Correct Answer :   6.2%

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India’s gross domestic product (GDP) is expected to grow at 6.2% in FY24 as drivers of domestic demand remain intact amid fears of an impending slowdown, Morgan Stanley said in a research report released on Thursday (16th February 2023).

The report said that as the economy fully reopened in 2022 leading to a cyclical recovery in consumption, pickup in private capex with healthy balance sheets in the private corporate and financial sector, and acceleration in government capital spending, the world’s fifth largest economy will breach the consensus GDP growth figure of 6%.

“We believe that the key for sustained domestic demand is a pickup in capex, which will help create more jobs, thus leading to a virtuous cycle of more jobs leading to higher income, which will lead to higher saving, resulting in higher investment”, the report notes.

Earlier, the Union Budget for FY24 had projected nominal GDP growth at 10.5%, as the centre increased the capital investment outlay steeply for the third year in a row by 33% to Rs 10 trillion.

The Economic Survey for 2022-23 projected that India would witness a growth between 6-6.8% in FY24, depending on the trajectory of economic and geo-political developments globally.

The report also mentioned that the incoming high-frequency data on indicators like private consumption and investment reflected a moderation in the December quarter driven by base effect and shift in the festival calendar rather than a slowdown.

“Indeed, incoming data on high-frequency indicators have gained momentum both in YoY (year-on-year) and MoM (month-on-month) terms in January. The trend is thus encouraging after these indicators exhibited mixed signs, with some of them slowing in YoY terms in Q3 after peaking in Q2, driven by the impact of shift in festival dates on growth rates”, the report notes...

Source : Business Standard

Correct Answer :   $8.31 Billion

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India's foreign exchange reserves experienced its biggest decline in over 11 months, dropping by 8.3% in the week ending 10th February 2023, according to the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) statistical supplement released on Friday (17th Feb 2023).

As of the end of last week, India's foreign exchange reserves were recorded at a one-month low of $566.95 billion, reflecting a decline of 8.3% from the previous week's figure of $575.27 billion, during which it fell 1.5%.

The Weekly Statistical Supplement released by the RBI revealed that, for the week ending February 10, the foreign currency assets - a significant component of India's foreign exchange reserves - decreased by $7.108 billion to $500.587 billion.

According to the Reserve Bank of India, gold reserves have decreased for the second consecutive week, dropping by $919 million to reach a total of $42.862 billion.

Additionally, the Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) also decreased by $190 million to $18.354 billion. The country's reserve position with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) also declined by $102 million to $5.145 billion during the reporting week, as per data from the apex bank..

Source : CNBC

Correct Answer :   Intel

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Intel has launched the new Xeon W-3400 and Xeon W-2400 desktop workstation processors (code-named Sapphire Rapids), which are built for professional creators to provide massive performance for media and entertainment, engineering, and data science professionals.

* According to Intel, the new workstation processors are available for pre-order from industry partners, with system availability beginning in March.

Intel Launched ‘Sapphire Rapids’ Processors for Professional Creators :

* The new Intel Xeon desktop workstation platform is uniquely designed to unleash the innovation and creativity of professional creators, artists, engineers, designers, data scientists, and power users.

* Intel vice president and general manager Roger Chandler informed that it is built to tackle both the most demanding workloads as well as the professional workloads of the future.

* Moreover, the company informed that the Xeon W-3400 and Xeon W-2400 processor series enable unprecedented scalability for increased performance with a breakthrough new compute architecture, faster cores, and new embedded multi-die interconnect bridge (EMIB) packaging.

* The new processors also provide the high-end computing foundation that professionals these days require for the future of computing.

* The chip-making company, Intel, mentioned that with DDR5 RDIMM memory, PCIe Gen 5.0, and Wi-Fi 6E, the new processors give professionals the cutting-edge platform technologies they require for the compute workloads of the future..

Source : Business Standard

Correct Answer :   Cheteshwar Pujara

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Indian batsman Cheteshwar Pujara became the 13th player to play the 100th Test match for India. In the second match of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2023, he achieved this level. Pujara, who will follow David Warner in this eminent club.

Then in October 2010, he made his debut against Australia debut in Bangalore Test. Moreover, he made his ODI debut on August 1, 2013, against Zimbabwe at Queens Sports Club. If Pujara scores a century in this Test match then he will become the first Indian batsman to score a century in his 100th Test.

Source : The Sports Rush

Correct Answer :   Chetan Sharma

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Chetan Sharma resigned today (February 17, 2023), from the post of Chief Selector of the Indian Cricket Team. Recently he was heavily censured due to the remarks that he gave during a TV Sting Operation.

He was under pressure to resign after this controversial undercover session. No other person has been appointed as the new Chief Selector of BCCI so far.

Indian cricketer Chetan Sharma was re-appointed as the chief selector in January. In December 2020, he was first elected as the chairman of the selection committee. Also, he played a total of 88 matches for India between 1984 and 1994, including 23 Test matches and 65 ODIs..

Source : Indian Express

Correct Answer :   4th Edition

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India and Japan will kick off an exercise ‘Ex Dharma Guardian’ at Camp Imazu in Shiga Province, Japan from February 17 to March 2, 2023. The Indian Army contingent arrived at the exercise location on February 12, 2023.

This will be the 4th edition of the Exercise ‘Dharma Guardian’ between India and Japan. 

Exercise Dharma Guardian will strengthen bilateral ties and the level of defence cooperation between the Indian Army and the Japanese Ground Self-Defense Force.

Troops of the Garhwal Rifles Regiment of the Indian Army and an infantry regiment from the Middle Army of the Japan Ground Self Defence Force (JGSDF) are participating in the exercise this year to share experiences gained during operations in order to enhance inter-operability in planning and execution.

Focus : The training will focus primarily on a high degree of physical fitness and sharing of drills at the tactical level. During the exercise, participants will engage in a variety of missions ranging from joint planning, joint tactical drills, basics of establishing integrated surveillance grids, including the employment of aerial assets...

Source : AIR

Correct Answer :   Velocity

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Homegrown financial technology firm Velocity on Monday (13th February 2023) launched India’s first AI chatbot integrated with OpenAI’s ChatGPT, called “Lexi".

Velocity has integrated this latest advancement in artificial intelligence with its existing analytics tool, Velocity Insights.

A chatbot is a computer program that uses Artificial intelligence and Natural Language Processing (NLP) to understand and answer the queries put by customers.

Velocity introduces Indian version of ChatGPT :

"We are thrilled to launch India’s first chatbot tool that is integrated with ChatGPT. We have integrated this latest advancement in artificial intelligence with our existing analytics tool – Velocity Insights," the blog post by Velocity reads.

The CEO and co-founder of Velocity, Abhiroop Medhekar, said in the same blog post that the product teams had been thinking of ways to use the ChatGPT technology for the benefit of their customers.

Velocity insights helps businesses to keep a tab on their market spending, revenues, and so on. It provides founders with necessary business insights, which can be accessed via WhatsApp in the form of a daily business report.

Now that ChatGPT has been integrated in the same WhatsApp interface, customers will be able to use the AI, Lexi.

The integration of ChatGPT with Velocity Insights empowers eCommerce founders by providing them with AI-powered business insights in a conversational manner, freeing up time for critical business functions...

Source : India Today

Correct Answer :   Deepti Sharma

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* Indian women's team all-rounder Deepti Sharma, on Thursday (15th February 2023), became India’s leading wicket-taker in T20Is.

* The off-break bowler accomplished the feat in India’s T20 World Cup 2023 Group B match against Hayley Matthews’ West Indies at the Newlands in Cape Town.

* Deepti went past leg-spinner Poonam Yadav, who has 98 wickets from 72 matches, to set a new record for India.

* She also became the first Indian bowler to pick up 100 wickets in T20Is and the ninth overall in women’s cricket after Anisa Mohammed, Nida Dar, Ellyse Perry, Shabnim Ismail, Megan Schutt, Katherine Brunt, Sophie Devine and Anya Shrubsole to the milestone.

* Among the Indian men’s team, Yuzvendra Chahal is on top of the tree with 91 wickets from 75 matches.  Bhuvneshwar Kumar is second in the list with 90 wickets from 87 matches...

Source : India Today

Correct Answer :   Rishab Shetty

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Kantara star Rishab Shetty adds another feather to his cap. The actor has been honoured with the Most Promising Actor Award at the Dadasaheb Phalke International Film Festival Award 2023.

* The award has been given to the actor for his stellar performance in the Kannada film last year (2022). Kantara was not only praised by critics but also emerged as one of the biggest pan-India blockbusters of 2022, receiving much love from fans.

* Directed and starring Rishab Shetty, Kantara revolves around a Kamabala champion who is at loggerheads with a forest officer.

* The film was praised for the performances and for keeping intact the nuances of the traditions shown, including that of the Bhoota Kola performer.

* The Dadashab Phalke International Film Festival Award 2023 will reportedly take place on 20th February 2023 in Mumbai.

* The film recently completed 100 days of its release. On the occasion, Rishab announced Kantara 2. Rishab shared that what the audience has seen for now is actually part 2 and therefore what will be released next is Kantara’s prequel. Dropping hint about the release date, the actor also revealed that the film is likely to hit theatres in 2024...

Source : News18

Correct Answer :   India and US

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A joint counter-terrorism exercise between National Security Guard (NSG) and US Special Operations Forces (SOF) culminated in Chennai on February 14, 2023 after four weeks of intense training and joint anti-terror exercises.

Highlights :  The main highlight of the exercise was mock drills for the CBRN (Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear) counter terror response by special forces of both countries.

The training regimen of the exercise included the conduct of urban counter-terrorism drills, combat shooting and practice of long-range marksmanship, to enhance mutual warfare capabilities.

The NSG Director General MA Ganapathy said, "NSG needs to be prepared to keep in mind the future challenges and threats.”

“For this, capabilities have been developed to effectively deal with CBRN threats,'' the NSG Director General further said. Moreover, the NSG Director General stressed that mock drills have been conducted considering the challenges of urban warfare. The drills included para-slithering of SF commandos from IAF choppers.

What is Exercise Tarkash?

Exercise Tarkash is a counter-terrorism exercise between India’s National Security Guard (NSG) and US Special Operations Forces (SOF).

AIM : The main aim of this exercise is to train commandos of both the special forces units for the implementation of rapid neutralisation of enemies, the rescuing of hostages and neutralise the threat of chemical weapons.

Notably, this was the first instance in the exercise's history where Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Terror response (CBRN) drills were conducted. CBRN weapons are classified as weapons of mass destruction and have been used by states and terror elements in the past.

In the current geopolitical landscape, Exercise Tarkash is a significant one as India is surrounded by two nuclear-armed neighbours, China and Pakistan. Furthermore, Pakistan has a history of issuing nuclear threats. Notably, China has surpassed the United States in possession of nuclear warheads, according to STRATCOM...

Source : Republic World