Current Affairs Quiz - March, 2020

Notes:
The Gollapudi Srinivas National Award 2019 is to be presented jointly to two debutant film-makers for the first time since 23 years of its inception.
Aditya Dhar for the Hindi film ‘Uri: The Surgical Strike’ and Madhu C. Narayanan for the Malayalam movie ‘Kumbalangi Nights’ are selected as the winners. Both the filmmakers will be awarded at a ceremony in Chennai. The award was established in 1998 after Gollapudi Srinivas, a young director, who passed away tragically.

Notes:
The Union Labour Minister Santosh Kumar Gangwar recently informed that the number of job seekers in the country marginally declined between 2015 and 2017 from 4.35 crore in 2015 to 4.24 crore in 2017.
This is the count of job seekers who registered on live register of employment exchanges. The minister also added that all of them may not necessarily be unemployed. The Labour bureau has revamped quarterly employment survey (QES) with the objective to measure relative change in employment situation.

Notes:
The former Chief Justice of India, Ranjan Gogoi has been nominated to Rajya Sabha by the President Ram Nath Kovind, as per the notification of the Union Home Ministry
The nomination is done to fill the vacancy arising due to retirement of one of the members. The maximum strength of Rajya Sabha is 250 members out of which 12 are nominated by the President of India. Gogoi was the 46th Chief Justice in India and was known for his several landmark judgments.

Notes:
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, also known as Bangabandhu was the Founder President of independent nation of Bangladesh. He led the movement against the Pakistani rulers in the then East Pakistan, which led to the liberation of Bangladesh in 1971.
His birth centenary was celebrated on March 17, this year in Bangladesh and across the world. The year-long celebration has been named as ‘Mujib Barsho’.

Notes:
A bench headed by Justice DY Chandrachud pronounced the landmark judgment, which ordered the government to grant permanent commission to female officers in Indian Navy.
After Indian Army, the female officers of Indian Navy are also to be granted permanent commission, which will let them serve for 14 years against the Short Service Commission (SSC), in which they retire in 10 years.

Notes:
Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh paid tribute to the late Goa Chief Minister and former Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar ahead of his death anniversary. He also launched a book titled ‘Invincible-A Tribute to Manohar Parrikar’.
Manohar Parrikar was the Chief Minister of Goa passed away due to an illness and he was succeeded by Pramod Sawant as the next Chief Minister. He served as the Defence Minister of India from 2014 to 2017.

Notes:
Fitch Ratings has recently cut India growth forecast to 5.1 per cent for FY 2020-21. Fitch had projected India to grow at 5.6 per cent in 2020-21 and 6.5 per cent in the following year, in its previous report released in December 2019.
In its Global Economic Outlook 2020, Fitch also estimated that India will witness increased number of people affected by coronavirus, in the coming weeks. It also announced that the outbreak will remain contained amidst the downside risks to this scenario.

Notes:
Every year March 20 is observed as World Sparrow Day to raise awareness about sparrows around the world. It highlights the huge decrease in population of the bird as the house sparrow is on the verge of extinction.
The initiative was started by the India-based Nature Forever Society (NFS), founded by the conservationist Mohammed Dilawar. The first World Sparrow Day was celebrated in 2010 across the globe.

Notes:
America-based Private space agency owned by Elon Musk, SpaceX will send astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) for the first time in May.
This was announced by NASA, which also revealed that the first crewed launch from the United States to the ISS platform since 2011 is to be sent through SpaceX. The space company will launch a Falcon 9 rocket to transport NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the station.

Notes:
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has appointed former RBI Deputy Governor R Gandhi and former banker Ananth Narayan on the board of Yes Bank.
They have been appointed as Additional directors on the board for two years. Ananth Narayan was serving as the regional head of financial markets in the Standard Chartered Bank. R Gandhi was earlier appointed to Yes Bank’s board last year. Prashant Kumar has been appointed Chief Executive of Yes Bank.