Current Affairs Quiz - August, 2020

Notes:
India’s central bank, the Reserve Bank of India releases the ‘Consumer confidence Survey’. RBI has recently released the results of the July 2020 edition of the survey.
Due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the survey was conducted online through telephone interviews from over 5000 households in 13 major cities including Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai among others. The current situation index dropped to 53.8 in July, which was at the all-time low since the index was introduced.

Notes:
Indian Railways is observing ‘Cleanliness Week’ from August 10, to commemorate the Independence Day.
During the week, a special Cleanliness campaign will be launched and Cleaning of tracks, offices and other areas near Railway premises will be focussed. Collection of wastes with separate pool of plastic waste will also be done. Awareness drives will also be organised to keep the places clean.

Notes:
Walmart-owned Flipkart has announced the launch of a Start-up promotion programme named ‘Flipkart Leap’.
Flipkart’s first start-up accelerator program includes a 16-week virtual program to train the B2C and B2B start-ups across the country. The technical experts in Flipkart in the fields of Business, Operations and Technology, along with industry experts will mentor the start-ups.

Notes:
The state government of Andhra Pradesh launched its Industrial Development Policy 2020-23. It seeks to provide best infrastructure, set-up, skilled labour and hand-holding support for units.
The policy aims to give an industry-friendly environment aligned with international standards. Some of the incentives include reimbursement of 100 % stamp duty, power reimbursement of Rs 1 per unit for five years, reimbursement of 100 % net SGST for five years, interest subsidy of 3 % for five years, among others.

Notes:
A set of 10 ventilators were gifted by the Indian Army to the Army of Nepal in order to support Nepal tackle Covid-19. The ventilators were handed over by the Indian Ambassador to Nepal to the Nepal Army Chief.
The ventilators are to be deployed for a broad range of applications and advanced respiratory support. They are compact in size and are portable for using in intensive care. This assistance is a part of the humanitarian assistance and relief operations of the Indian Army.

Notes:
A book titled ‘Connecting, Communicating, Changing’ will be released by the Defence Minister at Delhi. It narrates the third year in Office of Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu. The e-version of the book would be released by Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting Prakash Javadekar.
The book highlights the Vice President’s travel in India & abroad, his interaction with foreign nationals, world leaders and various sections of the Indian society including farmers, scientists, administrators, industry leaders and artists, among others.

Notes:
The Supreme Court of India ruled that the daughters cannot be deprived of their right of equality and they will have equal coparcenary rights in joint Hindu family property even if the father died before the Hindu Succession (Amendment) Act, 2005.
The daughters will have the right to inherit their ancestral property with retrospective effect with similar rights and liabilities as sons hold. Coparcener refers to a person who assumes a legal right in parental property by birth.

Notes:
Founded by two former scientists at the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), the Space tech start-up Skyroot Aerospace is the first Indian private company to build a homegrown rocket engine.
The company has recently test-fired an upper stage rocket engine successfully. It has also planned to launch the first satellite into the lower earth orbit by the end of 2021. The company had also manufactured India’s first 3D printed Cryogenic rocket engine.

Notes:
According to a recent data from the NASA’s Dawn Spacecraft, the dwarf planet Ceres, which lies in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, is not a barren space rock.
It was earlier believed that the dwarf planet is barren but the data collected reveal that it is a water-rich place and there could be a large and deep reservoir of salt water. In the year 2015, the Dawn spacecraft arrived at Ceres, which us far smaller than the Earth’s moon.

Notes:
World Animal Protection, an international animal welfare organisation has released a new report titled “Elephants. Not commodities”.
The third edition of the report reveals that India has the second-highest number of elephants used in tourism in Asia. It also reveals that as many as 225 of the elephants, which is more than 45%, were kept in severely inadequate conditions.