Current Affairs for SSC CGL Exams - 13 May 2015

Current Affairs for SSC CGL Exams - 13 May 2015

:: National ::

President appoints Governor for four states

  • President Pranab Mukherjee appointed Governors for four States, bringing down the number of Governors who had been holding the additional charge of more than two States for the past few months.
  • Droupadi Murmu, former Odisha Minister, has been appointed Governor of Jharkhand, whereas J.P. Rajkhowa has been given the gubernatorial post of Arunachal Pradesh. Tathagata Roy, former president of the BJP’s West Bengal, has been made the Governor of Tripura; whereas V. Shanmuganathan has been appointed Governor of Meghalaya.

  • Lieutenant General (Retd.) Nirbhay Sharma, Governor of Arunachal Pradesh, has been transferred and appointed Governor of Mizoram for the remainder of his term.

  • Jharkhand Governor Syed Ahmed has been transferred and appointed Governor of Manipur for the remainder of his term.

DD to bring separate news channel in Hindi and English

  • Battered by falling viewership, DD News, which prides itself in being the only bilingual channel in the country offering news in Hindi and English, has proposed to reinvent itself amid a growing realisation that the bilingual offer has left the viewer quite confused.

  • Subject to clearance from the Prasar Bharati Board, the channel, which also lacks staff strength as compared to private newscasters, is proposing to do away with the current bilingual model and have separate channels catering to Hindi and English news viewers.

  • The Prasar Bharati Board has asked DD News organisers to work out the modalities of running the channels. Director General, News, Akshay Kumar Raut, confirmed that the channel is working on the proposal but refrained from putting a date to it.

  • He said he is in the process of finalising the proposal and would take it to the board soon. Mr. Raut also acknowledged that Hindi programming was stronger than English programming.

  • But getting the approval of the board is only a part of the process. Doordarshan, though autonomous on paper, depends on the Information and Broadcasting Ministry for financial support. Over 70 per cent of the budgetary allocation of the Ministry is earmarked for Prasar Bharati Corporation and its 22,000-odd employees.

Iconic Rajabai Clock Tower re-opened for public

  • The iconic Rajabai Clock Tower on the Mumbai University campus reopened after two years of restoration work, the first since its construction in 1878. While it was originally built at a cost of Rs.5.5 lakh, the first phase of its restoration taken up by Tata Consultancy Services in co-ordination with the Indian Heritage Society — cost Rs.4.2 crore.

  • TCS has also offered Rs.3.05 crore for the second phase of the restoration, which will cover the repairs of furniture, fixtures and lighting at the clock tower and library. “By the end of the year, the tower will once again be the beacon of the city,” assured Anita Garware of The Indian Heritage Society, Mumbai.

  • The Neo-Gothic tower that faces the more modern art deco buildings along the Oval Maidan, was designed by English architect Sir George Gilbert Scott who did not even visit India for the purpose, and was modelled on London’s Big Ben. In keeping with the wishes of Jain businessman and stockbroker Premchand Roychund, who in 1864 donated Rs. 2 lakh for its construction, the tower was named after his mother Rajabai.

:: Prize and Award ::

Neel Mukherjee wins £10,000 Encore award for the year 2014

  • Neel Mukherjee’s story of a young man who is drawn into into extreme political activism in 1960s Calcutta, The Lives of Others, has won him the £10,000 Encore award for the year’s best second novel.

  • Already shortlisted for the Man Booker prize, where it missed out to Richard Flanagan’s The Narrow Road to the Deep North, and the Costa, Mukherjee’s novel “immensely impressed” judges with its “ambition and depth”, said chair of the panel Alex Clark. It beat second novels by authors including Will Wiles, Deborah Kay Davies and Amanda Coe to win the Encore, an award which was founded by Lucy Astor 25 years ago, and which has been won in the past by major names including Ali Smith, Anne Enright and Colm Tóibín.

  • Mukherjee, who lives in London, called the Encore “a burst of light in what is usually considered to be dark, damp, bleak territory – the dreaded second novel”, and said he was “thrilled by my good fortune and, looking at the list of past winners, both humbled and deeply honoured” to win.

:: Newsmaker ::

Daniel Mookhey first Indian origin MP in Australia

  • Daniel Mookhey has become first Indian-origin Member of Parliament (MP) from the Australian state of New South Wales to be sworn in to Australian parliament on the Hindu religious text, the Bhagavadgita.
  • Recently, he was chosen by the Australian Labour Party to fill the casual vacancy in the New South Wales upper house. Thus, making him state’s first politician of Indian background.
  • Daniel Mookhey was born in Blacktown suburb in New South Wales to Indian parents who had migrated to Australia from Punjab in 1973.
  • He holds three university degrees and currently is working as a consultant to unions, charities and community groups.

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