Current Affairs Quiz - August, 2019

Notes:
Madan Mani Dixit (96), a pioneering writer and Journalist, has passed away in Kathmandu on 15th August 2019. He was fondly known as ‘maadsaap’ by his contemporaries and friends. Some of his famous works include Meri Nilima, Bhumisukt, Rig Veda dnd the short story, Kasle jityo kasle haryo?. He was awarded the prestigious Madan Puraskar of Nepal for his literary masterpiece “Madhavi”. Dixit is also acknowledged as the first photojournalist of Nepal.

Notes:
Denmark’s third largest, Jyske Bank has launched the world’s first negative interest rate mortgage and started to offer a10-year mortgage deals at a negative interest rate of 0.5% a year. Under its negative mortgage, borrowers will pay the usual EMI but the outstanding amount will be slashed each month by more than the borrower has paid. The unconventional decision is the latest in a series of moves central and commercial banks in advanced economies have undertaken to revive demand and boost consumption.

Notes:
The Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB) has proposed a new scheme called Supra with the sole objective of funding exploration of new scientific and engineering breakthroughs with global impact. The initiative is part of the PM Modi’s 100-day transformative ideas. The Supra (or Scientific and Useful Profound Research Advancement) scheme is designed to attract high quality research proposals consisting of new hypotheses or challenge existing ones and provide ‘out-of-box’ solutions. The SERB is a statutory body under the Department of Science and Technology (DST) to promote and fund research in different scientific disciplines.

Notes:
In New Delhi, the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) has launched the 5th edition of the annual cleanliness survey – Swachh Survekshan 2020 (SS 2020) – with theme “Cleanliness is Our Right’’. The survey will be conducted in January 2020. On this occasion, the MoHUA also launched Swachh Nagar app for waste collection – solid, wet or Construction and Demolition (C&D). The Ministry also launched the Water PLUS Protocol which aims to provide a guideline for cities and towns to ensure that no untreated waste-water is released into the environment thereby enabling sustainability of the sanitation value chain.A city could be given the tag of Water+ if it ensures 100% treatment of wastewater and 10% use of treated wastewater, among other things.

Notes:
Union Minister of State for Chemical & Fertilizers, Mansukh Mandaviya has recently announced that the India’s first Central Institute of Chemical Engineering & Technology (CICET) will be set up in Gujarat to give boost to the chemical industry. The CICET will come up either at Ahmedabad or Surat. The proposed institute will help the chemical industry with research and innovations.

Notes:
Damodar Ganesh Bapat (84), the noted social worker and Padma Shri awardee, has passed away in Bilaspur district, Chhattisgarh on August 17, 2019. He dedicated his life to the treatment and service of leprosy patients at an ashram run by Bharatiya Kushta Nivarak Sangh (BKNS) in Sothi village in Janjgir-Champa district of the state for the last four-and-a-half decades. He played an instrumental role in making people aware about leprosy in tribal areas of the state.

Notes:
Dr. K Thangaraj, Chief Scientist at the city based Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) has bagged the prestigious J C Bose Fellowship for his outstanding scientific contributions in the field of population and medical genomics. The J C Bose fellowship is awarded to active scientists in recognition of their outstanding performance by the Science and Engineering Research Board, Department of Science & Technology. Dr Thangaraj is a population geneticist. Some of his major works includes finding out the origin of Indian population– how humans migrated from Africa during different episodes and populated different parts of India. These studies led to further work on understanding how these populations interbred. He also showed how in the last 2000 years Indians started practicing endogamy resulting in many population specific genetic disorders.

Notes:
Environmental NGO Greenpeace has recently released an analysis of a National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) satellite data. as per country-wise world rankings, India is the world’s largest emitter of Sulphur Dioxide (SO2) as it has the maximum hotspots. It contributes more than 15% of all anthropogenic SO2 hotspots in the world. The major SO2 emission hotspots in India are Singrauli in Madhya Pradesh, Neyveli and Chennai in Tamil Nadu, Talcher and Jharsuguda in Odisha, Korba in Chhattisgarh, Kutch in Gujarat, Ramagundam in Telangana and Chandrapur and Koradi in Maharashtra. According to report, the vast majority of plants in India lack Flue-Gas Desulfurization (FGD) technology to reduce their air pollution. Individually, the Norilsk smelter complex in Russia is the largest SO2 emission hotspot in the world, followed by Kriel in Mpumalanga province in South Africa and Zagroz in Iran. Singrauli in Madhya Pradesh is at 5th position.

Notes:
In Madhya Pradesh, former Chief Minister of the state Babulal Gaur (89) has passed away in Bhopal on 21st August 2019. Born on 2nd June 1930 at Pratapgarh in Uttar Pradesh, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader was credited with expanding party’s foothold in Madhya Pradesh. He retired from electoral politics in 2018 citing old age. He served as the Chief Minister of MP from August 2004 to November 2005 and represented Govindpura Vidhan Sabha seat 10 times.

Notes:
On 21st August 2019, Indian Para swimmer Satendra Singh Lohia from Madhya Pradesh has scripted history by becoming the first Asian swimmer to cross the Catalina Channel of America. He holds the Asian record of crossing both the English and Catalina channels. Gwalior-born Satendra led the Indian Para Relay team along with 5 team mates and crossed the Catalina Channel in 11 hours 34 minutes. At that time, the water temperature was around 13 degrees Celsius. In 2014, Satyendra has also honoured with the highest sports award of Madhya Pradesh – Vikram Award.