INDIA-BAHRAIN JOINS HANDS FOR RENEWABLE ENERGY
The first India-Bahrain Joint Working Group meeting in the field of Renewable Energy was held in a virtual format on February 04, 2021, for promoting bilateral cooperation in the field of Renewable Energy.
The Indian delegation was led by Dinesh Dayanand Jagdale, Joint Secretary, Ministry of New & Renewable Energy.
Abdul Hussain bin Ali Mirza, President of Sustainable Energy Authority led the Bahraini delegation.
Both sides also agreed to forge deeper engagement in capacity building and focused cooperation between concerned agencies as well as the private sector of the two countries in this sector, particularly in the field of solar, wind and clean hydrogen.
- King of Bahrain: Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa.
- Bahrain Capital: Manama.
- Bahrain Currency: Bahraini dinar
RBI PROJECTED INDIA’S GDP GROWTH
In the last bi-monthly monetary policy meet for the current, the Reserve Bank of India projected India’s GDP growth rate at 10.5 per cent for the fiscal year 2021-22.
The growth outlook has improved significantly, and the vaccination drive will further boost the economic rebound.
The apex bank expects the Indian economy to grow in the range of 8.3 per cent to 26.2 per cent in the first half of FY22, followed by a 6 per cent growth in Q3FY22.
The central bank’s projection is lower than that of the Economic Survey that projected India to grow at a rate of 11 per cent in the coming fiscal.
ARVIND KEJRIWAL LAUNCHED ‘SWITCH DELH’I CAMPAIGN
Delhi Chief Minister, Arvind Kejriwal has launched the ‘Switch Delhi’ campaign to promote electric vehicles and appealed to people to buy such vehicles to combat pollution in the city.
Kejriwal said his government will hire only electric vehicles for various purposes in the next six weeks.
In the ‘Switch Delhi’ campaign, awareness will be created about the benefits of electric vehicles and how it can contribute to making Delhi clean and pollution-free.
Under its electric vehicle policy, the Delhi government has planned extensive subsidies on purchase of electric two-wheelers and four-wheelers, besides waiving road tax and registration charges.
More than 6,000 electric vehicles have been purchased since the policy launch in August 2020. The government has also issued tenders for setting up 100 charging stations across the city.
The government has fixed an ambitious target of 25 per cent electric vehicles among total vehicle registrations in Delhi by 2024.
WORLD’S FIRST ‘CARBON NEUTRAL OIL’ FROM US
The Kerala government is all set to launch Rs 300 crore three-tower ‘Gender Park’ in Kozhikode. The park will become functional on the occasion of the second edition of the International Conference on Gender Equality (ICGE-II).
The park will be inaugurated by the Chief Minister of Kerala, Pinarayi Vijayan, in between February 11-13 that will also mark the inauguration of the second edition of ICGE-II.
The gender park was established with the aim of creating relevant interventions so as to address a range of gender-based issues.
It includes both off-campus and on-campus activities and other projects that work to empower the individuals and communities.
The gender park was established by the government of Kerala in 2013. It is an initiative that works towards gender equality and empowerment in Kerala. The headquarter for the initiative is in the capital of Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram.
The platform will provide an environment for policy analysis, research, capacity development, advocacy, economic and social initiative. The park will be operational under the Department of Social Justice. This space is first of its kind across the world.
ASIA-PACIFIC PERSONALISED HEALTH INDEX
India ranked 10th out of 11 Asia Pacific countries in a newly-launched health index to measure the progress towards personalised healthcare.
Singapore(1st), Taiwan (2nd), Japan (3rd) and Australia (4th) also performed well in overall readiness. These include Policy Context, Health Information, Personalised Technologies and Health Services.
The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) report ”Asia-Pacific Personalised Health Index” measures the readiness of 11 health systems across the region–Australia, China, Japan, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and New Zealand–in adopting personalised healthcare, enabling the right care to be tailored to the right person at the right time.
The ‘Personalised Health Index’ measures performance against 27 different indicators of personalised health across four categories called”Vital Signs”.
APPOINTMENT OF TWO NEW MD TO SBI
The appointments committee (ACC) of the Cabinet has approved the appointment of Swaminathan Janakiraman and Ashwini Kumar Tewari as new Managing Directors (MDs) of State Bank of India (SBI) for a period of three years.
Prior to this, Swaminathan Janakiraman was the deputy managing director (Finance) at SBI and Ashwini Kumar Tewari was serving as MD & CEO of SBI Card, a subsidiary of SBI.
SBI is headed by a Chairman and four managing directors. Dinesh Kumar Khara is the current Chairman of the bank.
The other two MDs of the bank are C.S. Setty and Ashwani Bhatia. The two posts were vacant since October 2020.
OSCAR WINNING CLORIS LEACHMAN PASSED AWAY
Oscar winning-actor Cloris Leachman has passed away. The late star was known as one of Hollywood’s most prolific performers having won an Academy Award, a Golden Globe, and eight Primetime Emmy Awards.
Leachman’s character Phyllis in The Mary Tyler Moore Show, which she claimed was close to her own persona, brought the actress two Emmys as a featured actress in a series during the mid-’70s and made Leachman a household name.
Leachman also won a supporting actress Oscar for a far different character, an embittered small-town housewife in Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show.
