Prime Minister Narendra Modi has launched the country’s first seaplane service between the Statue of Unity near Kevadiya in Gujarat’s Narmada district and Sabarmati Riverfront in Ahmedabad.
The 19-seater seaplane will be managed by private airline SpiceJet.
The 40th Meeting of the SAARCFINANCE Governors’ Group was held virtually, under the Chairmanship of Shri Shaktikanta Das, Governor, RBI. The meeting was attended by the Governors from SAARC central banks. During the meeting, Mr Das also inaugurated the SAARCFINANCE Sync, a closed user group secure communication network.
Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi chaired the Virtual Global Investor Roundtable (VGIR) 2020 Conference, aimed at attracting investment in the country. It provided a platform for exclusive dialogue between leading global institutional investors, Indian business leaders and the highest decision-makers from the government of India and financial market regulators. The Indian side included business leaders, financial market regulators, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman and RBI governor Shaktikanta Das
The Finance Minister of India, Smt Nirmala Sitaraman has announced the ‘Aatmanirbhar’ Package 3.0. Addressing a press conference to announce more stimulus measures to boost growth. According to Finance Minister Nirmala Sitaraman, PMI rose to 58.9 in October 2020 indicating strong recovery of the economy from COVID-19 crisis
Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. has defeated Donald Trumpcto become the 46th U.S. president. Biden will become the oldest president-elect in U.S. history and the first to oust a sitting commander-in-chief after one term since Bill Clinton defeated George H.W. Bush in 1992. Biden’s electoral college vote to 290, surpassing the 270 needed to win the White House. Biden’s running mate, California Senator Kamala Harris, becomes the first Black and Indian-American woman to serve as vice president.
The founder-chairman of Wipro Ltd, Azim Premji has topped the EdelGive Hurun India Philanthropy List 2020. The 75-year-old made the highest contribution of Rs 7,904 crore between April 2019 and March 2020 towards philanthropic causes.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has placed cash- strapped Lakshmi Vilas Bank (LVB) under a moratorium for a period of one month and restricted withdrawals at Rs 25,000 for depositors, owing to a serious deterioration in the lender’s financial position. The central bank also superseded the board of directors of LVB for a period of 30 days owing to a seriousvdeterioration in the financial position of the bank. Thevmove was announced through an order by the Ministry of Finance.
The Reserve Bank of India has created a Reserve Bank Innovation Hub (RBIH). The aim of Innovation Hub is to promote innovation across the financial sector by leveraging on technology and creating an environment which would facilitate and foster innovation.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has virtually addressed the 12th (BRICS) Summit. The Summit was held under the Chairmanship of Russian President Vladimir Putin. India will be taking over the Chairmanship of the BRICS in 2021 and host the 13th BRICS Summit in 2021. It would be the third time that India will take over the BRICS Presidency since its inception. Previously India was the Chair in 2012 and 2016.
Union Cabinet has approved the merger of capital-starved Lakshmi Vilas Bank (LVB) with DBS Bank India. The Reserve Bank of India on 17 November proposed the merger of the lender with the Indian arm of Singapore’s DBS Bank.
In India, 26 November is celebrated as Constitution Day or Samvidhan Diwas. On this day in 1949, the constitution was adopted which came into force on January 26, 1950, marking the beginning of a new era in the history of India
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) imposed monetary penalty on DCB Bank and Jio Payments Bank for various rule violations. The central bank has imposed a penalty of Rs 22 lakh on DCB Bank for non- compliance with certain provisions on marketing/distribution of mutual fund/insurance etc. The penalty has been imposed in exercise of powers vested in RBI under the provisions of Section 47A(1)(c) read with Section 46(4)(i) of the Banking Regulation Act, 1949.
The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has finally allowed Facebook-owned messaging platform "WhatsApp" to roll out its payments service in the country in a “graded” manner.
HDFC Bank has announced the launch of “SmartHub Merchant Solutions 3.0” for Small and mid-size enterprises.
SBM Bank India, the wholly-owned subsidiary of State Bank of Mauritius has partnered with Fintech PayNearby to launch a neo banking platform. Both firms signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to build an “open banking” network towards delivering basic banking solutions as well as advanced financial services, to their customers.
HDFC Bank & IndusInd Bank have been put in the ‘red flag’ list, a system used for monitoring foreign portfolio investor (FPI) limits. A listed company enters the list when the available legroom for overseas investment is less than 3% of the permissible limit. FPIs can invest up to 74% in both HDFC Bank and IndusInd Bank.
Rating Agency Moody’s has projected the GDP of India at -8.9% for the calendar year 2020. Earlier this was projected at -9.6%. Apart from this, India’s GDP growth for Calendar year 2021 is projected at 8.6% by Moody’s from 8.1% earlier.
The Investment bank, Goldman Sachs has revised upwards the growth forecast for India in FY21 to - 10.3% from its earlier projection of -14.8% in September 2020. For the financial year 2021-22 (FY22), the Goldman Sachs has projected India’s GDP at 13%.
Moody’s Investors Service has revised India’s GDP growth forecast to -10.6 per cent for the current fiscal 2020-21 (FY21), in its November 2020 update, from its earlier estimate of -11.5 per cent in September 2020. For next fiscal 2021-22, Moody’s projected India to grow at 10.8 per cent, as against the previous estimate of 10.6 per cent.
The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has approved the acquisition of General Insurance Business of Bharti AXA General Insurance Company Limited (Bharti AXA) by ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company Limited (ICICI Lombard) under Section 31(1) of the Competition Act, 2002.
The second World Health Expo was inaugurated on November 11, in Wuhan, the capital city of Central China’s Hubei Province. This year’s Expo will focus on displaying the most cutting-edge science and technology in the global health industry, and help Wuhan build “city of global health industry”.
The Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sharad Arvind Bobde and Justice DY Chandrachud of the Supreme Court, jointly inaugurated India’s first-ever E-resource centre and the virtual court called “Nyay Kaushal” at Judicial Officers Training Institute in Nagpur.
Digital/Online media has been brought under the purview of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting. Currently, there is no law or autonomous body governing digital content.
Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) Chairman M. Ajit Kumar, along with members of the Board inaugurated the GST Bhawan, Panchkula, Haryana.
Ganga Utsav-2020 has been organised by then National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) jointly with the Ministry of Jal Shakti. The three-day-long Ganga Utsav-2020 has been organised from 02 to 04 November 2020, virtually amidst COVID-19 precautions.
India will host the Summit of the G20 Group in 2023. India was earlier slated to host the summit in 2022. India and Indonesia have swapped their respective hosting year of G20 as Indonesia would also chair the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 2023. However, now the G20 Summit be hosted by Italy in 2021, Indonesia in 2022, India in 2023 and Brazil in 2024.
AK Gupta, the new Managing Director and CEO of ONGC Videsh Limited (OVL) took charge. Before this, he was Director (Operations) of the company.
Indian diplomat, Vidisha Maitra has been elected to the UN’s Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ).
India is placed at 77th position in the TRACE Bribery Risk Matrix 2020. India has achieved ascore of 45 in a global list that measures business bribery risks of 2020. India’s rank stood 78 positions in 2019. It was a better performance than neighbouring nations such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal and China. But, Bhutan scored better than India and got 48th place in the list.
The 15th G20 Summit was held under the chairmanship of Saudi Arabia. King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia chaired the Summit through video-conferencing, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The two-day Summit was held under the theme “Realising the Opportunities of the 21st Century for All”.
The 2020 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Economic Leaders’ Meeting was held under the Chairmanship of Malaysian Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin. The APEC Summit 2021 will be hosted by New Zealand. This is the second time Malaysia hosted an APEC meeting, having hosted one in 1998. The theme of the APEC Malaysia 2020 was “Optimising Human Potential Towards a Resilient Future of Shared Prosperity: Pivot. Prioritise. Progress”.
Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has inaugurated the 3rd Global Renewable Energy Investment Meeting and Expo (RE-Invest 2020) through video conferencing. The summit is organised by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy. The theme for RE-Invest 2020 is ‘Innovations for Sustainable Energy Transition’. The first two editions of RE- Invest were held in 2015 and 2018.
SpaceX has launched Four Astronauts (3 Americans, 1 Japanese) to the International Space Station on the first full-fledged taxi flight for NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) by a private company. They were launched by Falcon Rocket from the Kennedy Space Center.The capsule has been named as “Resilience”. The crew was led by Commander Mike Hopkins, Shannon Walker, Victor Glover (First Black Astronaut on a long-term space station) mission and Japan’s Soichi Noguchi (First person in 40 years to launch on three types of spacecraft).
The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has imposed a total ban on the sale and use of firecrackers in the Delhi-NCR region from 9 November to 30 November. The ban will be applicable in cities and towns where the air quality is in the “poor” category.