Daily GK Update 9th Feb 2015

Two Indians win Grammy this year

(i) India-based Ricky Kej’s collaborated album Winds Of Samsara won the Best New Age Album trophy at the 57th Annual Grammy Awards here.

(ii) Ricky teamed up with South African musician Wouter Kellerman for the album, which symbolises peace and harmony.

(iii) The website of the album describes the project as a “truly global effort”, which draws inspiration from two cultures. 

(iv) The music of the album blends in the creative influences of the cultures to generate a sound of calmness and positivity.

The Lunchbox loses to Polish film at BAFTA

(i) Internationally acclaimed Hindi movie The Lunchbox missed the trophy for the ‘Film Not in the English Language’ category of the BAFTA Awards 2015 to Polish-Danish drama movie Ida, which was named the winner at the ceremony here on Sunday night.

(ii) The list of winners for the 68th edition of the annual gala was announced on the official website of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Awards.

(iii) Actor Nimrat Kaur, the leading lady of The Lunchbox — a unique love story of a lovelorn wife and a lonely man — was seen on the red carpet in a pink gown.

Govt. to probe new Indian names in HSBC list: Jaitley

(i) Finance Minister Arun Jaitley on Monday said new names of Indians with Swiss bank accounts have come up and their veracity will be checked while 60 prosecutions have already been launched, as a fresh HSBC list revealed by an international body of journalists named more Indians, including big corporates and political leaders.

(ii) Mr. Jaitley said that the tax department has launched 60 prosecutions from an earlier list of Indian account holders in a Swiss branch of HSBC bank and most of the names revealed in today’s list are known to the government.

NITI Aayog: Telangana seeks sector-centric fund allocation

(i) Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has sought a change of policy in the allocation of funds by the Centre from the existing scheme-specific to sector-centric at the first meeting of the National Institution for Transforming India (NITI) Aayog chaired by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Delhi on Sunday.

(ii) Mr. Rao sought the change by explaining that the scheme-specific fund allocation was leading to discrimination in availing Central funds by some States, whose requirements were elsewhere in the same sector than in the scheme specified by the Centre. 

(iii) Sources told The Hindu that Mr. Rao had cited the examples of the Centre’s fund allocation for schemes to fight tuberculosis and to improve enrolment of children in schools by opening new schools.

Rising global debt, a scary sign

(i) Here are two things we know about how debt affects the economy.

(ii) First, in the abstract it doesn’t matter. For every debtor there is a creditor, and, in theory, an economy should be able to hum along just fine whether a country’s citizens have a great deal of debt or none. 

(iii) A company’s ability to produce things depends on the workers and machines it employs, not the composition of its balance sheet, and the same can be said of nations.

(iv) Second, in practice this is completely wrong, and debt plays an outsize role in creating boom-bust cycles across the world and through history. 

(v) High debt increases the amplitude of economic swings. To think of it in terms of the corporate metaphor, high reliance on borrowed money may not affect a company’s level of output in theory, but makes it a great deal more vulnerable to bankruptcy.

Vodafone India appoints Naveen Chopra as Chief Operating Officer

(i) Vodafone India on Monday announced the appointment of Naveen Chopra as Chief Operating Officer (COO) with effect from April 1, 2015.

(ii) Mr. Chopra, currently Director — Vodafone Business Services (VBS), will succeed Sunil Sood, who will be the MD and CEO of the company effective April 1.

(iii) Vodafone had earlier said that Mr. Sood would replace Marten Pieters as the head of the company.

(iv) Mr. Pieters, who has been its Chief Executive since 2009, is the longest serving Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of a telecom firm in the country.

Grammies announced

• Record of the Year - "Stay with Me," Sam Smith
• Song of the Year - "Stay with Me" (Darkchild Version)
• Album of the Year - Morning Phase, Beck
• Best Country Album - Platinum, Miranda Lambert
• Best R&B Performance - "Drunk in Love," Beyoncé
• Best Rock Album - Morning Phase, Beck
• Best Pop Vocal Album - In the Lonely Hour, Sam Smith
• Best Pop Solo Performance - "Happy," Pharrell Williams
• Best New Artist - Sam Smith
• Best Rap/Sung Collaboration - "Monster," by Rihanna and Eminem
• Best Rap Album - The Marshall Mathers LP2, Eminem
• Best R&B Song - "Drunk in Love," Beyonce
• Pop duo/group performance - "Say Something", A Great Big World with Christina Aguilera
• Best Rock performance - Lazaretto, Jack White
• Best Children's Album - I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up For Education And Changed The World (Malala Yousafzai)
• Best Musical Theater Album - Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, 
• Jessie Mueller, principal soloist; Jason Howland, Steve Sidwell & Billy Jay Stein, producers (Carole King, composer & lyricist) (Original Broadway Cast)