NATIONAL NEWS
Abey Kuruvilla appointed as BCCI’s new General Manager
Abey Kuruvilla has been appointed as the new General Manager of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). The former India pacer had retired from all forms of cricket in 2000 and took up coaching. Abey Kuruvilla’s tenure as the national selection committee member got over earlier in 2022.
PM Narendra Modi to participate in QUAD leaders virtual meet
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will participate in a Quad Leaders’ virtual meeting today along with other QUAD leaders including US President Joe Biden, Australian PM Scott Morrison, and Japanese PM Fumio Kishida. The leaders are expected to exchange views and assessments about important developments in the Indo-Pacific and review ongoing efforts to implement the Leaders’ initiatives announced as part of the Quad’s contemporary and positive agenda.
UP Elections 2022 Phase 6: 57 seats go to polls
The sixth phase of UP Assembly Polls 2022 was held on March 3, 2022 for 57 seats across 10 districts of the state including Gorakhpur, Ambedkar Nagar, Kushinagar, Deoria, Ballia, Basti, Balrampur, Maharajganj, Sant Kabir Nagar and Siddharthnagar. UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath is among the candidates in the fray this time. He is contesting his first assembly elections from Gorakhpur Urban constituency.
Election Commission of India orders re-polling in 12 polling booths in Manipur
The Election Commission of India has ordered a re-poll in 12 polling stations of 5 constituencies in Manipur where the polling for assembly elections took place on February 28, 2022. The 12 polling stations in Manipur, where the repoll will be held belong to the 5 assembly constituencies- Thanlon, Saitu, Khundrakpam, Singhat, and Henglep. The re-poll in Manipur will be on March 5, 2022, from 7 AM to 4 PM. The proposal for the re-poll was recommended on the facts and information received and reported from respective Returning Officers. One of the main reasons for the consideration of re-polling was connected to the damage of EVMs after the poll.
Prime Minister Modi interacts with students who returned from Ukraine
Prime Minister Modi interacted with the students in Varanasi who returned to India from Ukraine. The Indian students shared their experience with him and were from Varanasi as well as the other parts of Uttar Pradesh. A total of 17,000 Indians have left Ukraine and flights under Operation Ganga have also been increased to facilitate the evacuation of remaining students in the war-torn country.
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
US mulling over sanctions on India over defence system purchase from Russia
The United States has been mulling over whether to apply or waive sanctions on India for its purchase of S-400 Triumf missile defence system from Russia, under the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA). This comes amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and criticism over India’s abstention along with 34 other nationa at the United Nations vote on March 2nd.
Putin planning to reinstate Viktor Yanukovych as president of Ukraine? Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to reinstate Viktor Yanukovych as president of Ukraine, as per The Kyiv Independent. Viktor Yanukovych was ousted as Ukrainian President in the 2014 Ukrainian Revolution. He had fled to Russia then and has been in exile ever since. As per the Ukrainian media outlet, Viktor Yanukovych is allegedly in Minsk and the Kremlin is preparing an operation to replace Zelensky with the ex-president.
European Union bans 7 Russian banks from SWIFT
EU has banned 7 Russian banks from the Society for World Wide Interbank Financial Communication (SWIFT) global system which underpins cross-border payments. However, SWIFT spared two financial institutions in Russia as they are the key to transactions for EU energy imports. The exemption of the two banks by the EU has underscored the bloc’s reliance on Russian Energy and Russia’s two financial institutions’ role in managing the payments for that business. The 7 banks targeted by the latest EU sanctions against Russia are- Novikombank, Bank Otkritie, Rossiya Bank, Promsvyazbank, Sovcombank, VTB, and VEB.
