By: D.K Chaudhary
1. Cabinet Approves Establishing India’s 1st National Rail and Transportation University
i. The Union Cabinet chaired by PM Narendra Modi has approved the Ministry of Railways’ transformative initiative to set up India’s first ever National Rail and Transport University (NRTU) in Vadodara, Gujarat to skill its human resources and build capability.
ii. Government is planning to launch the first academic program in July 2018. The funding of the new University/Institute is to entirely come from Ministry of Railways.
- Present Railway Minister of India- Piyush Goyal.
- 1st Railway Minister of Independent India- John Mathai.
2. Cabinet Approves “Scheme for Capacity Building in Textiles Sector”
i. The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs has given its approval for a new skill development scheme covering the entire value chain of the textile sector excluding Spinning & Weaving in organized Sector, titled “Scheme for Capacity Building in Textile Sector (SCBTS)” from 2017-18 to 2019-20 with an outlay of Rs. 1300 crore.
ii. The scheme will have National Skill Qualification Framework (NSQF) compliant training courses. The objectives of the scheme are to provide demand-driven, placement oriented skilling program to incentivize the efforts of the industry in creating jobs in the organized textile and related sectors.
- Present Textile Minister of India- Smriti Zubin Irani.
3. UK Tops Forbes’ List of Best Countries for Business in 2018
i. The United Kingdom has topped Forbes’ rankings of best countries in the world for business in 2018 for the first time, up from fifth last year. The list ranks 153 countries on 15 factors including property rights, innovation, taxes and red tape.
ii. The UK is followed by New Zealand and the Netherlands, while India was ranked 62nd on the list. The UK’s $2.6 trillion economy is the fifth largest in the world. The world’s second (China) and third (Japan) biggest economies rank 66th and 21st, respectively. Chad ranks last for the third straight year.
- Forbes- American Business Magazine, Founded in- 1917.
- Headquarters- New York City, USA.
4. DARPAN Project Launched For Financial Inclusion of Rural Population
i. The Minister of Communications Manoj Sinha launched DARPAN- “Digital Advancement of Rural Post Office for A New India” Project to improve the quality of service, add value to services and achieve ‘financial inclusion’ of the unbanked rural population.
ii. The goal of the IT modernization project with an outlay of Rs. 1400 Crore is to provide a low power technology solution to each Branch Postmaster (BPM) which will enable each of approximately 1.29 Lakhs Branch Post Offices (BOs) to improve the level of services being offered to rural customers across all the states.
5. ‘Hamesha Vijayee’ Exercise Held in Rajasthan
i. The Indian Army’s Southern Command had conducted exercise ‘Hamesha Vijayee’ in the deserts of Rajasthan to evaluate the capability of the armed forces to strike deep into the enemy territory in an integrated air-land battle.
ii. The military exercise is aimed at fine-tuning surveillance and destruction mechanisms to support precision strikes and maneuvers by network-enabled forces.
- 27th Chief of Army Staff of Indian Army- Bipin Rawat.
