Current Affairs Quiz - April, 2019

Notes:
Justice Vikram Nath, seniormost judge of the Allahabad High Court, has been appointed Chief Justice of the Andhra Pradesh High Court. He succeeded acting CJ Justice Chagari Praveen Kumar. A collegium of Supreme Court comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi and judges S A Bobde and N V Ramana recommended the name of Justice Nath as the chief justice of the AP High Court. The new high court for Andhra Pradesh was created on 1st January 2019, following the bifurcation of a combined high court for AP and Telangana, which had been operating from Hyderabad since June 2, 2014, when the two Telugu states got separated.

Notes:
On 13th April 2019, the nation paid homage to the martyrs of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre on the centenary of the incident. On this day in 1919, hundreds of innocent Indians were killed by troops under British Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer, during a peaceful meeting on Baisakhi at the park in Amritsar, Punjab. Here, the civilians had assembled for a peaceful protest to condemn the arrest and deportation of two national leaders, Satya Pal and Saifuddin Kitchlew. The massacre is one of the darkest chapters of India’s freedom struggle against the British occupation. The official death toll by the British government was put at 379, but Indian figures put the toll at closer to 1,000. Even after 100 years, the British government has only regretted the massacre but stopped short of apologizing for the killing of so many innocent people.

Notes:
To make Google Pay more useful for Indian customers, Google has partnered with MMTC-PAMP India to introduce buying and selling of gold through the app. Through this partnership with India’s only London Bullion Market Association (LBMA)-accredited gold refinery, Google Pay users will be able to buy 99.99% 24-karat gold. Google Pay users can now purchase gold for any value, which will be stored on behalf of the user in secure vaults by MMTC-PAMP. Users can buy and sell this gold any time at the latest price, refreshed every few minutes on the Google Pay app. Other mobile wallet providers such as Paytm, MobiKwik and PhonePe too provide the facility of buying gold from their wallet apps.

Notes:
Meena Kumari Maisnam from Manipur clinched gold in the 54 kg category at the 2019 Boxing World Cup in Cologne, Germany. Reigning youth world champion Sakshi (57 kg) and India Open champion Pwilao Basumatary (64 kg) lost their final bouts and finished with silver medals. Hence, India completed a haul of five medals from this prestigious European tournament following Pinki Rani (51kg) and Parveen (60kg)’s bronze medal wins on 13th April 2019.

Notes:
Director General at Life Sciences – DRDO, Dr A K Singh has been conferred with Lifetime Achievement Award-2019 during 4th APJ Abdul Kalam Innovation Conclave at Chandigarh University, Mohali. He is recognized for his rich contribution in the field of life sciences, aerospace and aeronautics. The DST scientist has more than 18 patents and has contributed in more than 57 research publications at an international and national level. The conclave was organised by the university to mark World Creativity and Innovation Day (WCID).

Notes:
Journalists Kyaw Soe Oo and Wa Lone (Myanmar) has been chosen for 2019 UNESCO/Guillermo Cano Press Freedom Prize. Both laureates are serving 7-year prison sentences. At the time of their arrest in Yangon on 12 December 2017, they were working for the Reuters news agency, reporting on alleged human rights violations in Myanmar’s state of Rakhine. The prize will be awarded on 2 May as part of the celebration of 2019 World Press Freedom Day (3 May) which is taking place in Ethiopia. The Prize recognizes outstanding contributions to the defence or promotion of press freedom especially in the face of danger. It is named after Guillermo Cano Isaza, the Colombian journalist who was assassinated in front of the offices of his newspaper El Espectador in Bogotá, Colombia, on 17 December 1986. The $25,000 Prize is funded by the Guillermo Cano Isaza Foundation (Colombia), the Helsingin Sanomat Foundation (Finland), and The Namibia Media Trust.

Notes:
Telecom operator Bharti Airtel in collaboration with FICCI Ladies Organisation (FLO) launched a women safety app – My Circle – to help women in case they face any problem or a panic situation. The application is carrier agnostic which would work on phones with any telecom service network, both Airtel and non-Airtel. The app enables women to send SOS alerts to any five of their family or friends in 13 languages including English, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, Marathi, Punjabi, Bangla, Urdu, Assamese, Oriya, and Gujarati. A woman in distress can send an SOS alert by pressing the SOS prompt on the app. It can also be activated by voice command through Siri on iOS. It will instantly send an SOS alert along with the user’s location over SMS to the five contacts selected by the user and advise them to immediately reach out or respond to the emergency situation. The free-to-download app is now available on Google Play store (Android) and will be available on App Store (iOS) shortly.

Notes:
The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has recently successfully test fired the underdevelopment long range subsonic cruise missile ‘Nirbhay’ from launch complex-3 of the Integrated Test Range (ITR) at Chandipur, Odisha. It has a operational range of 1000 km and can fly very low to the ground to avoid detection by enemy radar called terrain hugging capability. The state-of-the-art missile is the India’s first indigenously designed and developed long-range sub-sonic cruise missile. It is capable of loitering and cruising at 0.7 Mach at altitude as low as 100 metre and covered the designated target range in 42 minutes and 23 seconds.

Notes:
The World Haemophilia Day (WHD) is observed every year on April 17 to increase awareness of haemophilia and other inherited bleeding disorders. The 2019 theme ‘Outreach and Identification’, encourages people to meet and connect with other people who have had similar experiences, and what it is like.It will be observed with the slogan – ‘Reaching Out: The First Step to Care’. Haemophilia is an inherited genetic disorder that impairs the body’s ability to form clots. This condition is dangerous as it can cause excessive loss of blood in case of injuries, easy bruising, and also bleeding between joints and in the brain. Haemophilia can only be managed but does not have a cure.

Notes:
Nepal has successfully launched its first satellite NepaliSat-1 into space from Virginia in the United States. The satellite was developed by the Nepalese scientists. NepaliSat-1 is a low orbit satellite which will be in the 400-km distance from the Earth’s surface. It will be stationed at the International Space Station (ISS) for a month and then it will be sent to orbit the earth. The satellite will take photographs on a regular basis to gather geographical information of the country. It weighs 1.3 kilograms, making it a small satellite with limited capability. The Nepal Academy of Science and Technology (NAST) initiated the launch of the country’s own satellite under the BIRDS project of the Japanese Kyushu Institute of Technology. The BIRDS project has been designed in association with the United Nations (UN) and aims at helping countries launch their first satellite.