Current Affairs December 2016 - Awards

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News 1 - UAE-based Indian teenager won the Children's Peace Prize

Indian teenager in the United Arab Emirates, Kehkashan Basu, has won this year’s prestigious International Children’s Peace Prize for her fight to save the planet.

Basu is an environmental activist fighting against climate justice. She founded her organisation Green Hope at the age of 12 which now has more than 1,000 volunteers in 10 countries around the world. It carries out environment-focused campaigns. The prize is awarded annually “to a child who fights courageously for children’s rights".

News 2 - La La Land won the Best Film at the New York Film Critics Circle

Musical romantic drama La La Land has been chosen as the best film of 2016 by the New York Film Critics Circle. It is also considered to be one of the Oscar frontrunners.

Other awards included:

• Best Actor − Casey Affleck for Manchester by the Sea.

• Best Actress − Isabelle Huppert for her work in both Elle and Things to Come.

• Best Director − Barry Jenkins for Moonlight.

News 3 - Actress Katy Perry honoured with the humanitarian award at the UNICEF event

Katy Perry received the Audrey Hepburn Humanitarian Award for her work as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador in support of the world’s most vulnerable children.

Katy Perry has served in this role since year 2013 with a special focus on engaging young people in UNICEF’s work, traveling to some of the poorest and most remote regions in Madagascar and Vietnam to bring awareness to UNICEF’s child protection, education and other health programs.

News 4 - Kaadu Pookkunna Neram to compete for BAFTA

Critically acclaimed Malayalam movie 'Kaadu Pookkunna Neram', written and directed by Dr. Biju has found a place in the list of films which are competing for the British Academy Film and Television Award nominations in different categories.

This movie is also competing in seven other categories including that of the best director, actor and actress and cinematographer. The nominations would be declared on the 10^th January, 2017. The movie revolves around the conflict between authority and activists who fight for the rights of marginalized.

News 5 - Star Screen Awards 2016

The 23^rd edition of the annual film awards show, Star Screen Awards, was held at Mumbai co-hosted by Salman Khan and Shah Rukh Khan.

Shoojit Sircar’s "Pink" bagged as many as four awards, including for the Best Film. Amitabh Bachchan won the Best Actor award for the film. Alia Bhatt received the Best Actress Award for Udta Punjab. Rekha was bestowed with the Lifetime achievement award. The Critics’ Choice award for the Best Actor went to Sushant Singh Rajput for “M.S. Dhoni – The Untold Story” and the Critics’ Choice award for the Best Actress went to Swara Bhaskar for “Nil Battey Sannata”.

News 6 - President presented the Shilp Guru Awards, National Awards

The President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee presented the Shilp Guru awards as well as the National Awards to master craftsperson’s at a function at the Rashtrapati Bhavan Cultural Centre in New Delhi.

These Shilp Guru Award consists of a gold coin, Rs. 2,00,000/- in cash, a Tamrapatra, an Angavastram and a certificate. The National Award consists of Rs. 1,00,000/- in cash, a Tamrapatra, an Angavastram and a certificate.

The Shilp Guru Awards, National Awards and National Merit Certificates are awarded to a craftsperson only once in a lifetime, to encourage master craftsperson’s.

News 7 - Helen Marten wins the 2016 Turner Prize

Sculptor and painter Helen Marten has won the 2016 Turner Prize. She received £25,000 as award. Marten uses sculpture, screen printing and writing to create her work. Marten had won the first-ever Hepworth Prize for sculpture last month.

The Turner prize is awarded to a British artist, under the age of 50, who is considered to have put on the best exhibition of the past year. It is named after the renowned English Painter J. M. W. Turner.

News 8 - BEML bags CII National Quality Award

The ‘CII National Quality 2016 Award’ was won by BEML Ltd, the Public-Sector Company under the Ministry of Defence.

BEML was awarded for practicing various EFQM Models (European Foundation for Quality Management) and achieving results. The award has been jointly instituted by the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) and the Export Import Bank (EXIM). The Chairman & Managing Director, BEML, Deepak Kumar Hota, received the award at a function held at Bengaluru.

News 9 - Petrotech 2016 awards presented

The Union Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister Shri Arun Jaitley presented the Petrotech 2016 awards in New Delhi. The key winners of the awards were −

• Lifetime Achievement Award in Upstream − Dr Avinash Chandra, Former DG, DGH

• Lifetime Achievement Award in Downstream − Shri P.S. Teckchandani, Swan Energy Ltd

• Lifetime Achievement Award in Midstream − Dr. C R Prasad, Former CMD, GAIL India Ltd

• Lifetime Achievement Award in R&D − Dr. Paul Ratnasamy, Chief Scientific Officer, Alphajet Inc

• Lifetime Achievement Award International − Mr. Igor Ivanovich Sechin, CEO, Rosneft

• Rising Star Award for Start-ups in Hydrocarbon sector − Planys Tech Pvt Ltd

• Best project Management team − HPCL and BPCL

• Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility (Corporate) − Cairn India Ltd

• Special Technology Award − Greening of oil and gas business: ONGC Ltd

News 10 - Indian documentary on Down Syndrome wins an international award

Indian filmmaker Onir’s documentary – Raising the Bar has won the Award of Recognition at the Australian film festival, which was held along with the Hollywood Independent Documentary Awards.

The documentary is based on six Indian and Australian youth who have Down syndrome. Onir is best known for his directorial films like I AM, My Brother Nikhil and Bas Ek Pal. He has also won the National Award for his film – I Am.

News 11 - John Kerry conferred with the highest French Civilian Distinction Legion of Honour

The US Secretary of State John Kerry was conferred with the highest French civilian distinction, Officer of the Legion of Honour for his contribution in the peace efforts.

The French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault presented Kerry with the insignia of the Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor at a ceremony in Paris. The Legion of Honor was created by Napoleon Bonaparte and is France's highest military and civilian decoration. Foreign nationals, who have served France in one way or the other are eligible for the honour.

News 12 - Ratan Tata awarded the 'Global Agriculture Leadership Award 2016' by ICFA

Indian Council of Food and Agriculture (ICFA) awarded the ‘Global Agriculture Leadership Award 2016’ to Tata Sons Interim Chairman Ratan Tata for his overall contributions spanning over five decades through industry-led development of the Indian economy and agriculture, which positively impacted the lives of millions of people in India and globally.

He was awarded the ‘Lifetime Achievement Award 2016’ for his role to help Tata Group be recognized as the globally admired group.

News 13 - BEML conferred with CEPM Fellowship Award

Shri Deepak Kumar Hota, Chairman & Manaing Director, BEML LIMITED, a Public Sector undertaking under the Ministry of Defence has been conferred with the CEPM Fellowship Award 2016 at the 24^th Global Symposium organized by the Centre for Excellence in Project Management.

This Award was bestowed on Shri Hota in recognition of his commitment in transforming and driving organizational capabilities through human centric approach.

News 14 - Maharashtra Chief Minister Selected for SIES - Kanchi Seer Award

Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis has been selected for the SIES Sri Chandrasekarendra Saraswati National Eminence Award for Public Leadership. Similarly, ISRO Chairman Mr. A S Kiran Kumar was selected for Science & Technology Category. UK-based scholar John Ralston Marr was selected for his work in the International category and Hari Katha exponent Kamala Murthy was selected in the Social Thinkers, Philosophers and Pravachana Karthas category.

Each award carries a cash prize of Rs 2.5 lakhs, a citation, a shawl and an ornamental lamp. The awards were instituted by the South Indian Education Society (SIES) in 1998 in the memory of the late Seer of Kanchi, Sri Chandrasekarendra Saraswati.

News 15 - National Commission for Protection of Child Rights gets SKOCH Awards for POCSO e-Box

The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) of Ministry of Women and Child Development has been conferred the SKOCH Silver and SKOCH Order-of Merit award.

These two awards were received by the NCPCR for applying technology to develop an electronic drop box, POCSO e-Box for registering complaints on Child Sexual Abuse.

POCSO e-box is a unique endeavor by NCPCR for receiving online complaint of Child Sexual Abuse directly from the victim.

News 16 - Sahitya Akademi awards announced

Sahitya Akademi announced its annual Sahitya Academi awards for year 2016 in 24 languages. The noted English novelist Jerry Pinto has got the award for his novel Em and the Big Hoom and Hindi Author Nasira Sharma has been named for the award for her novel Paarijat.

Other awarded novelists are Boluwaru Mohammad Kunhi for Swatantryada Ota in Kannada, Edwin JFD Souza for Kale Bhangar in Konkani and Gita Upadhyay for Janmabhumi Mero Swadesh in Nepali.

News 17 - HRD ministry conferred with the Web Ratna Digital India Award – 2016

The Ministry of Human Resource Development website has been given the Platinum Award in the Web Ratna Category in the recently concluded Digital India awards, 2016.

Digital India awards, earlier known as the Web Ratna Awards, were instituted under the Ambit of National Portal of India. The award acknowledges exemplary initiatives of various government entities in the realm of e-governance. These awards are conferred by the Ministry of Electronics and IT to promote more innovative e-governance initiatives by the government entities.

News 18 - Kaisa Matomaki and Maksym Radziwill honoured with the SASTRA Ramanujan award

The 2016 SASTRA-Ramanujan award for mathematics was presented to Maksym Radziwill of McGill University, Canada and Kaisa Matomaki of University of Turku, Finland for their mathematical work on properties of numbers. They were presented with $10,000 prize money.

Kaisa Matomaki from Finland’s University of Turku is the first woman to receive this prize since it was instituted in 2005. The SASTRA Ramanujan Prize is awarded every year to a young mathematician judged to have done outstanding work in Ramanujan's fields of interest.

News 19 - Bengali poet Shankha Ghosh to receive the 2016 Jnanpith Award

The Jnanpith Selection Board chose eminent modern Bengali poet Shri Shankha Ghosh as the recipient of the 52^nd Jnanpith Award for 2016. Ghosh has written several poems including ‘Adim lata-gulmomay’, ‘Murkha baro, samajik nay’, ‘Kabir abhipray’, ‘Mukh dheke jay bigyapane’ and ‘Babarer prarthana’.

The Jnanpith Award is an Indian literary award presented annually to an author for their "outstanding contribution towards literature". The award consists of a citation plaque, a cash prize of ₹1 lakh and a bronze replica of Saraswati.

News 20 - Rajasthani writer Satya Narayan chosen for Bihari Puraskar

Eminent Rajasthani litterateur Satya Narayan has been chosen for the 26^th Bihari Puraskar, 2016 for his Hindi book titled, "Yeh Ek Dunia". The book was published in 2010.

Bihari Puraskar is a literary award instituted by K. K. Birla Foundation and awarded to an outstanding work published in Hindi or Rajasthani by a Rajasthani writer. It carries a citation, a plaque and prize money of Rs. 1 lakh. Dr. Bhagwati Lal Vyas had won the award in 2015 ffor his Rajasthani Poetry, Kathe Sun Aawe Hai Sabad.