Daily Current Affairs -24th December 2016

Dear Readers, we are presenting Daily Current Affairs for All Exams- 24th December 2016. Daily Current Affairs and General Knowledge is very helpful for IBPS Bank Exams, SBI , RBI Assistant,NIACL, SSC and Railway Exams.

1. ICICI Bank launches EazyPay app for Merchants

1. ICICI Bank, India’s largest private sector bank has launched EazyPay mobile application for merchants that allows all-in-one acceptance payments platform. 

2. This app consolidates all digital wallets, QR code, Unified Payments Interface (UPI), and credit & debit cards modes of payments. With this, ICICI Bank became first bank in the country to roll out all-in-one payments platform. 

2. SBI adopts a village to make it cashless 

1. India’s largest lender State Bank of India has stepped on the gas towards a cashless economy as the banking behemoth has adopted a village in Maharashtra where it will drive all residents to transact digitally. 

2. Shirki, a village in Pen Taluka in Maharashtra is now the epicentre for SBI, which will promote Aadhaar number-based merchant payments in the light of demonetisation, the government’s pet scheme to weed out the evil of black money. 

3. Under this initiative, the bank volunteers have been meeting the families in the village and have enabled them to open bank accounts and seed their Aadhaar numbers, which is the only pre-requisite for enabling the entire village to become cash-less.

3. Modi inaugurates NISM campus in Navi Mumbai

1. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has called for considering methods for increasing taxes in a fair, efficient and transparent way for financial market participants.

2. Inaugurating the National Institute of Securities Markets (NISM) campus at Patalganga in Navi Mumbai, Modi said, “for various reasons, the contribution of tax from those who make money on the markets has been low. To some extent, it may be due to illegal activities and fraud. To stop this, SEBI has to be extremely vigilant. To some extent, the low contribution of taxes may also be due to the structure of our tax laws. Low or zero tax rate is given to certain types of financial income. 

4. Bengali poet Shankha Ghosh chosen for 2016 Jnanpith Award

1. Eminent modern Bengali poet Shankha Ghosh was chosen for the prestigious Jnanpith Award for the year 2016. He is the 52nd recipient of Jnanpith Award. 

2. He is sixth Bengali litterateur to bag this prestigious literary award after Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay (1966), Bishnu Dey (1971), Ashapoorna Devi (1976), Subhash Mukhopadhyay (1991) and Mahasweta Devi (1966).

5. NITI Aayog rolls out Performance on Health Outcomes index

1. The NITI (National Institution for Transforming India) Aayoga along with Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has rolled out Performance on Health Outcomes index to rank States on the basis of their performance on measurable health indicators. 

2. The index was developed with inputs from domestic and international experts, including academicians and development partners as well as feedback from States.

6. December 24: National Consumer Day

1. The National Consumer Day is observed every year in India on 24th December. On this day the Consumer Protection Act, 1986 had received the assent of the President. 

2. Observance of this day provides an opportunity for individuals to highlight the importance of the consumer movement and promote the basic rights and responsibilities of all consumers 

3. The Department of Consumer Affairs under the Union Ministry of Consumer Affairs Food and Public Distribution is celebrating this day this year with the theme Alternate Consumer Disputes Redressal.

7. Odisha Government launches Biju Sishu Surakshya Yojana to nurture HIV positive orphan kids

1. The Odisha Government launched the Biju Sishu Surakshya Yojana, a scheme to nurture the orphan and HIV-infected children residing in different child care institutions and orphanages. 

2. The main aim of the scheme is to facilitate care and protection towards orphans and HIV infected children of the state. It will act and supplement for providing additional resources and complementary modalities to the existing centrally sponsored schemes.