Rakesh Kapur, Joint Managing Director of Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Limited (IFFCO) has been elected as the new Chairman of the International Fertilizer Association (IFA) at the 2017 IFA annual conference in Marrakech, Morocco. He is also the Chairman of the Fertiliser Association of India (FAI). With this, Kapoor has become the third Indian to hold this prestigious position in IFA’s 90 years’ history. The Paris-based IFA is the global fertiliser association with 500 members representing 68 countries, including 24 members from India.

Padma Venkataraman, the chairperson of Women’s Indian Association (WIA) and daughter of former President R Venkataraman, has been bestowed with the 2017 Avvaiyar Award by the Tamil Nadu government for her efforts in the areas of women’s welfare and rehabilitation of leprosy-affected persons for the past 30 years. The award which has been instituted to encourage women excel in social reforms, women’s development, communal harmony, arts, science, culture, journalism and administration, carries `1 lakh, a gold medal and a citation.

The ICICI Bank Data Centre in Hyderabad has achieved the distinction of becoming the country’s first Platinum rated project under IGBC Green Data Centre Rating System. Prem C Jain, Chairman, IGBC presented IGBC plaque to Chanda Kochhar, MD & CEO, ICICI Bank at a programme organised on recently in Hyderabad. IGBC Green Data Centre Rating System would facilitate in providing tremendous tangible and intangible benefits. Tangible benefits include: 20 to 25 per cent reduction in Power Usage Effectiveness, 25 to 30 per cent reduction in water consumption. Intangible benefits include enhanced air quality, excellent daylighting, health and well-being of the staff operating such facility.

Veteran actress Saira Banu and actor Jackie Shroff have been named for the prestigious Raj Kapoor Lifetime Achievement and Raj Kapoor Special Contribution annual awards respectively by the Maharashtra government, Cultural Affairs Minister Vinod Tawde announced here on Wednesday.

Well-known Marathi film industry personalities Vikram Gokhale and Arun Nalawade have been named for the coveted V. Shantaram Lifetime Achievement and V. Shantaram Special Contribution annual awards, he added.

Both the lifetime achievement awards carry a citation and cash of Rs 500,000 each, while both the special contribution awards carry a citation and Rs 300,000 in cash.

Aniruddhan Vasudevan’s One Part Woman, a translation of Perumal Murugan’s controversial Tamil novel Maadhorubaagan,has been chosen for the translation prize in English 2016, Sahitya Akademi has announced.

“Sahitya Akademi has announced the translation prize 2016 in English language to Sri Aniruddhan Vasudevan for his book One Part Woman, translation of Sri Perumal Murugan’s Tamil novel Maadhorubaagan,” the literary organisation said in a press statement.

Shri B.N.Mohapatra has been appointed as the new Financial Commissioner (FC) (Railways) and ex-officio Secretary to the Government of India and has taken over the charge on 17/04/2017. Prior to this posting, Shri B.N.Mohapatra was posted as Additional Member/ Finance since 01.11.2016. An officer of Indian Railway Accounts Service (IRAS) of 1980 examination batch, Shri B.N.Mohapatra completed his post graduation in Political Science and graduation in LLB.

India has jumped one spot to 8th rank in the 2017 A.T. Kearney Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) Confidence Index. Governance and regulatory issues made up 7 of the top-10 factors that investors consider when deciding on an investment destination according to the report. Last year factors such as domestic market size and cost of labour were the top issues for investors.

Promising Indian shuttler B Sai Praneeth clinched his maiden Super Series title at the Singapore Open after defeating compatriot K Srikanth in a historic all-Indian final on Sunday.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the BHIM-Aadhaar platform, putting in place yet another keystone of a digital payment system that will help India make the shift to a less-cash economy. The biometric-based indigenous payment solution will enable real-time bank-tobank money transfers even for those without a phone and at no additional cost.
“This app can work even on a Rs 1,000-1,500 phone, you don’t need a smartphone. If you don’t have a phone you can use your thumb,” he said, referring to fingerprint authentication. Modi was speaking in Nagpur to mark the 126th birth anniversary of BR Ambedkar, after whom the payment system has been named.