19 November 2014 Daily Current Affairs Updates

1) ISRO chosen for Indira Gandhi prize for peace, disarmament 2014: Indian space agency ISRO will be conferred the Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace, Disarmament and Development for 2014 in recognition of its contribution in strengthening international cooperation in peaceful use of outer space. The award jury, chaired by Vice President Hamid Ansari, made the announcement 0n 19 November 2014. "The Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace, Disarmament and Development is awarded to the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) in recognition of its path-breaking achievement, culminating in the Mars orbiter mission, its significant contribution in strengthening international cooperation in peaceful use of outer space," a statement said.

2) Nation remembered Indira Gandhi on her 97th birth anniversary: President Pranab Mukherjee, Vice President Hamid Ansari and top leaders paid rich tributes to former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on her 97th birth anniversary. Congress President Sonia Gandhi, party Vice President Rahul Gandhi and former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh were among the Congress leaders who paid floral tributes to the departed leader at her memorial Shakti Sthal on the banks of river Yamuna.

3) 'Vape' chosen as Oxford English Dictionary's word of the year for 2014: Vape, a verb meaning to inhale or exhale the vapour produced by an electronic cigarette has been named as the word of the year 2014 by Oxford Dictionaries. The title is usually given to a word whose usage has increased exponentially during the year to date. The winning word should "reflect the ethos, mood or preoccupations of that particular year and to have lasting potential as a word of cultural significance".

4) India's Internet user-base to cross 300 million by December-end: Buoyed by strong growth in Internet consumption on mobile devices, the number of people online in India is forecast to touch 302 million by end of this year, overtaking the US as the second-largest Internet market in the world. According to a report by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) and IMRB International, the number of Internet users in India is expected to grow 32 per cent to 302 million this year from 213 million at the end of December last year.

5) China in focus at 45th IFFI: China will be the country in focus at the 45th International Film Festival in Goa. A variety of films will be showcased. The films in this section are 'American Dreams in China', 'Beijing Blues', ' Caught In The Web', 'Christmas Rose', 'Feng Shui', 'Finding Mr. Right', ''The Great Hypnotist', 'Out Of Inferno' and 'Silent Witness'.

6) World Toilet Day observed on 19 November: The World Toilet Day (WTD) was observed across the world on 19 November 2014. In 2001 WTO declared 19 November World Toilet Day (WTD).  The World Toilet Organization created World Toilet Day to raise global awareness of the struggle 2.5 billion face every day without access to proper, clean sanitation.

7) Indian-American student wins 2014 International Children's Peace Prize: Indian-American student Neha Gupta has won the 2014 International Children's Peace Prize Award for her exceptional work to raise money for underprivileged children around the world. Netherlands King Willem-Alexander, former archbishop and Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu and Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai presented Gupta with her award during a ceremony at The Hague, Netherlands on 19 November 2014.

8) Twitter opened up search engine to access every tweet ever: Twitter has re-designed its search engine so that it displays all tweets ever sent through the service — allowing users to watch historical events as they unfolded on social media, as well as to find embarrassing posts that had previously been lost to the mists of time.

9) Bharatiya Mahila Bank launches net banking: Bharatiya Mahila Bank Ltd (BMB) on Wednesday launched its internet banking facility by the name ‘BMBSmartBanking’. This facility was launched at the hands of Usha Ananthasubramanian, Chairman and Managing Director, BMB. A newly designed website of the bank was also launched. Currently, this women focused bank has branch network of 33 branches and all of them on core banking solutions with onsite ATMs.

10) IBM launched new email service Verse: International Business Machine Corp has launched a new e-mail application for businesses that integrates social media, file sharing and analytics to learn a user's behavior and predict interactions with coworkers. The application is part of IBM's attempt to shift its focus to cloud computing and data analytics from the hardware services that had long been the company's bread and butter. The new e-mail service, known as IBM Verse, includes a built-in personal assistant that can learn from a user's behavior and draft responses to e-mails based on similar previous interactions.