Lt Col Srinivas Gokulnath has the first Indian to complete the 4,900 kilometre Race Across America (RAAM) in solo category, which is the toughest cycle race in the world. He completed the race in eleven days, 18 hours and 45 minutes, which begin from California. Lt Gokulnath stated that his postings at Siachen Base Camp and at 15,000 feet on the Uri mountains helped him achieve the feat of finishing the race. A solo rider has 12 days to finish the race and has to ride over 400 kilometres a day to finish it in given time. Sleep is for under 3-hours a day.

The day-long National Conference of Chief Secretaries of States and Union Territories organised by NITI Aayog has started in New Delhi on July 10, 2017 to further the spirit of cooperative and competitive federalism. The focus of the conference is on best practices in social and economic sectors across states. Various developmental indicators developed by NITI Aayog, in areas like health, education, water management and digital transformation are being discussed. The idea is to measure performance and progress of states and rank them appropriately to instill healthy competition among them. In addition several interactive sessions on issues including agriculture and health are also on the agenda.

The Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has launched an app – GST Rates Finder in New Delhi to verify the accurate tax rate on commodity and services under the Goods and Services Tax (GST) regime. Through this app, user can determine GST rate by entering the name of the commodity or service. The search result will list all the Goods and Services containing the name which was typed in the search box. A taxpayer can search for applicable CGST, SGST, UTGST rate and Compensation Cess on a supply. This mobile app can be downloaded on any smart phone and can work in offline mode, once downloaded. The application has been launched on Android platform, and will soon be available on iOS platform. The Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC) has also provided a GST rate finder on its portal – cbec-gst.gov.in to help taxpayers know applicable GST rate on their supplies

Harinder Pal Sandhu from India has won the South Australian Open squash title by defeating Rhys Dowling in the final by 11-8, 12-10, 11-4 at Adelaide, Australia. It is Sandhu’s eighth career title at the PSA level.

The 22nd World Petroleum Congress (WPC) International Conference will takes place in Istanbul, Turkey from July 10 – 12, 2017. Dharmendra Pradhan Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum and Natural Gas, will represent India in the conference. The tri-annual WPC Conference is widely recognized as the `Olympics` of the oil and gas industry. It attracts Ministers, CEOs of Oil and Gas MNCs, experts and academics from the hydrocarbon sectors and provides an ideal forum to showcase potential of India’s hydrocarbon sector, highlight the recent policy reforms to international investors and interact with policy makers, technologists, scientists, planners and management experts, entrepreneurs, service providers and vendors in order to attract foreign investments into India’s growing oil and gas sector.