According to the Film Federation of India, ‘Newton’ will be India’s official entry for the Best Foreign Film category at the Oscars 2018.
Newton is a 2017 Indian Hindi-language black comedy film directed by Amit V Masurkar and Produced by Drishyam Films.
The movie tells the story of a polling officer Newton Kumar who is bent on conducting free and fair elections in the conflict-ridden jungles of Chhattisgarh.
This year’s Oscars will be held on 4th March 2018 in Los Angeles.
Dharmendra
Pradhan to host first LPG Panchayat in Gandhinagar
Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra
Pradhan will inaugurate one of the ambitious programmes of the Centre, LPG
Panchayat, aimed at encouraging rural communities to turn to clean fuel.
The First LPG Panchayat will be held in Gandhinagar,
where Pradhan will preside over the interaction between women using LPG under
the Pradhan Mantri Ujjawala Yojana (PMUY) and the companies.
According to data shared by the oil marketing companies,
so far three crore connections have been allotted under the PMUY against the
target of five crore by 2019.
SBI
launches Indian bond index series in London
State Bank of India (SBI) has launched the FTSE SBI Bond
Index series in partnership with global index provider FTSE 100, which will
give tools to investors from India, the UK and globally to analyse India’s
government bond market, and drive growth in this market.
This index, launched in collaboration with the London
Stock Exchange, will ensure that international investors have an international
benchmark that is transparent, that is well governed and that is something they
can easily rely on.
Samsung’s
Bixby Voice now works in India
Bixby takes some initial setting up, requiring users
to input their voice, reading commands and sentences and trying out a few
tasks.
Bixby is meant to do additional and on-phone tasks which
Samsung hopes will make getting things done faster and easier. Bixby Voice can
be triggered by saying “Hi Bixby” to a sleeping device also.
Dr.
Harshvardhan Launches Pt. Deen Dayal Upadhyay Vigyan Gram Sankul Pariyojana
Dr. Harshvardhan launched “Pt Deen Dayal Upadhyay
Vigyan Gram Sankul Pariyojana” which will experiment and endeavour to
formulate and implement appropriate S&T Interventions for Sustainable
Development through cluster approach in Uttarakhand.
Department of Science and Technology is implementing
several initiatives for upliftment and economic development of rural areas in
the country.
Note - Dr. Harsh Vardhan is the incumbent minister at Ministry
of Science & Technology, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change
and Ministry of Earth Sciences.
Govt
Launches Campaign to Sensitise Women About Cancer
Minister of State Health and Family Welfare Anupriya
Patel launched a nationwide health campaign to sensitise women about
the early screening and the preventive care for cancer.
Themed 'Nurturing the Nurturer', the campaign was
launched by FICCI Ladies Organisation (FLO) in partnership with the Apollo
Hospitals group.
Balraj
Joshi Appointed as New NHPC Chairman
Balraj Joshi was appointed the chairman-cum-managing
director (CMD) of NHPC Ltd, the country’s premier hydropower utility. Joshi is
at present director (technical) in the organisation.
According to another order, P. Alli Rani has been
appointed the CMD of Cotton Corporation of India (CCI) Ltd. She is at present
director (finance) in Container Corporation of India Limited. Rani has been
appointed to the post for a period of five years.
Dabur
India Ties Up with Amazon for Ayurveda Marketplace
Dabur India has tied up with e-commerce major Amazon for
an online Ayurveda marketplace which will house all ayurvedic brands and
products of the country.
The company will also offer consumers an insight into
various ayurvedic medicines for treating a variety of ailments. The
exclusive Ayurveda e-marketplace has been hosted by Amazon India and
the content is developed by Dabur India.
Note
Jeff Bezos was the Founder of Amazon.
Amazon is an e-commerce company based in the USA.
SBI
Tops Trust and Popularity Charts
State Bank of India (SBI) is India’s most trusted and
most popular bank according to a survey conducted by Brand Finance, a
business valuation and strategic consultancy headquartered in London.
On the trust charts, SBI is followed by HDFC Bank and
Central Bank of India whereas, on the popularity charts, ICICI Bank and HDFC
Bank take the second and third spots respectively.
Note -
Recently, SBI had slashed interest rate on savings
account deposits by 50 basis points to 3.5 per on balance of Rs 1 crore and
below.
Its is Headquartered in Mumbai.
India
Gets its First High Horsepower Locomotive from France
India has received its first High Horsepower Locomotive with
the bodyshell of 12000 HP loco from Alstom France at
Kolkata port. This first-of-its-kind high-power electric locomotive will be
used to haul freight trains at twice the existing speed by 2018.
This is the first major FDI (Foreign Direct Investment)
project in the rail sector. The first such locomotive is estimated to cost
about Rs 30 crore. The Indian Railways is currently using 6,000HP locomotives
for freight services. The locomotive will run at a speed of up to 120
km/h.
Note - Shri Piyush Goyal is the Present Railway Minister of
India.
West
Bengal Gets $300 Million ADB Loan
Multilateral funding agency ADB has sanctioned
a USD 300 million loan facility for carrying forward fiscal reforms
in West Bengal. The board of Asian Development Bank (ADB) approved a loan of
USD 300 million to continue a comprehensive series of fiscal reforms in West
Bengal.
West Bengal, for the first time in 2012 had received a
USD 400 million from ADB, its first policy-based lending with an aim
to create a fiscal space necessary to sustain higher public investment in the
eastern India.
Note - ADB headquarters in Manila, Philippines. Takehiko Nakao is the President of ADB.
First
Indian team for FIFA U-17 World Cup announced
The first ever Indian squad to participate in
the FIFA World Cup, U-17 World Cup Squad has been announced.
The 21 players who will participate in the World Cup
Squad include Dheeraj Singh, Prabhsukhan Gill, Sunny Dhaliwal Boris Singh,
Jitendra Singh, Anwar Ali, Sanjeev Stalin and Hendry Antony.
Liliane Bettencourt, the heir to the French L’Oreal
hairspray empire and the world’s wealthiest woman, has died aged 94.
She was from France.
Bettencourt, whose net worth was estimated at about €33bn
(£29bn) this year, was the face of one of France’s biggest cosmetics
conglomerates and had once captured the public’s imagination as the nation’s
poor little rich girl.