The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) showed concerns on separation of Debt Management Office (DMO) from Central Bank. The government had proposed to make DMO an independent body under the ambit of finance ministry. This would be accountable for managing the government's borrowing programme. With the increased government’s borrowings over the last few years the separation of DMO from Central Bank had gained the central stage.

As per RBI governor D Subbarao there is no conflict of interest between the debt management and the Central Bank. As per him only the Central Bank had the requisite market gauge and instruments which will help in making contextual judgments. As per him an independent debt agency, driven by narrow objectives would not be able to handle it.
As per RBI advantages of transferring debt management operations out of the central bank are exaggerated. The advantages that were stated were higher transparency, helping in debt consolidations, lowering cost of debt and resolving conflict of interest.
RBI opined that these benefits may work in few nations, but in case of India where the government borrowings are huge, sovereign debt management surpasses the exercise of merely resource raising.

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan has been appointed as the new Goodwill Ambassador for UNAIDS. She will assist the agency to achieve its goal of eliminating new HIV infections among children by 2015.
Bachchan will help spreading awareness on issues related to curbing new HIV infections in children and urge for increased access to anti-retroviral treatment.

The 9^th World Hindi Conefrence concluded in Johannesburg, South Africa.

During the function a bust of Pandit Nardev Vedalankar, known as the father of Hindi in South Africa, was also  unveiled.
Vedalankar came to South Africa in 1947 from Gujarat to take up a teaching post in a Gujarati medium school in Durban. He contributed immensely for the promotion of Hindi in South Africa.

INDEX -2012; the largest International Design Exhibition in the Gulf region was held at World Trade Center in Dubai. The exhibition witnessed participation of over 900 leading brands and companies from 45 countries including India exhibiting their innovative products and creative designs. Coir board of India was among the participants at the show with a range of products catering to the gulf market. The Coir Board and the Coir Federation of Kerala sees a big opportunity in the gulf region with a large Indian Diaspora around. The theme of exhibition was “Where Inspiration thrives”. The focus this year was on educational and health care interior fittings with the estimated market worth $900 billion in the Gulf countries.

Saraswati Samman to A A Manavalan for his comparative study on Ramayana

The esteemed Saraswati Samman was conferred on AA Manavalan for his work, Irama Kathaiyum Iramayakalyum.

“Irama Kathaiyum Iramayakalyum”

• A comparative study of epic Ramayana in 48 different languages.
• The characters, plot and individual insertions of the book deals with the alterations that occurred in the due course of migration.
• This book tries to explain the effect of Ramayana over the South East Asia, its language and culture.
• The comparative study of Ramayana is written in different languages over a certain period of time and some of the languages include Pali, Tibetan, Prakirt, Tamil, Japanese, Old Javanese, Assamese, Thai, Telugu, Malayalam, Bengali, Marathi, Kannada, Sanskrit, Odisi, Hindi, Malay, Persian, Maranao, Burmese, Laotian and Kashmiri.

“Saraswati Samman”

• It is an annual award given for extraordinary works in any Indian language listed in Schedule VIII of the Constitution of India.
• The honor was instituted in the year 1991 by KK Birla Foundation and is a renowned award in the field of literature.
• The award consists of a citation, a plaque and a cash prize of 7.5 lakhs.