Current Affairs Quiz - October, 2019

Notes:
The Hurun Research Institute has released it’s first-ever Hurun Global Unicorn List 2019. It is a ranking of the world’s billion-dollar tech ‘start-ups’ founded in the 2000s and not yet listed on a public exchange. This is the first year of the list and follows from the 6th quarterly Hurun China Unicorn Index. China has topped the list with 206 unicorns, followed by US with 203. While India has been ranked 3rd in the list with 21 unicorns, led by payments solutions platform One97 Communications (10 billion) and followed by cab aggregator Ola Cabs (6 billion); online educator Byju’s (6 billion) and travel-stay finder OYO Rooms (5 billion).

Notes:
The 2nd edition of Indo-French Knowledge Summit was held at University of Lyon in France on October 17-18.  It is dedicated to higher education, research and innovation. The summit was organised by the Embassy of France in India in association with the Ministry of Science and Technology and the HRD Ministry.

Notes:
The World Students’ Day (WSD)  is celebrated every year on October 15 to observe the birthday of India’s former President and great scientist Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam. He was the 11th President of India, who served from 2002 to 2007, and was widely referred to as the people’s President besides being credited for India’s civilian space programme and military missile systems.

Notes:
A Chinese company “Sam Enterprise Group” has signed a secretive deal with the  government of the Solomon Islands to lease an entire Tulagi island for up to 75 years but the status of the lease remains unclear since it is a non-binding agreement. The deal was signed just a few days after the Solomon Islands abandoned Taiwan and began diplomatically recognizing Chinese aid and investment to flow. The purpose of the deal is to establish a Pacific military base on a strategic gateway to Australia. The island of Tulagi served as a South Pacific headquarters for Britain and then Japan. It is the site of a former Japanese naval base and was the scene of fierce fighting in World War II.

Notes:
The Baliyatra is one of the biggest trade fairs of Odisha i.e. scheduled to begin on November 12. The 8-day trade fair will be jointly organized by the Cuttack District Administration, District Cultural Council, and the Cuttack Municipal Corporation (CMC).

Notes:
Indian cyclist Ronaldo Singh has won gold in the men’s junior Keirin event at the 2019 Asian Track Cycling Championships at Incheon in South Korea. Apart from Ronaldo, James Singh clinched a bronze medal in the same event. India also secured 2 bronze medals in men’s and women’s Jr. sprint team.

Notes:
Indo-Maldives joint military exercise ‘Ex Ekuverin – 2019’ has recently  culminated  at Foreign Training Node in Aundh military station, Pune. The 14 day exercise included joint training of the contingents in counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism operations in the semi-urban environment under the UN mandate, developing interoperability and cohesion between both the contingents.

Notes:
India has been ranked 63rd among 190 countries, as per latest Doing Business Report (DBR, 2020) of World Bank (WB). As per report, the World Bank (WB) has recognized India as one of the top 10 improvers for the third consecutive year. India’s recovery rate under resolving insolvency has improved significantly from 26.5% to 71.6%. The time taken for resolving insolvency has also come down significantly from 4.3 years to 1.6 years. India has reduced the number of procedures in granting construction permits. Apart from this, India continues to maintain its first position among South Asian countries. 

Notes:
Braj Raj Sharma, a 1984-batch IAS officer of J&K cadre, has been appointed as Chairman of Staff Selection Commission (SSC). He succeeded Pankaj Kumar, who recently became the new CEO of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).

Notes:
India has been ranked 32nd among 39 nations at the 2019 Melbourne Mercer Global Pension Index (MMGPI). The index is based on how they fare on providing pension and retirement benefits to citizens across different income groups. India’s index value increased largely due to the improvement in all three sub-indices of adequacy, sustainability and integrity. As per the index, the improvement was due to slight increase in scores across various dimensions, including net household savings, greater flexibility in managing retirement and part time work, steady progress in governance and reporting around private pension plans.