Daily Current Affairs Updates: 08 October 2014

1) 2014 Nobel Prize in chemistry announced: The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2014 to Eric Betzig Janelia Farm Research Campus, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Ashburn, VA, USA,Stefan W. HellMax Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, Göttingen, and German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany and William E. Moerner Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA “for the development of super-resolved fluorescence microscopy”. Read details>> http://goo.gl/E3cQDu

2) Anoop Jain wins 2014 Waislitz Global Citizen Award: A young Indian has won a prestigious global citizen award and USD 100,000 cash prize for his work to build community sanitation facilities, an area that aligns with Prime Minister Narendra Modi's commitment to ending open defecation, organisers of the award said. Anoop Jain was named recipient of the 2014 Waislitz Global Citizen Award for his "exemplified values of a Global Citizen" through his work in founding Humanure Power (HP) in Bihar in 2011 that builds community sanitation facilities in rural India.

3) Georgetown University appointed first Hindu priest: The Georgetown University has appointed its first Hindu priest —a woman — to serve the religious needs of its Hindu students, whose number has increased in recent years. Pratima Dharm, who recently retired as the first Hindu chaplain in the U.S. Army, has been appointed as the first Hindu chaplain at the Georgetown University, a move welcomed by the Hindu students of this top private research university. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Jesuit and Catholic university in the U.S. 

4) Jet Airways appointed Cramer Ball as new CEO: Jet Airways announced the appointment of its new CEO, aviation specialist Cramer Ball, after its earlier chief quit in January. The airline's activities were since that time being managed by Director and Manager Gaurang Shetty, who will continue to lead it "till the requisite approvals are obtained and Ball assumes charge as the CEO," said a Jet spokesperson. Jet's last CEO, Garry Kenneth Toomey, had quit in mid-January, barely seven months after taking charge of the airline.

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General Awareness Questions asked in IBPS PO IV Exam: 11 October 2014 (Morning Shift)

Friends.. Here are some GA questions asked in todays' morning shift IBPS PO Online Exam. Thanks to Pooja Mishra, Harikumar, Vinod KM, Ashraf Mohammad and Sneha Sharma for sharing the questions with us. Will useful for those having exams in coming days.

1) Currency of Spain? - Euro

2) Which freedom fighter was killed during protest of Simon Commission?- Lala lajpat Rai

3) Who is heading the commitee to take decision on Unclaimed PPF accounts in Post Offices?- HR Khan

4) Name the Music director of “Mile sur mera tumhara”- Ashok Patki

5) Capital of Arunachal Pradesh?- Itanagar

6) Serena Williams is associated with which game?- Tennis

7) Main objective of PM Jandhan Yojana? – Financial Inclusion

8) "India’s International Bank" is the tag line of?- Bank of Baroda

9) Author of Curtain Raiser?- Kandathil Sebastian

10) L in LAF Stands for?- Liquidity Adjustment Facility

11) S in RTGS Stands for?- Real Time Gross Settlement

12) Rupay Card launched by?- National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI)

13) There are how many languages in the currency printed by RBI?- 15 Languages

14) BKS Iyenger who passed away recently got which award?- Padma Vibhushan

15) ADR stands for? - American Depositary Receipt

16) Who is Donald Dusk? - Ex Prime Minister of Poland and next EU council head

17) Father of atomic Bomb?- J.Robert Oppenheimer

18) Prime Minister recently announced to build which city like Kyoto in his visit to Japan?- Varanasi (PM's constituency)

19) FAT full form?-  File Allocation Table

20) Ganesh Chathurthi made as public affairs by?-

21) NPCHE stands for?- National Programme for Health Care of the Elderly

22) Saving bank interest is decided by? – Individual Bank

23) As per 2011 census which city has least population? – Lakshadweep

24) NPA time limit?-90 days

25) Vijay Malya is defaulter for which firm?– Kingfisher Airlines

26) UN Agency for Cultural Science and Education?- UNESCO

27) Application used for purchasing online through monile?- Mobile Wallet

28) Which system enables linking of different banks to single platform?- CBS

29) Which city sends most Indian students to US for higher studies as per recent report?- Hyderabad

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Karnataka Circle Postal/Sorting Assistant Final Results Declared

Friends.. After long wait, the first final result of a Circle is out. Karnataka Circle has on 10 October 2014 published the final results of PA/SA Direct Recruitment for the year 2013-2014. They have published the list of 628 provisionally selected candidates in the examination held on 21-04-2014.

The write up along with the result read as follows:

1. The list is not in the order of merit.

2. All the candidates in the list have qualified in Computer/Typing Test (Paper-II) except physically handicapped candidates who have been exempted from attending typing test.

3. The list consists of candidates selected against UR/OBC/SC/ST/Ex-Serviceman, PH categories and GDS quota.

4. Further communication regarding division wise allottment, category against which selected and verification of records etc will follow.

5. Induction training for first batch of candidates will commence from 10th November 2014. Communication in this reagrd will be sent to candidates who accept offer of appointment , on completion of preappointment formalities. They are required to be in readiness to proceed to Postal Training Centre, Mysore for 8 weeks training.

6. As training at PTC, Mysore, will be conducted in batches, candidates who are not detailed in the first batch shall be trained at the local training centre for 2 weeks and deployed at the Post Offices. Subsequently they will be sent to PTC for formal training.

To view the results click on the following link.

Click Here to see result from official website

Alternate Link for Result: Click Here or Link 2

Results of other circles where typing test was held is expected to be out soon. Keep visiting for latest updates.

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Nobel Prize in Literature for 2014 to Patrick Modiano

Nobel Prize in Literature for 2014 

The Nobel Prize in Literature for 2014 is awarded to the French author

Patrick Modiano

“for the art of memory with which he has evoked the most ungraspable human destinies and uncovered the life-world of the occupation”.

-->  Paris' literary doyen Patrick Modiano has won literature's most coveted price for his unparalleled mastery in portraying loss and legacy.

--> The 69-years-old Modiano, legendary for shunning the limelight is the 11th literature laureate born in France and is known to be a modern master in depicting brooding themes surrounding "memory, identity and guilt".

--> He is known to be an authority on Paris with most of his epic works set in the city.

--> Modiano's struggle with his Jewish heritage is well known. He was born outside Paris to a Sephardic Jewish family with roots dating back to eminent rabbis in Greece. It haunted him for most part of his life having spent the early phase of his writing career bluffing away about his year of birth. He claimed he was born in 1947 in order to distance himself from the shame of the World War II.

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Daily Current Affairs: 07 October 2014

1) Karnataka HC rejected Jayalalithaa bail plea: In yet another setback to AIADMK general secretary Jayalalithaa, the Karnataka High Court on Tuesday refused to release her on bail and rejected her plea for suspending the four-year prison sentence imposed by the trial court on September 27 in the disproportionate assets case. The court also rejected similar pleas of the other convicts in the case — V.K. Sasikala, V.N. Sudhakaran and J. Elavarasi. Ms. Jayalalithaa and others may now have to move the Supreme Court for bail. The court adjourned the hearing of the appeal to October 24. The court’s rejection of bail came despite Special Public Prosecutor G. Bhavani Singh telling the Court that “he has no objection for the release of the convicts on conditional bail.” Justice A.V. Chandrashekara said in his order that “no ground has been made out” by the convicts for suspending the sentence.

2) 2014 Nobel Prize for Physics announced: 2014 Nobel Prize for Physics goes to Japanese Isamu Akasaki and Hiroshi Amano alongwith Shuji Nakamura (US) for their invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes (LED) which has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources. Read details>>http://goo.gl/CqtURg

3) President Presents Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award for excellence in Public Administration, Academics and Management: The President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee presented the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Award for Excellence in Public Administration, Academics and Management for the year 2014 to Dr. Apathukatha Sivathanu Pillai at Rashtrapati Bhavan on 07.10.2014. Speaking on the occasion, the President said, the annual Award for excellence in Public Administration, Academics and management was an occasion to remember the values and ideals of Shastriji.

4) Michael Phelps banned for six months, no 2015 worlds:  Michael Phelps, the 18-time Olympic swim champion arrested last week for drunk driving, was banned for six months by USA Swimming and dropped from the 2015 World Championships. Monday's punishments came six days after Phelps was apprehended by police in his hometown of Baltimore and charged with driving under the influence of alcohol, excessive speed and crossing the center line while driving inside a tunnel.

5) Nokia to shut down Chennai plant on November 1: Telecom gear maker Nokia said that it will shut down its Chennai plant from November 1 as Microsoft has terminated mobile purchase agreement from the the factory and it is left with no business. "Microsoft has informed Nokia that it will be terminating the manufacturing services defined in the agreement with effect from 1 November 2014. In absence of further orders from Microsoft, Nokia will suspend handset production at the Sriperumbudur facility from 1st November," Nokia said in a statement.

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Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2014

Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2014 announced 

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2014 to

Eric Betzig

Janelia Farm Research Campus, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Ashburn, VA, USA,

Stefan W. Hell

Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, Göttingen, and German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg, Germany

and

William E. Moerner

Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA

“for the development of super-resolved fluorescence microscopy”

--> The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced on Wednesday that for a long time, optical microscopy was held back by a presumed limitation: that it would never obtain a better resolution than half the wavelength of light.

--> Helped by fluorescent molecules, the Nobel laureates in Chemistry 2014 ingeniously circumvented this limitation. Their ground-breaking work has brought optical microscopy into the nano dimension.

--> In what has become known as nanoscopy, scientists visualize the pathways of individual molecules inside living cells. They can see how molecules create synapses between nerve cells in the brain; they can track proteins involved in Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and Huntington's diseases as they aggregate; they follow individual proteins in fertilized eggs as these divide into embryos.

--> It was all but obvious that scientists should ever be able to study living cells in the tiniest molecular detail. In 1873, the microscopist Ernst Abbe stipulated a physical limit for the maximum resolution of traditional optical microscopy: it could never become better than 0.2 micrometres.

--> Americans Betzig and Moerner and German scientist Hell have been awarded the Nobel prize in chemistry 2014 for having bypassed this limit. Due to their achievements the optical microscope can now peer into the nanoworld. Two separate principles are rewarded.

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Daily Current Affairs for exams: 06 October 2014

1) Nobel Prize for medicine 2014 announced: Nobel Prize for medicine 2014 awarded to British-American researcher John O'Keefe alongwith Norwegian couple, Edvard Moser and May-Britt Moser for their discovery of the brain's GPS system.  They revealed the mystery behind how the brain knows where we are and is able to navigate from one place to another. Read details: http://goo.gl/EJOwFZ

2) Eid-ul-Zuha celebrated across the nation: Lakhs of Muslims thronged mosques and Eidgahs on Monday to offer prayers as mass animal sacrifices, piety and spirit of brotherhood marked Eid-ul-Zuha which was celebrated across the country with traditional fervour. The celebrations were, however, a low-key affair in Jammu and Kashmir which is recovering from the losses of last month's devastating floods, with people observing austerity and many locals deciding to refrain from loud festivities.

3) Novak Djokovic thrashes Tomas Berdych to win fifth China Open title: Novak Djokovic thrashed Tomas Berdych in a one-sided contest to win his fifth China Open title on Sunday, while Maria Sharapova overcame Petra Kvitova 6-4, 2-6, 6-3 in the women’s final to move up to number two in the world rankings. Top seed Djokovic took 66 minutes to seal a 6-0, 6-2 win against Berdych, who raised his arms in celebration when he won a game to avoid the ignominy of a double bagel with the Serbian player leading 6-0, 5-0 and serving for the match.

4) World Habitat Day Observed across the World: World Habitat day was observed across the world on 6 October 2014. The purpose of this day is creation of the global awareness regarding the State of the towns and cities and the basic human right to adequate shelter. First Monday of October every year is designated as the World Habitat Day by the United Nation. The theme of the World Habitat Day 2013 is Shelter is my Right.

5) MS Dhoni becomes ISL team Chennaiyin FC co-owner: After the likes of Sachin Tendulkar and Virat Kohli, Mahendra Singh Dhoni has become the latest cricketer to own a football team in the high-profile Indian Super League, investing in the Chennaiyin FC ahead of the event starting October 12. Dhoni, the current Indian cricket captain, has pencilled a deal to be a co-owner of Chennaiyin FC along with Bollywood actor Abhishek Bachchan.

6) World Junior Chess Championship began in Pune: The World Junior Chess Championship began in Pune with a glittering ceremony attended by eminent dignitaries from the sporting world, entertainment and corporate world. The tournament will be played till 19th October and will be conducted in the Swiss League format, comprising of 13 rounds with one round scheduled each day.

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Nobel Prize for Physics 2014

Nobel Prize for Physics 2014 announced 

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2014 to

Isamu Akasaki

Meijo University, Nagoya, Japan and Nagoya University, Japan

Hiroshi Amano

Nagoya University, Japan

and

Shuji Nakamura

University of California, Santa Barbara, CA, USA

“for the invention of efficient blue light-emitting diodes which has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources”

--> The invention of an energy source that lights up our computer and/or mobile phone screens and holds promise to brighten up the quality of life of over 1.5 billion people around the world, has been awarded the Nobel prize for physics 2014.

--> The laureates were rewarded for having invented a new energy-efficient and environment-friendly light source — the blue light-emitting diode (LED).

--> According to the committee, the laureates' inventions revolutionized the field of illumination technology.

--> As about one fourth of world electricity consumption is used for lighting purposes, the LEDs contribute to saving earth's resources. Materials consumption is also diminished as LEDs last up to 100,000 hours, compared to 1,000 for incandescent bulbs and 10,000 hours for fluorescent lights.

--> When Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamura produced bright blue light beams from their semi-conductors in the early 1990s, they triggered a fundamental transformation of lighting technology.

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September 2014 Current Affairs PDF: Fourth Week

Current Affairs PDF September 2014

Fourth Week

Download as PDF- Click Here

1) Name the campaign launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 25 September 2014 to make India a manufacturing hub?

Ans. Make In India Campaign

Note: The campaign is aimed to attract foreign companies to set up their manufacturing units in India and to seek greater foreign investment.

2) Name the scheme launched by Union Government on 25 September 2014 aims at alleviating urban and rural poverty through enhancement of livelihood opportunities through skill development and other means?

Ans. Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Antyodaya Yojana

3) Which film was selected as India’s official entry in the 2015 Oscars Awards on 23 September 2014?

Ans. Liar's Dice

Note: The hindi film is directed by Geethu Mohandas. The 87th Oscar Awards event will take place in the US on 22 February 2015. The movie stars national award winning actors Geetanjali Thapa and Nawazuddin Siddiqui.

4) India’s Mars Orbiter Mission, Manglayaan successfully entered the Martian orbit on?

Ans. 24 September 2014 

Note: By achieving this fete, India created the history of becoming the first country to insert the spacecraft of the mission around the Mars in first attempt.

5) Which tech giant on 22 September 2014 announced to launch a nationwide contest to develop a mobile app for Prime Minister’s office (PMO)?

Ans. Google

6) Name the rescue operation undertaken by Indian Army during Jammu and Kashmir floods recently?

Ans. Operation Megh Rahat

7) Name the Chief Minister of Maharashtra who has resigned on  26 September 2014 after his government was reduced to a minority?

Ans. Prithviraj Chavan

Note: Prepared by www. currentaffairs4examz.com His resignation came in the backdrop of withdrawal of the support of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) that supported Congress for the last 15 years.

8) Name the new name of Aajeevika Skills Development Programme (ASDP) which was launched by Union government on 25 September 2014?

Ans. Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Grameen Kaushalya Yojana

9) Which cricketers were recently selected as Bradman Honouree 2014?

Ans. Sachin Tendulkar and Steve Waugh

10) Which banks allowed kids to operate bank accounts independently on 24 September 2014?

Ans. SBI and ICICI

Note: The bank account is available for all kids above 10 who can sign uniformly. On 5 September 2014, SBI had launched new accounts Pehla Kadam and Pehli Udaan for kids. ICICI Bank has launched Smart Stars account and Federal Bank Limited has Young Champ Account for minors.

11) Who was appointed as the head coach of the national team of Srilanka on 24 September 2014?Visit:www.currentaffairs4examz.com

Ans. Marvan Atapattu, the former national cricket team captain

12) Board of Cricket for Control in India (BCCI) Working Committee on 26 September 2014 extended Ravi Shastri’s tenure as Director of Indian Cricket team till?

Ans. End of 2015 ICC Cricket World Cup

13) Union Government recently declared which day as Antyodya Diwas?

Ans. 25 September

Note: Antyodya diwas was observed to mark the 98th birth anniversary of Pandit Deendayal Upadhyay. Pandit Deendayal Upadhyay was the noted philosopher, historian and political activist.

14) Name the renowned Hindi author was given the Saraswati Samman 2013 in New Delhi on 23 September 2014?

Ans. Govind Mishra

Note: He was given the Samman by Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh for his novel Dhool Paudhon Par that was published in 2008. Govind Mishra is the second Hindi author to be conferred with this honour after Harivansh Rai Bachchan in 1991.

15) Who was appointed as the new head of the Pakistan’s spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) on 22 September 2014?

Ans. Lieutenant General Rizwan Akhtar

16) CSIR on 26 September 2014 announced the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Awards 2014 for ten persons in recognition of their work. Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Awards is given in which field?

Ans. Science

17) Who are the winners of Right Livelihood Award 2014?

Ans. Edward Snowden and Alan Rusbridger

Note: The first one is former U.S. spy agency contractor and the other is the editor of The Guardian. The Right Livelihood Award is also known as Alternative Nobel prize of Sweden.

18) Who was selected for the JC Daniel Award for lifetime achievement for the year 2013 given by State Government of Kerala?

Ans. Noted writer and filmmaker MT Vasudevan Nair

19) UN Climate Change Summit 2014 was held at?

Ans. New York

Download PDF

20) Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on 22 September 2014 approved the appointment of whom as Managing Director (MD) and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Kerala-based South Indian Bank Ltd?

Ans. V.G. Mathew

21) The Forbes India magazine released The 100 Richest Indian List 2014 on 25 September 2014. Who has topped the list?

Ans. Mukesh Ambani

22) Who was appointed as the new president of the News Broadcasting Association (NBA) for the year 2014-2015 on 24 September 2014 ?

Ans. Rajat Sharma

Note: He is India TV chairman and editor-in-chief.

23) Union Ministry of Sports Sarbananda Sonowal on 22 September 2014  inaugurated National Academy for Athletics and National Golf Academy at?

Ans. Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala

24) Internet major Yahoo! Inc. on 21 September 2014 acquired which Bangalore-based start-up firm for over 8 million US dollars?

Ans. BookPad Inc

25) Who was re-elected as the Prime Minister of New Zealand for a third term on 21 September 2014?Visit:www.currentaffairs4examz.com

Ans. John Key

26) AP Government on 23 September 2014 issued an order enhancing the upper age limit for direct recruitment in government service from 34 to?

Ans. 40 Years

27) Who was unanimously elected as Chairman of Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC) for the year 2014-15 on 22 September 2014?

Ans. Amit Mathew

Note:  He is the resident editor and director of Malyala Manorama.

28) Ancient Nalanda University (NU) was formally inaugurated after 800 years on 19 September 2014 by Union External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj at?

Ans. Rajgir near Nalanda, Bihar. 

29) Who has sworn in as new Prime Minister of Fiji on 22 September 2014?

Ans. Voreqe Bainimarama

30) Which city will host ICC World Cricket League Division 3 from 23 to 30 October 2014?

Ans. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

31) Who won the Asian Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Leadership Award on 24 September 2014?

Ans. Sukinda Chromite Mine of the Tata Steel

32) Reserve Bank of India on 24 September 2014 released which report on Capacity Building in banks and non-banks?

Ans. Gopalakrishna Committee report

33) Who was appointed as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Sherpa for the Group of 20 annual Summit 2014 on 23 September 2014?

Ans. Suresh Prabhu

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Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2014

Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2014 announced 

The 2014 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was divided with one half to

John O´Keefe

and the other half jointly to

May-Britt Moser and Edvard I. Moser

"for their discoveries of cells that constitute a positioning system in the brain"

--> Keefe is currently director of the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre in Neural Circuits and Behaviour at University College London.

--> This year's Nobel Laureates have discovered a positioning system, an "inner GPS" in the brain that makes it possible to orient ourselves in space, demonstrating a cellular basis for higher cognitive function. In 1971, John O'Keefe discovered the first component of this positioning system. He found that a type of nerve cell in an area of the brain called the hippocampus that was always activated when a rat was at a certain place in a room. Other nerve cells were activated when the rat was at other places. O'Keefe concluded that these "place cells" formed a map of the room.

--> More than three decades later, in 2005, May-Britt and Edvard Moser discovered another key component of the brain's positioning system. They identified another type of nerve cell, which they called "grid cells", that generate a coordinate system and allow for precise positioning and pathfinding. Their subsequent research showed how place and grid cells make it possible to determine position and to navigate.

--> The discoveries of John O'Keefe, May-Britt Moser and Edvard Moser have solved a problem that has occupied philosophers and scientists for centuries — how does the brain create a map of the space surrounding us and how can we navigate our way through a complex environment?

-->The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced the first of the many Nobel prizes for 2014 on Monday.

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Daily Current Affairs Updates: 05 October 2014

1) Shah Rukh Khan received Global Diversity Award: Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan has been honoured with Global Diversity Award 2014 by British parliament for his contribution to cinema. House of Commons speaker John Bercow presented the award to Shah Rukh Saturday. "Now (in) parliament to receive the Global Diversity Award... Humbled and grateful. Thank you," he tweeted before the ceremony. The past recipients of the award include megastar Amitabh Bachchan, former beauty queen and actress Aishwarya Rai and Hollywood actor Jackie Chan.

2) Modi pays tribute to freedom fighter Shyamji Krishna Varma:  Prime Minister Narendra Modi Saturday paid tributes to freedom fighter Shyamji Krishna Varma on his 157th birth anniversary, urging people to visit his memorial. "On his birth anniversary, I bow to Shyamji Krishna Varma. A devout patriot, he inspired several nationalists, both in India and overseas," the prime minister said in a tweet. He added that Varma was closely associated with India House, which was a very active hub for the nationalist movement in London. Varma was a freedom fighter hailing from Gujarat. He was was born Oct 4, 1857 in Kutch.

3) President, PM greet nation on Eid-ul-Azha: President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi Sunday greeted the nation on the eve of Eid-ul-Azha and urged people to imbibe the spirit of love and service. "I convey greetings and best wishes to all fellow citizens, especially my Muslim brothers and sisters," the president said in a statement. "Let us imbibe the spirit of universal love, brotherhood, sacrifice and service which constitute eternal values always upheld by our composite culture and work unitedly for peace, progress and prosperity of our nation and the world," he added. "Eid-ul-Azha symbolizes sacrifice, faith and devotion."

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