Banking Current Affairs

Navtej Sarna's novel Crimson Spring won the 2025 Sahitya Akademi Award for English. Sarna, a former IFS officer who served as India's Ambassador to the US, had been writing fiction alongside his diplomatic career.

The awards were announced on 16 March 2026, months after the Akademi had to cancel its original December 2025 press conference when the Ministry of Culture asked for a review of the awards process.

The discussions aimed to strengthen economic cooperation by expanding trade and investment between India and MERCOSUR member countries.

Cassandra Kulukundis won the inaugural Best Casting Oscar for One Battle After Another. The Academy had first announced this category in February 2024. It is the first new competitive Oscar category since Best Animated Feature was introduced in 2001.

Norway's Sentimental Value, directed by Joachim Trier, won the Best International Feature Film at the 98th Academy Awards. The film also received acting and other nominations that night.

Sinners received 16 nominations at the 98th Academy Awards, breaking the previous all-time record of 14, which had been held jointly by All About Eve (1951), Titanic (1998) and La La Land (2017). Despite 16 noms, Sinners won four awards.

Jessie Buckley won the Best Actress Oscar for her role as Agnes, William Shakespeare's partner, in Hamnet. Her win made her the first Irish woman ever to take the Best Actress Oscar.

Michael B. Jordan won the Best Actor Oscar for his dual performance as Smoke and Stack in Sinners, Ryan Coogler's supernatural thriller set in the Jim Crow-era South. It was his first Oscar nomination and first win.

One Battle After Another, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, won the Best Picture Oscar at the 98th Academy Awards on 15 March 2026. The film won six awards in total that night — the most of any film at the ceremony.

India's space economy, currently around $8 billion, is targeted to reach $44 billion by 2033-2040, driven by private sector participation and government ambition.

Lathmar Holi is celebrated in Barsana and Nandgaon in Mathura district, Uttar Pradesh — where women beat men with sticks (lathis) in a traditional festival.

18. Vairamuthu was named the recipient of the 60th Jnanpith Award for 2025, announced by Bharatiya Jnanpith in March 2026. He is the third Tamil writer to receive the award after Akilan (1975) and Jayakanthan (2002), and the first to be honoured primarily for poetry rather than prose. The selection committee was chaired by Pratibha Ray, who herself won the Jnanpith in 2011.

BrahMos is a joint venture between India (DRDO) and Russia (NPO Mashinostroyeniya), not Israel. It is named after the Brahmaputra and Moskva rivers.

The Philippines was the first country to receive the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile from India under a USD 375 million deal signed in 2022, marking a landmark defence export.

Exercise Shakti is a biennial joint military exercise between the Indian Army and the French Army. India-France have a strategic partnership since 1998.

The IBC 2016 consolidated the insolvency framework in India, providing time-bound resolution of insolvency for companies, partnerships, and individuals.

Atmanirbhar Bharat (Self-Reliant India) was launched in 2020, with a Rs 20 lakh crore package covering PLI schemes, infrastructure push, and reducing import dependence.

NIFTY 50 is the benchmark index of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) of India comprising 50 major stocks. SENSEX is BSE's benchmark index with 30 stocks.

Cheetahs had become extinct in India by 1952. They were reintroduced on September 17, 2022 at Kuno NP, Madhya Pradesh — 8 from Namibia initially.

India reintroduced cheetahs in September 2022 at Kuno National Park, Madhya Pradesh — initially 8 cheetahs from Namibia, followed by 12 from South Africa in 2023.