DAILY GK UPDATE - 4th April

1.    R Gandhi appointed Deputy Governor of RBI !
i. The government has appointed R Gandhi as deputy governor of the Reserve Bank of India for three years, effective April 3, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said on Thursday.

ii. Mr Gandhi was the executive director at the RBI before being promoted to this post.

iii. He will look after the department including banking operations and development, non-banking supervision, risk monitoring, urban banks and expenditure and budgetary control.
iv. Gandhi�s appointment follows Anand Sinha relinquishing his charge as Deputy Governor in mid-January. 
v. RBI now has 3 Deputy Governors � HR Khan and Urjit Patel. R Gandhi.
vi. As KC Chakrabarty, Deputy Governor, Reserve Bank of India, has quit three months ahead of completion of his term on 20 March 2014.

2.    Qatar based Doha Bank announced it�s First branch in Mumbai

i. Qatar based Doha Bank announced on 3 April 2014 that it will be opening its first branch at Nariman Point in Mumbai in India. The branch in Mumbai will be opened as a full-fledged bank in May 2014.

ii. Initially, branch will offer retail and corporate banking solutions with emphasis on off-branch banking. The Doha Bank has set a target of 5 billion dollars balance sheet by the third year of operations.

iii. Doha Bank got permission from the Reserve Bank of India to open the branch in December 2013.

iv. Already Doha Bank runs a brokerage (Doha Brokerage) with 41 percent stake and the rest of the stake is held by local brokers of Kochi in India.

Note: Bank of Bahrain & Kuwait, Abu Dhabi Bank are the two other banks from Arab countries to have operations in India before Doha bank.

About Doha Bank 
Doha Bank is the largest private commercial bank in the state of Qatar. It was incorporated in 1978 and commenced its domestic and international banking services in Doha, Qatar in 1979.

Qatari government holds 16 percent stake in the bank and the bank has a market capitalisation of 5 billion dollars and an asset of 18.4 billion dollars in December 2013.

3.    �India ranks 102 on social progress�

i. India ranks 102nd among the 132 countries on the Social Progress Index, a measure of human wellbeing that goes beyond traditional economic measures such as GDP or per capita income.

ii. Of the BRICS countries � Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa � only India ranked lower than the 100th position on the list of the Social Progress Index 2014 compiled by US�based non�profit group Social Progress Imperative.

iii. China was next lowest of the five, in the 90th position, and Brazil was the highest, at 46^th

iv. Last year, the first Social Progress Index ranked 50 countries. This year, its ranking includes 132 countries around the world.

v. India ranks 102nd on social progress with challenges across all three dimensions with particularly low scores on shelter (39.77) in the basic human needs dimension, access to information (39.87) in the foundations of wellbeing dimension, and tolerance and inclusion (21.54) in the opportunity dimension.

vi. �The Social Progress Index provides evidence that extreme poverty and poor social performance often go hand-in-hand,� it said.

4.    USFDA banned imports from Indian plant of Apotex Pharma Co

i. The US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) on 2 April 2014 banned imports from Apotex Inc�s manufacturing plant in India because of not meeting the quality standards.

ii. The FDA banned the imports from the plant situated in Bangalore without physical examination because the plant did not meet the FDA� manufacturing practices. However, FDA allowed the imports of Riluzole, drug which is used to treat amyotrophic lateral sclerosis commonly called Lou Gehrig�s disease.

iii. Recently, FDA sanctioned a series of ban on top Indian drug makers such as Ranbaxy Laboratories Ltd Wockhardt Ltd and Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd to export to the United States on quality concerns.

About Apotex Inc
Apotex Inc.  is the largest Canadian owned pharmaceutical company. It was founded in 1974.  Apotex Research Private Limited (ARPL), the Indian Research & Development wing of Apotex Inc. was established in the year 2004 in Bangalore.

5.    D K Pathak appointed as the new Director General of BSF

i. Union Government on 2 April 2014 appointed senior IPS officer D K Pathak as the new Director General of the Border Security Force (BSF).

ii. BSF is country's largest border guarding force. His name for the post of DG was approved by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) headed by Prime Minister Mamohan Singh. He is expected to continue till February, 2016.

iii. Pathak is a 1979-batch officer of the Assam-Meghalaya cadre. Prior to the appointment of DG, he was posted as the Special DG and was also officiating as the DG since 1 March 2014.

6.    HAL received the Most Efficient Navratna Award 2013

i. Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd (HAL) on 3 April 2014 recieved the Most Efficient Navratna  Award for the year 2013.

ii. It received the award at the 5th Dalal Street Investment Journal Awards ceremony held in New Delhi. The award was collected by the Chairman of HAL, Dr. R K Tyagi.

iii. The award was given to the company for the measure it has taken on various fronts such as R&D, modernization, customer initiatives, quality and thrust given on indigenization.

iv. In the financial year 2013-14, HAL achieved its highest ever turnover. In 2013-14 it achieved a turnover of 15180 crore rupees surpassing the figure of 14324 crore rupees in 2012-13.

About Hindustan Aeronautics Limited

Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) came into existence on 1st October 1964.  The Company was formed by the merger of Hindustan Aircraft Limited with Aeronautics India Limited and Aircraft Manufacturing Depot, Kanpur.

7.    PSLV launches India's second navigation satellite

i. An Indian rocket carrying the country�s second navigation satellite, IRNSS-1B, on Friday blasted off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.

ii. Exactly at 5.14 pm, the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle-C24 (PSLV-C24) standing around 44.4 metres tall and weighing around 320 tonnes � tore into the evening sky with orange flames fiercely burning at its tail.

iii. The space centre is around 80 km north of Chennai.

iv. Space scientists and other invitees at Indian Space Research Organisation�s (ISRO) rocket mission control room intently watched the rocket�s progress as it escaped the earth�s gravitational pull.

v. The rocket is expected to sling its only luggage, the 1,432 kg IRNSS-1B (Indian Regional Navigational Satellite System), into the space around 20 minutes after the blast-off.

vi. According to Mr. Radhakrishnan, though the IRNSS is a seven-satellite system, it could be made operational with four satellites.

vii. The two more navigation satellites will be launched during the second half of 2014. The first one � IRNSS�1A � was launched July 2013.

8.    Sri Lanka beats Windies to enter World T20 final

i. A dominant Sri Lanka made it to the ICC World T20 final for the third time knocking out defending champions West Indies by 27 runs via the Duckworth Lewis method after thundershowers stopped proceedings in the 14th over of the second innings.

ii. Batting first in the first semi-final, Sri Lanka scored an impressive 160 for six riding on important contributions from Angelo Mathews (40) and Lahiru Thirimanne (45). In reply, West Indies were 80 for four in 13.5 overs when a storm followed by heavy downpour ruled out any chances of a game.

iii. The D/L par score at that point of time was 107 and the Caribbeans were well short of the target, struggling at 80 for four in 13.5 overs.