Ø The Chief Justices of the Calcutta and Orissa
High Courts, Arun Kumar Mishra and Adarsh Kumar Goel, and
senior lawyer Rohinton Nariman
were sworn in as Supreme Court judges.
Ø President Pranab Mukherjee has accepted the
resignation of Bharat Vir Wanchoo as Governor of Goa and appointed Margaret
Alva, Governor of Rajasthan, to discharge the functions of the Governor of Goa, in addition to her own duties, until regular
arrangements for the office of the Governor of Goa are made.
Ø NASA has fitted a 17-tonne telescope with an
effective diameter of eight feet on a modified Boeing 747 jetliner that the
U.S. space agency is using as a flying observatory to study stars. The
infrared telescope called “Stratospheric
Observatory for Infrared Astronomy” (SOFIA)
is mounted behind a sliding door that reveals
it to the skies. The jet can stay airborne for over 12 hours and its range is
up to 6,625 nautical miles (7,624 miles). According to NASA, “The data provided
by SOFIA cannot be obtained by any other astronomical facility on the ground or
in space.” SOFIA is mobile, so it can better spot transient space events
like supernovae and comets. Nasa plans to launch SOFIA — now in Germany for its
last extensive maintenance and refitting leg — in 2015.
Ø Former World Bank economist Ashraf
Ghani won Afghanistan’s presidential election,
according to preliminary results released, with 56.4 per cent of the run-off
vote to Abdullah Abdullah’s 43.5 per cent.
Ø The government plans to increase the foreign
direct investment in the insurance sector to 49 per cent with a rider that the
voting rights of the overseas partner will remain capped at 26 per cent.
The Insurance Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2008, proposes an increase in foreign
holding in insurance joint ventures to 49 per cent from the existing 26 per
cent with corresponding voting rights.
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