Current Affairs Quiz - December, 2020

Notes:
The ABTO (Association of Buddhist Tour Operators) International Convention is an event organised by ABTO in partnership with the Ministry of Tourism.
ABTO is a body consisting of over 1500 members in India and overseas. It has been organising the ABTO convention and International Buddhist Travel Mart (IBTM) since 2018, in Bodh Gaya in the state of Bihar.

Notes:
Malana Cream is a type of hash, which comes from the Malana Valley in Kullu district of Himachal Pradesh. The Charas is the resin obtained from a species of the cannabis plant, which grows in the valley.
The Narcotics Control Bureau has recently claimed that it has seized the smuggled ‘Malana Cream’. Charas was banned in India in 1986 under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985.

Notes:
Asia’s oldest stock exchange, BSE Limited, has launched an electronic spot platform for agricultural commodities through its subsidiary BSE Investments.
The platform is named as BSE E-Agricultural Markets Ltd (BEAM). It is to function as a national level, electronic, commodity spot trading platform. Through this, farmers of one state will get access to markets in other states.

Notes:
Veteran aerospace scientist and Padma Vibhushan awardee Roddam Narasimha has recently passed away at the age of 87.
He served at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), teaching Aerospace Engineering from 1962 to 1999. He also served as the director of the National Aerospace Laboratories. He was conferred with the Padma Vibhushan award in 2013.

Notes:
The Government of India and New Development Bank today signed a loan agreement for USD 1000 million.
The loan aims to provide support to Aatma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan through MGNREG Scheme. This is expected to facilitate economic activity and employment generation to stimulate rural demand, which will in turn help the recovery of economy, hit by Covid-19.

Notes:
The Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) held a voting for conducting Asian Games for the year 2030 and 2034. The candidates were Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
The 2030 Asian Games were awarded to Qatar (Doha), while the 2034 event went to Saudi Arabia (Riyadh). The Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) is a governing body of sports in Asia and was formed in the year 1982.

Notes:
The United States Treasury named Switzerland and Vietnam as Currency manipulators. It also added India in the watch list of Currency manipulators.
As per the U.S. Treasury, Switzerland and Vietnam had intervened heavily in currency markets to prevent balance of payments (BoP) adjustments. The ‘Monitoring list’ of countries has reached ten, with the additions of Taiwan, Thailand and India.

Notes:
E-commerce platform Snapdeal has partnered with National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) to allow buyers to make digital payments at the time delivery.
This QR-based facility aims to assist new or first-time users who are not comfortable in pre-paying for the goods. The delivery executive will generate a UPI-linked QR code, which will be scanned by the customer for payment.

Notes:
The World Bank has recently released the corrected Doing Business rankings after review of data irregularities.
The World Bank corrected the rankings of China, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Azerbaijan. China’s rank in 2018 would have been 85, a drop of 7 places. India holds the same place of 63 in the Doing Business 2020 report.

Notes:
The Indian cricket team has recently scored its lowest ever total in Test cricket against the Australian cricket team.
In the second innings of the first Test match, Indian team collapsed to 36 runs leaving 9 wickets in 21.2 overs. Indian Team had a 53-run lead in the first innings. India’s earlier lowest score was 42 in the year 1974 against England.