Current Affairs Quiz - January, 2021

Notes:
Namrup is a town located in the southeastern part of Assam state. Recently a meeting was held by the Ministry of Chemicals & Fertilizers regarding the upcoming urea plant at Namrup.
The 12.7 lakh MMTPA capacity project is to be implemented jointly by the National Fertilizers Limited (NFL), Oil India Limited (OIL), Rashtriya Chemicals and Fertilizers Limited (RCF), Brahmaputra Valley Fertilizer Corporation Limited (BVFCL) and Assam government.

Notes:
The Indian Government has approved the construction of over 1.68 lakh houses in urban areas under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana- Urban.
As per the Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry, the total number of houses sanctioned so far stands at 1.1 crore. Under PMAY-U, 41 lakh houses have been completed so far and over 70 lakh houses are under construction.

Notes:
The domestic capital market, denoted by SENSEX has touched a new height of 50,000 mark for the first time ever.
The Sensex was launched in 1986 as the country’s first equity index. The index commenced operations with 124 points. It reached 1000 points in 1990 and has grown at a compounded annual growth rate of 15.9% to reach 50,000 points in 2021.

Notes:
Punjab is implementing a scheme named ‘Shagun’ under which financial assistance is provided for the marriage of daughter who belongs to the low-income family. It aims to prevent child marriages.
Recently, the Punjab government hiked the grant for the marriage of daughters of construction workers from Rs 31,000 to Rs 51,000.

Notes:
The World Health Organization (WHO) has collaborated with the American pharmaceutical firm Pfizer recently.
As per the deal, 40 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine will be distributed for poor and lower-middle income countries under its COVAX programme.

Notes:
The Netherlands government played host to an online international Climate Adaptation Summit (CAS Online) on 25 January 2021, under the leadership of Prime Minister Mark Rutte. It aims to help the countries build a climate-resilient ecosystem back after the pandemic
Indian Prime Minister participated in the virtual conference and addressed the members. The Global Center on Adaptation (GCA) released a “State and Trends in Adaptation 2020”, which said global funding must be increased ten-fold, to meet the UNEP’s climate risk mitigation data.

Notes:
The United States Senate confirmed veteran economist Janet Yellen as first woman Treasury Secretary of the country.
The 74-year-old eminent economist is also the Former chairperson of the Federal Reserve during the Global Financial Crisis. She is the third cabinet member of the Biden Administration to be confirmed by the Senate.

Notes:
A recent research by University of Sao Paulo has revealed that Melatonin hormone secreted in the lungs of human beings act as an effective barrier against Covid-19 infection.
It has been identified that the hormone secretion inhibits the expression of genes that are entry points for the virus.

Notes:
The report titled “World Gold Demand Trends” has been released by the World Gold Council. As per the report, Gold purchase by central banks of various countries declined sharply in 2020 and fell by nearly 60% to 272.9 tonnes.
The decline in purchase was most particular in Q2 of the FY 2020-21.

Notes:
The Union Cabinet has cleared and approved the Policy on privatisation of public sector undertakings (PSUs). The policy would lay a detailed road map for presence of government ownership in strategic and non-strategic sectors of the country.
The Government has proposed for the presence of 1 to 4 Government owned entities in strategic sectors and completely exit from non-strategic sectors.