• Prime Minister Narendra Modi has launched TB-free India Campaign to eradicate tuberculosis (TB) from India by 2025, five years ahead of the globally-set deadline.
• The Centre has constituted a three-member Mahanadi Water Disputes Tribunal to adjudicate the dispute between Odisha and Chhattisgarh over sharing the river’s water. Supreme Court Judge AM Khanwilkar will be the Chairman of the tribunal, with Justice Ravi Ranjan of the Patna High Court and Justice Indermeet Kaur Kochhar of the Delhi High Court being the other two members.
• India’s tallest national flag (9,600 sq ft wide flag on a 110-metre-tall flagpole) was unfurled in Belagavi (also known as Belgaum) in Karnataka. Where size is concerned, this flag in Belgaum beats the one at the India-Pakistan border at Attari in Punjab.
• ICICI Bank has launched instant overdraft ‘InstaOD’ facility for MSME (Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises) customers in a completely online and paperless manner.
• Nepal’s first woman President Bidya Devi Bhandari was re-elected for a second term in office.
• Gina Haspel has been nominated first-ever female director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The Central Intelligence Agency is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the United States federal government.
• Stephen Hawking, whose insights shaped modern cosmology, died at the age of 76.
• Hindi film actor Narendra Jha, seen in films like Haider and Raees, died due to a heart attack.
• Pune came on top in the fifth edition of the Annual Survey of India’s City-Systems (ASICS). Bengaluru was ranked at the bottom.
• As per the World Happiness Report 2018,Burundi in East Africa is the unhappiest place in the world. India ranks 133rd in the report. Finland tops the list.
• Germany’s Parliament elected Angela Merkel for her fourth term as chancellor.
• World Consumer Rights Dayis celebrated globally on 15th March. It is an awareness day and theme for this year’s WCRD 2018 is ‘Making Digital Marketplaces Fairer’.
• The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) was awarded the International Kochon Prize 2017 for encouraging research and development (R&D) efforts towards tuberculosis treatment.
• The World Bank has projected India’s GDP growth at 7.3% for 2018-19 and accelerates further to 5% in 2019-20.
• Andhra Pradesh stands at equivalent to 51st rank globally in Multidimensional Poverty Index (2017) according to a recent household survey conducted in the state. Andhra Pradesh becomes the first Indian state to conduct an exclusive household survey at state and district level to estimate the multidimensional poverty of the state.
• Oklahoma plans to start using nitrogen gas for executions, in what would be the first such method of capital punishment in the United States.
• Actor Jackie Shroff’s short film ‘Shunyata’has won an award at Best of India Short Film Festival in Los Angeles, US. The 22-minute fiction film directed by Chintan Sarda was selected to be in top six.
• Indian filmmaker Nila Madhab Panda’s “Halkaa”,which had its world premiere at the 21st Festival International du Film Pour Enfants de Montreal Film (FIFEM), has bagged the Grand Prix de Montreal at the gala.
• The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare launched ‘LaQshya program’ aimed at improving quality of maternity care in labour room and maternity Operation Theatre (OT).
• Lok Sabha has passed gratuity amendment bill.The Payment of Gratuity (Amendment) Bill, 2017 aims at increasing the upper ceiling of the gratuity from the present 10 lakh rupees to 20 lakh rupees for employees in the private sector and in Public Sector Undertakings at par with Central Government employees.
• India has been ranked at 78th among 114 countries on the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) energy transition index. The list was topped by Sweden.
• Muthoot Finance, the flagship company of Muthoot Group has tied up with Global IME Bank to expand its money remittance services between Indo Nepal Corridor. Muthoot Finance is the only NBFC to extend the money transfer services from India to Nepal.
• India and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) signed a $120 million loan agreement for completion of works for double-tracking and electrification of railways tracks along high-density corridors to improve the operational efficiency of Indian railways.
• In limited-overs cricket, Nepal achieved One-day International status, after their victory over Papua New Guinea.
• Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) paid tribute to former BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya with a book titled, ‘A Tribute to Jagu’.
• President Ram Nath Kovind released coins in denominations of Rs.10 and Rs.1,000 commemorating Lord Jagannath’s Nabakalebara festival observed in July 2015.
• The Indian government is in process of formulating ‘Kisan Urja Suraksha evam Utthan Mahabhiyan (KUSUM) scheme’to harness solar power for rural India. The scheme will allow to setup grid-connected solar plants in rural areas. The program aims to boost farmers’ income as they can sell their additional power to the main grid produced by solar plants located on their lands.
• The Indian Navy and the French Navy have been conducting bilateral maritime exercises, named VARUNA. This year VARUNA-18 would be conducted in three sea areas, namely, the Arabian Sea, the Bay of Bengal and South Western Indian Ocean.
• Singapore remains the most expensive city in the world,according to the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Worldwide Cost of Living report 2018. Damascus, the capital of war-ravaged Syria, is the cheapest city for living in the world, followed by Venezuela’s capital Caracas.
• Russian President Vladimir Putin stormed to victory in presidential election, giving him another six years in power.
• Mauritius President Ameenah Gurib-Fakim has resigned after being embroiled in a scandal over the use of a credit card to buy luxury personal items, using a credit card provided by London-based Planet Earth Institute.
• India and the European Union (EU)have signed an agreement that will enable them to share earth observation data from each other’s satellites. The European Union is a unique economic and political union between 28 European countries.
• National Cultural Audiovisual Archives (NCAA)project of the Ministry of Culture, Government of India has been certified as the world’s first Trusted Digital Repository as per ISO standard, granted by Primary Trustworthy Digital Repository Authorisation Body Ltd. (PTAB), United Kingdom.
• Since 2013, the United Nations has celebrated the International Day of Happiness (on 20th March) as a way to recognise the importance of happiness in the lives of people around the world. The theme for IDH 2018 is “Share Happiness” – focusing on the importance of relationships, kindness and helping each other.
• World Sparrow Dayis observed on 20 March every year globally to create awareness about the protection of sparrows. The theme for this year’s WSD is ‘I Love Sparrows’.
• India’s Purva Barve has won the Women’s Singles (Under-19) titleat the Israel Junior 2018 Badminton tournament held in Rishon LeZion, Israel.
• Renowned Hindi poet and critic Kedarnath Singh passed away.