Prime Minister Narendra Modi has left for Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan this morning to attend the meeting of Council of Heads of States of Shanghai Cooperation Organization -SCO.

Presidents and Prime Ministers of 8 member countries will participate in this multilateral international forum which will also be attended by 4 head of states as observers.

The SCO is a China-led eight-member economic and security bloc.  In July 2015 in Ufa, Russia, the SCO decided to admit India and Pakistan as full members and both the countries officially joined SCO as full members during the Astana Summit in 2017.

Important issues including global security situation, multilateral economic cooperation, people-to-people exchanges and topical issues of international and regional importance will be discussed during the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Summit.

British consumer goods giant Reckitt Benckiser named PepsiCo executive Laxman Narasimhan as its Chief Executive Officer on Wednesday. Narasimhan was serving as PepsiCo's global Chief Commercial Officer. He will be join the company as CEO-deignate and will be appointed to the board on July 16.

The company said in a statement that he will become group CEO on September 1.

Reckitt Benckiser said in the statement that Narasimhan's initial priorities will be to focus on delivering outperformance, especially in the health business unit, and to drive the Lysol maker's plan to split the firm into two business units under the same company.

The Reserve Bank has constituted a high-level committee under IBA Chief Executive V G Kannan to examine ATM charges and fees by banks amid demands for reviewing the levies. The use of automated teller machines (ATMs) has been growing significantly and there have been persistent demands to change ATM charges and fees.

The six-member panel will review the existing structures and patterns of costs, charges and interchange fees for ATM transactions, the RBI said June 11.

The committee will also review the overall patterns of usage of ATMs by cardholders and assess the impact, if any, on charges and interchange fees.

The government will provide scholarships to five crore minority students in the next five years to ensure their socio-economic-educational empowerment. The scholarships include pre-matric, post-matric and merit-cum-means. 

Of the five crore students, 50  per cent will be girls students. Union Minister for Minority Affairs  Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said this while chairing the Governing and  General Body meetings of Maulana Azad Education Foundation in New Delhi yesterday. 

He said the NDA government is committed to inclusive growth with trust. 

The Minister also announced that Padho-Badho Awareness Campaign will be launched across the country. The campaign will be launched in 60 minority concentrated districts during the first phase. 

Nripendra Misra and PK Mishra were on Tuesday re-appointed as Principal Secretary and Additional Principal Secretary, respectively, to Prime Minister Narendra Modi with cabinet minister rank.

The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has approved both the appointments with effect from May 31, according to orders issued by the Personnel Ministry.

During the term of their office, they will be assigned the rank of Cabinet minister, the ministry said.

Nripendra Misra was on May 28, 2014 appointed the Principal Secretary to Modi. He is a 1967-batch retired IAS officer of Uttar Pradesh cadre.

Nripendra Misra, who has served in various capacities in the government, retired as the chairman of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) in 2009.

The Jnanpith award for the year 2018 will be given to the noted English writer Amitav Ghosh. Former Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi will present the award to him at a function in New Delhi today. The award is given for outstanding contribution in literature.

The new Cabinet of Andhra Pradesh, under the leadership of Chief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy, met for the first time on Monday and approved several key decisions taken by him during the past ten to eleven days after he took charge as the Chief Minister.

It was decided to hike the monthly pension for the aged from ₹2,000 to ₹2,250 and to hike the salaries of Aasha workers (health workers in rural areas) from ₹3,000 to 10,000 per month. It was decided to pay interim relief of 27 per cent to the Government employees and to set up a committee for making appropriate recommendations for doing away with the contributory pension scheme (CPS) for State government employees.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has accepted an invitation from French President to attend the outreach session of the G7 Summit in Biarritz as a special invitee.

The MEA Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said that the Prime Minister has received an invitation from the President of France Emmanuel Macron to attend the outreach session at the G-7 Summit in Biarritz as a special invitee. He was responding to queries relating to comments of the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs of France Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne regarding the invitation extended to India.

The MEA Spokesperson further said that the invitation is a reflection of the personal chemistry between the two leaders, a demonstration of our deepening strategic partnership and recognition of India as a major economic power. The 45th summit of the G7 group of countries is going to take place from August 24 to August 26 in Biarritz in France.

IV Subba Rao will continue as secretary to Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu as per an order issued by the Ministry of Personnel on Tuesday.

The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet has approved the continuation of Rao, a retired IAS officer, as secretary to the vice president on a contract basis in the rank and pay of a secretary of the Government of India, it said.

His tenure will be co-terminus with the tenure of the Vice President, the ministry said.

International Centre for Automotive Technology (ICAT) has released India’s first Type Approval Certificate (TAC) for BS VI emission norms for the two-wheeler segment. The aforementioned certificate was awarded to Hero MotoCorp for the Hero Splendor iSmart. Here's an interesting fact: Hero designed and developed the Splendor iSmart bike at its Centre for Innovation and Technology (CIT) in Jaipur, Rajasthan.

For those who do not know, in order for an automobile manufacturer to receive BS6 certification for their vehicles, first a prototype must be tested and approved by government agencies like ARAI (Automotive Research Association of India), GARC (Global Automotive Research Center), ICAT, etc.