Monthly Current Affairs Quiz - October, 2018

Notes:
India’s first second generation (2G) Ethanol Bio-Refinery will set up in Bargarh district of Odisha by 2020, where ethanol will be produced from rice straw. The proposed plant will be set up by the Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) at an estimated cost of Rs 100 crore. The foundation stone of which was laid on 10th October 2018. The bio-refinery will have a capacity to produce 3 crore litre of fuel-grade ethanol annually using rice straw as feedstock. The Bargarh Bio-Refinery will utilise about 2 lakh tonne of rice straw annually as feedstock which will be sourced from nearby locations including Bhatli, Ambabhona, Attabira, Sohela, Burla and Lakhanpur. The refinery will be based on zero-liquid discharge plant technology where water will be recycled back into the plant. Blending of ethanol in petrol will also reduce greenhouse gas emissions as compared to fossil fuels. Apart from Odisha, BPCL will also set up bio-refineries in Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra. . The National Biofuel Policy of India 2018 targets 20% Ethanol blending to Petrol by 2030. However, due to non-availability of Ethanol, the current Ethanol blending in Petrol is about 3 to 4%.

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Veena Sendre from Chhattisgarh has been chosen as India’s first ‘Miss Trans Queen’. She defeated Namita Ammu of Tamil Nadu to claim the title at the national-level beauty contest organised in Mumbai on October 7. Sendre, a former Miss Chhattisgarh, belongs to Mandir Hasaud village in Raipur.

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On October 11, the Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) launched a Roll on-Roll off (Ro-Ro) service in Assam from Neamati to Majuli island. This service will reduce the road route distance of 423 km that trucks take from Neamati to Majuli Island via Tezpur Road Bridge to only 12.7 km with the use of river route. The IWAI has procured a new vessel MV Bhupen Hazarika at a cost of Rs 9.46 crore for the new service. The vessel which is 46.50 meter long and 13.30 meter wide has a carrying capacity of 8 trucks and 100 passengers. The vessel can sail at the speed of 22 km per house. Majuli is one of the biggest riverine islands in the world located on river Brahmaputra and faces serious challenges of connectivity. It has 144 villages with a population of over 1,50,000. The RoRo service was launched in collaboration between IWAI and Assam government.

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India’s first-ever India-Israel Innovation Centre (IIIC), an entrepreneurial technology hub, was launched at the 3rd edition of IoT India Congress in Bengaluru, Karnataka on October 10, 2018. The IIIC is a significant step towards facilitating penetration of Israeli companies in India and aims to forge local partnerships and joint ventures between companies from the two countries. It will provide an ecosystem to support entrepreneurship, partnership with vendors, mentoring and non-formal community development that will assist the growth of the companies in different verticals and covers business, technology, investors and customers. The start-ups that are part of IIIC will be given mentorship and guidance and opportunities to participate at all IIIC’s global events and experience networking avenues with potential customers. The IIIC was launched by Ramanan Ramanathan, the Mission Director of Atal Innovation Mission (AIM).

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India has been ranked 103rd among 119 countries in the 2018 Global Hunger Index (GHI). The 2018 GHI report was prepared jointly by global NGOs namely – Concern Worldwide (Ireland) and Welthungerhilfe (Germany). The index indicates that the level of hunger and undernutrition worldwide falls into the serious category, at a value of 20.9, down from 29.2 in 2000.

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Prema Gopalan, founder of Swayam Shikshan Prayog (SSP), has been honored as the India Social Entrepreneur of the Year (SEOY) 2018 for her work in promoting women’s entrepreneurship at the grassroots and ensuring rural livelihood. The SSP model comprises four ventures: a federated network of 5,000 self-help groups; a resilience fund for women-led businesses; a rural school of entrepreneurship and leadership for women; and a market aggregator that provides warehousing, branding, marketing and distribution services to last-mile business women. The SEOY award was jointly founded by Jubilant Bhartia Foundation and Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship in 2010. It recognizes promising and high-impact social entrepreneurs who implement practical and sustainable solutions. The Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship is a sister organization of the World Economic Forum (WEF).

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The 4th edition of International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) World Relays 2019 will be hosted by Japan Association of Athletics Federations (JAAF) at Nissan Stadium in Yokohama (near Tokyo), which is scheduled to begin from May 11-12, 2019. The 2019 edition of IAAF World Relays will serve as a qualifier for the 2019 IAAF World Athletics Championships in Doha and the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. Top 12 teams in world rankings will be qualified for the competitions in Doha while the best eight will make their way to Tokyo.

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The 12th Asia Europe Meeting (ASEM) summit 2018 will be held in Brussels, Belgium from October 18 with theme “Global Partners for Global Challenges”. Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu will lead the Indian delegation at the two-day summit. This will also be the first multilateral summit that Vice President will be attending after taking office in August 2017. Besides One to One meeting with the King of the Belgians, Mr. Naidu will have bilateral meetings with various Heads of State on the sidelines of the Summit. The ASEM summit is the highest platform for dialogue and cooperation between Asia and Europe in the areas of trade, investment, security and tourism.

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The festival of Fulpati has recently celebrated with traditional gaiety and religious fervour in various parts of Nepal. Fulpati is observed on the 7th day of Dashain festival. In Nepali, “Phool” means flower and “Pati” means leaves and plants. There is a tradition in Nepal to bring nine types of Fulpati into the home on the seventh day of Navaratri. It is believed that Fulpati represents nine Goddess and they brings health, wealth and prosperity to the homes. The tradition started during the period of King Prithvi Narayan Shah. The main function was held at Basantpur Durbar Square in Kathmandu, where Fulpati was brought to Dashainghar from Jamal in a traditional procession with Vedic rituals.

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Irish Author Anna Burns has won the prestigious 2018 Man Booker Prize for Fiction for her novel ‘Milkman’. With this, she became the first Northern Irish author and the first woman since 2013 to win the prize. Milkman is an exploration of Northern Ireland’s three decades of sectarian violence told through the voice of a young woman. The novel chronicles the struggles of a middle sister in a family as she confronts rumour, social pressures and politics amid violent sectarian divisions in her community.She had previously authored two novels – ‘No Bones’ and ‘Little Constructions’.