Current Affairs Quiz - February, 2021

Notes:
The “Anti radicalism bill” of France, that aims to strengthen oversite of mosques, schools and sports clubs has been put to vote in the nation’s law making assembly.
The bill has been proposed to rid France of radical Islamists and ensure respect for French value. This is considered to be President Emmanuel Macron’s landmark project.

Notes:
India’s leading cement maker ACC has launched a new low carbon range of ready mix concrete, in order to cut down carbon emissions.
This has been named as ECOPact. It has been launched in Mumbai and Hyderabad initially and would be rolled out in the entire country in some time.

Notes:
S. Chinny Krishna, the co-founder of Blue Cross of India, has been conferred with the prestigious ‘Prani Mitra’ award for 2021 by the Animal Welfare Board of India.
Union Minister for Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying Giriraj Singh presented the award to Mr. Krishna in New Delhi, for his lifetime service to animals. It is the country’s highest award for animal welfare.

Notes:
Social Justice and Empowerment Minister Thaawarchand Gehlot released the third edition of the Indian Sign Language (ISL) Dictionary.
This edition has 10,000 terms of daily use and technical terms including academic, legal, medical terms. The second edition of the dictionary released in 2019 had 6,000 terms and the first edition released in 2018 had 3,000 terms.

Notes:
Iran and Russia are organising a two-day navy exercise called “Iran-Russia Maritime Security Belt 2021” in the northern part of the Indian Ocean.
India has joined the exercise with a select group of vessels and forces. The drill will cover an area of 17,000 square kilometres and will include shooting at sea and air targets and liberating hijacked ships, as well as search and rescue and anti-piracy operations.

Notes:
The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved a set of amendments to the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015.
This was the proposal of the Ministry of Women and Child Development. The amendments include empowering the District Magistrates (DM) and the additional DMs to monitor the functioning of agencies, which are implementing the act.

Notes:
According to the Institute of International Finance, the total amount of global debt stood at USD 281 trillion at the end of 2020.
It also revealed that the countries, companies and households raised USD24 trillion last year to tackle the economic crisis created due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The total debt was over 355 per cent of global GDP.

Notes:
While addressing a high-level meeting of the UN Security Council, United Nations chief Antonio Guterres said 130 countries have not received a single dose of vaccine.
As only 10 countries have administered 75 per cent of all vaccinations, the UN slammed the uneven and unequitable distribution of coronavirus vaccines. He also called for a global effort to get all people vaccinated as soon as possible.

Notes:
25-year-old Manika Batra defeated Reeth Rishya to win the 82nd Senior National Table Tennis Championship.
The top-ranked Indian player and the World no 63 is set compete at two WTT Contender events this month followed by the World and Asian Olympic qualifiers in Doha in the month of March. She received Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna award in 2020.

Notes:
The Union Ministry of Agriculture has obtained approval from DGCA for use of drones to implement Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY).
The Agriculture Ministry has planned to fly drones over 100 districts of the country to capture images of rice and wheat fields for assessing crop yields. It would also be used for claim settlement under the crop insurance scheme.