Current Affairs Quiz - March, 2019

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.

Notes:
Malaysia has become the 124th member of the International Criminal Court (ICC) after ratifying the Rome Statute. It joined the ICC because of the following reasons: Firstly, the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 in Ukraine and the Rohingya crisis. Secondly, the May 2018 election of Mahathir Mohamad for his 2nd stint as Prime Minister has brought a significant shift in the relationship between the Malaysian government and monarchy. Thirdly, the election of Mahathir and appointment of a new Attorney General, Tommy Thomas, has seen the main legal obstacles to ratification removed. Finally, Malaysia’s decision to ratify the Rome Statute has also been driven by Mahathir’s stated ambition to see his country “play a more active role” in ASEAN and the United Nations. Hence, it is third country of the 10 member states of ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations), to ratify Rome Statute after Cambodia and Philippines. However, Philippines has announced its withdrawal from the ICC and it is set to take effect from 19th March 2019. Earlier, Burundi became the first country to quit the court in 2017.

Notes:
The Government of India (GoI) has constituted a 5-member committee to examine the issues related to framing of a proper, structured scheme for providing insurance cover to advocates and suggest modalities for its implementation. The committee, under the chairmanship of Legal Affairs Secretary Alok Srivastava, will recommend a comprehensive insurance scheme for the welfare of advocates all over the country to address concerns relating to untimely death and medical insurance. The committee will submit its reports within 3 months.

Notes:
Union Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports has granted provisional recognition to All India Carrom Federation (AICF) as National Sport Federation with immediate effect till up to 31st March 2019 or decision of the Hon’ble High Court of Delhi in the matter, whichever is earlier. It is to facilitate participation of Indian Athletes in the forthcoming National/International competitions. The recognition means granting a major role to AICF for development of the Carrom sport in India. The recognition can be reviewed by the government in case Memorandum of Association (MoA) of the AICF or its practices come into conflict with the government guidelines as amended from time to time. The Carrom sport is placed in the ‘Others’ category.

Notes:
Uttarakhand Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat has recently launched the free milk scheme “Mukhyamantri Anchal Amrit Yojana” for anganwadi children . Under the Amrit Yojana, flavored, sweet, skimmed milk powder will be made available to the 20,000 Anganwadi kendras across the state. Nearly 2.5 lakh children at 20,000 Anganwadi kendras in the state will be given 100 ml milk twice a week for free. This scheme has been launched as part of state government drive to fight against malnutrition in the state. Approx 18,000 children suffer from malnutrition in Uttarakhand.

Notes:
To reduce casualties in Pulwama type attacks & warefare, the Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences (INMAS) has developed a range of ‘combat casualty drugs’ that can extend the golden hour till the trooper is shifted to hospital. INMAS is a medical laboratory of DRDO. The spectrum includes bleeding wound sealants, super absorptive dressings, and glycerated salines, all of which can save lives in the event of warfare in a jungle and high altitude areas as well as in terror attacks. According to developers of the drugs, chances of survival and minimum disability are highest when effective first aid care is given within the golden hour. Among the drugs developed is glycerated saline, a battlefield intravenous fluid that does not freeze till -18 degrees Celsius and is useful in handling trauma cases in high altitude areas. Glycerated saline has life saving capacities as it gives more time to the medical personnel to shift the wounded patient to a higher care facility. INMAS has also developed a special medicated dressing material which is 200 times more absorptive than normal dressings during bleeding wounds. They have also developed a chitosan gel which helps in preventing blood loss by forming a film over the wound.

Notes:
The students from IIT Kharagpur have devised unique solutions ranging from detecting counterfeit currency to nuclear radiation tracking through wearable sensors at the recently concluded nationwide competition, Smart India Hackathon 2019. They developed a code for a smartphone application to address the problem of detecting fake Indian currency. For this, the 6-member team have developed an image processing application which can detect counterfeit currency. The application, which can be installed on smartphones, can be used by people at various touch points thus reducing chances of fraud. A user can upload a currency note image and the mobile app would verify its authenticity using 25 features extracted from the front and rear side of the currency note. In case of detection of a fake note, the user will also be notified of the failure checkpoints. The six students who developed the code are T.Y.S.S. Santosh, Satish Kumar Reddy, Vipul Tomar, Sai Krishna, Drishti Tulsi and D V Sai Surya.

Notes:
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world’s largest and most powerful particle collider and the largest machine in the world. It is in news because The European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN) has approved the experiment designed to look for light and weakly interacting particles at the LHC. It is planning a new experiment to look for particles associated with the mysterious dark matter which makes up about 27% of the universe. This novel experiment will help diversify the physics programme of colliders such as the LHC, and will allow the researchers to address unanswered questions in particle physics from a different perspective. FASER (or the Forward Search Experiment) will complement CERN’s ongoing physics programme & extend its discovery potential to several new particles. The FASER detector’s total length is under 5m and its core cylindrical structure has a radius of 10cm. It will be installed in a side tunnel along an unused transfer line which links the LHC to its injector, the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS). A collaboration of 16 institutes is building the detector and will carry out the experiments which will start taking data from LHC between 2021 and 2023. LHC is a giant lab in a 27-kilometre tunnel straddling the French-Swiss border. India is an associate member in the LHC project.

Notes:
The book titled “Tiger Woman” has been authored by Bengali novelist Sirsho Bandopadhyay. It is translated by Arunava Sinha from the Bengali version “Shardulsundori” is set in the Calcutta of the 1880s. It’s a historical novel that places a tragic love triangle in an era of patriotism and the Great Bengal Circus became a metaphor for a frustrated social revolution.

Notes:
The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) is the government agency for authentic source of data on crime, accidents, suicides, and prisons for policy matters and research data as defined by the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Special and Local Laws (SLL). Founded in 1986, Bureau is also apex nodal agency for all Finger Print related matters including accreditation of Finger Print Experts in the country. It is headquartered in New Delhi and is part of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA). The current Director of NCRB is Ramphal Pawar (IPS). Recently, NCRB has celebrated its 34th Inception Day on March 11.