24 December 2013

Ø  Mr. Kejriwal, who at 44 will be Delhi’s youngest Chief Minister, will be sworn in at Ram Lila Maidan, in keeping with the ‘pro-people’ spirit of his party and the bonhomie witnessed during its election campaign. Topmost in the list of poll promises was the pledge to slash electricity tariffs by 50 per cent and provide 700 litres of water free of cost daily to every household. the AAP said one of its priorities would be to clamp down corruption in the Delhi Jal Board by bringing transparency in the department. The party had also promised to construct 2 lakh community and public toilets, make the Yamuna cleaner by ensuring that no untreated sewage would be discharged into the river and had also proposed to redesign the sewage network and make sewage treatment plants functional. In the health care and educational sector, the AAP had promised new measures such as opening of 500 new schools, discouraging donations to private schools and setting up more hospitals. Assuring to regularise the unauthorised colonies, the AAP had promised not to remove slums till alternative plots or flats were provided to the residents.

Ø  Twenty-five years after the authorities conceived the Kashmir Valley’s first ropeway and created the Jammu and Kashmir Cable Car Corporation (JKCCC) to boost tourism at Gulmarg, the State got its second tourist-carrier on Monday. Rs 6.50-crore ropeway would ferry devotees, particularly the aged and infirm, from the sprawling Malkhah cemetery to the revered saint Sultanul Aarifeen Sheikh Hamza Makhdoom’s shrine and back.

Ø  The Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) of the Ministry of Defence on Monday gave the go-ahead for four major acquisitions worth nearly Rs. 16,000 crore for the Indian Navy and the Army. The approved shopping list includes two deep-sea rescue vessels, an indigenous anti-submarine craft programme, more Israeli Barak missiles and 41 advanced light helicopters. The DAC cleared a proposal to procure 262 Barak I missiles for Rs. 880 crore. The DAC has also given the nod to the Army to proceed with the acquisition of 41 Dhruv advanced Light Helicopters. The choppers will be acquired at a total cost of Rs. 300 crore. The DAC has also approved a Rs. 13,000 crore project that will enhance the anti-submarine warfare capability of the Indian Navy. The committee has cleared the indigenous development of a 700-tonne Anti-Submarine Warfare Shallow Water Craft that would take on submarines operating in coastal waters, within 200 nautical miles of the base port. These vessels would watch over foreign submarines operating close to the Indian coastline.  

Ø  Mikhail Kalashnikov, the designer of the fabled AK-47 automatic rifle, died on Monday, the office of the presidency in the Udmurtia region where he worked said. He was 94. AK-47’s name stands for “Kalashnikov’s Automatic” and the year it was designed, 1947.

Ø  The central government could utilise huge cash reserves of 20 public sector units (PSUs) to cut fiscal deficit target by about Rs 20,000 crore given the challenges in meeting its disinvestment target, pointed out a report of Crisil Research. By March 31, 2014, the top 20 PSUs, by cash holding, will have an estimated pre-dividend corpus of around Rs 160,000 crore, and the companies are comfortably placed to pay special dividends of Rs 27,000 crore over and above their normal dividend pay-outs, without impacting capex plans.