• Prime Minister Narendra Modi virtually addressed the World Environment Day event, which was jointly organised by the Ministry ofPetroleum & Natural Gas and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change.
• During the event, PM Modi also released the “Report of the Expert Committee on Road Map for ethanol blending in India 2020-2025”.
• The theme of the report is ‘promotion of biofuels for better environment’.
• Apart from this, he also launched Pilot Project of E-100 ethanol dispensing stations at three locations in Pune, for the production and distribution of ethanol across the country, because ethanol have a better impact on the environment as well as on the lives of farmers.
• Government has reset the target to achieve 20 percent ethanol blending in petrol by 2025. Earlier this target was to be met by 2030.
• As a part of WED 2021, Government of India has released E-20 notification, directing Oil Companies to sell ethanol blended petrol with percentage of ethanol up to 20% from April 01, 2023, and BIS Specifications for higher ethanol blends E12 & E15.

• The Punjab cabinet gave its nod for the creation of a special purpose vehicle (SPV) for operations and maintenance of large multi-village surface water supply schemes across the state.
• The move is aimed to ensure supply of potable water on a long term sustainable basis in rural areas of water quality affected districts.
• This SPV — Punjab Rural Water (Utility) Company — under the Water Supply and Sanitation department will be a utility company.
• The cabinet, chaired by Chief Minister Amarinder Singh, also accorded approval to open an account in the name of the SPV, with seed money of Rs. 25 crore allocated from the World Bank funds (64 per cent) and state budget (36 per cent), to support its functioning in the initial five years, it said.

• The UN Russian Language Day is observed annually on 06 June.
• It is one of the six official languages used by the United Nations throughout the Organization.
• The day was established by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 2010.
• 6 June is chosen as UN Russian Language Day as it coincides with the birthday of Aleksandr Pushkin, a Russian poet who is considered the father of modern Russian language.
• Each of the six official language has been assigned a day of celebration by UN’s Department of Public Information in 2010 to celebrate multilingualism and cultural diversity as well as to promote equal use of all six official languages throughout the Organization.

• ICICI Bank has tied up with Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT) to offer the facility, called ‘SWIFT gpi Instant’, for cross border inward payments.
• This facility helps overseas partner banks to send instant remittances on behalf of their customers to the beneficiary in India and the beneficiary will get the credit to the bank account instantly.
• The ‘SWIFT gpi Instant’ offers instant transfer of up to Rs 2 lakh personal remittance into the beneficiary account.
• With this ICICI Bank is the first lender in Asia-Pacific and the second globally to offer ‘SWIFT gpi Instant’ facility, for cross border inward payments.

• The NITI Aayog Vice-Chairperson Dr Rajiv Kumar released the third edition of the SDG India Index and Dashboard 2020–21 on June 03, 2021.
• The basic aim of the index is to comprehensively monitor and rank the progress made by States and Union Territories towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).
• The theme of SDG India Index and Dashboard 2020–21 is Partnerships in the Decade of Action.
• The third edition covers 16 Goals of SDG, with a qualitative assessment on Goal 17 and 115 quantitative indicators, covering 70 SDG targets.
• States and Union Territories are ranked based on their SDG India Index score as below:

• The Union Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ has announced that the validity period of the Teachers Eligibility Test (TET) qualifying certificate has been extended from the present 7 years to lifetime with retrospective effect from 2011.
• Now, the respective state government and union territories will take necessary action to issue fresh TET certificates to those candidates whose 7 years period has already elapsed.
• This decision will prove to be a positive step in increasing the employment opportunities for candidates aspiring to make a career in the teaching field.

• The Reserve Bank of India has launched a separate liquidity window of Rs. 15,000 crore certain contact-intensive sectors.
• These shall include hotels and restaurants; tourism – travel agents, tour operators and adventure/heritage facilities; aviation ancillary services – ground handling and supply chain; and other services that include private bus operators, car repair services, rent-a-car service providers, event/conference organisers, spa clinics, and beauty parlours/saloons.
• The tenors of this window shall be of up to three years at a rate of repo rate. The facility will be available till March 31, 2022.
• Under this scheme, RBI has advised commercial banks to create a COVID loan book. The loans given to contact-intensive sectors under this window shall form a part of this COVID loan book. Now banks will have the facility to park their surplus liquidity up to the size of the COVID loan book with RBI at a rate of (Repo Rate-0.25%). (special 14-day reverse repo window will be opened for this.)

• Kerala-based Thomas Vijayan, who is now settled in Canada, has won 2021 Nature TTL Photography Awards for his photo of an Orangutan clinging to a tree.
• The photograph is titled ‘The World is Going Upside Down’.
• Vijayan was adjudged as the overall winner of the competition from over 8,000 entries for Nature TTL Photographer of the Year 2021, which carries grand prize of 1,500 pounds (Rs.1.5 lakh).
• Nature TTL is the world’s leading online nature photography resource.  

• The European Union and an energy investment programme founded by Bill Gates plan to raise up to $1 billion to roll out the low-carbon technologies Europe is betting on to meet its climate change goals.
• The partnership would see Gates-founded Breakthrough Energy use private capital and philanthropic funds to match funding provided by the EU. The aim is to together provide up to 820 million euros, or $1 billion, from 2022 to 2026.
• Support will target hydrogen produced from renewable energy, sustainable aviation fuels, technology to suck CO2 out of the atmosphere, and long-duration energy storage.

• Noted Indian economist Kalpana Kochhar, who heads the Human Resources Department of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), is retiring next month after serving for over three decades with the organisation to join the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
• Ms. Kochhar, who served in various senior positions during her three decades at the IMF, will retire on July 30, and will join as Director of Development Policy and Finance, at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Download Daily GK PDF of 06 June 2021