Current Affairs Quiz - January, 2020

Notes:
The Community Policing wing of Kolkata Police conducts training programs named ‘Sukanya’ to teach self-defence to school girls. The third edition of the programme was recently inaugurated in the state of West Bengal. Under the scheme, training programs are to be conducted to the girls of hundred city-based schools and colleges, which come under the jurisdiction of Kolkata Police. West Bengal Women and Child Development and Social Welfare Department is the funding agency of the scheme.

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:
Mission Indradhanush is a Universal Vaccination Programme launched by the Ministry of Health and Family welfare in 2014. The Intensified Intensified Mission Indradhanush 2.0 is carried out from December 2019 to March 2020.
Under the Indradhanush scheme, unvaccinated or partially vaccinated children and pregnant women are vaccinated. The target fixed for the scheme is 2020. Recently the Ministry launched IMI 2.0 portal to record the target and real time data of the campaign.

Notes:
Drosophila is an insect, which is also called as small fruit fly. It belongs to the species of flies and the family of Drosophilidae. This fruit fly serves as the model organism for biological research all over the world.
Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) is to organise the fifth edition of the Asia Pacific Drosophila Research Conference (APDRC5) in Pune. The five-day conference will commence from January 6, 2020.

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:
India has Mutual Legal Assistance Treaties with 42 countries and is signatory to various International Conventions for cooperation in criminal matters. The Home Ministry is the designated central authority for this. The recently revised guidelines have incorporated various legal and technological developments in recent years and aim to make documentation more compliant with international requirements. The revised guidelines provide step-by-step guidance to the investigation agencies for drafting and processing letters rogatory or mutual legal assistance requests and service of summons, notices and other judicial documents. The guidelines have taken into account the concerns raised by various courts for prompt and timely responses in service of documents to person residing abroad. These revised guidelines have provision for service of documents to authorities of foreign country preferably within ten days of receipt of request in respect of offences committed against women and children.

Notes:
Niti Aayog and Indian Railways have recently released a discussion paper for running 150 trains on 100 routes by private operators. The plan envisages a total investment of Rs. 22500 crore. The discussion paper titled ‘Private Participation: Passenger Trains’ has identified 100 routes, including Mumbai Central-New Delhi, New Delhi- Patna, Allahabad-Pune and Dadar-Vadodara.

Notes:
After completion of extensive trials on the Shore Based Test Facility, the naval variant of indigenous Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) made its first successful landing on the aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya. The Light Combat aircraft is developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation, DRDO.
INS Vikramaditya was formally inducted into the Indian Navy on June 2014. It is a flagship air-craft carrier of the Indian Navy. Prior to this commission, it served with the Russian Navy.

Notes:
In the recently held presidential election of Taiwan, Tsai Ing-wen was re-elected as the country’s President. With more than 57% of the votes, Tsai won her second presidential term. Her victory in the election has gained significance as she vowed to protect the sovereignty of Taiwan amidst of the threats posed by China.
China has announced that Taiwan must be united with China at any cost and it would use power if necessary. There were several protests across the country against China’s Authoritarian behaviour.

Notes:
The first mission of the year of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is the communication satellite GSAT-30. It is scheduled for launch on January 17,2020 aboard the Ariane-5 launch vehicle (VA 251) from French Guiana.
The satellite will provide communication services from Geostationary orbit and is expected to serve as the replacement satellite to INSAT- 4 A with extended coverage. GSAT-30 would be beneficial in several ways including supporting VSAT networks, Cellular connectivity and DTH-Television services.