1. Eminent Pulmonologist Dr. Randeep Guleria was on March 24, 2017 appointed the new Director of the All India Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS) by the appointments Committee of the Cabinet chaired by PM Narendra Modi. Dr. Guleria is the first Indian to get a Doctorate of Medicine in Pulmonary and critical care Medicine. He will have a five year term as AIIMS Director. He succeeds Dr. MC Mishra on this top AIIMS post. Dr. Guleria joined AIIMS in 1992 as Assistant Professor in the Department of medical science.
2. President Pranab Mukherjee inaugurated the World Conference on Environment on March 25, 2017 in New Delhi. The National Green Tribunal, the premier environment watchdog of India organized the two days conference which was attended by Chief Justice of India, CJ of numerous high courts, union ministers and many other dignitaries. The emphasis of the conference was on the tools that need to bring into service for dispansation into environmental justice by different courts and tribunals across the worlds.
3. Indian Golfer SSP Chawrasia registered a seven shot comprehensive win to lift the Indian Open Golf crown 2017 on March 12 at the DLF Golf and Country Course in Gurugram. Chawrasia became the second Indian and third overall to successfully defend the Indian Open Golf crown after his fellow Indian Jyoti Randhawa (2006 and 2007) and Japan’s Kenji Hosoishi (1967 and 1968) after this litle win. He received US $291,660 as the prize money. Chawrasia also became the second Indian golfer after Jeev Milkha Singh to claim four European Tour titles. This was Chawrasia’s sixth win on the Asian Tour and overall sixth international victory.
4. Hydrabad for the third year in a row emerged as the best city in terms of living standards among Indian cities in the Mercer 2017 Quality of Living Index, released in March 2017. However Hydrabad suffered five place loss this year from its 139 position in the last year index. This year it was ranked on 144 place. Pune and Bengaluru secured second and third places respectively among the Indian cities; however worldwide ranks in the Index are 145 and 146. Vienna has been ranked at the top globally in the list of Mercer.
5. The Union Government on March 20, 2017 announced its decision to merge Bhartiya Mahila Bank (BMB) with State Bank of India (SBI) to ensure greater banking services outreach to a large number of women at a faster pace. SBI has a large outreach of more than 20,000 branches. BMB’s merger with SBI will make the advanced banking system accessible to BMB customers as BMB has only seven all women branches while SBI group has already 126 exclusive all-women branches across Indian with a 22 per cent women workforce out of the total 2,00,000 work force of SBI.
6. Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan was honoured with the 4th National Yash Chopra Memorial Award for his outstanding contribution to Indian Cinema. Veteran actress Rekha presented the honour to Shah Rukh at a ceremony in Mumbai on February 25, 2017 in the presence of Maharashtra Governor C. Vidyasagar Rao. Lata Mangeshkar, Amitabh Bachchan and Rekha herself are the previous recipents of the award which was instituted by TSR Foundation in memory of legendary filmmaker Yash Chopra who passed away in 2012. The award carries a gold medal and a prize money worth Rs 10 lakh.
7. India and the United States of America are set to further strengthen their bilateral ties under the Trump administration with the two countries deciding to continue to exchange programmes on hostage crisis, teror crime scene probe and cyber crime. The cooperation is to be undertaken under the Anti Terrorism Assistance pact between the two countries. Under the joint training programmes Indian Police Officers will undergo training in US training institution. The course conducted are an intregral part of the bilateral cooperation on internal security between the two countries.
8. India and Russia on March 17, 2017 signed two agreements for long term supply of spares for the Indian Air Force’s Sukhoi-30 fighter jets, a fleet plagued by engine troubles and poor serviceability. The IAF has contracted 272 Su-30 MKI fighter aircraft out of which nearly 240 have been delivered and the remaining planes are likely to be inducted over the next three years. The two-pact were signed and the two-day India-Russia Military and Industrial Conference jointly inaugurated by defence minister Arun Jaitley and Russia’s minister for industry and trade Denis Jaitley and Russia’s minister for industry and trade Denis Manturov. Seven Su-30 jets have crashed since 2009, including the fighter that went down in Rajasthan on March 15, 2017.
9. The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) on March 1, 2017 successfully carried out a test of an interceptor missile, further validating the reliability of the under-development, two-layered Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) in shooting down enemy missiles. According to defence source, the endo-atmospheric missile, which can intercept missiles at ranges of 15-30 km from the vAbdul Kalam Island odd the Odisha coast in response to an incoming ‘enemy’ missile which was launched from the Integrated Test Range (ITR) on Chandipur.
10. The Lok Sabha on March 14, 2017 passed the Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2016, which denies inheritance rights to heirs of individuals who left the country for Pakistan and China, completing the process after Rajya Sabha gave its assent to the long pending legislation earlier a week before. The amendment was necessitated by the claim made by the Raja Mahmudabad of Uttar Pradesh on properties belonging to his father which were declared enemy property and seized by the government of India following partition.
1. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates once again topped the Forbes magazing list of the world’s richest person with an estimation wealth of $86 billion. He toped the Forbes list which was released on March 20, 2017, as the world’s Wealthiest man for the fourth year in a row. Berkshire Hathaway Chief Warren Buffett finished behined gates. Others in top 10 included Amazon founder Jeff Bezos at number three. The US led countries with the most number of billionaries with 565 while China is a second place with 319 Chinese billionaires in the list.
2. Anil Ambani, chairman of Reliance Group was inducted into the international advisory board of the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based foreign policy think tank on March 28, 2017. The advisory board of the Atlantic Council included political and bussiness leaders like media baron Rupert Murdoch, Avibus CEO Dr. Thomas Enders, Zbigniew K. Brzezinski, former US national security advisor, former Australian PM Kevin Rudd etc. The Atlantic Council, through the work of its ten programmes and centers, promotes constructive US leadership and engagement in the world based on the central role of the Atlantic Community.
3. China-backed civil servant Carrie Lam was on March 26, 2017 elected the first women Chief Executive of Hong-Kong. Lam secured 777 votes in her support from the 1,194 member election committee. Former financial secretary John Tsang finished runner-up in the race, securing 365 votes only. Retired judge Wookwok-hing got 21 votes. Many votes were declared invalid. After winning the poll, Carrie pledged to work for all. In Hong-Kong, Chief Executive is not elected directly by public vote, but by an election committee dominated by pro-Beijing electors. The Chinese name of Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor.
4. Norway was ranked the happiest country of the world in the World Happiness Report 2017 released on March 20, 2017 by the United Nations on the International Day of Happiness. Norway captured the top spot in the report with a score of 7.54 while last year it was on fourth place. Denmark and Iceland finished second and third respectively on the list, completeing the dominance of Nordic nations. Finland was another Nordic nation in the top five as it secured fifth place. It was the fifth edition of the world Happiness Report since the first report was published in 2012. Total 155 countries were included in the report.
5. Ferrari’s German driver Sebastian Vettel won the season-opening Australian Grand Prix-2017, finishing the race in 1 hour, 24 minutes and 11.670 seconds, about 10 seconds clear of runner-up Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes, in the Albert Park Circuit, Melbourne on March 26, 2017. It was Vellet’s first F1 win since Singapore GP in 2015 and 43rd of his career. Hamilton remained second year unlucky in the Australian GP to start with the pole position and finished runner-up. Another Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas finished third in the race.
6. The US senate on March 14, 2017 gave its nod to the name of Indian-American Seema Verma, as the Chief of the $ 1 trillon centers of Medicare and Medicaid Services that provide health services to 130 million people. US President Donald Trump sent her name for the top health care position and senate cleared it by a vote of 55-43. Seema is the second Indian-American in the Trump administration to be confirmed by the US Senate after UN Ambassador Nikki Haley. The centre of Medicare and Medicaid Services is part of the US Department of Health and Human Services.
8. Bangladeshi lawmaker on March 11, 2017 unanimously adopted a resolution declaring March 25 as ‘Genocide Day’ in remembrance of the atrocities carried out by the Pakistani Army in the night of March 25, 1971. A total of 56 lawmakers including Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina backed the resolution. The Pakistani Army launched a brutal onslaught on unarmed civilians on the night of March 25, 1971 to suppress the Bengali movement under the operation searchlight. The Pakistani Army did not accept the landslide election victory of the Awani League in 1970 polls and carried out several brutal crimes against innocent people.
9. Pakistan’s Parliament has finally passed the landmark bill to regulate marriages of minority Hindus in the country. Pakistan’s Hinuds will now get an exclusive law to regulate marriages after National Assembly unanimously adopted the Hindu Marriage Bill, 2017 on March 9, 2017. The law was passed after a lengthy process of enactment. It was the second time that National Assembly passed the bill. It passed the bill in September last year but had to pass it again as its version of bill was changed by the Senate when it adopted the bill in February 2017.
10. The world faces the largest humanitarian crisis since the United Nations was founded in 1945 with more than 20 million people in four countries facing starvation and famine, the UN humanitarian chief has said. Stephen O’ Brien on March 10, 2017 told the UN Security council that "without collective and coordinated global efforts, people will simply starve to death" and "many more will suffer and die from disease". The largest sufferers are Yemen, South Sudan, Somalia and north east Nigeria. Arab World’s poorest country Yemen is the worst sufferer. Things have been made worse still by the shiite Houthi rebels. $ 2.1 billion are immediatly needed to provide relief.
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