NATIONAL:
1. GNFC township becomes India’s first cashless Township
2. Indian Railways Dedicated Freight Corridor: First portion to be operational by 2018
INTERNATIONAL:
3. Tehmina Janjua becomes Pak’s first woman foreign secretary
4. Longest elevated cycle path in the world opens in China
BUSSINESS & ECONOMY
5. Anil Ambani firm to service over 100 US Navy ships
6. Centre puts the ball in states court for factories act amendment
NATIONAL:
1. GNFC township becomes India’s first cashless Township
The Gujarat Narmada ValleyBSE 0.85 % Fertilizers and Chemicals (GNFC) township in Bharuch has become country’s first ever “cashless township”, as over 10,000 residents have embraced various digital mode of payments instead of cash.
Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani today inaugurated the “cashless” GNFC township and expressed confidence that other townships in the country will follow the suit
GNFC township has become country’s first cashless township. I congratulate all the residents of this township for taking this revolutionary step, which will surely encourage around 180 other such townships in the country to follow the suit and turn cashless .
He further said around 10,000 residents of this township have become a role model for the entire nation by embracing digital mode of payments instead of doing transactions using cash inside the township.
On the occasion, Union Labour and Employment Minister Bandaru Dattatreya congratulated the residents and urged others to embrace the vision of Prime Minister Narendra Modi on digitalisation
2. Indian Railways Dedicated Freight Corridor: First portion to be operational by 2018
The Ministry of Railways on 13 February 2017 announced that the Òrst portion of the Indian Railways Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) between Ateli and Phulera will become operational by March 2018. This will be a 190-km double track route with a total of 380 km track length which will be under the scrutiny of Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India (DFCCIL). The Ateli-Phulera section will take over the freight load from the Indian Railways.
Additionally, around 500-600 km of additional track length will be operational by Ònancial year 2018-19.
Key Highlights:
• DFCCIL, a special purpose vehicle of the railways, owns the responsibility to develop six Dedicated Freight Corridors across the country.
• These DFCs will transfer a minimum of 70 per cent of the freight carried by the Indian Railways on tracks parallel to DFCs.
• One rack on the DFC will be able to carry 13000 tonnes of load compared with 5000 tonnes carried by racks on the existing railway tracks. • Out of these six corridors, the Eastern DFC and the Western DFC were taken up on priority basis with funding assistance from World Bank and Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
• JICA sanctioned Rs 38722 crore loan while World Bank committed to provide USD 2.725 billion for the project.
• Eastern DFC will connect Mughalsarai to Ludhiana, while the Western DFC will run between Dadri and Jawahar Lal Nehru Port.
• The capital expenditure of the project is expected to reach around Rs 10000 crore in the current Ònancial year with the total investments till date reaching to Rs 29760 crore.
• The cost of operations on the DFCs is expected to go up by 40 per cent.
• The average speed in these tracks is also expected to rise threefold to 70-75 km per hour
INTERNATIONAL:
3. Tehmina Janjua becomes Pak’s first woman foreign secretary
- Career diplomat Tehmina Janjua was today appointed as Pakistan’s first woman foreign secretary.
- Tehmina Janjua will assume the post of Foreign Secretary in the first week of March 2017
- Earlier local media reports had named Pakistan high commissioner to India Abdul Basit as the front-runner for the coveted post.
- She was presently serving as Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations in Geneva.
- She holds Master’s degrees from Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad and Columbia University, New York.
- She has rich experience of working in bilateral and multilateral domains both at Headquarters and Missions abroad
- She also served as Spokesperson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs during 2011.
- Janjua served as Ambassador of Pakistan to Italy from December 2011 to October 2015.
- At present she is serving as Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Pakistan to the United Nations in Geneva since October 2015.
4. Longest elevated cycle path in the world opens in China
The world’s longest elevated cycle path has been opened in Xiamen, China which can handle about 2,023 cyclists with a speed limit of 15 miles per hour.
The path is five miles long and 16 feet wide having 11 entrances and connects to 11 bus stops and two underground rail stations.
Besides the private cyclists, the path also has facility of over 300 for-hire bikes available for sharing. In addition to the bike-share stations, the path also has plenty of space for bike parking, and some bike-centric service pavilions.
Initially for a month trail, the path will be open to all kinds of bikes, including public and private bikes, from 6:30 am to 10:30 pm in a bid to promote green transport.
The cycleway has been designed by Dissing + Weitling a Danish architectural firm, whoalso created the award-winning Cykelslangen or Cycle Snake which is an elevated orange bike lane in Copenhagen.
BUSSINESS & ECONOMY
5. Anil Ambani firm to service over 100 US Navy ships
Anil Ambani group’s Reliance Defence and Engineering has inked a major contract with the American Navy for repair and alteration services for its warships fleet of 100 vessels belonging to the Seventh Fleet — the largest forward deployed fleet operating in the region.
The Seventh Fleet looks after the Western Pacific and Indian Ocean involving more than 5000 ships and submarines, 240 aircraft and around 20,000 marine and navy personnel. The vessels will be serviced and repaired from the Reliance Defence-owned shipyard in Pipavav in Gujarat.
The Pipavav shipyard was qualified and approved to perform complex repair and alteration services for the U.S. Navy last month.
On Monday, Anil Ambani group firm announced that Reliance Infrastructure (RInfra)-led Reliance Defence and Engineering (RDEL) has signed the Master Ship Repair Agreement (MSRA) with the US Navy to maintain the vessels of its Seventh Fleet involving the 100 vessels operating in the Indian Ocean.
First such shipyard
The Reliance Shipyard is the first in India to have received MSRA Certification to undertake servicing and repairing work for the vessels of the Seventh Fleet. The fleet has about 100 vessels of different types including auxiliaries.
Currently, these vessels visit Singapore or Japan for such works.
“Reliance Shipyard has been selected after a detailed site survey by US Government representatives in end October 2016,” a Rinfra statement said, adding: “This selection by the U.S. Navy is a true recognition of the world-class facility, processes and the high standard of the capability of Reliance Shipyard at Pipavav.”
The signing of MSRA agreement comes a few months after the U.S. and India jointly signed Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA) in August 2016.
6. Centre puts the ball in states court for factories act amendment
- With labour law reforms back on the Centre’s agenda, fresh discussions begin with trade unions to push through a long-pending overhaul of the Factories Act of 1948.
- However, the Labour Ministry has tweaked its draft amendments to put the ball on contentious issues in the domain of State governments.
- Instead of increasing the threshold limit set for the number of workers in an industrial unit to be statutorily covered by the factories law.
- Centre is now proposing an enabling provision that lets State governments decide the threshold over which a unit will be considered a factory for the purpose of the law.
- Earlier, the Centre had proposed that the Factories Law be applicable to all factories that employ at least 40 workers – a move that was strongly opposed by the central trade unions.
- The present Factories Act 1948 applies to establishments with 10 or more workers, if the premise is using power and to establishments with 20 or more workers, without electricity connection.
- Factories with less than 40 workers were to be covered under a new law for small factories. However, the fate of the proposed Small Factories Bill, 2015 is unclear as the Labour Ministry note has no mention about the proposed law.
