14 MARCH 2014

Ø  A U.S. judge has thrown out the visa fraud case against Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade, ruling that she had full diplomatic immunity. District Judge Shira Scheindlin said “it is undisputed” that the diplomat acquired full diplomatic immunity at 5.47 p.m. on January 8 after the U.S. State Department approved her accreditation as counsellor to India’s mission to the United Nations.

Ø  Despite sagging growth rates in recent years, India could be the largest aviation market by 2030, and the third-largest in six years flat or 2020. Indian carriers will require 1,290 new passenger aircraft valued at $190 billion between now and 2032 to satisfy surging demand, according to a market forecast released by Airbus. The Indian annual passenger traffic growth rates of 8.6 per cent are well above the regional Asia Pacific average growth rate of 6.1 per cent and the world average of 4.7. Of the requirement of 1,290 new aircraft, some 73 per cent will be for growth and 27 per cent for replacement.

Ø Researchers at the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands recently recorded two new species of birds — the Great Short-Toed Lark and the Blue and White Flycatcher.

Ø  Rahasya , a movie allegedly based on the Aarushi murder case.

Ø  The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) has unveiled the first-ever cloud based open-source Web-GIS tool for estimating rooftop solar power potential for Indian solar cities. The web-GIS tool will be launched in Chandigarh followed by other cities.

Ø  Responding to a request from the Malaysian government, India on Thursday launched a combined force to scour the Andaman Sea for the Malaysian jetliner that mysteriously went missing while en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur last Saturday. Codenamed Operation Search Light, the massive mission would see warships and aircraft of the Indian Navy and the Coast Guard carry out a ‘systematic search’ of over 17,000 nautical mile area east of Campbell Bay and south east of Car Nicobar in the Andaman and Nicobar archipelago for wreckage of the missing plane, which was reported to have strayed towards the Straits of Malacca from its designated flight path. The western edge of the search would extend as far as 60 to 80 nautical miles east of Campbell Bay, said an official.

Ø  Tomas Halik, a Roman Catholic priest and philosopher, onetime Czech political activist and an advocate for religious freedom and interfaith dialogue, won the 2014 Templeton Prize for religious and spiritual progress. Halik, 65, a convert to Catholicism whose influences include religious figures such as Mother Teresa and author Graham Greene, has in recent years been increasingly active in building bridges between people of different faiths and between those who claim a religious tradition and those who do not.