Current Affairs Quiz - March, 2020

Notes:
The Union Cabinet approved a reconstruction plan proposed by the RBI for providing financial assistance to the Yes Bank. Union Finance Minister announced that the authorised capital of Yes Bank has been increased to Rs 6,200 crore.
Under the plan, SBI will infuse Rs 7,250 crore in the Yes bank and take 49 per cent equity. ICICI Bank shall invest Rs 1,000 crore and HDFC will infuse Rs 1,000 crore, while Axis Bank will invest up to Rs 600 crore.
Federal Bank and Bandhan Bank will invest Rs.300 crore each. Former non-executive chairman of Punjab National Bank Sunil Mehta is appointed as Yes bank’s non- executive chairman.

Notes:
The co-founder of Microsoft and the world’s second richest person Bill Gates has stepped down from the boards of Microsoft and Berkshire Hathaway.
Bill Gates recently announced that he steps down from the public boards to focus on the philanthropic work of Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation run by him and his wife Melinda Gates. Microsoft is now led by Satya Nadella as its CEO and is among the world’s most valuable companies.

Notes:
National Centre for Disease Informatics and Research, Bengaluru
Scientists at the National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune have isolated 11 strains of the Covid-19, which is the first step towards developing a vaccine for containing a disease. India has become the fifth country to successfully isolate the strains.
NIV Pune is a part of Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), which has more than 6,500 samples of 5,900 individuals. It is also the testing agency for the virus and has expanded its network of labs equipped to test Covid-19 from 51 to 65.

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:
Microsoft Bing team has launched a web portal for tracking COVID-19 infections worldwide. The interactive website has been developed to provide up-to-date infection statistics for each country.
It also features an interactive map for number of cases for specific location and related articles from publishers. The portal hosts the data from reliable sources like the World Health Organization (WHO), the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC).

Notes:
The city of Kishangarh in Ajmer district of Rajasthan is called the ‘Marble city of India’. Recently the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) today flagged off the first-ever thrice-weekly flight from Indore to Kishangarh, under the RCS-UDAN scheme.
Star Air has been awarded the Indore-Kishangarh route during the UDAN 3 bidding process. With this route, the Civil Aviation Ministry has operationalised 268 routes under the UDAN scheme.

Notes:
Scientists from the Institute of Nano Science and Technology (INST), an autonomous institute under the Department of Science & Technology, have developed a material called ‘Hemostat’.
It is a starch-based ‘hemostat’ developed to stop rapid blood loss during accidents, as it physically absorbs excess fluid and concentrates the natural clotting factors in blood. The product possesses increased absorption capacity, improved absorption, inexpensive and biodegradable.

Notes:
The Reserve Bank of India recently announced that it will regulate the entire activities of Payment Aggregators (PAs). Payment Aggregators enable the e-commerce sites and merchants to accept various payment instruments from the customers.
As per the guidelines on regulation of PAs and Payment gateways (PGs), the existing PAs should attain a net-worth of Rs 15 crore by March 31, 2021 and a net-worth of Rs 25 crore on or before March 31, 2023. Thereafter the net-worth of Rs 25 crore shall be maintained at all times.

Notes:
Former Chairman and Managing Director of Air India Ashwani Lohani has been recently appointed as the Chairman of Andhra Pradesh Tourism Development Corporation (APTDC).
This was announced in the order released by the Chief Secretary of the state and the appointment has been made for one year. He had earlier served in several similar positions including the Chairman of the Railway Board and CMD of the India Tourism Development Corporation.

Notes:
Kerala has launched an initiative to use robots for creating awareness on COVID-19 among the public. Two robots have been built by a start-up in Kerala called Asimov Robotics, under the Kerala Start-up Mission, an initiative by the state government to promote start-up firms.
One wears a mask and distributes hand sanitisers, napkins, and masks to people while the other robot responds to queries. They are deployed in Kochi on a pilot basis.