21 JUNE 2014: Hindi poet Kedarnath Singh chosen for Jnanpith award

Ø  The Indian Railways on Friday effected the largest-ever hike in recent times by increasing the passenger fares by 14.2 per cent and freight charges by 6.5 per cent. The hike will take effect from June 25.

Ø  Kodela Sivaprasada Rao, a six time MLA of Telugu Desam and Minister for 14 years, was elected Speaker of Andhra Pradesh Assembly.

Ø  Prasar Bharati directing its radio FM Gold and Rainbow channels to get rid of contract workers above the age of 35 years.

Ø  A review meeting convened by External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj decided that India would assist all its nationals in Iraq who desired to return but were unable to pay for their tickets. The assistance would be extended through the Indian Community Welfare Fund in Iraq — set up by the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs for the welfare of Indian workers in distress in foreign countries.

Kedarnath Singh: Hindi poet

Ø  Noted Hindi poet Kedarnath Singh has been chosen for the prestigious Jnanpith award for 2013. He is the 10th Hindi writer to receive the honour and joins the likes of Sumitra Nandan Pant, Ramdhari Singh Dinkar among others. Eighty-year-old Singh, who has also written essays and stories, was born in Balia, Uttar Pradesh. ‘Abhi bilkul abhi’ and ‘Yahan se dekho’ are among his prominent works.

Ø  NASA has identified an odd, tiny Near-Earth Object as a valid candidate for its ambitious first-ever asteroid-capture mission scheduled for the 2020s. The Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM) is a proposed spacecraft concept which aims to capture either a small asteroid or a boulder from an asteroid. Astronomers using NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope measured the size of the asteroid in question, called ‘2011 MD’, at 6 metres in diameter.

Ø  India-born Booker Prize winning author Salman Rushdie was named the winner of this year’s prestigious Pen Pinter prize for his outstanding literary output and support for freedom of expression. The award was established in 2009 by writers’ charity English Pen in memory of famous British playwright and Nobel laureate Harold Pinter.

Ø  Seeking to simplify norms, a government panel has suggested that foreign investment of over 10 per cent in a listed company be treated as FDI and the one from NRIs on a non-repatriable basis be deemed as domestic investment. The panel on rationalising definitions of FDI and FII, headed by Finance Secretary Arvind Mayaram, said foreign investment in an unlisted company should be treated as FDI.