Current Affairs Quiz - March, 2020

Notes:
Legendary India footballer P.K. Banerjee recently passed away at the age of 83. He was a member of the 1962 Asian Games gold-medal winning India football team.
The veteran football player scored 65 international goals in a total of 84 appearances for the national team. Banerjee represented India in the 1956 Melbourne Olympics and led India in the 1960 Rome Olympics. The international governing body of Football game, FIFA awarded him the Centennial Order of Merit in 2004.

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:
The Border Roads Organisation opened a 360 feet long suspension bridge over the Teesta river near Chungthang town in North Sikkim.
Under Project Swastik the project of construction of the bridge commenced in October 2019 and completed it in January 2020. The bridge is expected to promote tourism in the state. It also enables the movement of logistics for the Armed Forces easier.

Notes:
The Government of India has recently constituted a high-level committee of medical experts for prevention & control of COVID-19. The committee is headed by Dr V K Paul, a member of the India think-tank NITI Aayog.
The 21-member high level technical committee comprises of noted public health experts to suggest measures on the prevention and control actions. Union Health Secretary Preeti Sudan and Director General of Indian Council of Medical Research are the Co-Chairpersons of the committee.

Notes:
On the World Water Day, which falls on March 22, the United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned that between 3.5 and 4.4 billion people in the world will live with limited access to water.
He also announced that out of the people with limited access, more than 1 billion of them would be in major cities. He revealed that the world’s water resources are under threat and 2.2 billion people and 4.2 billion people lack safe drinking water and sanitation facilities respectively.

Notes:
The SAARC Disaster Management Centre has recently launched a website for information related to the COVID-19 pandemic in the region.
The website shows the number of coronavirus cases in the SAARC member states with live updates on the count of active cases. This initiative was earlier proposed by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, during the recent video conference with the leaders SAARC member nations.

Notes:
One of India’s leading private sector banks, IndusInd Bank has appointed Sumant Kathpalia as the Managing Director and CEO for a period of three years.
As the previous MD & CEO of the bank Romesh Sobti retired, after holding the top position for 12 years, this appointment has been approved. Sumant Kathpalia has more than three decades of experience in multi-national banks such as Citibank and Bank of America. He had previously served as the Head of Consumer Banking in the same bank.

Notes:
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman recently announced various relief measures amid lock-down of the country due to coronavirus scare.
As per the measures, the deadline for filing belated income tax return (ITR) for the financial year 2018-19 and for filing goods and services tax (GST) returns for March, April and May has been extended to June 30, 2020. She also announced waiver of minimum balance maintenance charge and ATM withdrawal charge for next 3 months. Vivad Se Vishwas Scheme has been extended from April 1 to June 30.

Notes:
The United Nations has recently launched a USD 2 billion global humanitarian response plan to fund the poorest countries and help them fight against the coronavirus pandemic.
This global response plan is to be coordinated by the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. The plan will also integrate the existing appeals from the World Health Organisation and other UN partners. This fund is expected to provide laboratory supplies for testing to NGOs and medical equipment to protect health care workers.

Notes:
The CRISIL rating agency recently announced its estimate on growth rate of India for 2020-21 as 3.5 per cent. The agency had earlier projected the growth rate of India to be 5.2 per cent for the next financial year.
The recent pandemic outbreak in India and the resulting 21-day consequent lockdown are the main reasons for the agency to slash the growth rate. It also announced that the dip in growth will be concentrated in the first half of the next fiscal whereas the second half would see a mild recovery.