Current Affairs May 18-19, 2019

In this post, GKToday presents Current Affairs of May 18-19, 2019 in Short Notes form for preparation of IBPS, Banking, CLAT, SSC, Railway, UPSC, IAS/PCS, UPPSC, BPSC, MPPSC, RPSC, TNPSC, MPSC, KPSC and all other competitive examinations of India.

1. The 2023 Asian Cup Football tournament will be hosted by China after South Korea withdraws its bid. The Korea Football Association (KFA) said in a statement it had pulled out to "strategically focus" on a joint bid with North Korea to host the Women's World Cup in the same year. The 2023 AFC Asian Cup is the quadrennial international men's football championship of Asia organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC).

2. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has released a vision document - Payment and Settlement Systems in India: Vision 2019 – 2021 - with its core theme of 'Empowering Exceptional E-payment Experience', for ensuring a safe, secure, convenient, quick and affordable e-payment system. The move comes as the apex bank expects the number of digital transactions to increase more than four times to 8,707 crore in December 2021. The vision document has been envisages to achieve a highly digital and cash-less society through the goal posts of competition, cost-effectiveness, convenience and confidence (4Cs). The document talks about creating customer awareness, setting up a 24X7 helpline and self-regulatory organisation for system operators and service providers, among others. And also, the 'no-compromise' approach towards safety and security of payment systems remains a hallmark of the vision.

3. China has expanded its ban on Wikipedia to block the community-edited online encyclopedia in all available languages. Hence, Wikipedia had joined thousands of other websites which cannot be accessed in China. According to a report by the Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI), China started blocking all language editions of Wikipedia from April 2019. China's online censorship apparatus -- dubbed the 'Great Firewall' -- blocks a large number of foreign sites in the country, such as Google, Facebook, LinkedIn and The New York Times. Topics that are deemed too sensitive are also scrubbed. An earlier enforced ban barred Internet users from viewing the Chinese version, as well as the pages for sensitive search terms such as Dalai Lama and the Tiananmen massacre.

4. Justice Madan B Lokur, the Retired Supreme Court judge of India, has been appointed to the Supreme Court of Fiji as a judge of its non-resident panel. He he received the offer from the Chief Justice of the Fiji Supreme Court on the day of his superannuation from the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court of Fiji has three sessions in a year. Justice Lokur will attend the August session from August 15 to August 30, 2019.

5. The first full-fledged Services Selection Board (SSB) of Indian Navy has been inaugurated by Navy Chief Admiral Sunil Lanba at Diamond Harbour near Kolkata. The SSB (Kolkata) will boost the induction of officers, both men and women, into the Indian Navy. Its location will reduce the travel time and effort for candidates from northern and northeastern parts of the country. This is the fifth SSB of the Indian Navy and will cater for selection of both permanent and short service commission (SSC) officers. The other boards are located in Bhopal, Bengaluru, Visakhapatnam and Coimbatore. The board can accommodate 160 candidates at a time and has separate facilities and accommodation for men and women candidates. Facilities available at the board include a GTO ground, testing hall, conference room, accommodation for staff and a medical inspection room.

6. Sanjiv Puri has been appointed as the new CMD (Chairman and managing director) of ITC Ltd, India’s largest cigarette maker. He will take over the legacy of noted industry leader and erstwhile ITC Chairman Y.C. Deveshwar, who passed away on 11 May. Prior to this post, Mr. Puri was the Managing Director since 2018. He was appointed on the board in December 2015 and as the CEO in February 2017. Deveshwar had played the role of mentor to the executive management led by Sanjiv Puri. ITC Limited is an Indian multinational conglomerate company headquartered in Kolkata, West Bengal.

7. The International Day of Families is observed every year on May 15 to promote awareness of issues relating to families and to increase knowledge of the social, economic and demographic processes affecting families. The 2019 theme “Families and Climate Action: Focus on SDG 13” focuses on families, family policies and major SDG 13 targets such as improve education, awareness-raising and human and institutional capacity on climate change mitigation, adaptation, and impact reduction and early warning.

8. ICICI Bank has launched a co-branded multi-currency card with online travel booking portal Goibibo. Anyone travelling abroad, whether they hold an ICICI Bank savings account or not, can apply for the Goibibo ICICI Bank Travel Card on the Goibibo website and mobile app The acceptance of the card is across 200 countries and 4.6 crore merchants globally. Further, the card can be loaded with up to 15 currencies. Customers can instantly transfer money from one currency to another through ICICI Bank’s internet portal and reload currency into the card anytime, anywhere, using the bank’s mobile and internet banking platform. The card also includes benefits of up to Rs. 20,000, including gift vouchers of Rs.15,000 from Goibibo. Additionally, customers get 40 paise discount on currency conversion rate on loading of a minimum of $1,000.

9. Justice Arjan Kumar Sikri, the former judge of Supreme Court of India (SCI), has been appointed as the chairperson of News Broadcasting Standards Authority (NBSA) by the News Broadcasters Association (NBA). He will succeed Justice (Retd.) R. V. Raveendran, and will assume the office of Chairperson of NBSA on May 26. This is an honorary post and not a government job. Justice Sikri was retired as senior most puisne judge of Supreme Court of India on 6 March 2019. NBSA is an independent body for self-regulation of 24x7 news channels, who are members of the NBA. Its task is to consider and adjudicate upon complaints about broadcasts.

10. The 5th edition of “International Army Scout Masters Competition” will be organized under the aegis of Konark Corps at Jaisalmer, Rajasthan from 24 July to 17 August 2019. This is the first time that India is the venue for the Army Scouts Masters Competition, which is part of International Army Games steered by Russia. It is also for the first time that an Indian team will participate in this competition. The event will witness participation of the Mechanised Infantry Scout Teams of 8 countries including Russia who is the founding member of this format of International Army Games. The competition will be conducted in five stages, which will test the overall skills of Mechanised Infantry Scouts in simulated battle field scenarios. The combat skills will be adjudicated by a panel of international judges and referees. The competition will showcase combat training and promote camaraderie amongst the contestants, facilitate sharing of best practices as well as develop military and technical cooperation between participating nations.


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