DAILY UPDATED CURRENT AFFAIRS – 12.06.2018 TO 13.06.2018 NATIONAL Odisha’s new health scheme to benefit 70 lakh families (a) Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has announced a health assurance scheme named “Biju Swasthya Kalyan Yojana” that will benefit around 3.5 crore people from over 70 lakh families in the state. (b) Under the Biju Swasthya Kalyan Yojana, secondary and tertiary cashless healthcare assistance will be provided up to Rs 5 lakh per family per annum to meet healthcare expenditure at all government-run hospitals and the entire cost would be borne by the state government. (c) Besides, an assistance of Rs 500 would be provided to all pregnant women and infant who visit public health facilities. The scheme will come into effect from August 15 2018. Centre sanctions Rs 14 crore for sports in J&K The Centre sanctioned Rs 14.30 crore to promote block level sports in Jammu and Kashmir. The amount has been sanctioned under the 'Khelo India' scheme by the Union Sports Ministry. Khelo India (1) It will cover 1,000 most talented young athletes each year across select sports disciplines. Each athlete selected under scheme will receive annual scholarship worth Rs.5.00 lakh for 8 consecutive years. (2) 20 universities across country will be promoted as hubs of sporting excellence, which will enable talented sports persons to pursue dual pathway of education and competitive sports. (3) Under it, programme will cover about 200 million children in age group of 10-18. It will not only measure physical fitness of all children in age group, but also support their fitness related activities. (4) First edition Khelo India School Games (KISG) held at the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium in New Delhi. East coast Railways, Waltair Division launches ‘SUBHADRA VAHINI’ Programme (a) With the inspiration of ‘Beti Bacho-Beti padao’ programme being initiated by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi, East coast Railways, Waltair Division has launched ‘SUBHADRA VAHINI’ programme for the security and protection of Women.( East coast Railway's HQ-Bhubaneswar) (b) A 32 member- women team consisting of RPF police and TC women employees will monitor the security of the women passengers in Trains and Railway stations in the division. (c) Women can complain on 24 hours toll-free helpline 182 for the grievance related to security of women. 3,000 more schools selected for setting up Atal Tinkering Labs (a) The NITI Aayog announced an additional 3,000 Atal Tinkering Labs to be set up in schools across different parts of the country under the Atal Innovation Mission (AIM). (b) The selected schools will receive a grant of Rs 20 lakh spread over the next five years to establish such labs. (c) The new additions take number of such ATLs to 5,441 representing all states and five out of seven union territories. It will facilitate the creation of over one million neoteric child innovators by 2020. (d) The Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) is the government's flagship initiative to promote a culture of innovation and entrepreneurship in the country. (e) The sub-schemes of AIM include establishing Atal Tinkering Labs (ATLs) and Atal Incubation Centers (AICs), for providing scaling up support to Established Incubation Centres. India to host first BIMSTEC Military Exercise in September (a) India will host the first military exercise of the BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) group focussing on counter-terrorism. (b) The exercise is scheduled to be held in Pune in the second week of September 2018. The theme includes counter- terrorism in semi-urban terrain and cordon and search. (c) The BIMSTEC member states—Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Bhutan, and Nepal. (d) Leadership is rotated in alphabetical order of country names. The permanent secretariat is in Dhaka. NITI Aayog to launch Composite Water Management Index (a) NITI Aayog announced to launch the Composite Water Management Index with an aim to achieve the objective of ‘Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas’. (b) The index is a useful tool to assess and improve performance in management of water resources by providing useful information which can be utilized to formulate and implement strategies for better management of water resources. (c) NITI Aayog was formed on 1st January 2015, which was a replacement of the Planning Commission. It serves as an advisory body or a “Think Tank” of the government of India to advice on social and economic issues. (d) NITI Aayog: Chairman-Narendra Modi, Vice Chairman-Rajiv Kumar, CEO-Amitabh Kant, Director-Dinesh Arora KSLMA initiates ‘Water Literacy’ campaign to create awareness about importance of water (a) Kerala State Literacy Mission Authority (KSLMA) has initiated a ‘water literacy’ campaign with the involvement of 70,000 students aiming to create awareness about the importance of water conservation in the State (b) As per the campaign, every student will take classes about water conservation for 15 families in their locality. (c) Around 10 lakh people will be benefited from the campaign scheduled to be held from June 20 to September 20. 10 ‘Swachh Iconic Places’ added to phase 3 of Swachh Bharat Mission (a) The government added ten Swachh Iconic Places (SIP) under phase III of its flagship programme, Swachh Bharat Mission. Raghavendra Swamy Temple (Kurnool, Andhra Pradesh), Hazardwari Palace (Murshidabad, West Bengal), Brahma Sarovar Temple (Kurukshetra, Haryana), Vidur Kuti (Bijnor, Uttar Pradesh), Mana village (Chamoli, Uttarakhand), Pangong Lake (Leh-Ladakh, Jammu & Kashmir), Nagvasuki Temple (Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh), Ima Keithal/market (Imphal, Manipur), Sabarimala Temple (Kerala) and Kanvashram (Uttarakhand) have been taken up under Phase III of the flagship project of Swachh Iconic Places (SIP) of the Swachh Bharat Mission. 1441, Opp. IOCL Petrol Pump, CRPF Square, Bhubaneswar-750015 1 Ph. : (0674) 6556677, 8093556677. Web : www.vanik.org, E-mail : [email protected] DAILY UPDATED CURRENT AFFAIRS – 12.06.2018 TO 13.06.2018 (b) These sites have joined the 20 iconic places selected under Phase I and II where special sanitation work is underway. (c) The SIP project envisioned by Prime Minister Narendra Modi is being coordinated by the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation with the support of state governments and local administration. Piyush Goyal launches “Rail Madad” and ‘Menu on Rails’ Apps (a) The two apps, 'Rail MADAD' and 'Menu on Rails', were launched by Railway Minister Piyush Goyal and Minister of State (MoS) Manoj Sinha during a press conference organised to highlight the achievements of the Ministry in the last four years. (b) While Rail MADAD will enable travellers to lodge complaints, Menu on Rails will facilitate seamless ordering of food. (c) Rail MADAD (Mobile Application for Desired Assistance During travel) registers a complaint with minimum inputs from passenger (option of photo also available), issues unique ID instantly and relays the complaint online to relevant field officials for immediate action. (d) Goyal further noted that the government has saved around Rs.11,000-Rs.13,000 crores through electrification, adding that 30,000 km of electrification has been done by March 1 this year. (e) Free WiFi is provided at more than 675 stations in the country, and to install the same in around 8000 stations by end of March 2019. Technology giant Google along with RailTel is working to equip 400 major railway stations in the country with high-speed internet facility. PM Modi to dedicate to nation SAIL’s expanded steel plant at Bhilai on 14 June (a) Prime Minister Narendra Modi will dedicate to the nation the modernised and expanded plant of state-run steel maker SAIL at Bhilai,Chhattisgarh. (b) Bhilai is Steel Authority of India Ltd’s (SAIL) largest plant and major producer and supplier of rails for Indian Railways including 260 metre long rails. (SAIL CEO: Prakash Kumar Singh) (c) This would be the third plant of SAIL which the prime minister will dedicate to the nation. In 2015, he had dedicated Rourkela and IISCO steel plants. SAIL had undertaken about Rs 70,000 crore modernisation and expansion of its integrated steel plants. (d) SAIL had undertaken about Rs70,000 crore modernisation and expansion of its integrated steel plants. The capacity to produce rails at Bhilai steel plant has reached 2MTPA from 0.8MTPA after modernisation. INTERNATIONAL 44th G7 Summit Was Held In Canada (a) The 44th G7 summit was held on June 8–9, 2018, in Quebec, Canada. This was the sixth time since 1981 that Canada has hosted the meetings. (b) Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has hosted this summit. The 44th G7 summit was the first summit for Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte. The 45th G7 summit or next G7 summit will be held in 2019 in France. (c) The Group of Seven (G7) is a group consisting of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. China confers highest state honour on Putin China’s President Xi Jinping has awarded the highest state honour to Russian President Vladimir Putin, a move that signals the close relationship between the two countries. The Friendship Medal of the People’s Republic of China was presented to Mr Putin personally by Chinese President Xi Jinping during a grand ceremony held at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. International Conference on ICT to be held in Kathmandu from June 17 An International Conference on Information and Communication Technology (ICT) will be held in Kathmandu, Nepal from June 17. The Theme of two day conference is “Sustainable Development Goals for Smart Society ”. The conference will provide a common platform to participants to exchange their knowledge and discover new insides for developing a plan of action using sustainable ICT applications.