preserve esteem? (4,4) 23. Thick slice of bread (8) 27. Where a trapped person finds himself? (2, 1, 6) 29. Carnivorous arthropod with segmented body (9) 31. The passing of a bill into law (9) 32. The____: on the eve of should we say? (3, 6) 33. Sad, pitiful or lamentable (8) 37. An area for graves or tombs (8) 42. How Mrs Hubbard found the cupboard (4)

ACROSS 43. Also know asin short? (1, 1, 1) 44. A mark left after an injury has healed? (4) 47. See 7 48. Air Pollution Index (3)

ACROSS 49. Undistinguished descendants of the great (7) 50. Ex-India all-rounder Salim _ (6) 51. Adorn with precious stones (5) 52. Feeling concern or interest about (6)

DOWN 1. Delayed bodily effects due to long journey by plane? (3.3) 2. Sacred painting, mosaic, etc. in an orthodox church (4) 3. Put to use or make use of (7) 5. Alleviate, diminish or ease (7) 6. Collected or piled up (7) 8. Simple and natural? (7) 9. Abound or surround in great numbers (4) 10. More friendly, informally speaking? (6) 11. An excessive accumulation of serous fluid (6) 12. Played quickly (music) (6) 19. Palindromic Indian language (9) 20. Person or thing one particularly dislikes? (4,5) 22. Madras city as it is now called (7) 24. Barred as born a year or two too soon? (7)

DOWN 25. Dried, evaporated or ventilated? (5) 26. Yellow fever bug (5) 28. Frequently (3) 30. In-flight entertainment (3) 34. Pagan (7) 35. Not belonging to us? (6) 36. Travesty (7) 37. A highly poisonous substance (7) 38. Great numbers – or religious ceremonies? (6) 39. Russian empress (7) 40. Implored or beseeched (6) 41. Oh my _feet: my legs are paining a lot? (6) 45. Mid-East VIP (4) 46. Lines or curves satisfying a given geometric condition (4)



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Do you remember? (All questions based on content of previous issue; Answers on page No: 30)

1. Who replaced Martin Winterkorn as CEO of

Volkswagen in September? 2. Who was the designer of Beetle car at Volkswagen?

His surname is one of the brands at Volkswagen. 3. Under the One Rank One Pension scheme for the ex-

servicemen, pension will be revised after every ______ (3/5/7/9) years.

4. Expand the abbreviation MCOCA. 5. How many additional days of work will people in

drought-hit areas get under the MGNREGA scheme due to monsoon deficit in various parts of the country (10/25/50/75)?

6. Who organised a 574-km long ‘ultra marathon’ from Pathankot to Ghaziabad to commemorate the Golden Jubilee of the 1965 war in September (Army/Navy/Air Force/BSF)?

7. What is the slogan for the portal launched by HRD Minister for promotion of a National Apprenticeship Scheme in September?

8. The Supreme Court imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on Ministry of Woman and Child Development in September for not appointing Chairperson of which organisation related to children?

9. Which is the first railway zone to eliminate all unmanned level crossings from its region?

10. Whose term as Chairman of the Law Commission ended in September?

11. Who is the author of ‘1965, Turning the Tide: How India Won the War’? It is the official version of the war launched by the army in September.

12. Engineers’ Day was observed on September 15, 2015 in honour of ____ (Sir C. V. Raman/Vikram Sarabhai/P. C. Mahalanobis/Sir M. Visvesvaraya).

13. Hindi Divas (Hindi Day) was observed on ______, 2015.

14. National Nutrition Week was observed from ________ to _____ with the theme – ‘Better Nutrition: Key to Development’.

15. Which honour was bestowed on Indian-American author JhumpaLahiri by US President Barack Obama in September?

16. Who received KK Birla Foundation’s ‘Bihari Puraskar-2014’ for his book ‘Muanjodaro’ in September?

17. Who took over as the new Union Home Secretary in September? He replaced L.C. Goyal.

18. L.C. Goyal took over as the new head of which organisation related to international trade in September?

19. Who was appointed the new Chairman of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) in September?

20. Scientist S.A.V. SatyaMurty was appointed as Director of which organisation in the field of atomic energy in September?

21. TrilochanMohapatra was appointed as Director of which organisation in the field of agriculture in September?

22. Abhilash Bhardwaj was appointed as Chairman of which organisation in the field of atomic energy in September?

23. Wilfred De Souza died on September 4 at the age of 88. He was the former Chief Minister of which state?

24. Mahendra Pandya passed away in Vadodara on August 28 at the age of 89. He was a well-known ____ (musician/doctor/lawyer/sculptor).

25. Which is the first monument in the world to get an official twitter account in August?

26. Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh laid the foundation stone for the National Research Centre on Integrated Farming (NRCIF) in which district of Bihar in August?

27. The movie “Manjhi - The Mountain Man” is based on the life of ______ Manjhi.

28. Which Chief Minister launched the Rajiv Gandhi Illuminating Scheme for Hill Town Advancement (RISHTA) in August? Virbhadra Singh

29. Which Chief Minister claimed his state as India’s first totally digital state in August?

30. Sanat Mehta died in Vadodara on August 20 at the age of 90. He was the first Chairman of which important infrastructure project for Gujarat?

31. Which state will develop ‘NakshatraVatikas’ in government schools to educate students about constellations and medicinal properties of trees?

32. Which state saw the inauguration of Centre of Excellence for Vegetables developed with assistance from Israel in August?

33. Who were fined Rs. 60 crore by the Supreme Court for the Uphaar Cinema fire tragedy case of 1997 that killed 59?

34. Which island was renamed as Abdul Kalam Island by Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik in September?

35. Which state’s Karunya Benevolent Fund provides money for treatment of poor people from the sale of lottery tickets?

36. Which Chief Minister launched the ‘Indira AmmaBhojan’ for providing subsidised food to people in August?



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37. BhamashahSwasthyaBimaYojana is health insurance scheme for the poor run by which state?

38. The Sentinel Group of newspapers is based in which state (Goa/Haryana/Assam/Gujarat)?

39. Which Chief Minister appointed former JNU VC Prof Amitabh Mattoo as his Advisor in August?

40. What is the female buffalo calf cloned by Karnal-based National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI) in August named?

41. Which Chief Minister launched GramaJyothiprogramme aimed at comprehensive development of rural areas in August?

42. Which state has been chosen to host the proposed National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO) by Science and Technology Minister HarshaVardhan in September?

43. Which Chief Minister announced the creation of new districts Biswanath, Charaideo, Hojai, South Salmara-Mankachar and West KarbiAnglong in August?

44. Which film festival was organised in Bhubaneswar in August by the Federation of Film Societies of India (FFSI)?

45. Where was the two-day meeting of the G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors held in September?

46. Which is the Best Country was for older people to live in the Global AgeWatch Index 2015 compiled by HelpAge International in September?

47. The three day international _____ Economic Forum was organised in the Russian city of Vladivostok in September.

48. Which Observer State was allowed to raise its flag in front of UN buildings for the first time in September?

49. France has decided to refund $1 billion to Russia for not delivering which class of warships?

50. South Korea and USA organised an exercise in September to hone their response to potential biological attacks. What was it named?

51. What was the joint air drill launched by Chinese and Pakistani forces in September named?

52. Which Asian country will rejoin the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in December?

53. Which famous square in Beijing was the venue of China’s military parade to mark the 70th anniversary of its victory over Japan in World War II?

54. What was renamed as Denali by the US President in September?

55. International Day of Charity was on ____. 56. UN Day for South-South Cooperation was on _____. 57. International Day of Democracy was on _____.

58. International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone Layer was on _____.

59. International Coastal Cleanup Day was on _____. 60. International Day of Peace was on ____. 61. World Maritime Day was on ____. 62. World Tourism Day was on _____. 63. World Rabies Day was on _____. 64. World Heart Day was on _____. 65. Who is known for international bestsellers like

“Awakenings” and “The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat: And Other Clinical Tales”. He died on August 30 at age 82.

66. The UNESCO King Sejong Literacy Prize is sponsored by which nation?

67. The UNESCO Confucius Prize for Literacy is sponsored by which nation?

68. Who is known for the international bestseller ‘Your Erroneous Zones’? He died on Sept6 at the age of 75.

69. Which two countries are the winners of UNESCO King Sejong Literacy Prize in September?

70. Which three countries are the winners of UNESCO Confucius Prize for Literacy in September?

71. Who is the author of novel “In the Light of What We Know”?

72. Who became new Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago in September following polls?

73. US President Barack Obama appointed diplomat Jim O’Brien to the newly created post of the Special Presidential Envoy for _____ Affairs in August.

74. Guatemalan President _____ resigned in September after the country’s Parliament stripped him of his immunity from prosecution to stand trial for corruption.

75. World’s shortest man died on September 4 at the age of 75. Who was he?

76. Which Director, known for horror movies like ‘Nightmare on Elm Street’ (1984) and ‘Scream’ (1996) died at the age of 76 on August 31?

77. Which were the top three countries in medals tally at the World Athletics Championships that ended in Beijing on August 30?

78. How many medals were won by India at the World Athletics Championships that ended in Beijing on August 30?

79. Who created the only World Record at the World Athletics Championships that ended in Beijing on August 30?

80. Which famous boxer announced retirement after winning his 49th consecutive bout in Las Vegas in September?

81. Who won the Men’s Singles title at the US Open?



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82. Who won the Women’s Singles title at the US Open tennis in September?

83. Who won the Men’s Doubles title at the US Open tennis in September?

84. Who won the Women’s Doubles title at the US Open tennis in September?

85. Who won the Mixed Doubles title at the US Open tennis in September?

86. Who won the F1 Italian Grand Prix at Monza circuit on September 6?

87. The Commonwealth Youth Games were organised at which Pacific Island country in September?

88. Which is the only non-European city in the list of five shortlisted by the IOC for 2024 Olympic Games?

89. Which Chinese city was named host of the 2022 Asian Games in September?

90. Who won the 26th Asia Women’s Basketball Championship in Wuhan (China) in September?

91. Which regulator merged with SEBI from September 28?

92. Who is the head of the Seventh Central Pay Commission?

93. JagmohanDalmiya was elected the President of BCCI for the first time in in which year?

94. Which economist is the author of ‘An Upstart in Government’?

95. Which economist is the author of ‘The Country of First Boys’?

Do you remember? Answers

1. Matthias Mueller 2. Ferdinand Porsche 3. 5 years 4. Maharashtra Control of

Organised Crime Act 5. 50 6. Air Force 7. SashaktYuvaSamarth Bharat 8. NCPCR 9. West-Central Railway

10. Justice (retd.) A.P. Shah 11. NitinGokhale 12. Sir M. Visvesvaraya 13. September 15 14. September 1 to 7 15. National Humanities Medal 16. Om Thanvi 17. Rajiv Mehrishi 18. ITPO 19. Raghav Chandra 20. IGCAR, Kalpakkam 21. IARI, New Delhi 22. AERB 23. Goa 24. Sculptor 25. TajMahal 26. East Champaran 27. Dashrath 28. Virbhadra Singh 29. OommenChandy 30. SardarSarovar Narmada

Nigam Ltd 31. Madhya Pradesh

32. Gujarat 33. Ansal brothers 34. Wheeler Island 35. Kerala 36. Harish Rawat 37. Rajasthan 38. Assam 39. Mufti Mohammad Sayeed 40. ‘Swarupa’ 41. K. Chandrasekhar Rao 42. Kerala (Kochi) 43. TarunGogoi 44. Kalinga International Film

Festival 45. Ankara 46. Switzerland 47. Eastern 48. Palestine 49. Mistral 50. Able Response 15 51. Shaheen (Eagle)-4 52. Indonesia 53. Tiananmen Square 54. Mount McKinley 55. September 5 56. September 12 57. September 15 58. September 16 59. September 18 60. September 21 61. September 24 62. September 27 63. September 28

64. September 29 65. Oliver Sacks 66. South Korea 67. China 68. Wayne Dyer 69. Mozambique and Sri Lanka 70. Chile, Slovakia, Madagascar 71. Zia Haider Rahman 72. Keith Rowley 73. Hostage 74. Otto Perez Molina 75. Chandra BahadurDangi 76. Wes Craven 77. Kenya, Jamaica, USA 78. 0 79. Ashton Eaton (USA) in

Men’s Decathlon 80. Floyd Mayweather 81. Novak Djokovic (Serbia) 82. FlaviaPennetta (Italy) 83. Pierre Herbert, Nicolas Mahut 84. Martina Hingis, SaniaMirza 85. Leander Paes, Martina Hingis 86. Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes) 87. Apia, Samoa 88. Los Angeles 89. Hangzhou 90. Japan 91. FMC 92. Justice A K Mathur 93. 2001 94. ArunMaira 95. AmartyaSen



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Corporate Knowledge Quiz (All questions based on content in this issue& previous issue)

(Answers Key on Page No: 34) 1.Rashesh Shah is the promoter of which financial services company? a) Muthoot b) Bandhan c) Edelweiss d) Indiabulls 2. Who among the following purchased Lincoln House in Mumbai for Rs 750 crore ($113 million) from the US government in September? a) Nusli Wadia b) Kumar Mangalam Birla c) Adi Godrej d) Cyrus Poonawalla 3. SBI and _____ are the first two banks identified as Domestic Systemically Important Banks (D-SIBs) by RBI in September. a) Axis Bank b) ICICI Bank c) HDFC Bank d) Kotak Mahindra Bank 4. Who was the world’s largest seller of cars in 2014? a) Suzuki b) Volkswagen c) General Motors d) Toyota 5. Which IT company has agreed to provide 110 modern ambulances to the Delhi government under its “Home to Hospital Care” Scheme in September? a) Wipro b) TCS c) Infosys d) Tech Mahindra 6. Which IT company has signed a deal with ATP, the governing body for professional men’s tennis, to become the Global Technology Services Partner and Platinum Sponsor of the ATP World Tour? a) Wipro b) TCS c) Infosys d) Tech Mahindra 7. SoundLink is a trademark owned by which audio equipment company?

a) Bang &Olufsen b) Bose c) Harman d) Blaupunkt 8. Which of the following is not matched correctly? a) Bolt, Zest – Tata Motors b) Grand Cherokee, Wrangler – Ford c) Ciaz – Maruti Suzuki d) Camaro – General Motors 9. Which of the following agreed to sell its 19.9% stake in Suzuki Motor Corp valued at $3.8 billion following a decision from arbitrators in August-end? a) Toyota b) Ford c) General Motors d) Volkswagen 10. Cheerios, Betty Crocker and Pillsbury are brands marketed by which foods MNC? a) Cargill b) GroupeDanone c) ConAgra d) General Mills 11. Indian IT company Wipro bagged a contract to become a digital partner of which English Premier League club in September? a) Liverpool b) Manchester United c) Arsenal d) Chelsea 12. Nishi Vasudeva is the CMD of which PSU? a) BPCL b) ONGC c) GAIL d) HPCL 13. Finacle is the core banking solution of ___. a) Wipro b) TCS c) Infosys d) Tech Mahindra 14. Which Maharatna PSU selected AtulSobti as its next chairman and managing director in September?



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a) BPCL b) SAIL c) NTPC d) BHEL 15. Which Maharatna PSU selected P.K. Singh as its new Chairman in September? a) BPCL b) SAIL c) NTPC d) BHEL 16. Which of the following launched Gear S2 smartwatch in September? a) LG b) Samsung c) Lenovo d) Apple 17. Which real estate company appointed Rajeev Talwar and MohitGujral as its co-CEOs in September? a) DLF b) HCC c) Gammon d) Unitech 18. Which bank launched a mobile app IndPay that allows its customers to operate bank accounts from anywhere, anytime? a) Indian Bank b) IDBI Bank c) IndusInd Bank d) Indian Overseas Bank 19. Who was fined $900 million by USA for defective ignition switches in its vehicles that caused 124 deaths? a) Fiat–Chrysler b) Volkswagen c) General Motors d) Ford Motor Company 20. What is the online release of new LPG connections launched by the Petroleum & Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on August 30 named? a) Saral b) Sahaj c) Swayam d) Saksham 21. Which water purifier company had to withdraw its ad“Doctor’s 1st Choice RO Purifier” in September after ASCI raised objections?

a) Luminous b) Kent RO Systems c) Ion Exchange d) Eureka Forbes 22. Gadgets 360 is the ecommerce venture of which media group? a) Zee b) NDTV c) Times d) India Today 23. Indu Jain is the wealthiest Indian woman in Hurun Report’s India Rich List. She owns one of India’s leading companies in which business? a) Steel b) Media c) Shipping d) Chemicals &Fertilsers 24. Which taxi service was co-founded by Bhavish Aggarwal and AnkitBhati in 2010? a) Meru Cabs b) Uber c) Ola Cabs d) Taxi For Sure 25. The BrandZ list of 50 Most Valuable Indian Brands in Septemberis an initiative of which advertising group? a) WPP b) JWT c) Ogilvy & Mather d) Omnicom 26. Which job search portalwas started by SanjeevBikhchandani? a) Naukri.com b) Monster.com c) Shine.com d) Jobsahead.com 27. Mary Barra topped Fortune’s list of 50 Most Powerful Women in Business in September. She is the CEO of : a) Fiat–Chrysler b) Renault c) General Motors d) Ford Motor Company 28. Which private sector bank launched mobile app LIME offering wallet, shopping, payments and other banking facilities in September? a) Axis Bank



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b) ICICI Bank c) HDFC Bank d) Kotak Mahindra Bank 29. Which social networking portal released its live streaming app called Mentions for journalists in September? a) Twitter b) Instagram c) Google+ d) Facebook 30. Which is the energy drink brand marketed by Glaxo SmithKline in India? a) Stamina b) Isotonik c) Gatorade d) Lucozade 31. HT Media Executive Director BenoyRoychowdhury was appointed as the Chairman of which of the following in September? a) Press Council of India (PCI) b) Directorate of Advertising & Visual Publicity (DAVP) c) Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI) d) Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) 32. Which of these luxury automobile brands is not owned by Volkswagen group? It is owned by Fiat group. a) Bentley b) Bugatti c) Maserati d) Lamborghini 33. Which Indian company launched compact SUV TUV300 in September? a) Force Motors b) Mahindra & Mahindra c) Tata Motors d) Ashok Leyland 34. Who launched Fuze Tea brand in India in September? a) PepsiCo b) Starbucks c) Coca Cola d) Nestle 35. ‘Property Now’ is a real estate channel launched by Which of the following in September? a) Bloomberg b) Zee Group c) Times Group

d) CNBC 36. Avance is the limited edition version of which of its models launched by Maruti Suzuki India in September? a) Alto b) Ciaz c) Swift d) Wagon R 37. Which of the following has decided to relaunch its luxury car brand Maybach in India? a) Mercedes b) Porsche c) Rolls Royce d) BMW 38. Which Indian handset-maker launched Aqua Glam - a new smartphone exclusively for women - in September? a) Lava b) Karbonn c) Spice d) Intex 39. Which of the following was the first to conceptualize Eva rooms exclusively for women travellers in the 1990s? a) ITC Hotels b) Oberoi Hotels & Resorts c) Taj Hotels Resorts & Palaces d) Leela Palaces, Hotels and Resorts 40. Which of the following successfully test-fired anti-tank guided missile Amogha in September? a) BrahMos Aerospace b) Tata Advanced Systems c) Hindustan Aeronautics d) Bharat Dynamics 41. India was ranked 81stin the Global Innovation Index while Switzerland was first. Which US University published he index in September in tie up with INSEAD and the World Intellectual Property Organisation? a) Wharton b) Cornell c) Harvard d) Princeton 42. Paul Polman is the CEO of which leading MNC company in FMCG business? a) Reckitt-Benckiser b) Unilever c) Sara Lee d) Procter & Gamble



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43. Who purchased the iconic Jatia House in the Malabar Hill area in Mumbai for Rs 425 crore in September? a) NusliWadia b) Kumar Mangalam Birla c) Adi Godrej d) Cyrus Poonawalla 44. Which food brandwas sold by Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL) to Everstone Group in September? a) Kissan b) Annapurna c) Kwality Wall’s d) Modern

45. HCL Technologies bagged a contract to become a digital partner of which EPL club in September? a) Liverpool b) Manchester United c) Arsenal d) Chelsea 46. Who is credited with reviving Volkswagen after destruction of its factories during WWII? a) Henry Ford b) Ivan Hirst c) Will Durant d) Alfred Sloane

47. Who acquired Firefox Bikes in September? a) Atlas Cycles b) Hero Cycles c) Avon Cycles d) TI Cycles 48. Which of the following acquired BK Birla flagship firm Kesoram Industries’tyre manufacturing plant at Haridwar for Rs. 2,200 crore in September? a) Apollo Tyres b) JK Tyres c) CEAT d) MRF 49. Which famous food company was founded by Fred DeLuca? He died at age 67 on September 14. a) Taco Bell b) Pizza Hut c) Subway d) Domino’s 50. Which of the following launched an online specific credit card branded SimplyCLICK in September? a) MasterCard b) SBI Card c) Visa d) RuPay

Answer Key

1. c 2. d 3. b 4. d 5. a 6. c 7. b 8. b 9. d 10. d

11. d 12. d 13. c 14. d 15. b 16. b 17. a 18. a 19. c 20. b

21. b 22. b 23. b 24. c 25. a 26. a 27. c 28. a 29. d 30. d

31. d 32. c 33. b 34. c 35. c 36. d 37. a 38. d 39. a 40. d

41. b 42. b 43. b 44. d 45. b 46. b 47. b 48. b 49. c 50. b

Point-Counterpoint

“Air India will launch a direct flight to San Francisco from December 2 this year. It will fly three times a week.” –Narendra Modi, during his recent visit to the US

“I can’t fathom how the decision to start a new long-distance, non-stop flight to the US has been taken when it’s (Air India’s) other three flights to the country are piling up huge losses year after year.”

–Jitendra Bhargava, Ex-Executive Director, Air India



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Sudoku (Solution below)

I

II

Solutions

CROSSWORD

SUDOKU I

SUDOKU II

genesis-october 2015 issue i.pdf

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