1. Today is World Hypertension Day i.

World Hypertension Day is a day designated and initiated by The World Hypertension League (WHL), which is itself an umbrella to organizations of 85 national hypertension societies and leagues. ii. May 17 is designated as World Hypertension Day. The day was initiated to increase the awareness of hypertension. iii. This was especially important because of the lack of appropriate knowledge among hypertensive patients. iv. Hypertension is a chronic medical condition in which the blood pressure in the arteries is elevated. v. This requires the heart to work harder than normal to circulate blood through the blood vessels. vi. Blood pressure is summarised by two measurements, systolic and diastolic, which depend on whether the heart muscle is contracting (systole) or relaxed between beats (diastole) and equate to a maximum and minimum pressure, respectively. vii. Normal blood pressure at rest is within the range of 100-140mmHg systolic (top reading) and 60-90mmHg diastolic (bottom reading). viii. High blood pressure is said to be present if it is persistently at or above 140/90 mmHg. ix. Hypertension has also been associated with memory loss. 2. S&P warns INDIA of rating downgarde; retains negative outlook i. Global agency Standard & Poor's on Friday warned that it may downgrade India's sovereign rating to junk grade if the govt fails to pursue reforms and check deterioration in fiscal and current account deficits. ii. While retaining India's sovereign rating at 'BBB-' with a negative outlook, S&P said there is at least a one-in-three likelihood of a downgrade within the next 12 months. iii. 'BBB-' is the lowest investment grade and a downgrade would mean pushing the country's sovereign rating to junk status, making overseas borrowings by corporates costlier. iv. S&P said although part of this slower growth in India is cyclical, rigidities in the labour and product markets and inadequate infrastructure constrain the country's medium-term growth prospects. v. S &P credit analyst Takahira Ogawa said: "High fiscal deficits and a heavy government debt burden remain the most significant constraints on our sovereign ratings on India. Nevertheless, the government has regained control of public finances and embarked on fresh structural reforms since September 2012 vi. In the current fiscal, the economy is projected to grow at 6.1-6.7 percent, up from the decade's low level of 5 percent growth clocked in 2012-13 fiscal. 3. RBI relaxes ECB norms for housing and aviation sectors i. In a bid to provide companies with easier access to cheaper funds for key infrastructure sectors, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Tuesday relaxed external commercial borrowing (ECB) norms. ii. The central bank said it extended the ECB relaxation for the housing sector from one year to two more years and for the aviation sector by a few more months.

iii. Announcing the decision, RBI Deputy Governor H R Khan said, "The RBI has extended the external commercial borrowing (ECB) relaxation for affordable housing which was there for one year to two more years (now) and aviation for a few more months." iv. The central bank, however, made no overall change in ECB limit, which is current at US$40 billion. NOTE: i. Earlier in December last year, the RBI had permitted housing finance firms and real estate developers to raise up to US$1 billion via ECBs to promote low-cost housing projects. ii. The central bank had also permitted civil aviation sector to raise capital through the ECB route. iii. ECBs are increasingly gaining popularity as cost of raising loans overseas is considerably lower than that of domestic borrowings. 4. Star India launched Second English Movie Channel, Star Movies Actions i. Star India in the month of May 2013 launched its new movie channel, Star Movies Actions, which is targeted at male audiences. ii. The new channel is supposed to replaces the companys action brand Fox Action Movies. iii. The channel had strong tie-ups with the top four Hollywood studios and has a library of nearly 300 exclusive movies. iv. The channel is going to begin with having premiers of recent action movies that includes Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter and Taken 2 v. The channel will also be airing big franchisee movies such as Rambo, Fast and Furious, Resident Evil and Jaws. 5. Choudhary becomes first Indian to be elected as BoD of ITTF i. Table Tennis Federation of India (TTFI) general secretary Dhanraj Choudhary has become the first Indian to be elected as one of the Board of Directors (BoD) to the international sport body (ITTF). ii. He was elected during International Table Tennis Federation's Annual General Meeting held in Paris on Thursday night. iii. Choudhary was nominated to the decision-making body by the Asian Table Tennis Union (ATTU), following his service to the sport in the region, particularly India. iv. Choudhary took over as secretary-general of the Indian body when his predecessor Moolchand Chouhan died during his tenure in 2009. 6. David Beckham announced his Retirement i. Legendary Footballer and Former England captain David Beckham on 16 May 2013 announced his retirement from professional football and gave an end to his illustrious career of more than two decades. ii. He will retire from the professional football after the end of this season. iii. The 38 year old footballer recently helped his team to win a league title in the fourth country with Paris Saint Germain iv. David Beckham joined Manchester United as a 14-year-old in 1992 and made 398 appearances, winning six Premier League titles and the Champions League. v. He is the most capped outfield player of in the history of England

vi. Beckham earned 115 caps for England, a record for an outfield player, and won the Champions League, six Premier League titles and two FA Cups with Manchester United. 7. Six more arrests by TN police in connection with IPL spot fixing i. Tamil Nadu police on Friday arrested six more people in connection with IPL spot fixing and conducted searches in several places in Chennai in connection with alleged IPL fixing and betting. ii. Meanwhile, BCCI has suspended Amit Singh, a Rajasthan Royals player who was arrested as one of the bookies. iii. The Board has also called an emergency meeting of the Working committee in Chennai on Sunday to discuss the spot-fixing issue. iv. Meanwhile, the Delhi Police is investigating whether spot-fixing took place in matches involving Rajasthan Royals in the IPL other than the three matches in which three of its players were allegedly involved. v. It has also come to light that Amit Singh, one of the bookies arrested, had played for Rajasthan Royals in the previous IPL season. 8. Bill Gates emerges worlds richest person i. Bill Gates has once against claimed the title of the richest person in the world, according to the latest data released by Bloomberg. ii. Gates managed to surpass telecom sector billionaire, Carlos Slim of Mexico to become the richest person in the world, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index that was released on Friday. iii. The Bloomberg Billionaires Index, a daily ranking of the world's 100 wealthiest individuals, showed that Mexican telecommunications magnate Carlos Slim ceded the first position to the American entreprene iv. Bloomberg news on its official Twitter account wrote, "Bill Gates dethrones Carlos Slim as the world's richest man as Microsoft hits five-year high." v. Gates's fortune was valued at 72.7 billion dollars, which is higher than Carlos Slim's total fortune worth 72.1 billion. Microsoft founder Bill Gates recorded an increase of 10 billion dollars in his fortune this year while Slim saw his fortune fall by more than 2 billion dollars. vi. Gates has claimed the title for the first time since 2007, when he was the richest person in the world. 9. Rajasthan Royals take on Sunrisers under the shadow of spot-fixing row i. Reeling under the spot-fixing scandal, a depleted and demoralized Rajasthan Royals lock horns with Sunrisers Hyderabad in their last league encounter at the Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium, here on Friday night. ii. Though the Royals are assured of a spot in the qualifiers courtesy their 20 points, the spotfixing saga has hit them at the wrong time. iii. After losing to Mumbai Indians on Wednesday night, the Rahul Dravid-led side was keen on ending its league matches on a high as a win would have given the team the chance to have a go at the first two spots. iv. But the arrests of S Sreesanth, Ankeet Chavan and Ajit Chandila for their role in the scandal and with two of their foreign recruits under the scanner, the Royals are a badly bruised lot.

v. It remains to be seen if the Royals have the resilience to bounce back from this off-the-field incidents. vi. But the battle will again be between the Sunrisers' attack and the Royals' batting.