APRIL 2016 CURRENT AFFAIRS ( PART-5)

Essential IAS Prelims Books List

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched National Agriculture Market portal eNAM to connect emandis in several States. e-National Agriculture Market (NAM) is a pan-India e-trading platform. eNAM will be implemented in different phases with an aim to integrate 585 regulated markets across the country with the common e-market platform by March 2018. So far 365 mandis from 12 states have been granted approval.
• The Union Government has renamed Panagarh Air Force Base of Indian Air Force in West Bengal as ‘Air Force Station Arjan Singh’ in honour of the Marshal of the Air Force Arjan Singh. It is located in Burdwan district of West Bengal.
• The search engine giant Google has extended free internet service through WiFi to 10 railway stations across the country to provide internet to over 1.5 million people. The free internet service was extended as part of Google’s tie up with Railtel, the internet provider arm of Indian Railways.
• Iconic Indian woman boxer Mary Kom has been named as the International Boxing Association (AIBA) ambassador for Women’s World Championship to be held in Astana, Kazakhstan.
• Supercomputer Param Kanchenjunga was unveiled at the National Institute of Technology Sikkim. It has been named after Kangchenjunga mountain (8,586 m), the third highest mountain in the world which lies partly in Nepal and partly in Sikkim. Param Kanchenjunga has been jointly developed by Pune-based Centre for Development of Advanced Computing ‘C-DAC’ and the NIT Sikkim.
• The Indian Army conducted major battle exercise named as ‘Shatrujeet’ in the Thar Desert of Rajasthan.
• Every year 12th April is being observed as the International Day of Human Space Flight to commemorate the date of the first human space flight in the history of mankind. On this day in 1961, Yuri Gagarin, a Soviet Union (USSR) cosmonaut undertook first successful first human space flight.
• The Union cabinet has given its formal approval for adopting the Statute of the South Asia Wildlife Enforcement Network (SAWEN). With this, India will become member of SAWEN, a regional inter-governmental body in combating wildlife crime in the region and beyond.
• The Reserve Bank of India has given its in-principle approval to Bharti Airtel’s payments bank venture — Airtel M Commerce Services Ltd (AMCS). With this AMCS has become the first entity to receive final approval from the RBI to start a payments bank. In August 2015, RBI had granted in-principle licences to 11 entities to start payments banks.
• India remained the world’s largest remittance recipient in 2015. It was revealed by the World Bank’s annual report Migration and Development Brief.

April 2016 Current Affairs ( PART-4)                      April 2016 Current Affairs ( PART-6)