Current Affairs Quiz - February, 2020

Notes:
Veteran Hollywood actor Kirk Douglas has recently passed away at the age of 103. The legendary actor was born in Amsterdam and his original name was Issur Danielovitch Demsky.
He made his Hollywood debut in 1946 with the film “The Strange Love of Martha Ivers” and Kirk Douglas became a leading box-office icon of Hollywood during 1950-60. One of his most popular movies was ‘Spartacus’, which made a universal box-office record. He was the recipient of the prestigious Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest award given to a US civilian.

Notes:
Minister of State for Labour Santosh Gangwar recently announced that the government is conducting a new Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS). The survey conducted this year comprises of new parameters and bigger sample size.
As per the results of the PLFS survey being conducted by the government, the Unemployment rate in the country in 2017-18 was 6.1 per cent. The labour force participation in the country in the same time period was found to be 36.9 per cent. The Minister also announced that the new survey conducted through the Ministry of Statistics provides more authentic data.

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Pakistani cricketer Naseem Shah recently became the youngest person to get a hat trick in test cricket. Naseem, aged 16 years and 359 days took three wickets against Bangladesh on February 9, 2020 to set this record.

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23rd edition of the two day annual National Conference on e-Governance recently concluded in Mumbai. Its focus was on improving delivery of public services by promoting use of digital platforms. During the event, Blockchain Sandbox – Maharashtra was also launched. Mumbai Declaration on e-Governance was also unanimously adopted on the concluding day.

Notes:
The City Police has recently launched ‘Operation Nakail’ in Ghaziabad, to verify the identity of auto-drivers of the city. Under the initiative, a unique four-digit number will be allotted to every auto-rickshaw of the city.
The owner of the vehicle has to paint the number, his name and mobile number on the auto, which would be easy to identify them. After many crimes were reported to be held in auto-rickshaws, this initiative was launched.

Notes:
The Chief economist of World Bank, Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg recently announced her resignation. The economist is expected to step down from her role on March 1 and return to teach at Yale University.
Pinelopi Koujianou assumed charge as the Chief economist at the end of April 2018. World Bank President David Malpass announced that Research Director Aart Kraay would take over as an interim Chief economist.

Notes:
The Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act of 1989 was legislated to protect the scheduled communities from harassments and atrocities.
In March 2018, the Supreme court gave a judgement diluting the original act and it even granted anticipatory bail for those booked in the atrocity case. After huge protest, the government amended the original act and passed the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Act, 2018. This amendment has been upheld by the apex court.

Notes:
The 2nd Seven-nation BIMSTEC Disaster Management Exercise, 2020 was recently inaugurated at Bhubaneswar, the capital city of Odisha by its Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik.
The Exercise is hosted by the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) as the nodal agency. The theme of the exercise is- “Response to a cultural heritage site that suffers severe damage in an earthquake” & “Response to a Cultural Heritage site that is affected by flooding or storm surge”.

Notes:
The Ministry of health and family welfare recently said in a notification that all medical devices sold in the country would be treated as drugs and would be regulated under the Drugs and Cosmetics Act of 1940, from April 1, 2020.
As of now, only 23 medical devices are being categorised as drugs. Only a few of these including cardiac stents and intrauterine devices have been brought under price control. The decision was taken after discussing with the Drugs Technical Advisory Board (DTAB).

Notes:
The Economist Intelligence Unit has lowered its global growth forecast for 2020 to 2.2%, from its earlier estimate of 2.3%. The dip was due to the new risks that have emerged following the virus outbreak in China, which was recently named by the WHO as COVID-19.
The real GDP forecast for China in 2020 was also decreased to 5.4%, from the earlier estimate of 5.9%. The agency has assumed that the spread of the virus will be contained by the end of March.