Daily GK Update [30th April 2015]

1. Govt withdraws PDMA, RBI Bill provisions from Finance Bill

i. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley withdrew the clauses from the Finance Bill pertaining to setting up of the proposed Public Debt Management Agency (PDMA) and the amendments to the Reserve Bank of India Act.
ii. The government in consultation with the RBI will prepare a detailed roadmap separating the debt management function and the market infrastructure from the RBI.

iii. The entire chapter on PDMA (Chapter VII) in the Finance Bill is being dropped, in addition to the changes proposed in sections 45U and 45W of the RBI Act.

iv. Having an independent debt management office is also the best international practice in countries like US and UK neither public debt is managed by central bank nor is regulation of GSec, Currency and Derivative with the central bank.

2. India and Japan sign action plan for investment and trade promotion 

i. India and Japan on Thursday signed an action agenda for boosting investment and trade. 

ii. Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Japanese Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Yoichi Miyazawa signed the action agenda for India-Japan investment and trade promotion and Asia-Pacific economic integration. 

iii. The five agenda points included in the action agenda are: 

1) Development of selected townships in India as Japanese industrial townships. 

2) Promotion of investment and infrastructure development. 

3) Further development and cooperation in information technology. 

4) Enhancing cooperation in strategic sectors. 

5) Asia-Pacific economic integration. 

3. RBI fines 3 banks Rs 4.5cr

i. The Reserve Bank of India on Thursday imposed a fine of Rs 1.5 crore each on Dena Bank, Bank of Maharashtra and Oriental Bank of Commerce and cautioned eight other public sector banks following its investigation into last year's fixed deposit fraud.

ii. The fixed deposit fraud involved the perpetrators forging fixed deposit certificates of large organizations and misusing cash credit facilities against them.

iii. The fraud, which ran into several hundred crores, affected organizations such as Mumbai Metropolitan Regional Development Authority, South Indian Education Society and Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust. 

iv. The banks cautioned by the RBI are Central Bank of India, Bank of India, Punjab and Sind Bank, Punjab National Bank, State Bank of Bikaner & Jaipur, UCO Bank, Union Bank of India and Vijaya Bank. 

4. Mamata declares Nadia first 'open defecation-free' district in India

i. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee declared Nadia as the first Open Defecation Free (ODF) district in the country.

ii. Thanking UNICEF and the World Bank for helping the district achieve this feat, Ms. Banerjee declared April 30 as the “Nirmal Bangla Diwas” to be observed in the years to come.

iii. UNICEF India representative David Mcloughlin congratulated the people of the district for achieving the goal.

5. Parliament Passes Amendment to Regional Rural Banks Bill

i. Rajya Sabha passed the Regional Rural Banks (Amendment) Bill, 2014. With this, the bill has been passed by both houses of the Parliament. It was passed by the Lok Sabha on 18 December 2014.

ii. The Regional Rural Banks (Amendment) Bill, 2014 that seeks to amend the Regional Rural Banks (RRB) Act, 1976 was introduced by the Union Minister of Finance, Arun Jaitley.

iii. It seeks to amend the RRB Act, 1976 which mainly provides for the incorporation, regulation and winding up of Regional Rural Banks (RRBs).

iv. It removes the five year limit cap that was put on the sponsor banks to assist the upcoming RRBs under the RRB Act, 1976. As per the Act, sponsor banks were liable to train personnel and provide managerial and financial assistance for the first five years.

6. Pak court jails 10 men for 25 years over 2012 attack on Malala Yousafzai

i. A Pakistani court jailed 10 men for 25 years each on Thursday for involvement in the 2012 shooting of teenage activist Malala Yousafzai, targeted for her campaign against Taliban efforts to deny girls education.
ii. Malala was seriously wounded and airlifted to Britain for treatment, where she now lives. 

iii. Since then, Malala has become a symbol of defiance in the fight against militants operating in ethnic Pashtun areas in northwest Pakistan. She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014.