- Justice Gulzar Ahmed is appointed as the 27th Chief Justice of Pakistan. He takes over from Chief Justice Asif Saeed Khosa, whose tenure came to an end after serving as the country’s top judge from January this year. The new Chief Justice will remain in office until February 21, 2022.
- HDFC Bank Ltd crossed the $100 billion market capitalization (M-Cap) in intraday trading; this makes it the third company in India to reach this milestone. Although, it closed below $100 billion mark at $99.5 billion it still makes HDFC as one of India’s topmost private-sector lenders.
- A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between the University of Birmingham and the National Rail Transport Institute (NRTI). It was signed in Rail Bhawan, New Delhi to set up its first Centre of Excellence for Next-Generation Transportation Systems. NRTI is deemed to be university under the Union Ministry of Railways.
- Donald Trump the President of the United States has chosen Indian-American computer scientist Sethuraman Panchanathan to lead the National Science Foundation (NSF). He will replace France Cordova when her 6-year term as the NSF Director ends in 2020. The position of NSF Director will be fixed by the Senate of the state.
- National Farmers Day is celebrated on December 23 every year. The Government of India had decided to celebrate Farmers Day in the year 2001. Every year India celebrates National Farmers Day on December 23 to mark former Prime Minister of India Chaudhary Charan Singh’s birth anniversary. The government organizes many programs and debates, seminars on agriculture on this day. National Farmers Day is celebrated every year especially in those states which are predominantly are engaged in farming such as Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh among others. Chaudhary Charan Singh was also known as a farmer’s leader.
- Saikhom Mirabai Chanu won the women’s 49kg category gold medal at the 6th Qatar International Cup. The 25-year-old Chanu won gold with an effort of 194kg in the Olympic qualifying silver level event final rankings for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. This was in a period of six months from November 2018 to April 2020 at least six events and in at least one gold and silver level event. In the men’s 67kg category India’s Jeremy Lalrinnunga won the silver medal with a total lift of 306kg (140kg in snatch and 166kg in clean and jerk).
- Space was described as the world’s newest war-fighting zone by US President Donald Trump. He officially launched the US military ‘Space Force’ at an army base near Washington. Trump highlighted that the Space Force will help deter aggression and control the ultimate high ground.
- The World Economic Forum on 22nd December 2019 would experience around 3,000 world leaders at the meet at its 50th annual meeting to discuss actions that are required to make a “cohesive and sustainable world”. The theme of the event is ‘Stakeholders for a Cohesive and Sustainable World’. The event is to be held in Davos between January 21, 2020, and January 24, 2020. The leaders believe that it is critical to develop “Davos Manifesto 2020”.
- The remnants of the world’s oldest fossil forest have been discovered by Scientists. It is an extensive network of trees that are around 386 million years old. This Fossil Forest was found in a sandstone quarry in the United States (US). According to the researchers from Binghamton University, and New York State Museum in the U.S., the fossil forest in Cairo would have spread from New York all the way into Pennsylvania and beyond. The finding was published in the journal Current Biology.
- On December 23, 2019, the Reserve Bank of India will buy and sell government securities of Rs 10,000 crores under a special Open Market Operation (OMO). Such moves are carried out by the federal bank to bring down the interest rates of long-term securities. This time RBI has named its move as “Operation Twist”. There are different kinds of government securities. The buying of long-term bonds and selling short-term bonds by RBI is called operation twist. When the long-term bonds are bought by RBI, their demand increases. This lowers long-term yields. This way the yield curve gets twisted that is why it has been given the name “Operation Twist”. This has a significant effect on the long term interest rate that governs the investment and growth in the economy.