GK Updates Daily : 29/9/2014

1.    Justice H.L. Dattu sworn-in as 42nd Chief Justice of India

i. Justice Handyala Lakshminarayanaswamy Dattu was today sworn-in as the new Chief Justice of India. He was administered oath of office by President Pranab Mukherjee at Rashtrapati Bhawan.

ii. Justice Dattu succeeds Chief Justice R M Lodha who retired yesterday. He is the 42nd Chief Justice of India and will have a tenure of 14 months as Chief Justice of Supreme Court. 
iii. Vice President M. Hamid Ansari, Union Ministers Rajnath Singh, Ravi Shankar Prasad, Venkaiah Naidu and senior BJP leader L K Advani are among those present during the swearing-in ceremony.

iv. Born on December 3, 1950, Justice Dattu began his practice as an advocate in Bangalore in 1975 and dealt with all type of cases including civil, criminal, tax and Constitutional matters. 

2.    Nation remembers Bhagat Singh on his 107th birth anniversary

i. Thankful nation is remembering Shaeed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh today on his 107th birth anniversary. It was on this day the great martyr of freedom movement was born at Khatkar Kalan village of then Jalandhar district of Punjab. Today Youth and Sports Club at various villages of Punjab took oath to work for de-addiction among the youth.

ii. Bhagat Singh sacrificed his life on March 23, 1931 for the freedom of the nation and his sacrifice influenced youth of the country at that time to work for the national movement.
iii. He is respected as an ideal by many present day youth organisation while they take pledge to work for the betterment of the society.

3.    PM want World to adopt an Int'l Yoga Day

i. Prime Minister Narendra Modi while discussing matters of regional and bilateral cooperation with top leaders of Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal wanted world leaders their full support to suggest to the UN to celebrate International Yoga Day once a year.

ii. Prime Minister during his 35-minute speech at the UN General Assembly had urged world leaders to adopt an International Yoga Day.

iii. PM Modi also reiterated his commitment to make SAARC a strong regional block. Before his UN speech, Modi met UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and discussed issues like imminent reforms in the UNSC and the need to involve countries contributing peace troops in the decision-making process of the multilateral institution. 

4.    Modi invites New Jersey Governor Chris Christie to visit India

i. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has invited New Jersey Governor Chris Christie to visit India with a trade mission.

ii. Modi extended the invitation to Christie when the latter called on him at the New York Palace hotel, where the Prime Minister is staying for attending the annual session of the UN General Assembly.

iii. Christie, a popular Republican politician and a 2016 presidential election aspirant, has accepted the invitation to visit India with a trade delegation sometime next year, said Andy Shenoy, director on the Board of United Nations Development Corporation who played a major role in coordinating this important meeting.

5.    Number of asylum seekers in developed countries up by 24 %: UNHCR

i. UN High Commissioner for Refugees has said that the number of people seeking refugee status in developed nations has gone up by 24 percent in the first half of 2014. UNHCR’s new asylum trends report reveals that it is mainly driven by the wars in Syria and Iraq as well as conflict and instability in countries such as Afghanistan and Eritrea. 

ii. The report based on data received from 44 governments in Europe, North America and parts of the Asia-Pacific, says more than 3,30,700 people asked for refugee status in these countries between January and June this year.

iii. The report has warned that more than seven lakh claims for refugees status may be made in the remaining half of 2014 reaching its highest level in 20 year

6.    Swachh Bharat Mission to be launched on Oct 2

i. The Swachh Bharat Mission will be launched on 2nd of next month. The Mission aims at fulfilling the dream of clean India of Mahatma Gandhi by his 150th birth anniversary in 2019. 
ii. As part of Swachh Bharat campaingn various departments have initiated cleanliness drive. Yesterday Rashtrapati Bhawan, Prime Minister's Office and other Ministries initiated special cleanliness drive in their premises ahead of launch of the Mission. 

7.    ONGC Videsh signs agreement with Petroleos Mexicanos

i. ONGC Videsh Ltd, the overseas arm of state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), has signed an agreement with Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) for cooperation in the Latin American nation.

ii. The MoU was signed by Anil Bhandari, Director (Exploration), OVL and Gustavo Hernandez Garcia, Director General, Pemex Exploracion Y Produccion at Cancun, Mexico on the sidelines of World National Oil Companies Congress— Americas.

iii. “Under the MOU, the two companies plan to discuss future cooperation and collaboration in the upstream sector in Mexico. The MOU also envisages cooperation in the fields of technology, human resources, research and development,” OVL said in a statement.

Note: Mexico is the largest crude oil producing country in Latin America. It has excellent potential for both conventional and unconventional hydrocarbon. As a result of recent energy reforms in the country, the oil and gas sector is being opened for participation by foreign firms.

8.    Delhi Metro ranked 2nd among 18 international metro systems

i. Delhi Metro has been ranked second among 18 international Metro systems in terms of overall customer satisfaction in an online customer survey.

ii. According to a DMRC official, in the survey conducted among the commuters of those Metro systems by Global Metro Benchmarking Groups NOVA and CoMET, Delhi Metro along with London DLR and Bangkok were the best three performers in the Net Promoters Score (NPS) category.

iii. Under this category the survey analysed the likelihood of customers recommending the service to others on the basis of their satisfaction.

iv. More than 41,000 respondents gave their feedback worldwide in this survey conducted online through the websites and social media links of 18 major Metros of the world from April 28th to May 25th earlier this year.

v. The Metro systems that participated in this survey apart from Delhi Metro were Hong Kong MTR, London Underground, Metro De Madrid, Paris RATP, Metro De Sandiago, Singapore SMRT, Barcelona TMB, Brussels STIB, Bangkok BMCL, London DLR, Istanbul Ulasim, Kualalumpur Rapid PL, Metropolitano De Lisboa, Montreal STM, Newcastle Nexus, Metro Rio and Toronto TTC. The NPS is calculated by the percentage of promoters minus the percentage of detractors (P-D = NPS).

9.    President’s rule imposed in Maharashtra

i. President’s rule was imposed on Sunday in poll-bound Maharashtra after Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan resigned following the break-up of 15-year-old Congress-NCP alliance in the state.

ii. President Pranab Mukherjee signed the proclamation for imposition of central rule in Maharashtra, a day after the Union Cabinet recommended clamping of President’s rule in the state, a Home Ministry spokesperson said.

10.  Yogeshwar Dutt wins gold in the men's 65 kg freestyle wrestling at the Asian Games.

i. Yogeshwar Dutt ended India’s 28-year-old wait for a wrestling gold medal in the Asian Games by emerging champion in the men’s freestyle 65kg category at the Dowon Gymnasium in Incheon Sunday.

ii. The Indian, an Olympic bronze medallist, put on a stupendous show in winning 3-0 against Zalimkhan Yusupov of Tajikistan in the title clash.

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11.  Asian games: Khushbir scripts history, wins silver in 20km race walk

i. Khushbir Kaur today became the first Indian woman to win a medal in race walking in the Asian Games as she clinched silver in 20km event on the second day of the athletics competition here.

ii. The 21-year-old from Amritsar clocked 1:33:07 to finish behind Lu Xiuzhi of China, who won the gold in 1:31:06, at the Marathon Course here.

iii. The Indian, who holds the national record of 1:31:40, was consistently third till the 18km mark before going up a position in the final two kilometres, thanks largely to the slowing down of second-placed Chinese Nie Jingjing, who eventually finished fourth.

iv. The bronze medal went to local favourite Jeon Yeongeun, who also clocked a personal best of 1:33:18.

v. This is the biggest triumph of Khushbir’s nascent career after the bronze medal she won at this year’s Asian Walking Championships bronze in Japan. She was the first Indian woman to achieve such a feat

12.  Indian pair of Sania-Prarthana settles for bronze

i. Indian pair of Sania Mirza and Prarthana Thombare settled for a bronze after losing their women’s doubles semifinal to Chinese Taipei’s Chin Wei Chan and Su Wei Hsiehin in the Asian Games, in Incheon on Sunday.

ii. The fifth seeded Indian combo put up a brave fight before going down 6-7 (1-7), 6-2, 10-4 to the Chinese Taipei duo, seeded second, at the Yeorumul Tennis Courts.

iii. Sania and Prarthana took the courts and toiled hard for an hour and 35 minutes but at the end failed to make it to the finals.