April,01-16

1.      Samajwadi Party MLA Mata Prasad Pandey was unanimously elected Speaker of the 16th Uttar Pradesh Assembly .

2.      The Union Cabinet  gave its approval to the introduction of a Bill seeking an amendment in the Registration of Births and Deaths Act, 1969 to include registration of marriages as well, so that the existing administrative mechanisms will be able to carry out such registration of marriages in accordance with the specified procedures and be able to maintain necessary records and statistics for registration of marriages also. The Cabinet also approved introducing a Bill in Parliament to further amend the Anand Marriage Act, 1909 to provide for registration of marriages under the Act.

The proposed Bill is set to benefit the women from unnecessary harassment in matrimonial and maintenance cases. It also seeks to provide evidentiary value in the matters of custody of children, right of children born from the wedlock of the two persons whose marriage is registered and the age of the parties to the marriage.

3.      Credit rating agency Moody's downgraded the local currency rating of ONGC to Baa1 from A2 and that of GAIL to Baa2 from A3.

4.      Union government approved Rs 30000 crore bailout for Air India. Rs 6750 crore would be infused immediately to meet the airline's working capital requirement.

5.      The 18-year-old Shiva Thapa (56kg category) on 11 April 2012 became the youngest Indian boxer to qualify for the Olympics.

6.      The Supreme Court of India upheld the constitutional validity of the Right to Education Act, 2009, which mandates 25 per cent free seats to the poor in government and private unaided schools uniformly across the country. The apex court clarified that its judgment will come into force from 12 April 2012. However, the act will apply uniformly to government and unaided private schools except unaided private minority schools. A three-judge bench of Chief Justice S H Kapadia and justices K S Radhakrishnan and Swantanter Kumar gave the ruling.Right to Education Act (RTE) was passed by the Indian parliament on 4 August 2009.The act came into force on 1 April 2010. It  has the provision of free and compulsory education for children between 6 and 14 in India under Article 21A of the Indian Constitution. India became one of 135 countries to make education a fundamental right of every child.

7.      The Union Cabinet approved a proposal to set up a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) for Goods and Services Tax Network (GSTN) to help facilitate the smooth introduction of the new indirect tax regime.GSTN SPV is to be incorporated as Section 25 not-for-profit private limited company in which strategic control would be held by the Centre. It will provide IT infrastructure and services to various stakeholders including the Centre and states.The SPV will have an equity capital of Rs 10 crore, with both the Centre and states having stakes of 24.5 per cent each. Non government institutions would hold 51 per cent equity.

8.      Union government made it mandatory for individuals with income above Rs 10 lakh to file their tax returns 2011-12 onwards electronically.

9.      Myanmar's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi on 1 April 2012 won a parliamentary seat in a historic by-election. It set the stage for her to take public office for the first time. Her party National League for Democracy (NLD) won 43 seats.

10.  Geeta Kumari, the woman wrestler, won a gold in 55kg category at the ongoing Asian qualifying tournament in Astana.

11.  Coal India Limited ( CIL) appointed S Narsing Rao as its full time Chairman and Managing Director.

12.  SEBI issued broad guidelines on Algorithmic Trading based on recommendations of technical advisory committee (TAC) & secondary market advisory committee (SMAC)

13.  US Senate on 30 March 2012 confirmed career diplomat Nancy Powell as ambassador to India.

14.  Chandigarh girl Vanya Mishra crowned as the Pantaloons Femina Miss India World 2012 in the grand finale of the 49th edition of the beauty pageant on 30 March 2012 in Mumbai.