Daily Current Affairs, 18th February 2019

1) List of MOUs/Agreements Signed During State Visit Of President Of Argentina To India

•MoU between the Ministry of Defence of the Republic of India and the Ministry of Defence of the Argentine Republic on Defence Cooperation.

•MoU between the Republic of India and the Republic of Argentina for cooperation in the field of Tourism.

•MOU on Cooperation and Collaboration between Prasar Bharti, India and the Federal System of Media and Public Contents, Argentina.

•MoU in pharmaceuticals between Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO), GoI, and National Administration of Drugs, Food and Medical Technology, Argentina.

•MoU on Antarctic Co-operation between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Worship of the Argentine Republic and the Ministry of Earth Sciences of the Republic of India.

•Work Plan on Cooperation between the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare of the Republic of India and the Ministry of Production and Labour of the Argentine Republic within the MoU signed in 2010.

•Work Plan for the year 2019-21 between Indian Council of Agriculture Research Republic of India and the State Secretary of Agro-industry of the Ministry of Production and Labour of the Argentine Republic within the MoU signed in 2006.

•Joint Declaration of Intent on Cooperation in the field of Information & Communications Technology and Electronics between the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology of the Government of the Republic of India and the Government Secretary of Modernization of the Republic of Argentina.

•MOU between Global Centre for Nuclear Energy Partnership (GCNEP), India, and CNEA, the Secretariat of Energy, Argentina.

•Agreement for the establishment of India-Argentina Centre of Excellence for Information and Technology.

2) India’s First District Cooling System To Be Built In Amravati

•United Arab Emirates (UAE) based international cooling provider, National Central Cooling Company PJSC (Tabreed) entered into a 30-year concession with Andhra Pradesh Capital Region Development Authority (APCRDA) to build India’s first district cooling system in Amaravati.

•The agreement is for a contracted cooling capacity of 20,000 Refrigeration Tons (RTs) and will cater to the State’s Assembly, High Court, Secretariat and other Government buildings currently being constructed, for which cooling services will start in early 2021.

3) J P Morgan Became First US Bank With Cryptocurrency

•JP Morgan rolled out the first US bank cryptocurrency. The currency is designed to be decentralized so that no one has control over transactions being sent over the network. Cryptocurrencies are used successfully to move money between the bank and a client which usually runs on a blockchain technology.

•The cryptocurrency, called “JPM Coin,” is intended for the bank’s wholesale payments business that moves $6 trillion around the world daily and not for retail customers. It will be used internally by the bank to enable instant transfers of payments between institutional accounts.

4) ‘Simplicity & Wisdom’ Authored By Mr. Dinesh Shahra Launched

•A book ‘Simplicity & Wisdom’ written by Dinesh Shahra was launched at Parmarth Ashram in Kumbh Mela. Launched by the Governor of West Bengal– Keshari Nath Tripathi and Swami Chidanand Saraswati, Head of Parmarth Ashram, this book is dedicated to Late Vedanti Swami Pragananandji. The book aims at guiding towards saintly wisdom and leading a content and happy life.

5) Government Raised Rs.10000 Crore From Bharat-22 ETF Offering

•The government of India gets Rs.10000 crore from Bharat-22 Exchange Traded Fund(ETF) by additional offering. The government has absorbed approximately Rs.46000 croreby way of disinvestment with the successful offering of Bharat-22 ETF.

•Bharat-22 is an Exchange Traded Fund ( ETF) which will closely track the performance of Bharat-22 index. It was launched by Government of India in November 2017. ICICI Prudential Mutual Fund AMC will manage the fund.

6) Hina Jaiswal Becomes The First Indian Woman Flight Engineer

•Flight Lieutenant Hina Jaiswal from Chandigarh, became the First Indian Woman Flight Engineer of the Indian Air Force(IAF). She was commissioned in the IAF’s engineering branch in 2015 and completed the 6-month Flight Engineer course from the 112 Helicopter Unit attached to the Air Force Station in Yelahanka, Bengaluru. The Flight Engineer branch was opened to women officers in 2018.

7) Abdul Aziz Muhamat Wins International Human Rights Prize

•Sudanese refugee, Abdul Aziz Muhamat, who spent 5 years in the Australian detention centre on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea, was given the Martin Ennals Award 2019 in Geneva, Switzerland, for exposing “the very cruel asylum seeker policy of the Australian Government”.

•It is sometimes referred to as the “Nobel Prize for human rights”. Abdul Aziz Muhamat’s podcast “The Messenger”, created from more than 4,000 WhatsApp messages Muhamat sent from the detention centre, had won best radio/audio feature at Australia’s Walkley Awards in 2017.

8) India Boosts Customs Duty To 200% On Goods Imported From Pakistan

•India with immediate effect has boosted the Customs Duty on all the goods imported from Pakistan to 200% followed by the day after India repealed Most Favoured Nation (MFN)status from Pakistan. This punitory move followed by the Pulwana Terrorist attack that led to the death of 42 CRPF (Central Reserve Police Force).

•This step is likely to strike Pakistan’s exports to India which were $381 million in the April-Nov period and for overall FY18, it was $489 million. This 200% tariff rate is higher than the average bound rate of 113.5% for agriculture products and 34.6% for non-agriculture products. The MFN applied rates are 32.8% and 10.7%, respectively for farm and non-farm products.

9) Sunil Chhetri Given First Ever Football Ratna Award

•Sunil Chhetri, the all-time leading scorer for India in international football, has been conferred the first ever Football Ratna honour by Football Delhi, the association governing the sport in Delhi.

•He is popularly known as Captain Fantastic. He has scored the 2nd highest number of goals in international matches among active players after Cristiano Ronaldo.