Daily GK : 24 Dec 2016

Important Dates

1. National Consumer Day being observed on 24th December

• 24th December is observed as National Consumer Day, On this day the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 had received the assent of the President.
• This Act aims to provide consumers with effective safeguards against different types of exploitation such as defective goods, unsatisfactory services and unfair trade practices.
• This day provides an opportunity for individuals to highlight the importance of the consumer movement and the need to make every consumer more aware of their rights and responsibilities.
• This year the theme is Alternate Consumer Disputes Redressal.

Honours & Awards

2. Bengali poet Shankha Ghosh chosen for 2016 Jnanpith Award 

• Bengali poet and literary critic Shankha Ghosh (84-year) will get the Jnanpith Award for 2016 (52nd).
• Shankha Ghosh is regarded a leading authority on Rabindranath in addition to being one of the most prolific writers in Bengali.
• He was born in Chandpur (now Bangladesh).
• Ghosh got his undergraduate degree in Arts in the Bengali language from the Presidency College,Kolkata in 1951 and subsequently his master's degree from the University of Calcutta.
• He has earlier won the Sahitya Academy Award and the Padma Bhushan for his contribution to Indian literature.

Note

• The Jnanpith Award is an Indian literary award presented annually by the Bharatiya Jnanpith to an author for their 'outstanding contribution towards literature'.

National Affairs

3. The Union Govt. announces new rules to ease process of getting passport

• The Minister of State for External Affairs Gen V K Singh has announced the new passport rules in order to streamline, liberalise and ease the process of issue of passport.
• Now, Birth certificate is no longer mandatory for getting the passport.
• The date of birth on documents such as PAN card, driving license, Aadhar, Matriculation Certificate will also suffice.
• The online passport application form now requires the applicant to provide the name of only one parent and not both.
• This would enable single parents to apply for passports for their children. Besides, married applicants would not be required to provide any marriage certificate.

4 Tea tribes to get govt sponsored insurance cover of Rs 2 lakh

• The Assam government has decided to cover all the people belonging to the tea tribe communities under a government-sponsored insurance scheme worth 2 lakh rupees per person.
• The state government has also decided to enhance scholarship amount of the communities.
• The annual scholarship amount for youths from Class IX to XII has been increased to Rs. 5,000  from Rs. 1,880.
• Now, for the degree level students the existing scholarship amount of Rs. 2,530 has been enhanced to Rs. 7,000 .

5. 10 Delhi metro stations to go fully cashless from Jan 1

• Ten metro stations in Delhi will go completely cashless in their transactions from 1st January next year in view government's vision to transform India into a cashless economy.
• The cashless transactions for token, smart card purchase and top up at these stations can be done through the mobile wallet, Debit and Credit cards.
• All stations have over 70% Smart Card users as a result of which cash transactions here are moderate in comparison to other stations.
• Initially, at least one counter will have the option of cash.

The stations are:

• Red Line: Rohini East and Rohini West.
• Yellow Line:  MG Road Station.
• Blue Line: Mayur Vihar Phase-I, Nirman Vihar, Tilak Nagar, Janakpuri West, and Noida Sector-15.
• Violet Line: Nehru Place and Kailash Colony

Banking & Finance

6. RBI opens banking ombudsman office in Dehradun

• The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has set up a banking ombudsman office in Dehradun (Uttarakhand).
• The Dehradun office is the third in North India after Kanpur and Chandigarh.
• Now, the total number of RBI ombudsman offices have increased to 17 in India.

Note:

• The Banking Ombudsman office receives and considers complaints relating to deficiencies in banking and other services filed by consumers.

7. Note ban: I-T detects Rs 3,651 crore undisclosed income

• The Income Tax (I-T) Department has detected undisclosed income worth over Rs. 3,651 crores and seized new notes worth more than Rs. 98 crore after demonetization.
• The taxmen have carried out a total of 785 searches, survey and enquiry operations under the provisions of the Income Tax Act, across the country after 8th November this year.
• The IT department has also issued 3,647 notices to various entities on charges of tax evasion and hawala-like dealings, till Thursday

International Affairs

8. Nepal to import additional 240 MW power from India

• India will export an additional 240 MW of electricity to Nepal in a bid to lessen the power shortage of the country.
• An agreement has been signed between Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) and state-owned NTPC Vidyut Vyapar Nigam (NVVN) in effect in New Delhi.
• According to Nepal Electricity Authority(NEA), the import of 80 MW power immediately from January and 160 MW from February will be made through Dhalkebar-Muzaffarpur Cross-Border Transmission line.

Sports

 9. Shiva Keshavan clinches gold at Asian Luge Championships

• India's seasoned Winter Olympian Shiva Keshavan has won a gold medal at the Asian Luge Championships at Nagano in Japan.
• Japan's Tanaka Shohei came in second for the Silver.
• The bronze medal was claimed by Chinese Taipei's Lien Te-An.
• Shiva is slated to take part in the 2017 World Championship in Innsbruck, Austria.

10. Pankaj Advani bags National title in 6-red Snooker

• The  Pankaj Advani has ended the year on a high by bagging the National title in 6-red Snooker (shorter format of the game).
• The Advani overcame his junior opponent Ishpreet Chadha 7-4 in a strong display of potting in the final Mumbai.
• He is the only player in the world to win all titles  National, Continental and World - in 6-red Snooker.
• Advani is now the strongest contender for qualifying for the Asian and World Championships in 6-red Snooker in 2017 to represent India.