Monthly Current Affairs Quiz - April, 2018

Notes:
Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu has launched FIEO Globallinker in New Delhi on April 17, which is a digital platform for MSME exporters to digitise their businesses and join a global community of growing businesses. FIEO stands for Federation of Indian Export Organisations.

Notes:
The ‘Group of Ministers (GoM) meeting – 2018’ under the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has started in Guwahati, Assam on April 18, 2018. The team is led by the Chairman and Transport Minister of Rajasthan, Yunus Khan, and transport ministers of various states are its members. In total 24 states are participating in the two-day programme. The meeting will mainly focus on the following agenda: frame a National Road Safety Code with the objective to reduce fatalities and road accidents by 50% by 2020; improving road accident victims’ assistance infrastructure; strategies for road safety advocacy programmes; harmonization of motor vehicles taxes across different states; strategies for improving the inter-state passenger and goods transport, harmonization of permit conditions and permit fees across the states, etc.

Notes:
Lieutenant General PP Malhotra has taken charge as new Director General of National Cadet Corps (NCC), the largest uniformed youth organization in the world. Prior to assuming his present appointment, he was the Chief Engineer of the Army’s premier Northern Command. The NCC is the Indian military cadet corps with its headquarters at New Delhi.

Notes:
Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani has launched the digital platform ‘Pocket Cop Project’ in order to ensure that the police force of the state is equipped with modern day technology. Under the project, every officer in charge of the police station, Investigating Officer, PCR van and officials handling the passport verification process shall be equipped with a smartphone enabled with internet connectivity. The government has made a provision of 4900 such phones. These phones will have the information of as many as 69 lakh criminals and their crimes at fingertips. In Gandhinagar, the CM also handed over these smartphones to each and every police officer of various districts during the event.

Notes:
India has been ranked 10th in the latest Commonwealth Innovation Index (CII- 2018). The index was launched as part of a new Commonwealth Innovation Hub on the sidelines of the 25th Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM 2018). It has been created in partnership with the United Nations World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) and its annual Global Innovation Index (GII). The purpose of index is to provide a tool that allows member states, organisations and citizens to benchmark themselves against 53 countries of the Commonwealth, with the new innovation hub offering a dedicated online space for Commonwealth countries to showcase what they have to offer and share with other members. The list is topped by UK, Singapore and Canada.

Notes:
The Union Government has constituted a Defence Planning Committee (DPC) to facilitate comprehensive planning for the defence forces besides focusing on military doctrines to deal with emerging security challenges. It will be chaired by National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval. Apart from the NSA, the committee will comprise, the foreign secretary, chairman of chiefs of staff committee, the Army, Navy and Air Force chiefs and secretary (expenditure) in the Finance Ministry. The chairman of the DPC can co-opt experts into it depending on requirement. The committee would prepare drafts of national security strategy and doctrines, international defence engagement strategy and roadmap to build defence manufacturing ecosystem. It will also work on strategy to boost defence exports, and prioritised capability development plans for the armed forces. The committee will also focus its energy on development of Indian defence industry and technology advancements. The DPC would submit its draft reports to the Defence Minister according to “given timelines” following which further approvals will be obtained as required.

Notes:
The United Nations (UN) has officially declared April 21 as the World Creativity and Innovation Day (WCID) to encourage people to use creativity in problem-solving. The first official WCID was celebrated on April 21, 2018. The day is marked as well positioned to encourage creative multidisciplinary thinking to help us achieve the sustainable future we want.

Notes:
The Government of India (GoI) celebrates April 21 every year as ‘Civil Services day’ as an occasion for the civil servants to rededicate themselves to the cause of citizen and renew their commitments to public service and excellence in work. This date is chosen to commemorate the day when first Home Minister of Independent India, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel addressed the probationers of Administrative Services Officers in 1947 at Metcalf House, Delhi, he referred to civil servants as the ‘steel frame of India’. This year, in 2018, Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu inaugurated the two-day Civil Services Day event in New Delhi. He also released a book ‘Emulating Excellence- Takeaways for Replication’.

Notes:
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has created history by becoming the first listed Indian IT company to hit the $100 billion market capitalisation (m-cap) mark. On April 23, 2018, the market value of the company stood at Rs 6.53 lakh crore. TCS breached the Rs 3,500 ($52.87) per share mark for the first time, reaching $100 billion in market capitalisation. By definition, market capitalisation is the value of a company that is traded on the stock market, calculated by multiplying the total number of shares by the present share price.

Notes:
Out of 2.5 lakhs gram panchayats, the Central Government has declared Digambarpur gram panchayat of West Bengal in South 24 Parganas district as the best panchayat in the country. The survey was conducted by the Ministry of Panchayati Raj. On the basis of 7 factors of work include the system of planning, quality of planning, different activities and level of coordination, implementation of the plan and its proper monitoring, use of Information Technology and documentation the ranking of the Gram Panchayats have been selected. Gram Panchayats in districts including Purulia, Birbhum and Burdwan have also been awarded special prizes for certain achievements.