Current Affairs Quiz - August, 2019

Notes:
Navneeth Murali, an Indian-American teenager from New Jersey, has won the 2019 South Asian Spelling Bee (SASB) contest. The prize money for this contest is USD 3,000. The SASB is an annual spelling bee platform in the US for children of South Asian descent. The competition is open to any student at or below the age of 14, who has at least one parent or grandparent who is of South Asian descent, or whose lineage can be traced to Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and/or Sri Lanka.

Notes:
For the first time-ever India is hosting the prestigious World Youth chess championship, which is scheduled to be held in Mumbai from October 1 to 13. The world’s best talent in under-14, u-16 and u-18 categories will be on view. The tournament is being held under the aegis of the All-India Chess Federation and organised by the All-Marathi Chess Association. Players from 62 countries have confirmed their participation, including Russia, USA, France, Italy and Azerbaijan.

Notes:
By using sugar, sulphuric acid and salt, the researchers of IIT Hyderabad have developed a cheap and efficient nano-carbon catalyst to help in the production of biofuel precursors. The catalyst showed better efficiency and selectivity than the commercially available variants to produce the desired C15 oxygenated hydrocarbon — a precursor to diesel and jet fuel. This development is important as States like Uttar Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh /Telengana produce a large amount of corncob waste in the country. This can be converted into valuable fuel instead of being burnt. The nano-carbon catalyst developed by the institute can enable conversion into biofuel (fuel from biological sources rather than fossil fuels) and provide an additional earning opportunity for the corn farmer, besides being a sustainable energy source.

Notes:
On 22nd August 2019, Union Minister of State for AYUSH Shripad Yesso Naik inaugurated the two-day National Conference on Varmam Science in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. ‘Varmam’ is a constituent of the Siddha system of medicine, that also doubles up as a martial art. The national conference is being organized by the National Institute of Siddha in Chennai.

Notes:
In a first-of-its-kind initiative in Asia, 8 armed forces veterans have initiated a high-end adventure sports survival training and self-defence mission at a pan India level titled ‘Op-Blue Freedom’ as a part of their parent project — Special Forces Adventures (SFA). The SFA is led by Major (retd) Vivek Jacob and has veterans from the Indian Army Para Commandos and the Naval Marine Commandos (MARCOS). ‘Op-Blue Freedom’ is a nation-wide adaptive scuba diving programme for people with disabilities as well as able-bodied persons. The purpose of the program is to train adventure enthusiasts in special forces skills like survival techniques, emergency first response skills, unarmed combat, endurance and fitness. Recently, ‘Op-Blue Freedom’ is in news because the Union Sports Minister Kiren Rijiju and football legend Bhaichung Bhutia have flagged off dive for Delhi-NCT leg for the Op-Blue Freedom.

Notes:
The State of Karnataka has got the first position in the SARAL – ‘State Rooftop Solar Attractiveness Index’ that evaluates Indian states based on their attractiveness for rooftop development. The index has recently launched by the Union Minister of State for Power and New & Renewable Energy (IC), RK Singh. Telangana has acquired the 2nd position, followed by Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh. The index has been designed collaboratively by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation (SSEF), Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM) and Ernst & Young (EY).

Notes:
The book titled “Big Billion Startup: The Untold Flipkart Story” has been authored by Mihir Dalal. It will recount the story of how the IIT graduates Sachin and Binny Bansal built Flipkart and how internet entrepreneurship was made a desirable occupation. It is also a story of big money, power and hubris, as both business and interpersonal complexities weakened the founders’ control over their creation and forced them to sell out to a retailer whose dominance they had once dreamt of following.

Notes:
The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has extended title sponsor rights to Paytm for the Indian cricket team’s international and domestic matches with a winning bid of Rs 3.80 crore per match for the 4-year cycle commencing October, 2019. Over the next 4 years, India is set to host at least 86 international men’s matches in bilateral series & BCCI is thrilled with the 57% hike in sponsorship amount. Besides men’s international cricket, BCCI offers extension of sponsorship rights to domestic cricket and women’s international games at no additional cost.

Notes:
Under the Swachh Bharat Mission, the Government of India (GoI) has launched its latest initiative called the ‘San-Sadhan’ Hackathon – for Divyangjan accessible toilets. The aim of the initiative is to ease lives of Persons with Disabilities (Divyangjan) by making toilets smarter, more accessible, and easier to use. In this hackathon, the government is looking for smart, scalable and innovative solutions for economical toilets for individual and community use in rural and urban contexts. The Hackathon is inviting researchers, start-ups, student innovators, technology enthusiasts, and industry experts to participate. The last date to apply for participating in the Hackathon is August 28. The shortlisted applicants will work to develop their prototype during the two-day Hackathon scheduled to be held in the month of September in New Delhi. The initiative is being organized jointly by the Ministry of Jal Shakti and the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities, in collaboration with Atal Innovation Mission, NITI Aayog, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and 91springboard.

Notes:
The flagship scheme of Rajasthan government has topped the 16-state chart detailing implementation of the free medicine scheme i.e. run under the National Health Mission (NHM). The NHM assessed the performance of the states on the basis of effective implementation of Drugs and Vaccine Distribution Management System (DVDMS), stock of essential drugs, value of drugs about to expire along with other such parameters. According to an NHM letter, the DVDMSA (coverage in Rajasthan is 77.26% and proportion of online drug distribution counters – 96.03%. The expired quantity proportion viz. breakage, wastage and loss are just 7.43%.