1) Arvind Panagariya appointed as Sherpa for G-20 Summit.
- Government has decided to appoint NITI Aayog Vice-Chairman Arvind Panagariya as the Sherpa for G-20 talks replacing Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu. The Summit will take place in Antalya, Turkey in November 2015.
- Sherpa is a senior official responsible for preparing the agenda for leaders to consider during the summit.
- Earlier, the Deputy Chairman of the erstwhile Planning Commission used to be the Prime Minister’s Sherpa for G-20 talks.
- During the decade long UPA regime, former Deputy Chairman of the Commission, Montek Singh Ahluwalia was the sherpa for G-20 talks.
About Arvind Panagariya:
- Arvind Panagariya is an Indian-American economist and Professor of Economics at Columbia University. He also served as the Chief Economist of the Asian Development Bank.
- He has also worked for the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, World Trade Organisation, and the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in various capacities.
2) Chaitanya’s Court chosen as India’s Oscar entry.
- Chaitanya Tamhane’s critically acclaimed Marathi film `Court` was selected as India’s official entry to the Best Foreign Language category of the 2016 Academy Awards.
- ‘Court’ was selected from a shortlist of 30 films by a Film Federation of India jury headed by film-maker Amol Palekar.
- Debutant Tamhane’s film beat Rajkumar Hirani’s ‘PK’, Neeraj Ghyaywan’s Cannes winner ‘Masaan’, Omung Kumar’s ‘Mary Kom’, Vishal Bharadwaj’s ‘Haider’, M. Manikandan’s ‘Kaaka Muttai’ and SS Rajamouli’s ‘Bahubali’ in the Oscar race.
About movie ``Court``:
- Tamhane’s ‘Court’, which narrates story of the trial of an ageing folk singer accused of performing an inflammatory song that may have incited a sewage worker to commit suicide in a manhole to expose the flaws of the Indian judicial system, has had a fascinating year, travelling to 19 national and international film festivals and picking up 16 awards.
- The film won two coveted awards - the Horizons award for Best Film which carries a $100,000 cash prize and the Lion of the Future award for a Debut Film - at the Venice International Film festival in 2014 among others.
- It was picked up by New York-based Zeitgeist Films, known for sensing the next big film-making talent in the world, for distribution in the US.
3) Abdul Bari Siddiqui elected Bihar Cricket Association President
- Senior RJD leader Abdul Bari Siddiqui was elected as president of Bihar Cricket Association (BCA) after an election held as per directions of the Supreme Court.
- Siddiqui, who was the RJD Legislature party leader in the outgoing Assembly, defeated Vinod Kumar, a former president of BCA.
- Siddiqui is also the chairman of the state Badminton Association.
- International umpire Laliteshwar Prasad Verma was elected as Working President of the cricketing body defeating S D Choudhary.
- The BCA elections were held in accordance with a direction of the apex court in August this year, which had appointed former Patna High Court judge Dharampal Sinha as electoral officer-cum-observer for the polls.
4) V Shanmuganathan to hold additional charge of Manipur Governor.
- President Pranab Mukherjee has appointed Governor of Meghalaya V. Shanmuganathan to discharge the functions of the Governor of Manipur.
- He was given additional charge of Manipur after previous Governor Dr. Syed Ahmed passed away. Thus he will discharge additional functions of the Governor of Manipur along with his own duties, until regular arrangements are made.
About V Shanmuganathan:
- V Shanmuganthan is a prolific writer and had written three books related to culture and social aspects in Tamil.
- He was member of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and had joined it in 1962. Later he had joined Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) where he had served in many party positions.
- He was appointed as Governor of Meghalaya in May 2015 succeeding Keshari Nath Tripathi.