Daily Current Affairs: 25th January 2014

1) National Voters day celebrated: Election Commission of India celebrated the 4th National Voters Day across the country on 25 January 2014. The theme for the 4th NVD is Ethical Voting. National Voters Day is started from 25 January 2011.

2) Mohinder Singh, Radhakrishnan get Communal Harmony awards: National Communal Harmony Award for Mohinder Singh for his work done in restoring peace after the 1984 anti-Sikh riots and noted academician N Radhakrishnan for his promotion of Gandhian values were announced on Saturday. Singh, along with Gandhian Radhakrishnan of Kerala, have been selected for the coveted award in the individual category while the Centre for Study of Society and Secularism, Mumbai has been selected in the organisation category.

3) Kamal Haasan, Vidya Balan, JS Verma, Yuvraj among 127 Padma awardees: Noted scientist RA Mashelkar, yoga expert BKS Iyenger, actors Kamal Haasan and Vidya Balan, tennis player Leander Paes, cricketer Yuvraj Singh, and former chief justice of India, the late JS Verma were Saturday conferred the Padma awards on the eve of the 65th Republic Day. While Mashelkar and Iyengar were the two named for Padma Vibhushan, 24 eminent people including Verma, Justice Dalveer Bhandari, Haasan, writers Anita Desai and Ruskin Bond, badminton player P Gopichand and Paes got the Padma Bhushan. Padma Awards - the country's highest civilian awards, are conferred to eminent people for their contribution in the field of social work, public affairs, science and engineering, trade and industry, medicine, literature and education, sports, civil service.

4) Japanese PM Shinzo Abe arrived in New Delhi: Japanese PM Shinzo Abe, who will be chief guest at this year's Republic day Parade, arrived in New Delhi on a three-day official trip to India. Abe, accompanied by his wife Mrs Akie Abe, is visiting India on the invitation of PM Manmohan Singh. During his three-day trip (25 -27 Jan), Abe is scheduled to hold talks with PM Manmohan Singh for the Annual Summit between India and Japan.

5) Third ODI between India-New Zealand ends in a thrilling tie:  Ravindra Jadeja very nearly pulled off a sensational victory with some lusty hits but could not take India home in the last over as the third ODI against New Zealand ended in a nail-biting tie to keep the visitors afloat in the five-match series on Saturday. Chasing New Zealand's stiff target of 315 largely built around opener Martin Guptill's 111, India came back from the dead to tie the game, riding on R Ashwin's 65 and Jadeja's 45-ball unbeaten 66 to save themselves the blushes of another overseas ODI series defeat.

6) India regain top ODI ranking after Australia lose to England:  India regained back their No 1 ranking in the ICC ODI list after Australia lost their fourth one day international against England by 57 runs thereby dropping to the second place in the 13-team table.

7)  Li Na won Australia Open 2014 singles title: Li Na made it third time lucky in the Australian Open final, beating Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia 7-6 (3), 6-0 on Saturday to become the oldest woman to clinch the title in the Open era. In doing so, she became the oldest winner of the women's title, surpassing Margaret Court who was 30 when she became champion in 1973.