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• North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said that his resolve for complete denuclearisation remains unchanged but he may have to seek a "new path" if the United States continues to demand unilateral action from North Korea.


• In his New Year address, Kim said there would be faster progress on denuclearisation if the United States takes the corresponding action.

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• German authorities gave their approval to an US$8 billion (6.30 billion pounds) rail and road tunnel linking Denmark and Germany, despite environmental objections. It is part-funded by the European Union.


• The 19 km (11.8 mile) Fehmarnbelt link, connecting the Danish island of Lolland to the island of Fehmarn on the German side, was due to be completed in 2024.

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• Russias Federal Security Service (FSB) said that it has detained a US citizen on suspicion of espionage.


• American citizen Paul Whelan was arrested over three days ago in the Russian capital, the FSB was cited as saying by TASS news agency. A criminal investigation was launched against the man. If found guilty, he faces between 10 and 20 years in jail.

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• Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs headed by Minister of State Hardeep S. Puri, extended the Credit-Linked Subsidy Scheme (CLSS) for Middle Income Group (MIG) Scheme by another 12 months till March 31, 2020.


• Around 93, 007 beneficiaries have been covered till date and have already received Rs 1,960.45 crore of subsidy in the scheme under which the government provides a subsidy of up to Rs 2.67 lakh on home loans.


• The scheme covers two income segments in the MIG viz. Rs 6,00,001 to Rs 12,00,000 per annum for MIG-I and Rs 12,00,001 to Rs 18,00,000 per annum for MIG-II.


• The dwelling unit carpet area to avail the benefit of the scheme include ‘upto 160 sq.m’ and ‘upto 200 sq.m’ for MIG I and MIG II respectively.


• In the MIG-I, an interest subsidy of 4 per cent has been provided for loan amounts up to Rs 9 lakh, while in MIG-II, an interest subsidy of 3 per cent has been provided for loan amount of Rs 12 lakh.


• To become eligible for the scheme, a beneficiary family should not own a pucca house (an all weather dwelling unit) either in his/her name or in the name of any member of his/her family in any part of India.

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• Union Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan launched the Ujjwala Sanitary Napkin initiative in Bhubaneswar, Odisha.


• To provide access to hygiene products and employment to opportunities in every district of the state.


• Around 100 local manufacturing units will be set up by oil marketing companies at Common Service Centres (CSCs) across 93 blocks in all 30 districts of Odisha in the first phase.


• The units are expected to be ready by March 2019.


• The cost of setting up each manufacturing unit is expected to be Rs 2.94 crores.


• The sanitary napkins will be priced at Rs 42 per pack of eight pads.


• Each manufacturing unit will employ five or six Ujjwala beneficiaries and will thus employ nearly 600 women across all districts.


• The scheme is a central move to counter Odisha government’s Khushi scheme that provides free of cost sanitary napkins to female students of government and government-aided schools in the state.


• Under the initiative, the National Aluminium Company Limited (Nalco) would sponsor 100 of the 500 units to be set up.

• Deen Dayal Veterinary University in Uttar Pradesh proposed to set up the first goat fertility lab in the state under Rastriya Krashi Vikas Yojna at the cost of Rs 22 crore.


• The University has entered into a contract with Pradeshik cooperative Dairy Federation for marketing.


• Rastriya Krashi Vikas Yojna or National Agriculture Development Programme is a State Plan Scheme of Additional Central Assistance launched in August 2007 as a part of the 11th Five Year Plan by the Government of India.


• It aims to achieve 4% annual growth in agriculture through development of Agriculture and its allied sectors.


• The funds are released to the State Governments/UTs on the basis of projects approved in the State Level Sanctioning Committee Meeting (SLSC) headed by the Chief Secretary of the concerned State.

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• the national food regulator, Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) issued guidelines to enable government to monitor the online food and grocery operators such as Grofers and Big Basket as well as food delivery platforms like Swiggy and Zomato any time.


• The guidelines are part of directives issued by the regulator to re-operationalise licensing and registration of e-commerce food companies.


• Food products offered for sale are liable to sampling at any point in the supply chain.


• An image of the said food should be out up in the platforms of the Companies so that consumers can recognise the product.


• All mandatory information mentioned in the Food Safety and Standards (FSS) Act will also have to be provided to consumers before purchase only fresh food should be delivered to consumers.


• A remaining shelf life of 30% or 45 days of the food should be maintained before expiry at the time of delivery.

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• Congress-led Madhya Pradesh Government announced that that it is going to create an Adhyatmik Vibhag (spiritual department) by merging several existing department.


• The Congress had promised to form such a department before the last month’s Assembly elections.


• The proposed Adhyatmik Vibhag (Spiritual Department) going to be formed by merging Dharmik Nyas Evam Dharmasv Department (Religious Trust and Endowment Department), Anand Vibhag (Happiness Department) in addition to the Directorate of Religious Trust and Endowment, Madhya Pradesh Teerth Evam Mela Pradhikaran and Rajya Anand Sansthan.

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• A ‘bancassurance’ pact was signed between State-owned Allahabad Bank and SBI Life Insurance to sell the policies of the insurer from over 3,200 branches of the Allahabad Bank.


• The agreement is considered as one of the largest Bancassurance partnerships in the country.


• The agreement was signed in the presence of Allahabad Bank Managing Director (MD) and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Mallikarjuna Rao and SBI Life MD & CEO Sanjeev Nautiyal.

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• In its report titled ‘Growth Outlook for 2019’, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) stated that India will remain the fastest growing major economy with GDP growth estimated to be 7.5% in FY19.


• The reasons cited for the growth are Better demand conditions, settled GST implementation, capacity expansion resulting from growing investments in infrastructure and better credit inflow especially in the service sector (that is of 24%).

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• 25 years old Indian fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah became the highest international wicket-taker of 2018 with 78 wickets after taking 9 wickets in the 3rd Test Match against Australia held in Melbourne Cricket Ground, Australia.


• South African fast bowler Kagiso Rabada ranked 2nd in the list of Highest International wicket taker of 2018 with 77 wickets.


• Indian spin bowler Kuldeep Yadav along with Adeel Rashid and Rashid Khan ranked 3rd with 76 wickets in 2018.

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• Indian Cricket team captain Virat Kohli equaled Former Indian Captain Sourav Ganguly’s record with 11th away test win as a captain after defeating Australia in the 3rd Test Match held in Melbourne, Australia.


• Virat Kohli became the first Indian captain to retain the Border-Gavaskar trophy on Australian soil. India is leading the series with 2-1.


• Indian team also achieved the record of highest number of away Test wins after defeating Australia in the 3rd Test Match.

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• 21 years old Indian wicket-keeper Rishabh Pant became the 1st ever player to take 20 catches in a Test series by surpassing former cricketers Naren Tamhane and Syed Kirmani who had recorded 19 catches in 1954-55 and 1979-80 respectively.


• Pant achieved the feat to take 20 catches in just 3 matches whereas Naren Tamhane and Syed Kimani took 19 catches in 6 and 7 matches respectively.


• Rishabh Pant took 11 catches 6 in first innings and 5 in second innings against Australia in the 3rd Test Match to break the record of fellow wicket-keeper Wriddhiman Saha who took 10 catches in a match.

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• Indian pace trio of Ishant Sharma, Mohammed Shami and Jasprit Bumrah broke the 34 year record of highest test wickets in a calendar year to become the most successful pace trio with 131 wickets in 2018.


• The record was previously held by West Indies seamers Joel Garner, Michael Holding and Malcolm Marshall who had taken 130 wickets in 1984.


• South African trio of Morne Morkel, Makhaya Ntini and Dale Steyn hold the third position with 123 wickets in 2008.


• Current Indian bowling line-up had also created the record of having most wickets in Test in calendar year for india with a total of 257 wickets in 14 matches.

• US-based Kathak dancer Anindita Neogy Anaam will be honoured with the National Nritya Shiromani award for promoting the dance form across the world.


• This award of national repute has been given in the past to the outstanding Indian classical dance performers and musicians of India and abroad.


• The award would be conferred on her in Cuttack on the opening day of the 10th Cuttack Mahotsav: International Dance and Music festival in Cuttack on 2nd January, 2019.


• Anindita Anaam is a recipient of prestigious national awards like Jayadev Rashtriya Puraskar and Bidagdha Nartaki Samman for her outstanding achievement in the preservation and promotion of Indian art in India and abroad.

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• India Women Cricket team Vice-captain and Left-handed opener, Smriti Mandhana was adjudged ‘Rachael Heyhoe Flint Award for the Women’s Cricketer of the Year‘ as well as the ‘Women’s ODI Player of the Year’ by the International Cricket Council (ICC).


• The 22 year old Mandhana, scored 669 runs in 12 ODIs along with 622 runs in 25 T20 Internationals in 2018 and became the second Indian woman to win an ICC award after fast bowler Jhulan Goswami, who was named the ICC Women’s Player of the Year in 2007.


• Besides this Harmanpreet Kaur of India who spearheaded her side to the semi-finals of the ICC Women’s World T20 2018 held in the Caribbean in November 2018, has been named the captain of ICC Women’s T20I Team of the Year.

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• Three Indian-origin women scientists were among the 60 Superstars of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics) list awarded by Australian government.


• The 3 scientists are Onisha Patel, Devika Kamath and Asha Rao.


• Under the initiative, due to gender gap in STEM courses, the government there is planning to train these scientists for one year to become influencers for female students.


• 32-year-old, Devika Kamath is an astrophysicist, Onisha Patel is doing her research on generate a cure for many cancers including breasts.


• Whereas, Asha Rao is a cyber mathematics expert and specialises in detection of money laundering.

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• The Government of India has appointed Sudhir Bhargava, an information commissioner in the Central Information Commission the new chief information commissioner. The government has also appointed four new information commissioners.


• President Ram Nath Kovind has approved the appointment of former bureaucrats Yashwardhan Kumar Sinha, Vanaja N Sarna, Neeraj Kumar Gupta and Suresh Chandra as the new information commissioners.


• The appointments came weeks after the Supreme Court had asked the Centre to disclose the process of appointment of the members of the Central Information Commission, including details on applicants and search committees. The court had asked the government to maintain transparency in the process.

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• Second senior-most Supreme Court judge Justice Madan B Lokur retired.


• He was among the four judges who held the controversial January-12 press conference against the then Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra over the issue of allocation of sensitive cases.


• He also played an active role in the pursuit of judicial reforms — computerisation of courts, judicial education, legal aid and legal services.


• His tenure in the Supreme Court began in June 2012.

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• On December 31, 2018, Hong Kong-born filmmaker and “City on Fire” director Ringo Lam died at 63.
  
• He worked on many other films like “Prison on Fire” and “School on Fire”, “Maximum Risk”, “In Hell” and “Replicant”.


• His final film was “Sky on Fire”.