Daily Current Affairs : 18th September 2013

1. Tony Abbott has been sworn-in as the new Prime Ministerof Australia. 55 year-old Abbott took oath at the Government House in Canberra, in front of Governor-General Quentin Bryce.

2. Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan is likely to maintain his predecessor Duvvuri Subbarao's “hawkish” policy and keep key rates on hold due to continued inflationary pressure and the volatility in rupee, analysts say.

3. ICICI Prudential Life Insurance has launched ICICI Pru Easy Retirement, a unit-linked plan that enables customers to build their retirement corpus. The plan provides customers the flexibility to choose their equity exposure according to their risk appetite. 

4. Bhartiya Mahila Bank, the first nationalized bank for women expected to be operational from November, intends to recruit 115 officers initially.

5. Market regulator, SEBI has inked a Memorandum of Understanding, MoU with its counterpart in Argentina to promote mutual assistance and exchange information related to securities markets in both the countries. 

6. New Zealand has opened its embassy in Myanmar, Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully announced Wednesday. 

7. India's impressive show at the World Wrestling Championships continued as Bajrang bagged a bronze medal in the 60kg freestyle category with an overwhelming 9-2 win over Mangolia's Nyam-Ochir Enkhsaikhan in a match which was held in Budapest on Tuesday. 

8. Tigmanshu Dhulia was presented the best director award for Paan Singh Tomar at the 11th Norway Bollywood Film Festival at a packed Loreskog cinema center in Oslo on Tuesday. While filmmaker Rahul Mittra bagged the Best Producer award for his last year's
hit Saheb Biwi Aur Gangster Returns, Jimmy Sheirgill got the best actor award for the same film. 

9. Sebastiaan Bowier, a 23-year-old Dutch cyclist breaks the world land speed record record, hitting more than 133.78kph as he sped through a US desert, to become the planet's fastest cyclist. 

10. Himachal Pradesh government is all set to launch the Food Security programme in the state from 20th September. 

11. P. Sudhakar took over as the Chairman & Managing Director of the Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL) on 16 September 2013. 

12. Rohan Kokane, a 12 year old Indian roller skating enthusiast, made it into the 2014 edition of the Guinness Book of World Records released on 12 September 2013. He is one of the youngest new record breakers to make it into the Guinness Book. He is from Belgaum in Karnataka.

13. Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani teen shot by the Taliban for championing girls' education, and US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden have been nominated for the European Parliament's prestigious "Sakharov human rights prize" on 17 September 2013. 

14. India continue to occupy the number one position in the latest International Cricket Council, ICC ODI rankings with 123 rating points followed by Australia with 115 and England with 111 points.

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