Current Affairs Quiz - February, 2021

Notes:
Soyuz-2 is a flagship three-stage launch vehicle of Russia, which places satellites in the low Earth orbit. It is the modernised form of the Soyuz rocket.
Recently, it was announced that the country has planned to launch around 40 satellites from over 12 countries using the Soyuz-2 rocket. It includes the CAS500-1 (Compact Advanced Satellite 500) of South Korea.

Notes:
As per the data given by the Social Justice and Empowerment Ministry, as many as 66,692 manual scavengers have been identified across the country.
As of February 2021, the highest number of manual scavengers have been identified in Uttar Pradesh at 37,379. It is followed by Maharashtra, Uttarakhand and Assam. It was also announced that 340 people have died while cleaning sewers and tanks in the last five years.

Notes:
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has recently unveiled the draft “Humans in space policy 2021”.
The policy will be sent to the government for approval. The policy seeks to facilitate start-ups and the local industry to build technologies for its human space programme. ISRO has also set up a two-member team to study the technologies needed for the mission.

Notes:
The Union Culture Ministry is organising the 11th edition of its Rashtriya Sanskriti Mahotsav (RSM) in West Bengal.
The events will be held in various places namely Cooch Behar, Darjeeling and Murshidabad during this month. It was inaugurated at the Cooch Behar palace and will promote traditional art forms and tribal heritage.

Notes:
Maharaja Suheldev was an Indian king belonging to Shravasti, which is the Gangetic Plains of present-day Uttar Pradesh.
The Government has decided to construct a memorial for the king and Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to lay the foundation stone of Maharaja Suheldev Memorial.

Notes:
Union Textile Minister Smriti Irani rolled out the commercial Jute seed distribution scheme. The productive variant of Jute seeds will help enhance the income of Jute farmers.
Jute Corporation of India had signed an MoU with National Seeds Corporation for commercial distribution of around one thousand Metric Tonne jute seeds for the year 2021-22.

Notes:
A group of six black storks (Ciconia nigra), were spotted recently in the Sigur plateau in the Nilgiris, Tamil Nadu.
The species is classified by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) in the “Least Concern” category. The sighting of the black stork in this region is considered to be extremely rare.

Notes:
Union Labour Minister Santosh Gangwar is to launch software applications for five all India surveys, being conducted by the Labour Bureau.
The Ministry will also release instruction manuals with questionnaire for five All India Surveys including All India Survey on Migrant workers, All India Survey on Domestic Workers, All India Survey on Employment Generated by Professionals, All India Survey on Employment Generated in Transport Sector, and All-India Quarterly Establishment based Employment Survey.

Notes:
Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu has granted recognition to Mallikarjun Kharge as the Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha.
The Indian National Congress Leader succeeds Ghulam Nabi Azad whose term has ended recently. Mallikarjun Kharge was a former Union minister and had been Congress leader in the Lok Sabha, earlier.

Notes:
The Union Cabinet recently approved a Rs 12,195-crore Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for domestic manufacturing of telecom and networking products.
The products include switches, routers, radio access network, wireless equipment and other internet of things (IoT) access devices. With this, the total number of sectors stand at 13, for which incentives of 4 to 6 per cent would be provided by the Government.