Census India-2021 to begin on 1st April to be conducted through mobile app

NATIONAL NEWS

Census India-2021 to begin on 1st April to be conducted through mobile app

• Census India-2021 will begin on 1st of April this year and will end on 30th of September. Census India-2021 will be conducted through a mobile phone application, moving away from the traditional pen and paper. 
• Enumerators of the census will seek the information of mobile number of the head of the family, information related to toilets, TV, Internet, vehicles owned, source of drinking water besides asking other questions during the house listing phase of the exercise.

CBFC announces implementation of new certificate design in regional office

• The Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) has announced the implementation of its new certificate design in all its nine regional offices across India. The certificate will have a new and modern look.
• The certificate should be interactive and it should reflect the modern digital world, leveraging the ease that technology has brought in the organisation's work processes.
• That the new design underlines the positive, user-friendly and dynamic approach of the CBFC and its board.
• The new certificate will provide all the information and basic certification data about the film from cast credits details to synopsis, plot, trailer and promo.
• The new certificate and the logo of CBFC was showcased on August 31 last year and was unveiled by Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar, along with the then Information and Broadcasting Secretary Amit Khare.

Chennai-Andaman Submarine Optic Fibre Cable Laying Begins

• Union Communications, Electronics and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has inaugurated the submarine optical fibre cable laying work between Chennai and Anadaman and Nicobar Islands. The project will connect Port Blair along with seven other islands of Andaman & Nicobar viz Little Andaman, Car Nicobar, Kamorta, Great Nicobar, Havelock, Long Island and Rangat.
• Total length of the submarine cable project is 2,250 km and will have four fibre pairs. Each fibre pair has the ultimate capacity of 6.4 Tbps with very low latency.
• At present, the combined availability for Andaman & Nicobar Islands is only 3.2 Gbps.
• According to officials, at the initial stage of commissioning the project itself, bandwidth availability will be 400 Gbps which is nearly 100 times of the existing capacity.
• Presently the Andaman & Nicobar Islands are connected to the mainland through satellite link with limited bandwidth capacity with high latency. As a result the Central government decided to install submarine optical link from here to Andaman & Nicobar Islands to provide high speed internet connectivity.

BANKING

IRDA imposes Rs 1 crore penalties on Cholamandalam MS General Insurance

• IRDAI has imposed a penalty of ₹1 crore on Cholamandalam MS General Insurance Company (Chola MS) holding that the firm had violated certain provisions of corporate governance guidelines for insurers.
• The trigger for the action was an analysis of 2016-17 financial statements and specifically, advance payments of about ₹115 crore made by the insurer to four entities who  were corporate agents, related parties and auto original equipment manufacturers (OEM).

RBI amends KYC norms, allows banks to use V-CIP

• The RBI has amended the KYC norms allowing banks and other lending institutions regulated by it to use Video based Customer Identification Process (V-CIP), a move which will help them onboard customers remotely.
• The V-CIP, which will be consent-based, will make it easier for banks and other regulated entities to adhere to the RBI's Know Your Customer (KYC) norms by leveraging the digital technology.
• It decided to permit video based Customer Identification Process (V-CIP) as consent based alternate method of establishing the customer's identity, for customer on boarding with a view to leveraging the digital channels for Customer Identification Process (CIP) by regulated entities (REs).

ECONOMIC AND FINANCE

 World Bank pegs India’s growth for FY20 at 5%

• The World Bank cut India’s growth for financial year 2020 to 5% from 6% estimated earlier, a day after the country's statistics office pegged growth in the current financial year at 5%, the lowest in 11 years.
• The multilateral lender expects the country’s growth to recover only slightly to 5.8% in the next fiscal year.
   

OBITUARY

Veteran Odissi Danseuse Minati Mishra passes away

• Renowned Odissi Danseuse and yesteryear movie actress Odia Padma shri Minati Mishra passed away, at the age of 91.
• She was also a popular actress in 1960s and had acted in several Odia movies that include Surjya Mukhi, Arundhati, Jiban Sathi, Bhai Bhauja and Sadhana. Four of these films had won Presidents award for best regional cinema. She was awarded the Central and State Sangeet Natak Academy Awards for her contribution to Odissi dance.