Current Affairs Quiz - March, 2019

Notes:
The National Science Day (NSD) is observed every yearon 28th of February to mark the discovery of Raman effect by Physicist C V Raman on 28th February, 1928. For his discovery, Sir CV Raman was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1930. In honour of this discovery and as a mark of tribute to the scientist, National Science Day was marked for the first time on February 28, 1987. The purpose of the day is to spread the message of importance of science and its application among the people. This year, the theme for the 2019 NSD is, ‘Science for the People and the People for Science’. The Raman Effect is the inelastic scattering of a photon by molecules which are excited to higher energy levels. It forms the basis for Raman spectroscopy which is used by chemists and physicists to gain information about materials.

Notes:
The West Bengal government has launched ‘Banglar Shiksha’ portal to provide real-time data on state-run and aided schools. The portal, ”Banglar Shiksha” (banglarshiksha.gov.in), will store real-time data of 1.5 crore students, 5 lakh teachers and 1 lakh schools. It will be operated on a trial basis for two months to remove glitches, if any and will be fully functional by 1st May 2019. The system will enable the headmaster and class teacher to access the academic performance of a student. Parents, too, can access the information by downloading the Banglar Shiksha app.

Notes:
The 7th Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Intersessional Ministerial Meeting (7th RCEP ISSL MM) will be held in Siem Reap, Cambodia on 2nd March 2019. The aim of the 16-member RCEP is to cover issues related to goods, services, investments, economic and technical cooperation, competition and intellectual property rights. From India, Union Minister of Commerce & Industry and Civil Aviation, Suresh Prabhu will attend the meeting. The RCEP is a proposed Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between 16 countries namely 10 countries of ASEAN (Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam) and their six FTA partners (also known as AFP’s or ASEAN FTA Partners) namely Australia, China, India, Japan, Korea and New Zealand.

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On 4th March, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a National Common Mobility Card (NCMC) in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, which will function on the “One Nation One Card” model across the country. The NCMC is the India’s first indigenously developed payment platform for transport that can be used to make payments across public transport anywhere in the country, including Metro, bus and suburban railways, for toll and parking, and for retail like any credit or debit card. The stored value on card supports offline transaction across all travel needs with minimal financial risk to involved stakeholders. The service area feature of this card supports operator specific applications e.g. monthly passes, season tickets etc. The card will address the challenges associated with the cash payment e.g. cash handling, revenue leakages, cash reconciliation etc. Beside this, PM Modi also launched an Automatic Fare-Collection system (AFC) called ‘SWEEKAR’, and a gate and card-reader system called ‘SWAGAT’ . The three together will enable the use of the national mobility card across the country without a conflict with existing Point-of-Sale (PoS) machines. The cards can be issued by all public and private banks the same way credit, debit, and prepaid cards are issued.

Notes:
On 5th March, the Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh has inaugurated the project BOLD-QIT (Border Electronically Dominated QRT Interception Technique) on India-Bangladesh border in Dhubri District of Assam. The project is a part of the Comprehensive Integrated Border Management System (CIBMS), which many countries including Israel have adopted to ensure proper border management. Hence, the implementation of the BOLD-QIT project will not only help Border Security Force (BSF) to curb all types of cross border crimes but also provide respite to the troops from round the clock human surveillance. Now, the entire span of River Brahmaputra has been covered with data network generated by Microwave communication, OFC Cables, DMR Communication, day and night surveillance Cameras and intrusion detection system. These modern gadgets provide feeds to BSF Control Rooms on the Border and enable BSF Quick Reaction Teams to thwart any possibility of Illegal Cross Border Crossing/ Crimes. The BSF is responsible for safeguarding of over 4,000km long International Border with Bangladesh.

Notes:
Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal has recently ordered a ban on molasses in the state in the aftermath of the hooch tragedy in two districts – Golaghat and Jorhat – which claimed 158 lives. Molasses is an important component in making “sulai”, an intoxicating drink widely consumed in the tea garden areas of Assam.

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The Tripura government has launched a one-month project – Notun Disha (new direction) to provide training to school teachers. In it, the state government has decided to distribute laptops to 800 school teachers to assess the level of students’ development in different disciplines. Here, 800 teachers would be selected for the training, and selected NGOs, societies or educational institutions would provide them training. In February 2019, the state government held a survey to assess the educational status of students between third and eighth standard in government schools. The survey report has revealed that 60% of students (equal to 51,599) in the fifth standard cannot read Bengali language textbook from the second standard. Apart from this, as per the survey, 46% of the surveyed students cannot do subtraction and 81% students do not know how to solve division problems. Hence, the aim of the Notun Disha is to make the students efficient and capable in all subjects from the 3rd to 8th standard.

Notes:
Union Minister Dr. Mahesh Sharma has recently inaugurated ‘Azaadi Ke Diwane’ museum at the Red Fort premises in New Delhi. The museum is dedicated to the unsung heroes of the country’s freedom struggle and is built by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI). It is a modern, state-of-the-art, informative and educational exhibition involving multi-sensory technology to engage the visitors. The ‘Azaadi Ke Diwane’ is the 5th in a series of recently inaugurated ones — the others being the Subhash Chandra Bose and INA museum, the Yaad-e-Jallian museum, the Museum on 1857 (on the India’s first war of Independence) and the Drishyakala (a museum on Indian Art) — on the sacrifices of India’s freedom fighters.

Notes:
The Geological Survey of India (GSI) has launched 22 permanent Global Positioning System (GPS) stations across India to identify seismically hazardous zones and encourage mapping activities. The 22 GPS-Geodetic (pertaining to Geodesy, the science of earth measurement) observatories are located in Kolkata, Thiruvananthapuram, Jaipur, Pune, Dehradun, Chennai, Jabalpur, Bhubaneswar, Patna, Raipur, Bhopal, Chandigarh, Gandhinagar Vishakhapatnam, Agartala, Itanagar, Mangan, Jammu, Lucknow, Nagpur, Shillong and Little Andaman. These stations are meant to delineate high strain zones for earthquake probability, determine a seismic motion on faults that may lead to a rupture and produce thematic maps with high positional accuracy. The new 13 stations will be located in Aizawl, Faridabad, Uttarkashi, Pithoragarh, Cooch Behar, Zawar, North Andaman, Middle Andaman, South Andaman, Ranchi, Mangalore, Imphal and Chitradurga.

Notes:
P Venkata Ramesh Babu, a 1985 batch IAS officer, has been appointed as the director-general of the National Archives of India (NAI). Prior to this post, he was CMD of Rural Electrification Corporation Limited. The NAI is a repository of the non-current records of the Government of India (GoI) and holds them in trust for the use of administrators and scholars. It functions as an Attached Office of the Department of Culture under the Ministry of Culture.