Current Affairs Quiz - January, 2020

Notes:
The 14th edition of the famous Global Healthcare summit is proposed to be held in Vishakhapatnam in January 2021. An association called the American Association of Physicians of Indian Origin organises this three-day-event. The 13th summit was conducted in Hyderabad, in the month of July, 2019. The event is proposed to be jointly organised by the Andhra Pradesh state Government. More than 500 doctors and health care professionals are expected to participate in the summit.

Notes:
For his commended performance in the movie ‘Joker’, American actor Joaquin Phoenix won the ‘Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama’ award in the Golden Globe awards 2020. The Joker movie was nominated in four categories in the ceremony and won two awards namely Best Actor (Drama) and Best Original Score. Joker is a psychological thriller film which was directed by Todd Philips. The movie was released in October 2019 and created records by collecting revenues in box offices world-wide.

Notes:
The third ‘International Symposium on Marine ecosystems- challenges and opportunities’ (MECOS-3) is to be held in Cochin from January 7 to 10, 2020. The summit will be organised by the Marine Biological Association of India at the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute, Cochin. A veteran Marine Fisheries Researcher of Finland, Petri Suuronen will be the Chief Guest. The event will focus on United Nation’s SDG Goal of ‘Life Under water’ and sustainable utilisation of marine wealth.

Notes:
The Union Sports Minister recently released the schedule of the 1st edition of ‘Khelo India University Games 2020’. The event is to be conducted in Bhubaneswar from February 21 to March 1, 2020.
Students from various universities across the country will take part in the event in 17 different sports. The logo and the jersey of the players were also released by the Sports Minister along the Chief Minister of Odisha, Naveen Patnaik.

Notes:
The Central Statistical Office recently released the first advance estimates of the Gross Domestic Product of India for 2019-2020. The CSO forecasted the GDP growth rate of India to be 5 % in the current fiscal year.
The CSO had earlier estimated the GDP growth of the previous fiscal to be 6.8%. The reason for the decrease in the growth rate is cited to the slowdown in manufacturing sector. The Reserve Bank of India also estimated 5% as the GDP growth rate for this fiscal.

Notes:
About 1.46 crore voters (80.55 lakh males + 66.35 lakh females) will have a chance to vote in the Delhi assembly elections on February 8. The results will be declared on February 11. Delhi Legislative Assembly has 70 seats of which 67 seats were won by AAP in last elections.

Notes:
The Uttar Pradesh cabinet chaired by its Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath recently approved to build a new zoological garden in Gorakhpur. The zoo is to be named after the famous freedom fighter Shaheed Ashfaqullah Khan, who was sentenced after the Kakori conspiracy, 1925.
The proposed 121-acre zoo is expected to improve the tourism sector of the state and provide employment opportunities. The Government also sanctioned Rs. 234 crores for the construction of the zoo.

Notes:
Union Minister for Women and Child Development and Textiles, Smriti Irani recently launched a scheme named ‘Yashaswini’ from Goa. It is a women empowerment scheme, which aims at supporting women Self Help Groups (SHGs) with interest free loans up to ₹5 lakh. The scheme will also help them to get guidance from experts.
During the event, the Minister also launched Swasthya Sakhi Project and a mobile breast cancer screening initiative, which will be carried out by Anganwadi workers to screen all women of Goa for breast cancer.

Notes:
The Paytm Payment Bank recently announced that it has issued three million FASTags so far and has become the largest issuer of FASTags in the country. The Common Service Centre (CSC) recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Paytm Payment Bank Ltd (PPBL) for selling FASTags.
The users can recharge the FASTags provided by paytm directly from their paytm wallet without having the necessity of using another wallet or application. FASTag is an electronic toll collection system, which is based on Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology.

Notes:
Senior IPS Officer A.P. Maheshwari has been appointed as the new Director General of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) by the Appointments Committee of the Cabinet. The previous DG of CRPF, Rajeev Rai Bhatnagar retired last month and ITBP Director General S.S. Deswal was given the additional charge in CRPF.
Maheshwari is a 1984-batch IPS officer of Uttar Pradesh cadre, who is the Special Secretary (Internal Security) in the Union Home Ministry at present, has been appointed as the new Director General up to 28 February, 2021.