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• Army Day is celebrated on 15 January every year in India.


• It is 71st Army Day.


• Army Day is celebrated on 15 January every year in India, in recognition of Field Marshal Kodandera M. Cariappa’s (then a Lieutenant General) taking over as the first Commander in Chief of the Indian Army from General Sir Francis Butcher, the last British Commander-in-Chief of India, on 15 January 1949.

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• Foreign Minister, Sushma Swaraj left for a two-day visit to Uzbekistan to attend the first ever India-Central Asia Dialogue which was held in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.


• India and the five other Central Asian countries backed an inclusive peace process in Afghanistan that would be Afghan-owned and Afghan-led in the first ever India-Central Asia Dialogue.

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• Macedonia’s parliament passed an amendment to the constitution to rename the country as Republic of North Macedonia, on a mutual agreement with Greece to put an end to a 27-year rivalry.


• The agreement was reached between Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras and his Macedonian counterpart Zoran Zaev. The language of the country would be referred to as Macedonian and its people known as Macedonians.

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• Union Minister of Science and Technology, Earth Sciences and Environment and Forests and Climate Change, Dr Harshvardhan launched the special weather services for the benefit of people visiting Prayagraj during Kumbh Mela at a function in New Delhi.


• The service will provide information of the prevailing weather and forecasts for next 3 days through four Automatic Weather stations (AWS) and a mobile van AWS that have been installed and operationalized at different locations at Prayagraj.


• The observational sites are distributed in all four directions within 5-10 km radius.


• It will be helpful for the local and state authorities by providing the real-time location specific weather information for efficient management of the entire event and also benefit the pilgrims by keeping them abreast of the latest weather information.


• Besides a mobile application named “Kumbh Mela Weather Service” was also launched to inform about the live weather information (temperature, humidity, rainfall and winds) and warnings if any for Prayagraj for next 3 days as observed in all the AWS sites.

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• The Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment has drafted a five-year action plan called the National Action Plan for Drug Demand Reduction (2018 -2023) NAPDDR which aims to employ a multi-pronged strategy to address the problem of drug and substance abuse in the country.


• The action plan involves preventive education, awareness generation, counselling, treatment and rehabilitation of drug-dependent people, besides training and capacity-building of service providers through collaborative efforts of the Centre, state and NGOs.


• For monitoring the effective implementation of the NAPDDR, a steering committee would be constituted under the chairmanship of the secretary, Social Justice Ministry, and with representatives from the Ministries of Health, Human Resource Development, Women and Child Development, Home Affairs, Skill development and Entrepreneurship.


• Furthermore a national survey to find the extent and pattern of substance abuse is also being conducted by the ministry, in collaboration with the National Drug Dependence Treatment Centre (NDDTC), AIIMS.


• As a part of the plan, a database for re-treatment, ongoing treatment and post-treatment of addicts of different categories and age groups and on substance used will be maintained.

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• The Union Minister for Finance and Corporate affairs, Shri Arun Jaitley and Union Minister of Minority Affairs Shri Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi inaugurated the Hunar Haat Exhibition at State Emporia Complex in New Delhi.


• The Hunar Haat exhibition will be organized from 12th January 2019 to 20th January 2019.


• Hunar Haat aim at “ Development with Dignity” of the artisans and craftsman from the minority community.


• Hunar Haat is important for the national and international branding of the heritage of master artisans.

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• Chief Minister V Narayanasamy announced that production, sale and use of single-use plastic products will be banned in the Union Territory of Puducherry from March 1, 2019.


• He also announced To introduce ‘voluntary retirement scheme’ for the workers and staff of the century-old Anglo-French Textiles (AFT) mill and two other textile mills, named Bharathi and Swadeshi (run by Puducherry Textile corporation) in a phased manner in the next six months.


• One per cent quota of reservation would also be provided to the members of the ‘Irular, Villi and Vettaikaran’ communities under the Scheduled Tribes Category in education and employment opportunities.


• Government-owned Pondicherry Industrial Promotion Development and Investment Corporation Limited (PIPDIC) and Distillery and Power Corporations would get benefits of Seventh Pay Commission.

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• Volkswagen AG said it was investing $800 million to build a new electric vehicle at its plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and scheduled a briefing with Ford Motor Co for their efforts to forge a global alliance.


• The German automaker said in an announcement at the Detroit Auto Show that it was adding 1,000 jobs at the Chattanooga plant and that electric vehicle production there would begin in 2022.

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• The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said it would inject ₹ 10,000 crore into the system through purchase of government securities on January 17 to increase liquidity.


• The purchase will be made through open market operations (OMOs).

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• Pakistan skipper Sarfaraz Ahmed set a world record to become the wicket-keeper captain with the most number of catches in a match.


• This was achieved by him while playing a match against South Africa in the Third Test at the Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg.


• In the match, he took five catches in the first innings and repeated the feat in the second innings to go past Australia’s Adam Gilchrist and India’s MS Dhoni.

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• Asian Cup gold medallist Shakil Ahmed set a world record in indoor rowing by completing 1,00,000 (one lakh) metres in 10 hours, in above-40 years category, at Salt Lake Stadium in Kolkata.


• He also has the record of completing 50,000 metres of simulated rowing in four hours and 13 minutes which is already in the Limca Record Book.

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• Dr. T.C.A Anant, former Chief Statistician of India & Secretary, Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, took the Oath of Office and Secrecy as Member, Union Public Service Commission (UPSC). Oath was administered by Shri Arvind Saxena, Chairman, UPSC.


• The commission has a strength of 10 members, besides a chairperson.Despite Anant’s appointment, the commission had one more vacancy .Former Delhi Police Commissioner Bhim Sain Bassi, Prof. Pradeep Kumar Joshi, Air Marshal A S Bhonsle (retired), Sujata Mehta, Manoj Soni, Smita Nagaraj, M Sathiyavathy and Bharat Bhushan Vyas are members of the UPSC.


• A member of the UPSC have a maximum of six-year tenure or till an incumbent attains the age of 65.

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• Deepak Maheshwari, the retired HDFC Bank executive and former Federal Bank board member took charge as chief credit officer (CCO) at Axis Bank as part of an ongoing reshuffle undertaken by new CEO Amitabh Chaudhry.


• The 64 years old Maheshwari will be given responsibility of corporate credit appraisal and disbursement at the Axis Bank.


• Maheshwari was also granted an exemption to take over as CCO by the board of Axis Bank as he is now 64 which is above the bank’s retirement age of 60.


• The appointment of Maheshwari is an attempt by the CEO Amitabh Chaudhry to tighten the Axis Bank’s credit appraisal process and follow HDFC Bank’s model in the Axis Bank.

• The Chennai Traffic Police introduced a road safety robot named ROADEO, to help in traffic management and assist citizens.


• With this, Chennai became the second city after Mumbai to induct robots in traffic management.


• The robots would be integrated with traffic signals and could be managed manually via Bluetooth devices.


• The robot has been developed by schoolchildren of a private robotics lab.

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• Former Goa Ranji player Rajesh Ghodge passed away at 47 while playing at the Margao Cricket Club tournament.


• Ghodge was part of the Goa Ranji squad in 1999-2000.

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• Former India and 1956 Olympian footballer, Mohammed Zulfiqaruddin, passed away at 83 in Hyderabad.


• He also represented India in the 1958 Tokyo Asian Games and the Merdeka Cup in Malaysia.


• He was the captain of Andhra Pradesh in the Santosh Trophy from 1955 to 1967.


• He also captained AP Police team from 1954 to 1967 and won IFA Shield, Durand Cup and Rovers Cup tournaments.