The Daily Brief – 15th May 2019

Conference on Dialogue of Asian Civilizations will be hosted by China in Beijing, starting from 15 May to 22 May 2019. CDAC seeks to promote intercultural dialogue in view of building an “Asian Community of Shared Future”. The idea of hosting CDAC was proposed by President Xi Jinping at Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) held in Shanghai, China in 2014.

ITC Group’s present Managing Director (MD) Sanjiv Puri was elevated as new Chairman and Managing Director of company. His appointment comes after noted industry leader and erstwhile ITC Chairman Yogi C. Deveshwar died on 11 May 2019. ITC stands for ‘India Tobacco Company’, is India’s largest cigarette company. Established in 1910, it is headquartered in Kolkata, West Bengal.

Chhaya Sharma, deputy inspector general (DIG) at the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) of India and investigation officer of Nirbhaya rape case was felicitated with McCain Institute Award 2019. She was awarded with McCain Institute Award for Courage and Leadership. Being a DIG (Investigation) at NHRC since 2015, Sharma has been instrumental in bringing the voices of the victims of human rights’ violations for effective redressal by the National Commission.

India on May 14, 2019 extended USD 1 billion Line of Credit to Mongolia to set up its first-ever petrochemical refinery at Sainshand in Dornogobi Province. It is the largest project undertaken by India under its Lines of Credit programme which will be implemented by EXIM funding. The funding was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his visit to Ulan Bator in 2015.

‘Criczone’, world’s first exclusive women’s cricket magazine was released in India. It features Smriti Mandhana as cover story. Criczone stories will seek to empower young aspiring women cricketers to take the sport as a profession and able to make sustainable living. In CEAT International Cricket Awards 2019 Smriti Mandhana was given the International women cricketer of the year award.

India has been unanimously chosen as co-chair of the Consultative Group (CG) of Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR) for the fiscal year 2020 during the meeting of GFDRR held in Geneva, Switzerland on the margins of the 6th Session of the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction. India became a member of CG of GFDRR in 2015.

India’s G.S. Lakshmi has become the first woman to be appointed to ICC’s international panel of match referees and will be eligible to officiate in international games with immediate effect. Claire Polosak had become the first ever woman umpire to stand in a men’s ODI. Lakshmi, 51, who first officiated as a match referee in domestic women’s cricket in 2008-09, has overseen three women’s ODI matches and three women’s T20 International matches.