Current Affairs For Bank, IBPS Exams - 23 June, 2014

Current Affairs For Bank, IBPS Exams

Moving to a time-defined process, the Reserve Bank of India, fixed schedules for various regulatory approvals, including grant of private bank licence, and also released a citizens’ charter for its various services such as clearing of transactions.
The release of ‘Timelines for Regulatory Approvals’ and ’Citizens’ Charter’ for delivery of services on the RBI’s website is a part of implementation of non-legislative recommendations of the Financial Sector Legislative Reforms Commission (FSLRC), the central bank said in a notification.
In case an applicant does not get a response within the indicated timeline, they can approach the head of the department, who will respond with status of the application, the reason for delay, request for additional information and likely time for disposal of the application, it added.
As per the citizens’ charter for RBI’s departments which have public interface, deposit accounts department should issue cheque book within 20 minutes and demand draft should be issued in an hour, among others.

Sugar prices jumped by at least Rs. 10 per kg in the market after the government decided to increase import duty on the sweetener and continue with the export subsidy to give relief to the industry that owes Rs. 15,000 crore to sugarcane growers.
Market sentiment was affected as the government announced a slew of measures for millers, including an additional interest-free loan of up to Rs. 4,400 crore.
At a meeting convened by Union Food Minister Ram Vilas Paswan, it was decided to raise sugar import duty to 40 per cent from 15 per cent and provide export subsidy of Rs. 3,300 per tonne till September this year.

The first Budget of the Narendra Modi government will be presented on July 10. Parliament will be convened on July 7 for a session that will last till August 14.
The Railway Budget will be presented on July 8, while the Economic Survey will be released on July 9. Parliamentary Affairs Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu has asked all Ministries to draw up a list of pending bills.
There are at least four ordinances that need to be replaced with Acts of Parliament, including one that allowed Nripendra Mishra, who was earlier Chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, to be appointed Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister. The TRAI Act had restricted jobs its chairmen could accept subsequently.

As the BJP-led NDA government completes its first month in office later this week, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has zeroed in on three key areas where he wants the PMO to pay greater attention.
Mr. Modi has given top priority to streamlining the mechanism of redressal of public grievances, improving Centre-State relations and meeting the requirements of the armed forces. The PMO would have a special cell to monitor the progress in resolving issues relating to these three priority areas.

The Great Himalayan National Park (GHNP) in Kullu district of Himachal Pradesh accorded the Unesco World Heritage Site status.
The Unesco World Heritage Site Committee at Doha in Qatar granted the status to the park under the criteria of “exceptional natural beauty and conservation of biological diversity.”
The GHNP has now come in the league of Indian World Heritage Sites (WHS) such as the Taj Mahal, Ellora, Kaziranga National Park, Keoladeo National Park, Manas National Park, Nandadevi Biosphere Reserve and the Sunderbans.