Daily GK Updates: 30 July 2014

CWG 2014: Sushil, 2 others bag gold for India on first day of wrestling

i.Star grappler Sushil Kumar led India's sparkling show in the wrestling arena as the country claimed three gold medals on the first day of the wrestling competitions at the Commonwealth Games at Glasgow on Tuesday.

ii. Sushil expectedly bagged gold in men's 75kg freestyle category while Amit Kumar won the yellow metal in men's 57kg while Vinesh Phogat finished on top in women's 48kg at the SECC Hall.
iii. Rajeev Tomar, however had to settle for a silver in the mens 125 kg freestyle event after going down to Canadas Korey Jarvis 0-3 in finals.
iv. 31-year-old Sushil asserted his class as he won his all four bouts of the day quite comfortably. In the gold-medal bout against Qamar Abbas of Pakistan, Sushil had an easy outing.
v. Amit Kumar defeated Ebikweminomo Welson of Nigeria 6-2 in his final bout. 20-year-old Indian started off well and completely dominated the first round to post a comfortable 4-0 win.
vi. The Nigerian, however, fought back and the two wrestlers gave each other a tough time in the next round and they could bag just two points each.

2.    Fuad Masum elected as the seventh President of Iraq

i. Muhammad Fuad Masum of Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) party was elected as the seventh President of Iraq on 24 July 2014.

ii. He was elected with overwhelming majority by the Council of Representatives of Iraq (Iraqi Parliament) in Baghdad. He won 211 votes as against 17 votes won by Judge Hussein al-Musawi in the second round of voting.
iii. Masum is the second non-Arab President of Iraq after Jalal Talabani who founded the PUK party and is the incumbent President of Iraq.

iv. In the first round of voting, out of four presidential candidates Fuad had won 175 votes. But it was short of the 218 absolute-majority required for the president in the first vote. The other presidential candidates Hanan al-Fatlawi, Faiq al-Sheikh Ali and Hussein al-Musawi shared the remaining seats.

3.    KV Chowdary tipped to be new CBDT chief

i. Senior IRS officer K.V. Chowdary is tipped to be the new Chairman of the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT), the apex authority of the Income Tax department.

ii. The 1978-batch Indian Revenue Service officer is presently working as the Member (Investigations) in the CBDT and is expected to take over the new charge from August 1 after incumbent Chairman R.K. Tewari retires on July 31.

iii. Mr. Tewari, a 1976-batch IRS officer, has been at the helm for the last five months after he took over the top post on March 1.

iv. Officials said the name of the new CBDT boss would be soon cleared by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

v. The CBDT has six members apart from the Chairman and is the apex body for framing policy and administrative issues related to direct taxes and the Income Tax department.

4.   WB loan to West Bengal for Gram Panchayat improvement

i. The World Bank will give around one thousand two hundred crore rupees loan to the West Bengal Government for improvement of a thousand Gram Panchayats in the State.

ii. Giving this information in Kolkata, State Panchayat Minister Mr. Subrata Mukherjee said that the funds will be utilised in 9 districts to bring a thousand Panchayat bodies under the Nirmal Gram Panchayat scheme in the next five years. Mr. Mukherjee said that another 2400 Gram Panchayats will be brought under the scheme inthe next phase.

iii. The Minister said that speedy disposal of services to people in the Panchayats are the main objectives for the borrowing.

5.    Law Commission recommends fixed tenure for CJI

i. Same retirement age of 65 for Supreme Court and High Court judges, a “cooling-off period” for judges after retirement and a fixed tenure for Chief Justice of India.

ii. These are the three changes Law Commission Chairperson A.P. Shah has recommended in his note to Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad. These three, he says, is “intertwined” with the “overhaul” required in the process of judicial appointments.

iii. Justice Shah's note titled ‘A Judicial Appointments Commission for India: A Proposal’ became the central point of debate between the Law Ministry and eminent jurists on Monday.

6.    Arup Raha takes over as Chairman, CoSC

i. IAF chief, Arup Raha, today took over as the Chairman, Chiefs of Staffs Committee, from incumbent Gen Bikram Singh who is retiring tomorrow.

ii. The Chairman, Chiefs of Staffs Committee is the senior-most military officer in the country.

iii. Raha was handed over the baton of the CoSC by Gen Singh at a ceremony in South Block, Defence officials said.

iv. Raha, 59, will hold the office for a period of 29 months and would probably be the longest-serving officer in the chair.

v. He has got the long tenure because of the resignation of former Navy Chief Admiral, DK Joshi, in February after a series of accidents involving naval warships.

vi. Raha will continue in office till December 2016 and is expected to push for increasing jointmanship among the three services as the CoSC.

7.    Sushilarani Patel, a Classical singer died at 96

i.Sushilarani Patel, the renowned classical singer of India died at her Bandra home on 24 July 2014 due to heart attack. She was 96. She in 2002 became a Sangeet Natak Academy laureate.

ii.Patel, a widow of Baburao Patel was living alone in her Bandra home since his death in 1982 and was cared by her disciplines as she had no close relatives. Baburao Patel was the person, who ran India’s first Bollywood trade journal FilmIndia.

8.    The Vijay Mallya Story written by K Giriprakash published

i.The Vijay Mallya Story written by K Giriprakash was published by Penguin Books Limited in 2014. K. Giriprakash is the Chief of Bureau, The Hindu Business Line.

ii. The book is an intriguing story of the life of Vijay Mallya, an Indian industrialist with a history of ground-breaking success. The book tells about even the lesser known facts and stories from the professional events of Mallya’s life.

iii. The making of this industrial tycoon, his success story, the story of his decline with the downfall of Kingfisher, and a lot of important events from his life are presented in the book.

9.   Shakuntla Jakhu to take over as new Haryana Chief Secretary

i. Senior IAS officer Shakuntla Jakhu will be Haryana's new Chief Secretary.

ii. Speaking to reporters after a meeting of his cabinet here today, Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said Jakhu will take over from incumbent S C Chaudhary who retires Thursday.

iii. Jakhu, a 1978 batch IAS officer, is presently Haryana's Additional Chief Secretary, Revenue and Disaster Management