Current Affairs Quiz - November, 2020

Notes:
Ministry of Jal Shakti had constituted a multi-disciplinary Technical Committee to recommend innovative ‘field level solution’ technologies in Drinking Water and Sanitation for states and UTs.
The committee was chaired by the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India K Vijaya Raghavan. It also has other members from NITI Aayog, DST, CSIR, DRDO, IIT among others. The committee has recently recommended five technology solutions for states/UTs.

Notes:
American messaging app Snapchat has recently rolled out a new short-video making feature called ‘Spotlight’.
It would allow users to share short-form videos publicly in its Snapchat app. By the launch of the new feature, Snap Inc. is expected to compete with ByteDance-owned TikTok and Instagram Reels launched by Facebook.

Notes:
Life Insurance Corporation of India has launched a digital application named ‘ANANDA’, which is an acronym for Atma Nirbhar Agents New Business Digital Application.
Using the Digital application, life insurance policy can be applied through a paperless module with the help of the agent or intermediary. The application is developed based on paperless KYC process using Aadhaar-based e-authentication.

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:
India has recently announced the launch of Phase-IV of the High Impact Community Development Projects in Afghanistan.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar announced this during the 2020 Afghanistan Conference organized in Geneva, co-hosted by the United Nations, the Government of Afghanistan, and the Government of Finland. India would undertake over 100 projects worth 80 million dollars in Afghanistan.

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 Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 has been amended by the Motor Vehicles Amendment Act, 2019 to include the definition of the term ‘Aggregator’.
The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has issued the Motor Vehicle Aggregator Guidelines 2020, to regulate shared mobility services. The ride hailing services require permission from the state governments to start operations, and states will follow the norms specified by the Centre.

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.