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• On the request of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Saudi Arabia Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the release of 850 Indian prisoners lodged in Saudi Arabian jails.


• Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted that The Saudi Crown Prince also announced the increase in quota for Indian Haj pilgrims to 2,00,000 at the request of PM Modi.

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• Vietnam, the location of President Donald Trump's next meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, has come a long way since the U.S. abandoned its war against communist North Vietnam in the 1970s.


• United into a youthful nation that now numbers 95 million, beginning in the mid-1980s the country embraced global trade to become a production base for South Korea's Samsung and many other manufacturing giants. The ``Doi Moi'' reforms adopted by its communist rulers, modeled largely on China's transformation into the world's factory floor, could provide a model for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

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• A devastating fire raced through buildings in an old part of Bangladesh's capital and killed at least 69 people.


• About 50 other people were injured and the fire in Dhaka was mostly under control after more than nine hours of frantic efforts by fire fighters.

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• Prime Minister Narendra Modi flagged off the first ever diesel to electric converted locomotive twin engine of 10000 Horse Power(HP) at DLW Varanasi.


• Prime Minister, Narendra Modi inaugurated Virtual Experiential Museum (VEM) under Archeological Survey of India, Man – Mahal,in the bank of the River Ganges.


• PM Narendra Modi inaugurated supercomputer ‘Param Shivay’ at IIT-BHU.The supercomputer of 833 teraflop capacity built at the cost of Rs 32.5 crore.

Source: Cick Here

• The Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry launched Operation Digital Board on the lines of Operation Blackboard to provide better digital education in school.


• The Government has aimed at equipping 9 lakh classrooms in schools and colleges across the country (7 lakh classrooms of 9th, 10th and 11th standards and 2 lakh classrooms of colleges and Universities) with digital facilities for teaching by 2022.


• Human Resource Development Minister,Prakash Javadekar said, “Around 60-70 years back, ‘Operation Black Board was launched, and now as the country is progressing, we have come up with ‘Operation Digital Board’, the aim of which is to have digital and interactive boards in every classroom”.

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• World Corporate Social Responsibility Congress (World CSR Congress 2019) is one of the admired meetings which promote Entrepreneurship, Social Responsibility, Sustainability and Social Development.


• 8th World CSR Congress held between Feb 17 and Feb 18 ,2019 in Mumbai, Maharashtra. It was attended by participants from 33 countries to encourage the efforts of individuals and organizations.


• Theme of the year 2019 is ‘Sustainable Development Goals(SDGs)’ to focus on corporate strategies,innovation, and strategic alliances.

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• ‘KALIA Chhatra Bruti’ scholarship for the children of farmers benefited under the KALIA scheme was launched by the Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik in Bhubaneshwar, Odisha.


• It aims at providing financial assistance for technical and professional education to farmers’ children by creating provision for the State government to bear all expenses involved in various levels of education, such as course fee, hostel fee, mess fee and so on.


• The scholarship shall be sent directly to the bank accounts of students who require it via. DBT (Direct Benefit Transfer).


• The scholarship can be applied for online scholarship portal from 19th February 2019 itself.


• Children of KALIA Scheme beneficiaries who are eligible for the scholarship can avail monetary help in more than 13 professional/technical subjects of study- MBBS, BDS, BAMS, BHMS, B.Pharma, B. Sc Nursing, BVS and AH, B.E, B.Arch and B.Plan, B.Sc Agriculture, B.Sc Horticulture, B.Sc Forestry, B.Sc Fisheries, B.Sc Community Science in more than 30 government institutions.


• Furthermore, scholarship shall also be provided for more than 11 technical education and diploma courses in all ITIs, Polytechnics, Agro Polytechnics, D.Pharma, DMLT, BMRT, PBSC, GNM, ANM, Psychiatry Nursing, Ophthalmic Assistant/Surgical OPTH Assistant across the State in more than 150 institutions.

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• Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala shall host the Attaukal Ponkala festival-one of the largest religious gathering of women on a single day.


• The festival involves preparation of ‘Pongala’- a mixture of rice, jaggery and scraped coconut cooked in fresh earthen or metal pots,by lakhs of women, in order to worship the presiding deity of Attukal Bhagavathy temple.


• All the offices and institutions across the city observe a holiday on this day.

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• The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said Saudi Arabia will invest $100 billion in India and called it "a huge vote of confidence in the Indian economy."


• MEA said "PM Narendra Modi welcomed Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman's announcement to invest in areas like energy, refining and infrastructure," Crown Prince arrived for a two-day visit in India.

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• Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India(IRDAI) had issued the draft guidelines for Standard Health Product.The Guidelines on Standard Health Product are issued under the provisions of Section 34 (1) (a) of Insurance Act, 1938.


• Grace Period For Yearly payment of mode, a fixed period of 30 days is given as Grace Period.


• All other modes of payment except,Yearly payment of mode a fixed period of 15 days are allowed as a Grace Period.


• There are four modes of payment viz-Monthly, Quarterly, Half Yearly, Yearly.


• Basic Sum Insured under standard product Minimum limit– Rs.50000 and Maximum limit- Rs.10 lakhs.


• Minimum entry age is 18 years and maximum age is 65 under the Regulation 12(i) of HIR 2016, along with lifelong Renewability. There is no maximum exit age.Dependent Child / children shall be covered from the age of 0 days to 25 years.


• 5% of Co-pay will be part of the product feature.

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• A clearance for bulk production of 114 ‘Dhanush’ artillery guns has been received by the Ordnance Factory Board (OFB).


• It is the first long-range artillery gun to be produced in India.


• It portrays the success story of the ‘Make in India’ initiative.


• It has an inertial navigation-based sighting system, auto-laying facility, on-board ballistic computation and an advanced day and night direct firing system. Its self-propulsion unit allows it to negotiate and deploy itself in mountainous terrains with ease.

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• Windies smashed a total of 23 sixes in the first ODI against England on Wednesday to set the world record for hitting most sixes by a team in an ODI.


• The previous record (22 sixes) was set by New Zealand against Windies in 2014. This is the fourth instance of a team slamming at least 20 sixes in an ODI.

Source: Cick Here

• Windies opener Chris Gayle smashed 12 sixes in his 135-run knock in the first ODI against England, becoming the first batsman to slam 10-plus sixes in an ODI on three different instances.


• The 39-year-old had smashed 11 sixes against UAE in March last year and had slammed 16 sixes against Zimbabwe in a World Cup match in 2015.

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• International Cricket Council (ICC) banned(United Arab Emirates) UAE-based coach Irfan Ansari for a period of 10 years, from all forms of Cricket as he was found guilty of making a “corrupt approach” to Pakistan captain Sarfaraz Ahmed in 2017.


• ICC Anti-Corruption Tribunal found him guilty of breaching three counts of the Anti-Corruption Code during a hearing.

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• Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore, Information and Broadcasting Minister presented the 7th National Photography Awards in New Delhi. 13 people were awarded in total, in different categories.


• The Professional category was themed as Women led Development, while the Amateur category was themed as Fairs and Festivals of India. The List of Awards are given below.


• Ashok Dielwali- Lifetime achievement award- cash prize of Rs. 3,00,000.


• S L Shanth Kumar -professional category- cash prize of Rs. 1,00,000.


• Arun Sreedhar, Kailash Mittal, Mihir Singh, Ms Ranita Roy and P V Sunder Rao -special mention awards in professional category- cash prize of Rs. 50,000.


• Gurdeep Dhiman -Amateur category- cash prize of Rs. 75,000.


• Avijit Datta, Mahesh Balasaheb Lonkar, Manish Jaisi, S. Neelima and P. Ravi Kumar- special mention awards in the amateur category- cash prize of Rs. 30,000.


• National Photography Awards were started in 2010.


• The Minister paid a visit to the Photo Exhibition set up at National Media Centre and also released a special brochure.

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• Lady Gaga is the first person in Oscars' history to be nominated for Best Actress as well as Best Original Song in the same year.


• The actress earned the nominations for her performance in the film 'A Star Is Born' and her song 'Shallow'. Mary J Blige previously earned nominations for Best Supporting Actress and Best Original Song in 2018.

Source: Cick Here

• Anirban Mukherjee, presently the co-chief executive of Reliance Payments has been appointed as the CEO of PayU India.


• The urgent responsibilities at hand would be the management of $100 million worth of business, witnessing a growth rate of 30% currently, formulating investment plans and gauging potential technological partnerships.


• The company has also highlighted the plan to double its loan book to about $2 billion over the next few years.

Source: Cick Here

• Congress President Rahul Gandhi has sacked Kumar Ashish, the All India Congress Committee (AICC) secretary attached to Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, a day after he was appointed to the post.


• The move was taken after reports emerged that Kumar was booked in a question paper leak case in 2005. Meanwhile, Sachin Naik has been appointed in his place.

• A Tele-law mobile application ‘Nyaya Bandhu’ was launched by the Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.
  
• It is pro bono legal service which is designed to connect practising lawyers and the registered eligible beneficiaries in a hassle-free manner.


• It will enable the para legal volunteers (PLV)’s to perform on field pre-registration of cases with a facility to seek appointment from the panel lawyer on date and time suitable to them.


• It contains facility to confirm and register the pre-registered cases, to enable online interface between the beneficiary and the panel lawyer through video conferencing and telephone facility.


• The application will benefit 73,000 PLVs of National Legal Service Authority and State Legal Services Authorities (SLSA) in the country who will be associated under Tele-Law service.

Source: Cick Here

• Mr.Namwar Singh from Varanasi, a famous Hindi author and known for his different approach in Hindi literature through criticism.He died in New Delhi at the age of 92.


• He received the Sahitya Akademi award for ‘Kavita Ke Naye Pratiman’ for literary criticism in the year 1971.


• His other notable works are ‘ Chhayavaad’ and ‘Dusari Parampara Ki Khoj’.


• He was the former president of the All India Progressive Writers’ Association (AIPWA).

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