Monthly Current Affairs Quiz - November, 2018

Notes:
Nobel Prize Winner Malala Yousafzai will be honoured by Harvard University for her work promoting girls’ education. The award will be conferred with the 2018 Gleitsman Award at a ceremony on 6th December. Currently, Yousafzai is a student at Oxford University in England. The Gleitsman Award provides $125,000 for activism that has improved quality of life around the world. Yousafzai became the youngest person to win the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014 when she was recognized for her global work supporting schooling for all children. As a teen in Pakistan, she survived an assassination attempt by the Taliban. She later founded the nonprofit Malala Fund to support her work.

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The Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation (MDWS) organized a seminar on Gandhian Thought and Swachhata in Wardha district of Maharashtra on October 29, 2018. It was part of 150th birth year celebrations of Father of the Nation. The seminar was centered on the Gandhian ideology on sanitation and the implementation of the same through the Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM). It addressed on topics such as appropriate technologies in rural sanitation, organic waste management, and preventive sanitation. The main focus of the seminar was the Gandhi ji’s concept of Swachh evam Swawalambhi Sankul. The SBM campaign is a massive people’s movement, which has shown significant progress with the rural sanitation coverage having increased from 39%, at the launch of the SBM in 2014, to over 95% today. With 8.7 crore toilets constructed, 5.15 lakh villages, 530 districts and 25 States and Union Territories have been declared ODF. The campaign was officially launched on 2nd October 2014 at Rajghat, New Delhi by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

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Recently, the 19th meeting of the Financial Stability and Development Council (FSDC) held under the Chairmanship of the Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley reviewed the current global and domestic economic situation and financial sector performance. Apart from liquidity in NBFCs (segmental liquidity position and in mutual fund space), the FSDC discussed on various economic issues ranging from oil prices, rupee, inflation to improving cyber security in the financial sector including “progress made towards setting up of a Computer Emergency Response Team in the Financial Sector (CERT-Fin) under a Statutory Framework”. The FSDC is an apex-level body to strengthen and institutionalise the mechanism of maintaining financial stability, financial sector development, inter-regulatory coordination along with monitoring macro-prudential regulation of economy.

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Noted Malayalam writer M Mukundan has been selected for 2018 Ezhuthachan Puraskaram, the highest literacy prize of the Kerala government. The award, which carries a cash prize of Rs five lakh and citation, is being given for his overall contributions to the language and literature. His popular works inlcude ‘Mayyazhippuzhayude Theerangalil’, ‘Kesavante Vilapangal’, ‘Delhi Gadhakal’, ‘Appam Chudunna Kunkiyamma’ and ‘Lesli Achante Kadangal’.

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On November 1, former Indian cricket captain Rahul Dravid has officially been inducted into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame for his stupendous achievements in international cricket. In a ceremony held ahead of the fifth and final ODI between India and West Indies in Thiruvananthapuram, Dravid was presented with the HoF cap by Sunil Gavaskar. With this, Dravid became only the fifth player from India to be named in the elite list. The other four Indians are former skippers Bishan Singh Bedi, Sunil Gavaskar, Kapil Dev and Anil Kumble. Dravid, also popularly known as ‘the Wall’ had been a long-standing rock of Indian cricket for over 15 years. In all, he aggregated 13,288 runs in 164 Tests with 36 centuries and 10,889 runs in 344 ODIs with 12 centuries. He was also a brilliant slip fielder and finished his Test career in 2012 with 210 catches, which is a world record. He is currently the head coach of India A and India U-19 sides.

Notes:
The Maharashtra Cabinet has recently approved the conversion of decommissioned aircraft carrier INS Viraat into a floating museum. It will be India’s first-ever moored maritime museum-cum-marine adventure centre. As per primary estimates, the project worth Rs 852 crore will be implemented through Public-Private-Partnership (PPP). It will be grouted (grounded, sealed to the seabed with concrete and moored) seven nautical miles off the Malvan coast at Nivati rocks in Sindhudurg. This will enable the tourists to see the diverse aquatic life and experience sky-diving, sailing and other thrilling sporting activities. Besides, it will make the new generation familiar with the glorious history of INS Viraat. INS Viraat, which holds a place of pride in Indian defence history, was decommissioned in March 2017 and since then has been laid up at the Naval Dockyard. INS Viraat was commissioned by Navy in 1987 and had taken part in all major military operations such as Operation Jupiter (1988, Sri Lanka peacekeeping mission), Operation Vijay (1999, post-Kargil), and Operation Parakram (2001, after Parliament attack). It was made in 1959 for the United Kingdom’s Royal Navy as ‘HMS Hermes’ and was instrumental in the Falklands War victory. It is 743-foot long and 160-foot wide with a height of 29 feet.

Notes:
India has officially signed a $950 million contract with Russia for the purchase of two upgraded Krivak III-class stealth frigates for the Indian Navy. The two frigates of the Project 11356 class will be bought directly from Russia and a contract to build two more at an Indian yard is likely to be signed at a later stage. The frigates are built by Yantar Shipyard of Russia and will be powered by Ukrainian gas turbine engines. They will be equipped with Indian-built radar, sonar, communication suites and anti-ship BrahMos missile systems. The ships are expected to be delivered by the end of 2022. The procurement of the frigates will involve a rupee-rouble transaction instead of using U.S. dollars to avoid American sanctions on Russian defense companies under CAATSA (Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act). The Project 11356 is a derivative of the Talwar-class frigates that Russia has built for the Indian Navy.

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First time in Middle east, Qatar will host the 23rd edition of the World Corporate Games (WCG) in Doha in 2019, which will provide an opportunity for corporations around the world to showcase their competitive prowess through sports. It will be the first time that the WCG incorporate eSports and mindsports. The event features both individual and team competitions, open equally to women and men of all ages and abilities with team events for skilled, semi-skilled or novice participants.It is an all-inclusive event with paragames integrated for various categories as well. The World Corportate Games (WCG) aims to bring together, the local, regional and international business sporting community. The sporting event takes place every one to two years and the 2018 edition was held in Houston in the US.

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The World Vegan Day (WVD) is observed every year on November 1 to commemorate the holistic benefits of switching to veganism. Veganism is the practice of abstaining from consuming any animal products, including milk, curd, eggs, cheese, honey, and meat amongst other derived products.

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The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has recently permitted banks to grant Partial Credit Enhancement (PCE), or a partial guarantee, to bonds issued by systematically important non-deposit taking Non-Banking Financial Companies (NBFC-ND-SIs) registered with the Reserve Bank of India and Housing Finance Companies (HFCs) registered with National Housing Bank. The move is aimed at enhancing the credit rating of the bonds and enabling these NBFCs to access funds from the bond market on better terms. PCE is expected to help NBFCs and HFCs raise money from insurance and provident or pension funds who invest only in highly-rated instruments. The proceeds from the bonds, whose tenor cannot be less than three years, backed by PCE from banks can only be utilised for refinancing the existing debt. The central bank has restricted the exposure of a bank through PCEs to bonds issued by each such NBFC or HFC to 1% of capital funds of the bank within the current single and group borrower exposure limits.