NATIONAL

Foundation Stone for National Highways laid in UP

• Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari today inaugurated and laid foundation stone for 821 km of National Highways worth Rs 26,778 crore in Uttar Pradesh.
• He laid foundation stones in Kanpur for 8 National Highway projects worth Rs. 14,199 Crore in Kanpur for 16 National Highway projects worth Rs 7,409 Crore in Lucknow and for 4 National Highway projects worth Rs 5,169 Crore in Shringverpur Dham, Prayagraj.
• With construction of Lucknow-Kanpur Greenfield Expressway travel time from Kanpur to Lucknow airport will be reduced.
• It will also be connected to Lucknow-Agra Expressway, which will reduce the distance to Delhi and will save one and a half hours travel time from Lucknow to Kanpur.
• With the construction of Agra-Etawah bypass, the travel time from Agra to Etawah will be reduced by one hour.

Uttar Pradesh CM-Yogi Adityanath

Smart Cities and Academia Towards Action and Research launched

• Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs have launched Smart cities and Academia Towards Action & Research (SAAR), which is a joint initiative of MoHUA, National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA) and leading Indian academic institutions of the country.
• Under the program, 15 premier architecture & planning institutes of the country will be working with Smart Cities to document landmark projects undertaken by the Smart Cities Mission.
• The documents will capture the learnings from best practices, provide opportunities for engagement on urban development projects to students, and enable real-time information flow between urban practitioners and academia.
• The main activity under SAAR is to prepare a collection of 75 landmark urban projects in India under the Smart City Mission.
• The SAAR project includes 75 urban projects distributed across 47 Smart cities.

Additional data-

SMART cities mission- It is an Urban renewal and retroffitting program to develop smart cities across the country, implemented by Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs.

The Mission was launched on 2015, with an aim to develop 100 smart cities within 2019 ande 2023 deadline.

Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs-Hardeep Singh Puri

INTERNATIONAL

Japan and Australia signs defence treaty

• Australia and Japan are set to sign a treaty to strengthen defence and security cooperation on a virtual format.
• The move is aimed to strengthen ties amid the China’s rising military power in the Indo-Pacific region.
• Australian Prime minister Scott Morrison and his Japanese counterpart Fumio Kishida has set to sign a Reciprocal Access Agreement(RAA), which would for the first time set out a framework for the two countries' defence forces to cooperate with each other.
• The strengthened security ties will expand on efforts of Quad grouping comprising United States, Japan, India and Australia dubbed to work on shared concerns as well as freedom of navigation in the region.

New Member joins International Solar Alliance

• The Government of Antigua and Barbuda, Island country in caribbean has joined the India led International Solar Allianace, by signing the Solar Alliance Framework Agreement.
• Thus it becomes the 102^nd member to join the alliance, aimed to catalyze global energy transition through a solar led approach.

International Solar Alliance-

1. It was launched by India and France in 2015 during the United Nations Climate Change COP-21 at Paris.
2. The alliance is a treaty based intergovernmental organisation with 124 members of UN.
3. ISA Headquarters-Gurugram, India
4. ISA Director General- Ajay Mathur

Additional Data-

Antigua and Barbuda capital-St John’s

Antigua and Barbuda PM-Gaston Browne

BANKING, FINANCE AND ECONOMICS

RBI grants Schedule Bank status to payment Banks

• The Reserve Bank of India has granted Airtel Payments bank to operate as Schedule Payments bank, thus including the Airtel Payments bank under second schedule to the RBI Act, 1934.
• By this the Airtel Payments bank becomes the 4^th bank to get this status.
• Now Airtel Payments bank can now pitch for primary auctions and undertake both central and state government business, besides partcipating in government operated welfare schemes.

CEO of Airtel Payments bank- Anubrata Biswas

UiPath Automation Excellance Awards 2021

• South Indian Bank, Kerala based bank has won the UiPath Automation Excellence Awards 2021 for Best Automation under Crisis for Business Continuity.
• The award was given upon the Bank for its exceptional use of Robotic Process Automation capabilities under difficult times for solving severe operational constraints, thereby ensuring business continuity.
• South Indian Bank has been at the forefront in adopting robotic process automation with a robust ecosystem in place, with a vision to automate complex and tough processes.
• The UiPath Automation Excellence Awards aim to recognise the change-makers of automation.
• In the 2021 Edition of the UiPath Automation Excellence Awards, the individuals and organisations across India and South Asia (Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal), who have solved some of the greatest challenges through transformative automation projects were recognised.

CEO of South Indian Bank-Murali Ramakrishnan

Bharat BillPay launches Unified Presentment Management System

• NPCI Bharat BillPay (NBBL), the wholly-owned subsidiary of National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), has introduced the ‘Unified Presentment Management System’ (UPMS) for recurring bill payments.
• UPMS will enable the customers to set up standing instructions from any channel and for any mode on their recurring bill payments.
• The bills will be automatically fetched from the billers and presented to customers for their action, in terms of auto-debit and bill payment management.
• With the UPMS launch, the intent is to enable all the Bharat BillPay Operating Units (BBPOU) to extend this facility to their customers/corporate clients with minimal effort through the centralised infrastructure and application support provided by Bharat BillPay Central Unit (BBPCU).
• UPMS will help in democratising recurring bill payments and making them further convenient for customers.
• Numbers show that more than 50% of insurance premium payments and SIPs in mutual funds are processed through standing instructions or auto-debits, and it is expected that all AMCs, insurance companies, and even educational institutes will benefit from this platform.

NPCL Bharat BillPay Ltd CEO-Noopur Chaturvedi

APPOINTMENTS AND AWARDS

• The Reserve Bank of India has appointed Deepak Kumar and Ajay Kumar Choudhary as the new Executive Directors(ED) from 3^rd Jan.

MISCELLANEOUS

• Jan 6^th is observed as World Day for War Orphans, This day was created by French Organisation, SOS Enfantsen Detresses to raise awarness about their suffering and to better their future.
• Vintage Books Publishes new book titled “Gandhi’s Assasin: The Making of Nathuram Godse and his Idea of India”, authored by Dhirendra k Jha