Current Affairs Quiz - November, 2020

Notes:
Uttar Pradesh government has passed an ordinance to ban unlawful religious conversions for marriage.
As per the ordinance, unlawful conversion for the sake of getting married through force, deceit, undue pressure will be considered a non-bailable offence and can lead to imprisonment of a maximum of 10 years and penalty of 50 thousand rupees.

Notes:
The construction arm of Larsen and Toubro (L&T), L&T Construction has bagged the contract to build India’s longest river bridge.
The 19-km long bridge, which is to be built across the Brahmaputra river, will connect Dhubri in Assam to Phulbari in Meghalaya. It will also improve connectivity of the North Eastern states with the rest of the country.

Notes:
China has removed the last remaining counties (regions) from a list of 832 extremely poor regions, drawn up in the year 2014.
China also announced that it has lifted 93 million people out of poverty since 2013. China sets its own national standard of extreme poverty, based on a per capita income threshold of 4,000 yuan per year, or around USD 1.52 per day, and other social factors.

Notes:
The Union Cabinet of India chaired by the Prime Minister approved a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Cooperation in the field of Physical Culture and Sport signed among BRICS Countries.
Under the MoU, the five countries will help each other in expanding expertise in the area of sports science, sports medicine, coaching techniques etc. This would also strengthen bilateral relations with BRICS member countries.

Notes:
New Zealand’s Greg Barclay has been elected as the new independent Ahairman of the International Cricket Council (ICC).
He is also the second independent chairman of the international body, after Shashank Manohar of India. Greg Barclay served as the Director of New Zealand Cricket Team since 2012. He had also been the Director of 2015 Men’s World Cup, held in Australia and New Zealand.

Notes:
The Chairman of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has recently flagged off the first heavy weight torpedo, Varunastra.
The torpedo was delivered to the Indian Navy at a ceremony held at Bharat Dynamics Limited, Visakhapatnam Unit. It has been designed and developed by Naval Science & Technological Laboratory (NSTL), Visakhapatnam.

Notes:
The Honey FPO Programme of National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Limited. (NAFED) has been inaugurated by Minister of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare Narendra Singh Tomar.
Beekeeping will be promoted as an occupation for unemployed women and tribal populations, through these Honey FPOs. A new Central Sector Scheme for Formation & Promotion of new 10,000 FPOs was launched and 2200 FPO clusters for 2020-21 are already allocated.

Notes:
The Government of Madhya Pradesh has made a change in “Draft Madhya Pradesh Freedom of Religion Bill 2020”. As per the revised draft, marriages for forcible religious conversions would be a punishable offence with a jail term of 10 years.
Earlier, the proposed bill contained that the term of jail would be 5 years. The Government is expecting to table the bill in the state assembly session to be held in December.

Notes:
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is set to become the first Arab Gulf country to generate electricity from coal.
A USD 3.4 billion Hassyan coal plant is being set up in Dubai with a capacity of 600 MW. The capacity is expected to increase to 2,400 MW by 2023. Most of the existing power plants in UAE runs on Gas.

Notes:
Japan’s spacecraft named ‘Hayabusa2’ is approaching the Earth after a year-long journey from an asteroid Ryugu, about 300 million kilometers from earth.
As per the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, the spacecraft will bring soil samples and data that could provide clues to the origins of the solar system and life on Earth. The agency would drop the capsule containing the samples, in southern Australia.