Current Affairs Quiz - July 2022

Notes:
The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council has Union Finance Minister as chairperson, the Union Minister of State (Finance) from the Centre. Each state can nominate a minister in-charge as a member.
The two-day meeting of the 47th Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council was recently held in Chandigarh. The Council agreed to levy 18 per cent tax on cheques, lose or in book form. Hotel accommodations below Rs 1,000 will be taxed at 12 per cent among other changes.

Notes:
NATO member Turkey has agreed to support Sweden and Finland’s membership of the alliance. It had initially opposed the bids of the Nordic countries to join.
A trilateral deal was reached at a meeting between Turkey’s President, Finland’s President and the Swedish Prime Minister in the Spanish capital, Madrid. Foreign Ministers from the three countries signed a joint security pact that addressed Turkey’s concerns.

Notes:
The Union Cabinet approved the categorization of Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI) as an ‘International Organization’.
The cabinet also approved signing of the Headquarters Agreement (HQA) with CDRI, for grant of exemptions and privileges under Section-3 of the United Nations (Privileges & Immunities) Act, 1947.

 

Notes:
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman released the ‘Business Reforms Action Plan (BRAP), 2020’. Andhra Pradesh has topped the Business Reform Action Plan 2020 Rankings in the Ease of Doing Business.
It is followed by Gujarat, Haryana, Karnataka, Punjab, Telangana and Tamil Nadu. The BRAP 2020 includes 301 reform points covering 15 business regulatory areas such as Access to Information, Single Window System, Labour, Environment, Land Administration etc.

Notes:
The Delhi government introduced new assessment guidelines for school students. Under the new criteria, students will now be assessed for the impact of mindset curricula in their behaviour, along with other scholastic subjects.
It includes Happiness and Deshbhakti curricula for classes 3-8, while students of Class 9 and Class 11 will be assessed for Deshbhakti and Entrepreneurship Mindset Curricula.

Notes:
According to the Hurun India Future Unicorn Index 2022, Bengaluru continues to be the start-up capital of India, with 46 probable Unicorns.
It is followed by Delhi NCR (25) and Mumbai (16). As per the index, India will have 122 new unicorns in the next two to four years.

Notes:
Domestic rating agency Crisil lowered its real GDP growth forecast for India to 7.3 per cent in FY23 from 7.8 per cent estimated earlier.
It cited the reasons for downward revision to be higher oil prices, slowing of export demand and high inflation. This forecast is in line with the RBI’s estimate of 7.2 real GDP growth for this fiscal year.

Notes:
National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) is a regulatory body that controls the prices of pharmaceutical drugs in India.
It functions under the Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers. NPPA has recently fixed the retail prices for 84 drug formulations, including those used for treatment of diabetes, headache and high blood pressure.

 

Notes:
The 2022 Global biodiversity conclave is organised in Bonn, Germany. Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) announced that Assessment on the Sustainable Use of Wild Species will be released.
Sustainable use of wild species keeping in mind the well-being of communities that depend on them for livelihood will be the focus of the report to be released.

Notes:
Tech Major Google announced the launch of Start-up School India (SSI) as part of the Google for Start-ups initiative.
This is a platform under which Google will bring together investors, entrepreneurs and programmers and provide opportunities to start-ups from small cities to interact and learn from them. Google aims to reach out to at least 10,000 start-ups with this programme.