The Daily Brief – 24th February, 2017

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• The Union Ministry of Urban Development has approved the development of a 6 km long Bet Dwarka Darshan Circuit in Gujarat under the Heritage City Development and Augmentation Yojana (HRIDAY). The HRIDAY scheme was launched in January, 2015 with a focus on holistic development of heritage cities.
• The Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) in Goods of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) came into effect, with its ratification by two-thirds of the member countries of WTO including India. The TFA in Goods was adopted by the WTO Members in 2014. It aims to streamline, simplify, standardise and ease customs procedures and norms. It will help to cut trade costs around the world.
• The Cabinet Committee on Security headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi has approved a deal to jointly develop a medium range surface-to-air missile (MR-SAM) system for the Army with help of Israel. The deal will be executed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Israel Aerospace Industries.
• Indian Railways has unveiled the Antyodaya Express, a new train for unreserved passengers. It was unveiled by Union Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu in New Delhi’s Safdarjang station. The first Antyodaya Express is slated to start between Mumbai (Maharashtra) and Tatanagar (Jharkhand) and the second one between Ernakulam and Howrah.
• The Centre has scrapped the use of hand baggage tags at the airports in Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Kochi, Kolkata and Ahmedabad.
• Dingwamsai Pul withdrew her petition in the Supreme Court seeking the registration of an FIR and a CBI investigation into allegations of corruption her husband, former Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Kalikho Pul, had levelled in his suicide note against politicians, “two seniormost Supreme Court judges” and even the President. Kalikho Pul committed suicide in August 2016.

• Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will visit India in the second week of April at the invitation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The visit will focus on mutual interests and development initiatives along with issues of connectivity.
• Less than a month after Vodafone confirmed it was in talks with Idea for a possible merger in India that could create the country’s largest mobile operator, Bharti Airtel announced that it would acquire the local unit of Norway’s Telenor. The deal will help India’s largest telecom services provider to widen its lead over Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Jio, which has already notched up 100 million users. Were Vodafone and Idea to successfully conclude a merger, the combined entity would have almost 400 million users.
• PepsiCo India Holdings Private Ltd. has embarked on a ‘3P’ (People, Product Planet) initiative to put in place an India-centric business strategy that binds it to consumers in a purposeful way. The core objective of the 3P initiative was to be relevant to people in terms of products in a dynamic environment where the focus had shifted to healthy living.
• The International Shooting Sport Federation (ISSF) has officially announced that New Delhi would host the rifle and pistol World Cup in 2019, which would offer Olympic quota places for Tokyo 2020, following its Administrative and Executive Committee meetings in the Capital over the last two days.