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• Expressing dissatisfaction over New Delhi's decades-old role in the Afghanistan peace process, US President Donald Trump said he wants the regional countries, including India, Russia and Pakistan to fight the Taliban in the war-torn country.


• In his first Cabinet meeting of the year, the US President also reffered to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for funding a library in Aghanistan, wondering who would use it in that country.


• The US President cited India's efforts towards peace and development in Afghanistan but alleged that the countries were not doing enough in the war-ravaged country and that they were taking advantage of the United States.

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• Pakistan government has decided to send a no-fly list of 172 people, including former President Asif Ali Zardari, to a review committee. Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry told reporters in Islamabad yesterday that the move was in accordance with orders of the Supreme Court.


• The Minister said influential people often fly out of the country after facing corruption cases. The apex court had directed the Cabinet on Monday to reconsider its "hasty decision" of placing the names of 172 people, on the no-fly list.

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• China’s president, Xi Jinping, warned Taiwan that unification must be the ultimate goal of any talks over its future and that efforts to assert full independence could be met by armed force, laying out an unyielding position on Wednesday in his first major speech about the contested island democracy.


• Xi Jinping outlined his stance one day after Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, urged China to peacefully settle disputes over the island, whose 23 million people, she said, want to preserve their self-rule. But Beijing treats Taiwan as an illegitimate breakaway from Chinese rule, and Mr. Xi Jinping said unification was unstoppable as China rose.


• The country is growing strong, the nation is rejuvenating, and unification between the two sides of the strait is the great trend of history,” Xi told officials, military officers and guests in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing.

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• A head of the ‘Kumbh Mela 2019’, the Union Home Ministry (MHA) approved the Uttar Pradesh government’s proposal to rename Allahabad as Prayagraj.


• MHA had earlier approved the renaming of the British-era railway station Robertsgang as Sonbhadra, Farah Town railway station near Mathura and iconic Mughalsarai junction after Deen Dayal Upadhyay — both in Uttar Pradesh.


• The Centre had also approved the renaming of Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai as Chhatrapati Shivaji ‘Maharaj’ International Airport, earlier.


• The Tripura government also got Centre’s approval to change the name of Agartala Airport as Maharaja Bir Bikram Manikya Kishore, the erstwhile ruler of the state.


• The Home ministry approves any such proposals of name change after consulting various concerned agencies like Indian Railways, Survey of India, Department of Posts etc.

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• Lakhs of women from across Kerala formed a 620-km long Women’s Wall, that stretched from Kasargod in northern Kerala to the southern most district of Thiruvananthapuram, to uphold gender equality and renaissance values.


• This was a state sponsored move done in the backdrop of protests in Sabarimala due to Supreme Court’s decision to all women to pray at the Ayyappa shrine.


• Health minister K K Shylaja was the lead of the human chain at Kasargod whereas leader Brinda Karat was the last person at the end of the chain in Thiruvananthapuram.


• The event was organised by the ruling CPI(M), along with over 176 other socio-political organisations, including the CPI, Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana Yogam (SNDP) and Kerala Pulayar Maha Sabha (KPMS).

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• The government gave out the 6-crore free cooking gas (LPG) connection as the scheme to make available cleaner fuel in every household kitchens under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY).


• Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu handed over papers for an LPG connection to Jasmina Khatoon from Shivpark, Khanpur in New Delhi to mark the 6 crore LPG connections under PMUY.


• Under the scheme, the government provides a subsidy of Rs 1,600 to state-owned fuel retailers for every free LPG gas connection that they give to poor households.


• The 5-croreth free LPG connection under the scheme was given to Takrdiran, a resident of Sangam Vihar of the national capital, in August 2018 by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan.

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• Congress president Rahul Gandhi said Goa chief minister and former defence minister Manohar Parrikar was “blackmailing and threatening” the Prime Minister because Parrikar had all the information on the Rafale deal.


• Challenging the PM to a one-on-one debate on the Rafale deal for 20 minutes, Gandhi said Modi does not have the guts to face him. He said if the Congress came to power, its priority would be to investigate the Rafale deal.

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• Uttar Pradesh cabinet cleared a policy for implementation of a 0.5% cow welfare cess or 'gau kalyan' cess. This would help the state earn additional ₹34 crore for constructing and maintaining cattle shelters to accommodate at least 1,000 stray cattle per district.


• The additional levy on excise items may include alcohol and impact its price in the state.

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• Railway Minister Piyush Goyal said that Train 18 will run from Delhi to Varanasi. He said that the run-time of Train 18 between Delhi and Varanasi will be eight hours, "one-and-a-half-times" faster than the fastest train on the route.


• While the railways had been saying that it had proposed two routes for Train 18-- Delhi to Bhopal and Delhi to Varanasi-- this is the first time that the route has been officially confirmed.

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• Reserve Bank allowed a one-time restructuring of existing debt of up to 25 crore rupees to micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) which are facing cash crunch in the wake of demonetisation and GST implementation.


• The restructuring will be implemented by 31st of March 2020.


• The eligibility for the scheme entails that the aggregate exposure including non-fund based facilities of banks and NBFCs, to a borrower should not exceed 25 crore rupees as on January 1, 2019.


• The restructuring of existing loans was permitted to MSMEs that are in default but ‘standard‘ as on 1st of January, 2019, without any downgrade in asset classification.


• This means the MSMEs which have defaulted on payment but the loans given to them have continued to be classified as standard assets are eligible for the scheme.


• Furthermore, a provision of 5% of outstanding loan amount, in addition to the provisions already held, shall be made in respect of accounts restructured under this scheme.


• Banks will, however, have the option of reversing such provisions at the end of the specified period, i.e. one year, subject to the account demonstrating satisfactory performance.

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• Shares of Dena Bank and Vijaya Bank dropped as investors were disappointed after the merger share swap ratio with Bank of Baroda is seen at a steep discount.


• Intraday, Dena Bank shares fell as much as 19.8% to hit a low of Rs 14.40 a share, while Vijaya Bank dropped as much as 7.4% to touched a low of Rs 47.25 a share. The Bank of Baroda stock gained over 3% to Rs 123.


• Bank of Baroda (BoB) said that shareholders of Vijaya Bank and Dena Bank will get 402 and 110 equity shares of BoB for every 1,000 shares they held.

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• The Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India, is mulling to impose anti-dumping duty for 18 months on a Chinese synthetic rubber ‘fluoroelastomers’ used in automobile and other industries in order to minimize the impact of dumped imports.


• The proposal in this regard was considered after the investigative arm of Commerce ministry, Directorate General of Trade Remedies (DGTR) initiated the probe in January 2018 following a complaint from Gujarat Fluor chemicals which alleged dumping of the product.


• The DGTR said that the product has been exported to India from China at below its normal value, which has resulted in dumping and recommended a duty which ranges between $0.078 -$7.31 per kilogram.


• The final decision to impose the duty would be taken by Ministry of Finance.


• The duty which is imposed under the under the multilateral regime of World Trade Organization (WTO) is aimed at ensuring fair trading practises and creating a level-playing field for domestic producers with regard to foreign producers and exporters.


• India imposes anti-dumping duty on several products to check cheap imports from countries including China, with which India had a wide trade deficit of $63.12 billion in 2017-18.

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• When he allowed a cricketing misdemeanour under his watch and was banned for a year, Steve Smith put Australian cricket on the back foot. He also paused an individual career that was—and still is—the third-best in terms of average runs scored per innings in Test cricket.


• In his year of absence, Australia will play nine Tests. Had he played them, the former Australian captain, instead of being an asterisk, would have been even closer in Tests played to Virat Kohli, Joe Root and Kane Williamson—the other three members who make up the batting quartet of our times.

• Shooter Divyansh Singh Panwar from Rajasthan and shooter Nupur Patil from Maharashtra have won 10th R R Lakshya Cup 2018 in senior and junior category respectively. Dronacharya Awardee and former National Coach Prof. Sunny Thomas was the chief guest of the event.


• The tournament was organised in Lakshya Shooting Club, Karnala Sports Academy, Panvel, Navi Mumbai. The Club was founded by ace shooter Suma Shirur.


• R R Lakshya Cup being only a premier invitational tournament, it’s record wouldn’t be count for International records.


• The event has prize money of Rs. 1,00,000 in senior category and Rs. 50,000 in junior category.

• IIT Roorkee professor Jayanta Kumar Ghosh was facilitated with the National Geospatial Award for Excellence -2017 (Life Time Achievement Award) by the Indian Society for Remote Sensing for his contribution towards the development of geospatial science and applications.


• The award which carries a citation, a medal and Rs.1,00,000 was conferred to J. K. Ghosh, a professor at the civil engineering department of the IIT Roorkee on 5th December 2018 at SAC (Space Application Centre) Ahmedabad.


• The Indian Society for Remote Sensing is an organisation known in the area of space science, remote sensing and geo-spatial technology.

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• 12-year-old Indian-origin student Dhruv Manoj from Singapore has bagged two gold medals at the World Memory Championships held in Hong Kong from 20th December to 22nd December 2018.


• 12 Dhruv Manoj won in the “names and faces” and “random words” disciplines, beating 56 other contestants in the “kids category”.


• 12 Dhruv has mastered the Roman memory technique of creating “memory palaces“, which works by associating the ideas or objects to be memorized with scenes imagined at familiar locations, such as one’s house.

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• The players in France‘s football team which last year defeated Croatia to win the World Cup were awarded the Legion of Honour, France’s highest award for “exceptional service” to the nation, in the New Year’s honours list.


• The Football World Cup 2018 at Russia was France’s second World Cup title, after the 1998 World Cup.


• Each of the 23 players of French football team, including star strikers Kylian Mbappe and Antoine Griezmann, received France’s top medal for their part in beating Croatia in the World Cup final in Moscow.


• A total of 402 people, half men and half women were on this year’s winners list.

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• Jair Bolsonaro was sworn in as Brazil’s 42nd president.


• Mr Bolsonaro, 63, won the presidential election by a wide margin against Fernando Haddad of the left-wing Workers’ Party.

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• The Department of Financial Services announced appointment of Hemant Bhargava, Managing Director, Life Insurance Corporation of India, as the Acting Chairman.


• This was done after VK Sharma retired from the position at LIC on December 31.


• While, he is a contender for the post of Full-Time Chairman at the state-owned life insurer, his retirement is due in July 2019.


• Therefore, the Banks Board Bureau has called eight candidates for interviews for the posts of Chairman and MD on January 4.

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• P K Singh was appointed secretary of the Competition Commission of India (CCI).


• Prior to this, he was adviser (law) to the competition watchdog.


• After completing 5 years of experience as the adviser to the CCI, according to the norms of the institution, he was chosen as the candidate.

• Private sector lender RBL Bank appointed Pankaj Sharma as its chief operations officer (COO).


• Prior to this, Sharma was heading retail operations of Axis Bank.


• Under his leadership, the ATM channel, phone banking and branch automation and digital initiatives at Axis Bank took shape.


• He had previously worked with GE Countrywide, ICICI Bank and ICICI Prudential Life Insurance.

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• President Ram Nath Kovind nominated Justice Arjan Kumar Sikri as Executive Chairman of National Legal Services Authority (NALSA).


• His appointment is effective from December 31, 2018.


• The post got vacant after the retirement of Justice Madan B. Lokur.

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• On January 1st, 2019, Veteran Kannada actor C H Loknath died at 91.


• His acting career spanned almost six decades and he had acted in about 650 movies and performed in over 1,000 plays.


• He made his debut in the National award winning movie ‘Samskara’ in 1970.