Major News and Events of 24 December 2013

After 14 years important army commanders of India and Pakistan had a meeting for ensuring peace is restored by easing border tensions. The meeting was at the level of DGMO that is Director General Military Operations between Major General Amir Riaz of Pakistan and Lieutenant General Vinod Bhatia of India at the Wagah-Attari border. Gen. Bhatia was welcomed by Gen Riaz after he crossed from the check post at the Attari border. This level of discussion was last held in July 1999. The issues to be discussed also included ceasefire violation at the LoC. In the meeting a brigadier and three lieutenant colonels were also present from both the sides. Otherwise the DGMOs talk over the hotline on Tuesdays every week. There have been a number of ceasefire violations in 2013 along the LoC and killing of five soldiers aggravated the tension.

With the intelligence reports specifying that there can be Maoists attacks in Bihar, security has been beefed up in prisons and police stations. The possible targets may be the prisons in the districts of Patna, Bhagalpur and Muzaffarpur as per the police. The reason cited is that there are number of Maoists in the Beur Jail in Patna as well as in the central jails of Muzaffarpur and Bhagalpur and Maoists and the Maoists may be targeting these for setting free their members. The police stations near the jails are on high alert. In 2005 there had been a jailbreak in Bihar where 380 prisoners ran away from the Jehanabad prison. 300 of them after that returned or were re-arrested.

The Aam Aadmi Party made public a video which seeks to explain and justify its decision to opt for outside support from the Congress in the formation of the government in Delhi. The video link was posted on Twitter. The video begins with the question which the AAP asked whether they should form the government and this was placed before 26 lakh people in Delhi. They got overwhelming response to that and people stated they should to prove they can deliver. The party adhered to the decision of the people and went ahead with the decision of forming the government. It is also stated in the video that the party is forming a minority government and then it is explained what is the meaning of the minority government. It is also stated in the video that Congress will not be part of the government and will not be given any ministry and also states that AAP will be fulfilling all the 18 promises it has made.

The Bharatiya Mahila Bank (BMB) will be starting additional four branches in four capitals of the northeastern states of Agartala, Gangtok, Shillong and Itanagar in the current financial year 2013-14. 16 more branches will be started in which these 4 would be in northeastern states and the total number of branches till the year end will come to 25. BMB’s branches will be opened in Chandigarh, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Shimla, Srinagar, Bhubaneswar, Thiruvananthapuram, Patna, Panaji, Naya Raipur, Ranchi and Dehradun. BMB was inaugurated on November 19 and currently it has nine branches at Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Mumbai, Indore,Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Lucknow and Guwahati.

The seventh edition of IPL’s auction is scheduled on February 12 and may be extended to February 13 if required. Any team can retain five players and have a maximum of 27 players in the team. Among these 9 have to overseas player and 16 players are needed for the squad to be formed. All players capped, not capped, overseas and domestic will have to be part of the auction if they had not in 2013. Not more than Rs 60 crore should be spent on players’s fees and this can increase up to 5% in 2015 and 2016. Minimum amount which has to be spent is Rs.36 crore in each of the next three IPLs. Indian players will be paid in rupees while the overseas players will get the payment in their currency. Rs 39 crores will be paid for retaining the five players and so apart from that the team will have only Rs 21 crore for buying the other 22 players. The maximum earning of a retained player will be Rs.12.5 crore.

2013 was good for India in the technology domain and it has got its entry in the elite space club. It successfully launched Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM), first navigation satellite, Indo-French satellite SARAL, and also inked satellite launch contracts. ISRO connected through social media like Twitter and Facebook. ISRO will begin the year 2014 by launching the aborted GSLV rocket. In 2013 the launch of Rs.450-crore MOM utilizing Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle was the most important point for ISRO. It then put the 1,337-kg orbiter in the Mars Transfer Trajectory. ISRO launched in September the first "military"/communication satellite GSAT-7 in India. ISRO will be soon creating a new rocket assembly building so that the rocket/satellite launches can be increased and the two launch pads which are there now can be utilized efficiently. In the 12th Plan Period (2012-17), 58 missions are planned by ISRO.