Current Affairs India - 1 January 2013

1. The license of Kingfisher Airlines (KFA) expires today but it will have another 2 years time to renew the license, otherwise it will be lapsed forever. Also at the same time the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has set five conditions for Kingfisher Airlines to fly again which includes

 paying all salary dues to employees before renewing the license and getting written confirmation from the UB group regarding necessary funding.

2. The Astronautical Society of India (ASI) has chosen the former secretary of the Department of Ocean Development, A.E. Muthunayagam, for the prestigious Aryabhatta award 2010 and Scientific Adviser to the Defence Minister, V.K. Saraswat, for the prestigious Aryabhatta award 2011. Both of them have been selected for their achievements in rocketry.

3. The Astronautical Society of India (ASI) has chosen G. Satheesh Reddy, associate director of the Research Centre, Imarat, for the 2010 ASI award for rocket and related technologies. P. Kunhikrishnan of the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will receive the same for 2011.

4. The Astronautical Society of India (ASI) has chosen P. Chakraborty of the Laboratory for Electro-Optics Systems (LEOS), ISRO and Yateendra Mehta, ISRO Satellite Centre for the awards for spacecraft and related technologies for the year of 2010 and 2011 respectively.

5. The Hockey India League has signed a multi-year deal with Hero MotoCorp, India’s largest two wheeler manufacturing company for the title sponsorship of the event. After this deal, the tournament will be called as “Hero Hockey India League”.

6. State Bank of India has launched mobile wallet service MobiCash Easy in Mumbai and Delhi. This prepaid service will allow its customers to transfer money to any bank account or to any wallet issued by State Bank of India, pay bills, recharge mobiles, and pay for digital TV and broadband connections. Both SBI and non-SBI customers can use this facility.

7. Deepali Pant Joshi has been promoted as the Executive Director of the Reserve Bank of India. The RBI has total nine Executive directors. Before that she was the Regional Director of the RBI’s Rajasthan regional office and she will succeed V. K. Sharma.