Events; Appointments; Etc: April 2012

APPOINTED; ELECTED: Etc. B.V. Wanchoo: He has been appointed as the Governor of Goa. Dr Aziz Qureshi: He has been appointed as the Governor of Uttarkhand. Margaret Alva: She has been appointed as the Governor of Rajasthan. Jim Yong Kong: He has been selected to be the President of the World Bank. He is the first physician and Asian-American to head World Bank. 52-year-old Kim is a specialist in HIV/AIDS with a Ph.D in anthropology. He was born in Korea and grew up in USA. Salman Bashir: Former foreign secretary of Pakistan, he has been appointed as High Commissioner of Pakistan to India. RESIGNED Pal Schmitt: President of Hungary (after he was stripped of his 1992 doctorate title following claims he plagiarised most of his 200-page thesis. Mark Rutte: Prime Minister of Denmark. He resigned following crisis over budget cuts. DISTINGUISHED VISITORS Asif Ali Zardari: President of Pakistan. Ban Ki-moon: Secretary General of United Nations. During his four-day visit he held wide-ranging talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and other leaders on a range of issues, including UN reforms and the situation in the region. He was also conferred honorary doctorate by Jamia Millia University. Abdul Samad Abdulla: Foreign Minister of Maldives. Koichiro Gemba: Foreign Minister of Japan. During his meetings with Indian Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna, the two countries decided to move ahead with their negotiations to wrap up a civil nuclear accord and to kick-start maritime and cyber security dialogues and hold joint naval exercises off the coast of Japan in June 2012. They also decided to move ahead with collaboration in the development of rare earths, as also committed themselves to concluding a bilateral social security agreement soon. DIED N.K.P. Salve: Veteran leader of the Congress party, former Union Minister and ex-BCCI President. He was 90. EVENTS APRIL 1—Myanmar opposition leader and Nobel peace prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi wins a parliamentary seat in a landmark election, setting the stage for her to take public office for the first time. 3—Indian Navy inducts Russian-made nuclear-powered submarine INS Chakra, joining an elite group of nations possessing sophisticated warships. The submarine has been leased for 10 years from Russia. It can go up to a depth of 600m and has an endurance of 100 days with a crew of 73. 10—Bharti Airtel launches India’s first 4G (TD-LTE) service in Kolkata. 12—Guns fall silent in Syria as UN-backed ceasefire comes into effect. 13—India’s first Integrated Check Post (ICP) is inaugurated by Home Minister P. Chidambaram at Attari, near Amritsar (Punjab). The check post is expected to double bilateral trade between India and Pakistan. 16—Afghan forces regain control over parts of Kabul after killing all 36 Taliban militants who had unleashed on April 15 the biggest wave of coordinated suicide attacks in a decade. 19—Agni-V, India’s most potent missile with a 5,000 km range, is successfully launched, putting the country into ICBM league. 26—India successfully launches a microwave Radar Imaging Satellite (RISAT-1) using PSLV, from the spaceport at Wheeler Island in Andhra Pradesh. 27—A Delhi court convicts former President of Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) in a graft case and sentences him to four-year imprisonment. In 2001, he was caught on camera taking bribe from a fake arms dealer. MILESTONES Ajit Pal Singh: Former captain of Indian hockey team, he has been selected as the chef-de-mission of the Indian contingent at the London Olympics. He is the first Olympian to lead the Indians in Olympics. He had led India to their only Hockey world cup triumph in 1975. Dr Amit Garg: Haryana boy and a former IIT topper, he has created a world record by mentally dividing a 10-digit number with a five-digit number in 34.5 seconds. The previous world record of a similar calculation was 36 seconds. He will represent India at the Mental Calculations World Cup in Germany in September 2012. Justice Dalveer Bhandari: He has been elected as a judge of the International Court of Justice. He will serve a 2012-18 term in the ICJ, which is the principal judicial organ of the UN, based in The Hague, Netherlands. It is after a gap of over two decades that an Indian has been elected as a judge of ICJ.