Current Affairs Quiz - November, 2020

Notes:
The Central Government has opened 19 coal mines for auction, and it witnessed a stiff competition from leading private players.
The auction of these 19 mines is expected to generate a revenue of Rs.7000 crore per annum along with creation of more than 69,000 jobs once the mines are operationalised. These 19 mines have a combined peak capacity reaching 51 MT per annum.

Notes:
The Ministry of Food Processing and Industries has approved 21 projects under the Scheme for Integrated Cold Chain and Value Addition. The decision has been made by the Inter-Ministerial Approval Committee (IMAC) chaired by Narendra Singh Tomar.
This approval is expected to bring in investment worth Rs 443 crore in the food processing industry which is supported with a grant of Rs 189 crore.

Notes:
COVISHIELD, the Covid-19 potential vaccine candidate has recently completed the enrolment of Phase III clinical trials.
COVISHIELD has been developed by the Serum Institute of India with a master seed from Oxford University and AstraZeneca. SII has already manufactured 40 million doses of the vaccine and will make the vaccine available by joining hands with ICMR.

Notes:
The international rating agency, Moody’s Investors Service has recently revised India’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) forecast to -8.9% contraction from -9.6% projected earlier, for calendar year 2020.
The agency has projected the GDP of India for 2021 as 8.6%, an upward revision from the earlier projection of 8.1%.

Notes:
The Union Ministry of Food Processing and Industries has announced to provide a subsidy of 50% on air transportation of fruits and vegetables from North-Eastern and Himalayan states.
This subsidy is given under the Atmanirbhar Bharat – Operation Greens – TOP to TOTAL scheme. This subsidy is applicable for air transportation to 41 notified destinations.

Notes:
The United Nations’ apex judicial body, the International Court of Justice is based in The Hague, Netherlands.
Recently, four current members of the court, the judges from Japan, China, Slovakia and Uganda were re-elected and the Germany’s was elected. The 15-member world court seeks to settle disputes between countries.

Notes:
The Chief of Enforcement Directorate Sanjay Kumar Mishra has recently got one-year extension, after completing two years of his tenure.
The 1984-batch Indian Revenue Service official was appointed as the Executive Director in 2018. As per the recent order of the Finance Ministry, the previous order has now been modified with approval from the President.

Notes:
Union External Affairs Minister of India S. Jaishankar represented India in the 15th East Asia Summit, which was recently held virtually.
The East Asia Summit is a premier forum in the Asia-Pacific region which was founded in the year 2005. Apart from the 10 ASEAN member states, the Summit includes India, China, Japan, Republic of Korea, Australia, New Zealand, United States and Russia.

Notes:
A team of researchers from Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur have developed environment safe food packaging material using cucumber peels.
According to them, cucumber peels have greater cellulose content and the nanocrystals derived from the peels makes it suitable for making bio degradable food packaging material.

Notes:
Famous Actor Sonu Sood has been recently named as state icon of Punjab by the Election Commission of India (ECI).
The Election Commission has honoured the actor with the title, after he earned appreciation from across the country for his work to help the migrant labourers during the nation-wide lockdown. His auto-biography is also to be released with the title of “I Am No Messiah.”