Current Affairs Quiz - November, 2020

Notes:
The World’s first scientoon book named “Bye Bye Corona” has been published by Vigyan Prasar, an autonomous agency under the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India.
The book has been written by Dr Pradeep Srivastava who is the former Senior Principal Scientist at CSIR-Central Drug Research Institute, Lucknow. The main purpose of this book is to make people aware of COVID-19 in an engaging way

Notes:
The Government of Bangladesh has launched massive scheme to dredge 10,000 kilometres of riverways in the country. This is done to improve the inland water navigation system in the country.
The dredging work would be done on 178 rivers of Bangladesh and would be carried out by the Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority (BIWTA) at a cost of Taka 4371 crore.

Notes:
The people of New Zealand, in a recent referendum have voted to legalise euthanasia. Preliminary results of the referendum showed that 65.2% of voters supported the End of Life Choice Act coming into force as a new law.
The proposed law will permit terminally ill people with less than 6 months of life to choose assisted dying, if approved by 2 doctors.

Notes:
The Central Government is set to release the second tranche of Rs 6,000 crore to 16 states and 3 union territories.
As per the recent statement from the Finance Ministry, the total amount released to states to meet the compensation shortfall under goods and services tax (GST) under the special window is Rs 12,000 crore.

Notes:
The Vaishwik Bharatiya Vaigyanik (VAIBHAV) Summit was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 2nd October 2020.
The summit concluded on 31st October 2020 and saw the participation of 3,200 panelists and about 22,500 academicians and scientists from India and overseas. The month-long conference was held in a virtual manner in the form of webinars.

Notes:
The Union Ministry of Labour and Employment has notified draft rules for the Industrial Relations Code, 2020. This is expected to enhance the flexibility to employers to retrench workers.
It also mandates that Labour Unions should give a prior notice before a strike. The Government has aimed to implement the labour codes from April 1, 2021.

Notes:
Union Finance Ministry of India has recently announced that Abu Dhabi’s Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) has become the first foreign SWF that has been notified.
MIC Redwood 1 RSC Limited will get 100 per cent income tax exemption for the long-term investments to be made in specific priority sectors in India.

Notes:
The state of Kerala has got the Accelerator for Electronics Technologies (ACE), which has been established as a joint initiative of Kerala Start-up Mission (KSUM) and Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (CDAC).
The ACE will develop and evolve itself as a leading accelerator in the electronics technologies sector of India. It will nurture the development of high-tech start-ups in electronics and allied disciplines.

Notes:
The Indian Naval Ship Airavat carrying 100 tonnes of food aid has reached Sudan. This is a part of the “Mission Sagar-II” under which Indian Navy would deliver food aid to Sudan, South Sudan, Djibouti and Eritrea.
Earlier in May – June 2020, Mission Sagar was undertaken by the Indian Navy to provide food and medicines to Maldives, Mauritius, Seychelles, Madagascar and Comoros.

Notes:
WhatsApp has received the National Payments Corporation of India’s (NPCI) approval to enter Unified Payment Interface (UPI) in phased manner.
The Social-media giant, owned by Facebook has over 400 million users in India. The UPI payments service is expected to be launched to 2 crore WhatsApp users initially. NPCI stated that a 30% cap will be implemented on total payment volumes via every third-party payment app.