MEETING/SUMMIT
11th ASEM Summit Held in Mongolia
• The 11th Asia-Europe Meeting Summit held in Mongolian capital on July 15 to 16, 2016 with leaders from 51 countries.
• 11th ASEM which carries the theme—20 Years of ASEM: Partnership for the Future through Connectivity. The ASEM member nations represent 50% of the world’s population, and contribute to 60% of global trade.
• The two-day summit will have two plenary sessions under the titles of ‘Two decades of partnership : Taking stock and looking forward’ and ‘Promoting ASEM partnership for greater connectivity’.
• Session One will assess the 20-year experience of political dialogue, economic cooperation and socio-cultural exchange between Asia and Europe, while at the second session, discussions will continue on developing both ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ connectivity between the two continents.
BRICS Second ‘Anti-drug’ Meeting
• Home Minister Rajnath Singh inaugurated the second anti-drug Working Group meeting of Heads of Drug Control Agencies of BRICS countries on July 7, 2016.
• The meeting is being organised by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB). The seventh BRICS summit was held in July, 2015 in Russia and India shall be hosting the eighth BRICS summit in October, 2016 in Goa.
• The agenda of meeting includes improving information exchange mechanisms on illicit trafficking of synthetic drugs and new psychoactive substances including early detection of new psycho active substances, maritime drug trafficking, diversion of precursors and controlled chemicals for manufacturing of illicit synthetic drugs etc.
BRICS Youth Summit 2016 Held at Guwahati
• BRICS Youth Summit, 2016 was organised at Guwahati (Assam) from July 1 to 3, 2016. The Theme for the Summit is—Youth as Bridge for Intra-BRICS Exchanges.
• The programme for the Summit also includes thematic debates, cultural events, site-visits and interactive sessions with local youth. The Youth Summit would also be an occasion to introduce India’s North-East to BRICS youth.
• Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his remark at Fortaleza BRICS Summit, had stressed the role of youth and sports in furthering intra-BRICS cooperation.
Economy and Banking Current Affairs
CBDT Signed 7 Advance Pricing Agreements to cut Tax Litigation
• The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) signed seven more unilateral Advance Pricing Agreements (APAs) with Indian taxpayers on July 18, 2016.
• The APAs provide for signing an agreement between a taxpayer and the income lax department on an appropriate transfer pricing methodology for determining the value of assets and taxes on intra-group overseas transactions.
• The scheme attempts to provide certainty to taxpayers in the domain of transfer pricing by specifying the methods of pricing and setting the prices of international transactions in advance.
Fourth Tranche of the Sovereign Gold Bond Opened
• The fourth tranche of the Sovereign Gold Bond scheme was opened on July 18, 2016. The scheme will get an interest of 4% annually for the period funds are transferred from clearing corporations to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).
• Minimum investment under the Gold Bond scheme is 1 gm. Maximum investment under the Gold Bond scheme is 500 gm. Interest to be obtained under the Gold Bond scheme is at a fixed rate of 2.75% payable every six months.
• The bonds are tradable through stock exchanges—NSE and BSE. The Gold Bond scheme is available in DEMATS and paper form. The Gold Bond scheme has a tenure of eight years, with exit options in the 5th, 6th and 7th year.
• At time of exit the bond can be redeemed at market rate of gold. The gold bond can be used as collateral to avail a loan. Capital gain tax will be exempted on redemption.
Read Also – State Current Affairs
India’s First Centre of Excellence Launched
• Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the Centre of Excellence (CoE) for Internet of Things (IoT) in Bengaluru, to enable rapid adoption of loT technology and foster a new growth strategy as well empower India to have a leap frog advantage in the domain on July 11, 2016.
• It is a joint venture by National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM), Department of Electronics & Information Technology (DeitY) and Education and Research Network (ERNET), the CoE will be run on a Public Private Partnership (PPP) model with seed fund from the government and will be managed by NASSCOM.
• In India, Internet of Things (IoT) can be leveraged to address issues like transport system, parking, electricity, waste management, water management and women’s safety to create smart cities, smart health services, smart manufacturing and smart agriculture.
• The smart city and digital India campaign can also leverage IoT to bring about innovative applications and domain capability across verticals.
