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- Departing from convention, the Union Budget will be presented in Parliament on February 1, a month earlier than the usual, and the Economic Survey will be tabled on January 31 this year.
- Rajen Habib Khwaja, a 1976 batch AP cadre IAS officer, took charge as the new Director-General of Administrative Staff College of India (ASCI).
- Justice T.S. Thakur retired as the 43rd Chief Justice of India. He is succeeded by Justice J. S. Khehar, who will remain in office until August this year.
- A moderate intensity earthquake measuring 5.7 on the Richter scale and epicentred in Tripura jolted the country’s Northeast. It triggered landslides and left a woman dead and four others injured.
- The Election Commission of India (ECI) has announced the dates for the assembly elections in five states– Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Manipur and Goa. There will be single phase elections in Uttarakhand, Goa and Punjab.
- The Union Ministry of Urban Development launched Swachh Survekshan 2017 to rank 500 cities/towns across the country on cleanliness with a population of 1 lakh and above. The survey will be conducted by the Quality Council of India (QCI) under the Swacch Bharat Abhiyan in a bid to encourage competition to improve sanitation.
- Google honoured India’s 19th Century social reformer Savitribai Phule on the occasion of her 186th birth anniversary (3 January 2017) by dedicating a doodle on its webpage. Savitribai was among the country’s first women to speak up for the rights of women. She was the first woman teacher of the first women’s school in India and also a first pioneer in modern Marathi poetry.
- The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has appointed Surekha Marandi as its Executive Director (ED). She was appointed in place of U S Paliwal who retired on December 31, 2016.
- India is set to become the first country in the world where polished diamonds will be traded on a commodity exchange. The Indian Commodity Exchange Ltd (ICEX) is in the final stages of unveiling diamond contracts that will allow even individuals to trade in the precious stone in a transparent manner. The final approval from the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) is expected soon and a formal start is likely by March. The exchange has already received the in-principle approval from the regulatory body for the introduction of diamond contracts.
- Paytm Payments Bank has received the final approval from the Reserve Bank of India to commence operations.
- China confirmed that its aircraft carrier has for the first time conducted drills in the South China Sea with a formation of other warships and fighter jets.
- Scientists have identified seven key proteins that may make the Zika virus so deadly. The study is the first comprehensive description of the Zika virus genome.
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