Current Affairs Quiz - August, 2020

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.

Notes:
Leading multi-national company IBM India, has collaborated with National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) to offer a free digital education platform.
The training focuses on recent technologies like cybersecurity, blockchain, artificial intelligence and machine learning and professional development skills. The online courses developed by IBM will be offered through NSDC’s eSkill India portal to the learners between 18 to 22 years.

Notes:
Union Ministry of Power recommends all power generating companies and transmission companies to charge Late payment surcharge (LPS) within 12% per annum.
In many cases, LPS is up to 18 per cent per annum and the high cap has adversely impacted Discoms during the nation-wide lockdown. This measure aims at easing the financial burden on Discoms as well as the consumers.

Notes:
HSBC India launched its ‘Green Deposit Programme’, to finance green initiatives including renewable energy.
Under this new initiative, the bank will ask their corporate clients to deposit money, which will in turn be used for financing green projects by letting the clients indirectly participate in the sustainability projects. The product offers stable principal, pre-agreed return and protection.

Notes:
Union Ministry of Tribal Affairs and Ministry of Rural Development has recently signed a Joint Communication to promote sustainable livelihood opportunities Among Tribal Women SHGs in rural areas.
Rural Development Ministry will identify and map tribal women SHG members while Ministry of Tribal Affairs will promote livelihood opportunities among women identified by State Rural Livelihood Mission (SRLM) through several arenas.

Notes:
Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode (IIM-K) has signed a MoU with Switzerland based HELP Logistics.
This partnership is aimed to develop humanitarian logistics in India through consulting services and logistics training to United Nations bodies, Government Institutions and Non-Governmental Organizations. The MoU will be in force of a period of 1 year.

Notes:
South Africa’s cricket all-rounder Jacques Kallis has been recently inducted into the ICC hall fame.
In addition, Australian women all-rounder Lisa Sthalekar and former Pakistani cricketer Zaheer Abbas were also inducted into the ICC Hall of Fame. Jacques Kallis is the 4th South African player to be inducted.

Notes:
The administration of New Delhi has launched a new campaign named ‘Nirmaan Mazdoor Registration campaign’ from August 24 to September 11.
Through the campaign, the Government fast-tracks the process of analysing the applications received under the initiative for online registration of construction workers. Delhi has received over 70,000 applications for the registration.

Notes:
A team of scientists of Inter University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA), Pune has discovered Ultra Violet light originating from a galaxy named AUDFs01 which is 9.3 billion light years away from Earth.
The UV light was detected by India’s first multi wavelength satellite “Astrosat”. This discovery was made by the team of scientists, led by Dr Kanak Saha.

Notes:
The World Health Organization (WHO) has recently announced that the African continent is completely free of Polio.
A commission headed by Rose Gana Fomban Leke has certified that no wild Polio cases occurred in the African region for the past four years. The threshold for eradication of poliovirus is also four years. Africa had earlier eradicated smallpox disease.