30th-31st January, 2023

1. New Delhi International Arbitration Centre (Amendment) Act, 2022 has come into force to rename the New Delhi International Arbitration Centre to the India International Arbitration Centre.
2. MeitY Startup Hub (MSH), an initiative of the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY), and Meta have announced the list of 120 startups and innovators for the XR Startup Program.
3. Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways is developing a Mega International Container Transhipment Port (ICTP) at Galathea Bay of Great Nicobar Island of Andaman and Nicobar Islands in Bay of Bengal.
4. National Statistical Office (NSO) has released the progress report on the Twenty Point Program.
5. Mughal Garden at the Delhi University has been renamed the Gautam Buddha Centenary Garden.
6. Shri G. Kishan Reddy, Minister of Tourism, Culture and Development of North Eastern Region (DONER) launched the Visit India Year 2023 initiative and unveiled its logo at New Delhi.
7. National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and his US counterpart Jake Sullivan launched the US-India initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET) in Washington.
8. Delhi has started real-time source apportionment ‘supersite’ to tackle pollution in an accurate manner at Sarvodaya Bal Vidyalaya, Rouse Avenue.
9. Noble’s Helen is the name of the new Swallowtail Butterfly found in Arunachal Pradesh.
10. Indian Institutional Ranking Framework has released the Top Management and Business School 2023 ranking.
11. Ministry of Education has released the All-India Survey on Higher Education 2020-21.
12. Project 39A, an advocacy group with the National Law University, New Delhi, has published the Annual Death Penalty Report.
13. Indian Oil Corporation has exported the first ever consignment of AVGAS 100 LL, a special aviation fuel meant for piston engine aircrafts and unmanned ariel vehicles, to Papua New Guinea.
14. Defence PSU Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers (GRSE) Ltd has signed an MOU with Rolls Royce Solutions of Germany for manufacture of high-quality marine diesel engines at the former’s plant in Ranchi.
15. SBM Bank (India) has raised ₹99 crore from Life Insurance Corporation of India, through the issue of tier-II bonds.
16. Edelweiss Asset Management has launched a new fund offer (NFO) for India’s first open-ended passive short-duration index scheme.
17. National Stock Exchange of India (NSE) has emerged as the 3rd largest exchange in the world in the equity segment by the number of trades (electronic order book) in 2022.
18. Google researchers have created an AI that can generate musical pieces from text inputs.
19. RBI has released the ‘State Finances: A Study of Budgets of 2022-23’
20. India’s largest iron ore producer based in Hyderabad, NMDC Ltd has roped in world boxing champ Nikhat Zareen as its brand ambassador.
21. Retired Nato general Petr Pavel has been elected as new President of Czech Republic.
22. Air Marshal Amar Preet Singh has been appointed as the Vice Chief of the Indian Air Force.
23. World Neglected Tropical Diseases Day; Theme – Act now, Act together, Invest in neglected tropical diseases
24. Indian cricketer Murali Vijay has announced retirement from international cricket.
25. Australia Open (Tennis) 2023 – Men’s Singles: Novak Djokovic (Serbia); Women’s Singles: Aryna Sabalenka (Belarus)
26. “The Poverty of Political Economy: How Economics Abandoned the Poor” book has been authored by Meghnad Desai and Baron Desai.
27. A new species of wasp (Soliga ecarinata) has been named after Soliga — who are the indigenous community of Biligiri Rangan Hills (B.R. Hills) in Chamarajanagar district of Karnataka.

National News

1. New Delhi International Arbitration Centre (Amendment) Act, 2022 has come into force to rename the New Delhi International Arbitration Centre to the India International Arbitration Centre.
   • The Act extends the time period to 5 years.
2. MeitY Startup Hub (MSH), an initiative of the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY), and Meta have announced the list of 120 startups and innovators for the XR Startup Program.
   • As announced in September 2022, XR Startup Program is a collaboration between MSH and Meta to discover, nurture, and accelerate Extended Reality (XR) technology startups and innovators across India.

3. Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways is developing a Mega International Container Transhipment Port (ICTP) at Galathea Bay of Great Nicobar Island of Andaman and Nicobar Islands in Bay of Bengal.
   • The proposed facility is envisaged to be developed in four phases with the total estimated cost of ~INR 41,000 crore.
   • Phase 1 is proposed to be commissioned in 2028.
4. National Statistical Office (NSO) has released the progress report on the Twenty Point Program.
   • The report focused on the third phase of the PM Gram Sadak Yojana.
   • As per the report, the length of rural roads constructed under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) has again fallen short of its target.

5. Mughal Garden at the Delhi University has been renamed the Gautam Buddha Centenary Garden.
   • The Mughal Gardens at the Rashtrapati Bhavan has also been renamed as the ‘Amrit Udyan’.
6. Shri G. Kishan Reddy, Minister of Tourism, Culture and Development of North Eastern Region (DONER) launched the Visit India Year 2023 initiative and unveiled its logo at New Delhi.
7. National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and his US counterpart Jake Sullivan launched the US-India initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET) in Washington.

State News

1. Delhi has started real-time source apportionment ‘supersite’ to tackle pollution in an accurate manner at Sarvodaya Bal Vidyalaya, Rouse Avenue.
2. Noble’s Helen is the name of the new Swallowtail Butterfly found in Arunachal Pradesh.
   • Its origin is in China, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam, and Cambodia.

Reports and Indices

1. Indian Institutional Ranking Framework has released the Top Management and Business School 2023 ranking.

• World’s top B-Schools – London Business School (1st), Wharton-University of Pennsylvania (2nd)

2. Ministry of Education has released the All-India Survey on Higher Education 2020-21.
   • Total Enrolments
     • Total enrolment in higher education: It has increased to nearly 4.14 crore in 2020-21 from 3.85 crore in 2019-20.
     • Female enrolment: It has increased to 2.01 crore from 1.88 crore in 2019-20.
     • Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER): As per 2011 population projections for 18-23 years age group, GER has increased to 27.3 from 25.6 in 2019-20.
     • Female GER has overtaken Male GER since 2017-18.
     • Gender Parity Index (GPI), the ratio of female GER to male GER, has increased from 1 in 2017-18 to 1.05 in 2020-21.
     • Top 6 States in terms of number of students enrolled: Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Rajasthan.
   • Faculty
     • Total number of faculty/teachers: 15,51,070 of which about 57.1% are male and 42.9% are female.
     • Female per 100 male faculty: It has improved to 75 in 2020-21 from 74 in 2019-20 and 63 in 2014-15.
   • Institutions
     • Institutes of National Importance (INIs): They have almost doubled from 75 in 2014-15 to 149 in 2020-21.
     • States with highest number of Universities: Rajasthan (92), Uttar Pradesh (84) and Gujarat (83).
     • Institutes exclusively for women: 17 Universities (of which 14 are State Public) and 4,375 Colleges are exclusively for women.
3. Project 39A, an advocacy group with the National Law University, New Delhi, has published the Annual Death Penalty Report.
   • As per the report, Indian courts in 2022 awarded a record 165 death sentences, the highest in over two decades.
   • In total, 539 prisoners were on death row at the end of the year which was the largest population for the same since 2004.
   • Uttar Pradesh accounted for the highest death row inmate population (100), followed by Gujarat (61) and Jharkhand (46).

Banking and Economy

1. Indian Oil Corporation has exported the first ever consignment of AVGAS 100 LL, a special aviation fuel meant for piston engine aircrafts and unmanned ariel vehicles, to Papua New Guinea.
   • The global aviation gasoline market is projected to grow at 5% CAGR. The Aviation traffic in India is also likely to grow by 7%.
   • AV GAS 100 LL, produced by IndiaOil’s flagship refinery at Vadodara, is a higher-octane Aviation fuel meeting the product specifications with superior performance quality standards.

2. Defence PSU Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers (GRSE) Ltd has signed an MOU with Rolls Royce Solutions of Germany for manufacture of high-quality marine diesel engines at the former’s plant in Ranchi.
3. SBM Bank (India) has raised ₹99 crore from Life Insurance Corporation of India, through the issue of tier-II bonds.
   • The bonds have a maturity of 10 years with a call option at the end of five years.
4. Edelweiss Asset Management has launched a new fund offer (NFO) for India’s first open-ended passive short-duration index scheme.
   • The scheme is called as Edelweiss CRISIL IBX 50:50 Gilt Plus SDL Short Duration Index Fund.
   • The scheme will invest in a diversified portfolio of Indian Government Bonds (IGBs) and State Development Loans (SDLs).

5. National Stock Exchange of India (NSE) has emerged as the 3rd largest exchange in the world in the equity segment by the number of trades (electronic order book) in
   • In the previous year, it was ranked 4th as per statistics maintained by the World Federation of Exchanges (WFE).
   • NSE is the world’s largest derivatives exchange in 2022 by the number of contracts traded based on statistics maintained by Futures Industry Association (FIA), a derivatives trade body.

6. Google researchers have created an AI that can generate musical pieces from text inputs.
   • The AI model is called MusicLM.
7. RBI has released the ‘State Finances: A Study of Budgets of 2022-23’
   • As per the report, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka and Uttarakhand were the top five GST compensation receiving States during the five-year transition period from July 2017 to June 2022.

Appointments

1. India’s largest iron ore producer based in Hyderabad, NMDC Ltd has roped in world boxing champ Nikhat Zareen as its brand ambassador.
2. Retired Nato general Petr Pavel has been elected as new President of Czech Republic.

3. Air Marshal Amar Preet Singh has been appointed as the Vice Chief of the Indian Air Force.

Important Days

1. January 30 –
   • World Neglected Tropical Diseases Day; Theme – Act now, Act together, Invest in neglected tropical diseases
   • Martyrs’ Day or Shaheed Diwas (Mahatma Gandhi’s death anniversary)

Sports

1. Indian cricketer Murali Vijay has announced retirement from international cricket.
2. Australia Open (Tennis) 2023 – Men’s Singles: Novak Djokovic (Serbia); Women’s Singles: Aryna Sabalenka (Belarus)

Miscellaneous

1. “The Poverty of Political Economy: How Economics Abandoned the Poor” book has been authored by Meghnad Desai and Baron Desai.
2. A new species of wasp (Soliga ecarinata) has been named after Soliga — who are the indigenous community of Biligiri Rangan Hills (B.R. Hills) in Chamarajanagar district of Karnataka.

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