1) `Lady Singham` Manzil Saini becomes first woman SSP of Lucknow.
- Uttar Pradesh government, appointed Manzil Saini as the new Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) of state capital Lucknow. Saini has replaced Rajesh Pandey who has been attached to the DGP office.
- Popularly known as `Lady Singham` in her work circles, Saini cracked the Civil Services examinations to become the country`s first married woman IPS officer.
- A 2005 batch officer, Saini is the first woman officer in the history of the state to take charge of Lucknow.
- The police officer was earlier posted in Badayun, Muzaffarnagar and Mathura.
- She launched a crackdown against unauthorized usage of party flags by Samajwadi Party workers in four-wheelers and also penalizing them for bearing tinted windows during her tenure as an SSP in Etawah.
2) Baba Ramdev, Amazon’s Amit Agarwal listed among most creative people in business.
- Yoga guru and businessman Baba Ramdev and Amit Agarwal, the head of Amazon India, have been named in a list of most creative business people by American magazine Fast Company.
- Ramdev was ranked 27th in the magazine’s 2016 list of ‘Most Creative People in Business’, while Agarwal was ranked 10th.
- The magazine named Lin-Manuel Miranda, writer of the rap-musical Hamilton as the most creative person in business.
- Miranda was followed by Divya Nag, who heads Apple’s ResearchKit team and American comedian and writer, Jill Soloway. Others in the list include fourth-ranked Jean Liu, president of Didi Kuaidi and Valentino co-creative director Marla Grazla Chlurl.
3) Nirankari mission gets its first woman chief: Savinder Kaur.
- After the death of spiritual leader Baba Hardev Singh, his wife Sawinder Kaur has been named the next spiritual head of the Sant Nirankari Mission.
- Mataji, fondly called by followers, will be the first woman spiritual head and the fifth in line to the sect that was founded in 1929 and has over 10 million followers.
- An alumnus of Convent of Jesus and Mary School Mussoorie, Sawinder Kaur is originally from Farooqabad in Uttar Pradesh.
- She married Hardev Singh in 1975 and since then had been accompanying her husband to every congregation home, getting equal respect and love from their followers.
- An official announcement was made in New Delhi by Rev HS Upashak in the presence of thousands of devotees of the Mission.
4) Tsai Ing-wen sworn-in as first women President of Taiwan.
- Tsai Ing-wen has sworn-in as the first female and 14th President of Taiwan in front of national flag. She succeeds outgoing President Ma Ying-jeou.
- She is the leader of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) which favours independence from China.
- Earlier, Tsai led the DPP had won the Parliamentary and Presidential elections.
- Ms. Tsai’s victory was the biggest mandate ever won by a DPP President and is only the second-ever victory for the DPP since Taiwan split with China in 1949.
- The first was Chen Shui-bian who also was pro-independence (from China) advocate. During his time as President between 2000 and 2008 tensions had escalated with China.
5) Lhakpa sherpa becomes first woman to climb Everest seventh time.
- Lhakpa Sherpa,US-based Nepali climbed Mount Everest for the seventh time , breaking her own record for the most summits of the world’s highest mountain by any woman.
- Sherpa was accompanied to the top by a Nepalese guide. After her, eight members of a Russian team and eight guides climbed the same northern route.
- She works in a 7-Eleven shop in Connecticut in the US.
- Two Sherpa climbers share between them the record of 21 ascents of Everest, the most number of climbs by men.
6) Cairn India MD and CEO Mayank Ashar resigns.
- The petroleum exploration arm of London-listed Vedanta Resources Cairn India’s managing director (MD) and chief executive officer (CEO) Mayank Ashar has resigned from his post.
- He will be replaced by the company’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Sudhir Mathur as the interim CEO.
About Cairn India:
- Cairn India is an oil and gas exploration and production company, headquartered in Gurgaon, India.
- It is a subsidiary of Vedanta Resources.
- It was founded in 2007.
7) Nepal confers literary award on Sikkim CM Pawan Chamling.
- Sikkim Chief Minister Pawan Chamling was conferred with the Yug Kavi Siddhicharan Award, one of the Nepal’s prestigious literary award.
- The award was bestowed upon him by Nepal Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli for his commendable contributions in promoting Nepali literature in India.
- The award ceremony was organised by Siddhicharan Shrestha Academy on the occasion of 105th birth anniversary of the late poet Shrestha. Yug Kavi Siddhicharan Award carries a certificate of appreciation and a sum of 100,000 Nepali Rupees.
- Pawan Chamling is an author of many books in Nepali, English and Hindi. He is also a publisher. He has been awarded twice by the Sikkim Sahitya Parishad for the best poem Chintan Puraskar in 1987 and Bhanu Puraskar in 2010.
- His other works in Nepali include Prarambhik Kavita (1978), Antyaheen Sapana: Mero Bipana (1985), Ma Ko Hoon! (1992) and Sikkim ra Nariko Maryada.
8) Fifa fires acting deputy secretary general Markus Kattner over bonus payments.
- FIFA acting Secretary General Markus Kattner was dismissed from his position with immediate effect.
- He was removed after FIFA’s internal investigation uncovered breaches of his fiduciary responsibilities in connection with his employment contract. He was accused of paying himself bonuses worth millions of pounds.
- The German took over as acting General Secretary after Jerome Valcke was sacked for irregularities.
- Kattner joined FIFA in 2003 as Director of Finance, becoming Deputy Secretary General in 2007. His salary and bonuses were part of a contract that was unseen by relevant FIFA committees.
9) UK grants asylum to Maldives` ex-president Mohamed Nasheed.
- Britain has granted political refugee status to ousted former President of Maldives Mohamed Nasheed. His lawyer Hasan Latheef claimed that Nasheed had been granted political refugee status but the British government is yet to comment.
- Maldives` first democratically elected president, Nasheed had been allowed to go to Britain in January for spinal cord surgery following a deal brokered by Sri Lanka, India and the UK.
- Nasheed became Maldives` first democratically elected leader in 2008 but was toppled in a coup backed by the military and police. He was jailed for 13 years on terrorism charges after allegedly illegally ordering the arrest of a judge in a trial that put a spotlight on instability in the Maldives.