News in Short

• HDFC Asset Management Company (AMC) announced Navneet Munot as the new Managing Director & CEO. Munot, currently the Chief Investment Officer (CIO) at SBI Mutual Fund, will be succeeding the current MD Milind Barve.
• The fund management structure at SBI Funds Management will continue to remain the same as the company over a period of time has built a very capable second line with strong vintage.
• SBI Funds Management is the largest fund house in the country, managing assets of over ? 4.5 lakh crore, while HDFC MF has an asset base of ? 3.75 lakh crore.

• Scientists have further decoded the phenomenon that led Mars to lose the equivalent of a global ocean of water up to hundreds of feet deep over billions of years.
• Scientists using an instrument aboard NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft have discovered that water vapour near the surface of the Red Planet is lofted higher into the atmosphere than anyone expected was possible.
• Mars continues to lose water today as vapour is transported to high altitudes after sublimating from the frozen polar caps during warmer seasons.
• To make their discovery, the team tracked the abundance of water ions high over Mars for more than two Martian years.

• Arunachal Pradesh recorded the best sex ratio in the country while Manipur recorded the worst sex ratio, according to the 2018 report on vital statistics of India based on the Civil Registration System.
• Arunachal Pradesh recorded 1,084 females born per thousand males, followed by Nagaland (965) Mizoram (964), Kerala (963), and Karnataka (957).
• The worst was reported in Manipur (757), Lakshadweep (839) and Daman & Diu (877), Punjab (896), and Gujarat (896). Delhi recorded a sex ratio of 929, Haryana 914 and Jammu and Kashmir 952.
• The number of registered births increased to 2.33 crore in 2018 from 2.21 crore registered births the previous year.

• Legendary Bengali actor Soumitra Chatterjee passed away. He was diagnosed with Covid-19 last month and his condition had deteriorated for past few days. He was 85.
• The Dadasaheb Phalke award-winning actor is best known for his collaborations with Oscar-winning director Satyajit Ray, with whom he worked in fourteen films.
• Soumitra Chatterjee is also the first Indian film personality conferred with the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, France’s highest award for artists.
• In a career spanning over six decades, Chatterjee worked with Ray, Mrinal Sen, Tapan Sinha and later in his career with Goutam Ghose, Aparna Sen, and Rituparno Ghosh.

• Nitish Kumar took oath as the chief minister of Bihar for the fourth consecutive term at a ceremony attended by top BJP and JD(U) leaders.
• BJP leaders Tarkishore Prasad and Renu Devi took oath as the deputy chief ministers. Nitish has served as CM for 14 years and two months in three different tenures.
• Santosh Kumar Suman, son of Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) chief Jitan Ram Manjhi, Mukesh Sahni of Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP), JD(U)’s Vijay Kumar Choudhary, Vijendra Prasad Yadav, Ashok Choudhary, and Mewa Lal Choudhary were also sworn in.