Current Affairs Quiz - August, 2020

Notes:
The state of Assam has proposed to launch a Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) scheme named “Arunodoi”.
This scheme will be launched in lines with the flagship DBT scheme Jan Dhan Yojana. This is claimed as the largest DBT scheme of Assam till date. The scheme also called as Orunodoi, seeks to transfer Rs 830 per month to around 19.7 lakh families. The main beneficiaries of the scheme will be women.

Notes:
According to a new report by Purely Diamonds, Ho Chi Minh City, the largest city of Vietnam is the cheapest city to rent in the world.
The report also revealed that New York is the most expensive city to rent, in the world. The Indian Capital, Delhi is the second cheapest city in the world. Delhi is followed by the capital of Tamil Nadu, Chennai. New York is followed by Los Angeles as the second most expensive city.

Notes:
The Government of Goa has signed a tri-partite agreement with Siemens and GIZ, a German based agency, for vocational education and training at ITIs (Industrial Training Institutes) of the state.
The Indo-German agreement would facilitate in-plant trainings to students, so that they would be exposed to hands-on experience in their respect domain, thereby improving the employability of the students.

Notes:
The United Nations Security Council has rejected a resolution made by the United States to extend a ban of Arms on Iran.
Only the Dominican Republic supported the proposal of the United States in the 15-member UN Security Council. Russia and China opposed the proposal while Germany, France, the UK and eight other member countries abstained from voting.

Notes:
NITI Aayog’s Atal Innovation Mission has partnered with NASSCOM to launch an Artificial Intelligence-based module for school students. This module aims to bring AI based technology to the classrooms of the country.
This module is launched as a successor to a similar module launched in February. It contains a set of self-learning attractive modules, which can be easily understood by both rural and urban students.

Notes:
Considered as extinct over seventy years back, the Woolly flying squirrel was spotted at Gangotri National Park in Uttarakhand.
As per the Forest Research Institute, the flying squirrel was added in the IUCN Red List. It was spotted during the survey conducted in the national park. The animal uses its wool-like furry claws like a parachute and fly.

Notes:
Frozen shrimp was the major export product among the sea food followed by frozen fish in FY 2010-20. India has shipped 12.89 lakh tones of seafood during the last financial year amounting USD 6.68 billion.
The USA and China were the largest importers of Indian seafood. The Marine Products Export Development Authority (MPEDA) is aiming to increase the country’s sea food exports to Rs 1 trillion by 2030.

Notes:
People’s Bank of China (PBOC) has acquired a small equity stake in the leading Indian private sector bank, ICICI Bank.
It is one among the 357 institutional investors which had subscribed to the issue of the Qualified institutional investors (QIP) placement, of Rs 15,000 crore. PBOC has invested Rs 15 crore in the issue. It had earlier bought a stake in leading institution, HDFC.

Notes:
The Mysuru Zoo in Karnataka is the second Indian zoo to have African hunting cheetahs after the Hyderabad zoo.
Under the Animal Exchange Programme, the zoo has acquired one male and two female African hunting Cheetah from Ann Van Dyke Cheetah Centre at Johannesburg, South Africa. One female Cheetah of age 15 months and two male Cheetahs of age 14 and 16 months are brought by air.

Notes:
Vijay Rupani, the Chief Minsiter of Gujarat has given approval for construction of sky scrapers and high-rise buildings of 70 floors or more in five major cities of the state namely Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Surat, Rajkot and Gandhinagar.
The present rule governing the construction of buildings permits construction only up to 23 floors. A special technical committee would be set up to give approval to such projects.