Saudi Arabia ends the ban on female drivers.
Even with the end of the driving ban, Saudi Arabia remains one of the most restrictive countries for women, who need permission from legally mandated male guardians for important decisions such as foreign travel and marriage.
Saudi Arabia Capital: Riyadh
Currency: Saudi riyal
King: Salman of Saudi Arabia
India has lowered the limits on the export of certain essential commodities such as potatoes, onions, and eggs to the Maldives, according to a recent notification.
According to a bilateral pact that came into effect in 1981, India exports essential commodities by and large in line with the requirement as communicated by the government of Maldives.
Maldives Capital: Malé
President: Abdulla Yameen
Currency: Maldivian rufiyaa (MVR)
India and the United Arab Emirates are hoping to put in place a food security partnership that envisages storage farms in Maharashtra, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh to store excess agriculture produce for supply to markets in the Arab state.
India is working on a “farm-toport” project with dedicated logistics infrastructure along the supply chain for shipment to the UAE from farms in the three states.
Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, foreign minister of UAE is on seven-day trip to India.
UAE construction giant Emaar is building storage facilities in the three states toward this end.
President: Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan
Capital: Abu Dhabi
Currency: United Arab Emirates dirham
The over 11-km Mundka-Bahadurgarh section of Delhi Metro’s Green Line, connecting the capital to Haryana, was inaugurated.
The Metro network had taken six lakh vehicles off the roads, saved time and money and reduced pollution.
Metro network in Delhi would soon become the world’s fifth largest after Beijing, London, Shanghai and New York.
The London Underground first opened as an "underground railway" in 1863 and its first electrified underground line opened in 1890, making it the world's first metro system.
The Delhi Metro is the world's 11th longest metro system in length and 16th largest in ridership.
The Law Commission is preparing a report on the codification of personal laws which is being perceived as the first step towards bringing a uniform civil code (UCC) for the country.
The commission is examining the “defects” in the personal laws followed by various communities to rationalise them. This is likely to pave the way for a common code.
Personal laws cover matters of property, marriage, divorce, inheritance and succession.
Currently, there are different personal laws for Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Parsis and others.
A uniform code will mean a set of common personal laws for all citizens.
Article 44 of the Directive Principles sets implementation of uniform civil code as “the duty of the State”.
Praggnanandhaa became the country's youngest Grandmaster at the age of 12 years, 10 months and 13 days.
Indian chess legend Viswanathan Anand was 18 when he became a Grandmaster.
Magnus Carlsen, the man who toppled Anand as world champion in 2013 and has been reigning since then, became a GM at 13 years and 4 months.
In 2016, Praggnanandhaa became the youngest International Master at the age of 10 years, 10 months and 19 days.
Sergey Alexandrovich Karjakin, a Russian (formerly representing Ukraine) remains the youngest ever Grandmaster at the age of 12 years and 7 months.
The Indian Railways will soon start deploying drones to monitor rail tracks, a step that could help the national transporter leap forward on the safety aspect which is an area of special attention for the government.
Under an initiative of the telecom industry and the railways, IIT Roorkee has developed the drones which are currently being tested on the tracks around the Uttarakhand town.
This (drone) project was proposed by the Indian Railways to RailTel partnered with IIT-Roorkee.
TCOE (Telecom Centres of Excellence) is a public-private initiative in the telecom sector that works with the academia on new technologies.
Under it, the railways’ broadband services arm, RailTel Corporation, has partnered IIT-Roorkee to develop the drones that will help automate rail track monitoring, which currently is a labour intensive process.
Kannur International Airport will begin operations in September. Kannur airport will become the fourth international one in Kerala, which is already the State with the most number of international airports in the country.
The district is known for the hilltop shrine Sabarimala which attracts lakhs of pilgrims every year.
Kerala is a state in South India on the Malabar Coast.
Kerala state has 3 operational International airports and with the fourth in Kannur it will become the only Indian state having 4 international airports along with Tamil Nadu.
Capital of Kerala state is Thiruvananthapuram.
Chief Minister of Kerala Pinarayi Vijayan.
Sridevi won Best Actress (posthumously) for her role in 2017 film MOM.
Irrfan Khan won Best Actor in a leading role for Hindi Medium.
Vidya Balan's Tumhari Sulu won Best Film while Hindi Medium director Saket Chaudhary was given Best Director award.
IIFA Awards are a set of awards presented annually by the International Indian Film Academy to honour both artistic and technical excellence of professionals in Bollywood, the Hindi language film industry. Instituted in 2000, the ceremony is held in different countries around the world every year.
Digital payments network Visa is close to investing over $250 million into Mumbai-based payments gateway BillDesk, valuing the company at around $1.5-2 billion.
BillDesk is the largest online payments processing company in the country and competes with the likes of Naspers-backed PayU, CCAvenue and a bunch of younger startups like RazorPay.
BillDesk processes payments worth almost $50 billion per year and leads the charts for online bill payments.
BillDesk was founded in 2000 by three former Arthur Andersen executives — M N Srinivasu, Ajay Kaushal and Karthik Ganapathy — it is one among the rare profitable internet companies in India.