Current Affairs Quiz - August, 2020

Notes:
The Chief Minister of Uttarakhand Trivendra Singh Rawat announced that the state will set up the country’s first snow leopard conservation centre.
The centre will be opened in the Uttarkashi forest division in the state. It is to set up jointly with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) as a part of its six-year long project called ‘SECURE Himalayas’. It was started in 2017 to conserve snow leopards and other endangered species in the Himalayas.

Notes:
The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) took over the security at the strategic Leh airport from local Police.
The Kushok Bakula Rimpochee Airport is one among the country’s highest-altitude commercial aerodromes. It is also the 64th civil airport to be brought under the security cover of the CISF. Around 185 CISF personnel will provide round-the-clock armed security in the airport.

Notes:
The Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (IBBI) is the apex institution to implement the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC), which provides a time-bound realisation of stressed assets. It is headquartered at New Delhi.
IBBI has recently amended regulations related to liquidation process and provided clarifications on fee payable to liquidators. At present, the Committee of Creditors (CoC) fixes the fee payable to the liquidator. The liquidator is entitled to the fee corresponding to the amount realised or distributed by him.

Notes:
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has offered a credit facility of Rs 10000 crore to the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) and the National Housing Bank (NHB).
The fund of Rs 5,000 crore each is provided at policy lending rate to the banks, its will be deployed to boost rural lending and affordable housing across the country. Under this facility, small NBFCs and micro-lenders will extend small loans to the poor. Earlier, NABARD got a refinance support of Rs 35,000 crore and NHB got Rs 10,000 crore.

Notes:
The National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) releases the Business Confidence Index (BCI) and Business Expectation Survey (BES).
As per the recent survey conducted by NCAER, the Business Confidence Index fell to 62% from the last year’s level. The index recorded in the first quarter of this fiscal is the lowest index since 1991. During the period, the BCI for North India increased by 25.1% and decreased by 89.3% and 68.1% for East and West India.

Notes:
India’s leading trade association, the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) has partnered with GeM to organise the ‘National Public Procurement Conclave’.
The fourth edition of the conclave has been inaugurated by the Union Commerce& Industry Minister Piyush Goyal. He also asked more buyers and sellers to join the Government-e-Marketplace (GeM). He also warned sellers from selling poor quality goods or charging hefty prices.

Notes:
National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI) has launched a new loyalty platform named ‘nth Rewards’.
It is an analytics-enabled multi-branded loyalty platform that allows users to earn points through various bank transactions. The points can be redeemed on various products like e-vouchers, hotel and flight bookings. Using the platform, banks and merchants can identify consumer behaviour.

Notes:
The Democratic party’s Presidential nominee Joe Biden has named the Indian-origin senator Kamala Harris as his Vice-Presidential candidate.
The 55-year old Indian origin leader is currently the US Senator from California. Joe Biden has made history by selecting the first black woman to compete on behalf of a major party’s presidential process.

Notes:
As per the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, Indian Industrialist Mukesh Ambani is the 4th richest person in the world. According to the index, his personal wealth is USD 80.6 billion in 2020.
Mukesh Ambani, the CMD of Reliance Industries Ltd has surpassed Bernard Arnault, the Chairman and CEO of LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton. The top 3 richest positions are occupied by Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg.

Notes:
One of India’s leading public transit organization – the Delhi Metro has proposed to upgrade its entire fare collection system which will enable the travellers to pay for the distance they have travelled using debit and credit cards.
The passengers need not recharge their smart cards for making payments at the Automatic Fare Collection Gates (AFC Gates). This move has been made by DMRC in order to promote digitalization of the fare collection system.