Monthly Current Affairs Quiz - October, 2018

Notes:
The biography of late Anumolu Ramakrishna titled ‘Building a Legacy’ is authored by city-based Chartered Accountant V Pattabhi Ram. It was recently released by Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu. Ramakrishna, former President and MD at Larsen and Toubro (L&T), was posthumously awarded Padma Bhushan in 2014. He was instrumental in constructing several path breaking buildings including Tirumala queue complex, Hitech city, and Nehru Indoor Stadium. Ramakrishna was born in December 1939 and died on August 20, 2013 at Hyderabad.

Notes:
The 6th RCEP Inter-sessional Ministerial Meeting (IMM) was held in Singapore on 12-13 October, 2018. The Ministers from 16 RCEP countries discussed modern, comprehensive and mutually beneficial economic partnership agreement among ASEAN and ASEAN’s FTA partners. The Indian delegation was led by CR Chaudhary, the Minister of State for Commerce & Industry and Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution. The meeting also reviewed developments since the 6th RCEP Ministerial Meeting held in August 2018 in Singapore. The RCEP stands for “Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership”. It is a proposed Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between the 10 member states of the ASEAN (Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam) and the six Asia-Pacific states with which ASEAN has existing free trade agreements (Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand).

Notes:
Rashtriya Mahila Kisan Diwas is celebrated every year on 15th of October to increase active participation of women in agriculture & allied sectors. Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh will address the function in New Delhi this afternoon. Women farmers, entrepreneurs, farming organizations, agricultural scientists and researchers from different states will participate in the event. In 2016, the Ministry had decided to observe 15th of October as Rashtriya Mahila Kisan Diwas. Women are contributing invarious aspects of agriculture including sowing, planting, fertilizing, plant protection, harvesting, weeding, and storage.

Notes:
The ICICI Bank was originally established by ICICI Limited as a wholly owned subsidiary in 1994. Though, Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India (ICICI) was formed in 1955 as a joint-venture of the World Bank, the Government of India (GoI) and representatives of Indian industry. The principal objective was to create a development financial institution for providing medium-term and long-term project financing to Indian businesses. Recently, it is in news because the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has approved appointment of Sandeep Bakshi as Managing Director and CEO of the private sector lender ICICI Bank for 3 years. He succeeded Chanda Kochhar, who is facing enquiry over the charges of nepotism and conflict of interest. Ms Kochhar had quit the bank on October 4 before her current tenure was to end. She also resigned from all subsidiaries of the bank, including ICICI Securities where she had sought reappointment as the chairperson.

Notes:
Suraj Panwar has won the India’s first medal in athletics at the Youth Olympic Games 2018 after claiming the silver in the men’s 5000m race walk event at the Buenos Aires, Argentina. It was India’s third overall medal in athletics in the history of the Youth Olympic Games.

Notes:
The Government of India (GoI) has launched a nationwide campaign ‘Swasth Bharat Yatra’ from October 16 on the occasion of 2018 World Food Day (WFD to create consumer awareness about eating safe and nutritious food for becoming healthy. As per the campaign, a pan-India cycle rally is being organized by Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) to sensitize people about eating safe food and be healthy. About 7,500 cyclists are expected to participate in over 18,000 km relay cycle rally travelling across six tracks through almost every state and UT over 100 days to propagate a powerful message ‘Eat Right India’. The cyclathon will culminate in the national capital on January 27. The ‘Eat Right India’ movement is a collective effort of key stakeholders and citizens and is aligned with Government’s recent focus on public health through its three key programmes – ‘Ayushman Bharat’, ‘Swachh Bharat Mission’, and ‘POSHAN Abhiyaan’.

Notes:
Canada has officially become the 2nd Country in the world to legalize the recreational use of marijuana nationwide after Uruguay. The Cannabis Act (or Bill C-45) came into force on 17th October 2018. The new regulations aim to protect public health and safety by allowing adults access to legal cannabis and is a social experiment that the rest of the world will be carefully watching. Marijuana is a psychoactive drug from the Cannabis plant intended for medical or recreational use. With this, Canada has also became the the first G7 nation to legalize the drug’s recreational use. It must be noted that the use of medical marijuana has been legal in Canada since 2001. The Group of Seven (G7) is a group consisting of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Notes:
As per clause (2) of Article 75 of the Constitution, President Ram Nath Kovind has recently accepted the resignation of M J Akbar from the Union council of ministers on the advice of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He resgined from the post of Minister of State for External Affairs due to allegations of sexual harassment levelled against him by several women journalists.

Notes:
Piyush Goyal, the Union Minister of Railways & Coal, will be honoured with the 2018 Carnot Prize of Kleinman Center for Energy Policy at the University Of Pennsylvania School Of Design. The 2018 Carnot Prize is a recognition of India’s efforts towards eliminating energy poverty with sustainable energy solutions. It is the most prestigious award in the energy sector. The Prize is named after French physicist Nicolas Sadi Carnot who recognised that the power of the steam engine would “produce a great revolution” in human development. The Carnot Prize is intended to honour those leading revolutions in energy policy to further progress and prosperity. The Carnot Prize is the Kleinman Center’s annual recognition of distinguished contributions to energy policy through scholarship or practice.

Notes:
On Oct. 27, Turkey will host the four nation summit on Syria crisis in Istanbul to discuss the conflict in Syria and efforts for a lasting solution to the war in the Arab country. The summit will be held between the leaders of Turkey, France, Germany and Russia. Russia is a main backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government while Turkey has been helping insurgents trying to remove him from power. Though, in September 2018, Russia and Turkey reached an agreement to set up a demilitarized zone around the northwestern Syrian province of Idlib preventing a government offensive on the last rebel stronghold in the country. Idlib and adjacent areas are the last stronghold of rebels. The area is also home to an estimated 3 million people, more than half of whom have already been displaced once during the war. Hence, all aspects of the Syrian conflict are expected to be discussed, including the situation on the ground, the Idlib agreement and efforts for a lasting solution to the conflict.