Current Affairs Quiz - March, 2020

Notes:
The Saurashtra cricket team led by an inspiring skipper Jaydev Unadkat recently won the maiden Ranji trophy of the team.
At the final clash on the fifth and final day at the Saurashtra Cricket Association Stadium, Rajkot, the team stopped Bengal cricket team from clinching the trophy. There were several outstanding performers in the tournament including Arpita Vasavada, who scored a hundred in both semi-final and final, all-rounder Chirag Jani and Sheldon Jackson, who scored over 800 runs for the second successive season.

Notes:
Nita Ambani, the owner of Mumbai Indians cricket team franchise, has been named in the iSportconnect’s list of 10 most influential women in sports for 2020.
iSportconnect is a Sports business network, which released the list. The other women who feature in the list were Tennis superstars Serena Williams and Naomi Osaka, ace gymnast Simone Biles and famous footballer Megan Rapinoe among others.

Notes:
The Uttar Pradesh Cabinet recently passed the ‘Recovery of Damage to Public Properties Ordinance 2020’ for recovery of losses caused by damage to public property during violent protests.
The decision which was taken in a cabinet meeting headed by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath aims to prevent loss of public property in the state. The damages in the violence shall be recovered from the rioters, as per the ordinance. This comes at the backdrop of several violent protests in the state against Citizenship (Amendment) Act.

Notes:
According to the findings of the Gender Social Norms Index report, released recently by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), no country in the world has achieved gender equality.
The report also revealed that the world is not on track to achieve gender equality by 2030 and it would take 257 years to close the gender gap in economic opportunity. Pakistan tops a list of countries of people holding biased views against women.

Notes:
As per the recent information from the Union Defence Ministry, the share of Indian companies in contracts awarded by the Union Defence Ministry for procurement of defence equipment is 75.03 per cent in 2019-20.
The share has increased from 39.06 per cent in 2015-16 to 75.03 per cent in 2019-20 as the Ministry tries to procure indigenously manufactured equipment to the maximum extent. In the last five years 158 contracts were signed with Indian vendors against 100 foreign contracts.

Notes:
S&P Global Ratings lowered India’s economic growth forecast to 5.2 per cent for the year 2020. The rating agency had earlier predicted the growth rate of 5.7% for 2020.
The agency also estimated that the Asia-Pacific economic growth in 2020 will dip to less than 3 per cent. It also revealed that saying the global economy is entering a recession amidst the coronavirus pandemic.

Notes:
The most populous state of the country, Uttar Pradesh is planning to provide cash transfers to daily-wage labourers to protect them from income loss in economic slowdown due to COVID-19.
The state has set up a panel to study the proposal for transferring cash directly to bank accounts of labourers. The report is expected to be submitted within three days. Several countries have already launched ‘stimulus package’ to protect their economy and working population.

Notes:
India recently committed to provide a grant of Nepalese Rupees 107 million (equivalent to INR 68 million) to Nepal for the construction of three school buildings.
The Embassy of India and the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration of Nepal signed two Memorandum of Understandings (MoUs) for the construction of two new school buildings. These two school buildings shall be constructed under the India-Nepal Development Partnership programme.

Notes:
The state government of Uttarakhand issued orders to remove reservation in promotions for SC/ST employees.
In the month of February 2020, the Supreme Court stated that the government is not bound to make reservations and claiming reservation in promotions is not a fundamental right. Now Uttarakhand government has implemented government order which bans reservation in promotion and removed the restriction in promotions in all state government departments.

Notes:
Roger Mayweather, who passed away recently at the age of 58, was a two-time world champion turned trainer in boxing.
He was also the uncle of the boxing star Floyd Mayweather, and trained him for most of the latter’s boxing career. Roger Mayweather had won world titles at super featherweight and super lightweight categories. During his 20-year boxing career, he gained a total of 59 triumphs.