Current Affairs Quiz - January, 2020

Notes:
The Manas National Park is a UNESCO World Heritage site and a biosphere reserve is situated in Assam. Recently a one-horned rhinoceros of the national park named R3A gave birth to its calf. The R3A was also born in the same park to the elder rhino ‘Laisri’ in 2013.
The One-horned rhinoceros or the Indian rhinoceros is an endangered species and is listed as ‘Vulnerable’ in the IUCN Red list of threatened species. At present, the national park is home to 42 rhinos.

Notes:
Article 30 of the Indian Constitution confers the right on minorities to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice. This right is provided to all language and religious minorities.
The Article was recently in news because the Supreme Court of India held that the appointment of teachers in minority educational institutions can be regulated by the Government and it will not violate Article 30. As per the judgement, the institutions cannot have an absolute right on the appointment.

Notes:
In first week of January, 2020 the government has released the first advance estimates of gross domestic product (GDP) growth for 2019-20. The economy will grow at 5% this year, a massive downgrade from the 7% projected by the Economic Survey last year and much lower than the 6.8% growth in the previous year.

Notes:
An International Conference cum Exhibition on Civil Aviation sector named ‘WINGS INDIA 2020’ is scheduled to be organised from March 12 to March 15, 2020. The event is to be held at Begumpet Airport in Hyderabad.
Recently the Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Puri participated in the curtain raiser event for the WINGS INDIA Conference in New Delhi. The Ministry of Civil aviation is to organise the event in association with the industry body FICCI. This is one of the largest events on Civil Aviation in Asia.

Notes:
India’s leading private sector bank, HDFC bank recently launched a customised group of banking products called ‘myApps’. HDFC Bank offers four categories of applications namely mySociety, myClub, myPrayer and myCity at present.
This application suite will benefit several types of institutions like urban local bodies and societies to digitise their transactions. The users can pay bills or book tickets for several facilities using the app. It has many other features like broadcast messages, report on payments by customers and complaint filing.

Notes:
The Union Ministry of Steel is to launch a program called ‘Purvodaya-Accelerated Development of Eastern Region through an Integrated Steel hub’. The Union Minister for Steel and Petroleum & Natural Gas, Dharmendra Pradhan will launch the program.
The Eastern states of India such as Odisha, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, West Bengal and Northern Andhra Pradesh possess a huge share of reserves but lag in development. This proposed Integrated Steel Hub in the Eastern region would lead to an inclusive socio-economic development in the region.

Notes:
The 23rd National Youth Festival is to be organised by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports in Lucknow from January 12 to 16, 2020, in association with the Uttar Pradesh Government. The festival is celebrated to commemorate the birth anniversary of Swami Vivekananda.
Every year, the birthday of the famous Indian monk from Kolkata, Swami Vivekananda is celebrated as the National Youth day on January 12 and the week commencing from the day as the National Youth week. During the youth festival, several competitions are held for the youth and National Youth awards are also presented.

Notes:
The ruler of Oman and one of the longest serving rulers in the Middle East countries, Sultan Qaboos bin Said al Said recently passed away. He was not keeping well for a long time and was undergoing medical treatment in Belgium last month.
After his demise, the former culture minister of Oman, Haitham bin Tariq was named as the successor of Sultan Qaboos. It is mandatory to name the successor of the vacant throne within three days, as per the constitution of Oman.

Notes:
India recently signed an MoU with Bangladesh for content exchange programme between All India Radio and the national broadcaster of Bangladesh, Bangladesh Betar in New Delhi.
An MoU was also signed between National Film Development Corporation, India and Film Development Corporation, Bangladesh in the presence of Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar and his Bangladesh counterpart. A biopic on the life of the great leader of Bangladesh Sheikh Mujibur Rahman jointly produced by the countries, will be released in March 2020.

Notes:
Union Ministers Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari launched the ‘Integrated Road Accident Database (IRAD)’ during the road safety stakeholders’ meet. IRAD is a central accident database management system, to analyse the causes of road accidents and create solutions to reduce them.
The database was developed by the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (IIT-M) with the project cost of Rs. 258 Crores. This initiative is supported by the World Bank and it is implemented through the National Informatics Centre.