Monthly Current Affairs Quiz - January, 2018

Notes:
Arunachal Pradesh has been officially declared Open Defecation Free (ODF) and has become the second state in the North East after Sikkim to achieve the status. On 1st January 2018, Upper Subansiri, Siang and Changlang were officially declared ODF. The project undertaken under Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin) SBM (G) saw the light of day only after the state government extended an incentive of Rs 8,000 per toilet. This is in addition to the Centres support of Rs 12,000, raising the grant for constructing a toilet to Rs 20,000. The state government also launched Swachh Arunachal Mission on October 2, 2017 at Tawang which envisaged the Swachh Protocol (Cleanliness Protocol) aimed at ensuring sustainability of assets created under SBM (Gramin). The state has achieved the ODF status before the national target, which is October 2019.

Notes:
US buyout giant Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR) & Co. has become the first foreign investor to fully own an Asset Reconstruction Company (ARC) in India as it received approval from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) at a time when lenders are fighting with a pile of bad loans that have crippled their businesses. KKR is one of the most aggressive investors in financial services. It has plans to deploy a major chunk from its record Asia fund for buying troubled assets in the country, multiple sources with direct knowledge of the matter. Its headquarters is located in New York, United States. An ARC is in the business of acquiring Non-Performing Assets (NPAs). The Banks and an ARC get into an agreement in which the ARC take over the NPAs from the Banks Balance Sheet at a certain amount, lower than the Book Value. After this process, the particular ARC tries to recover this amount from the borrowers.

Notes:
Maneka Gandhi, the union minister of Women and Child Development (WCD), has inaugurated an online portal NARI in New Delhi for the empowerment of women. The portal – nari.nic.in – will provide easy access to information on government schemes and initiatives for women. The portal, which is developed by the Ministry, summarise over 350 government schemes and other important information. It elaborates how the Government is focussed to economically empower women through schemes under Direct Benefit Transfer. The portal provides links to the Ministries, Departments and autonomous bodies offering these schemes as well as easy access to online applications and grievance redressal. Also, there are tips on nutrition, suggestions for health check-ups, tips for job search, investment and savings advice, information on crimes against women and reporting procedures, contacts of legal aid cells, adoption procedures and much more.

Notes:
The 171st Araadhanai Music Festival (AMF) has started in Thiruvaiyaru, Tamil Nadu on January 2, 2018. The fest is one of the Trinities of Carnatic music Saint Thyagaraja, which was inaugurated by Governor Banwarilal Purohit. The main function of the festival – the choral singing of Thyagaraja’s five kritis in Ghana ragas – will be held on his Samadhi day which falls on next Saturday. Over 1,000 musicians from all over the world are expected to pay homage to Saint Thygaraja during the course of the five-day festival.

Notes:
The Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT), which is India’s Premier Container Port, has won the 2017 “Samudra Manthan – Caring Organisation of the Year” award.The award instituted by Bhandarkar Shipping aims to fuel healthy competition in the maritime sector. Besides achieving operational excellence, JNPT provides excellent facilities to their staff like medical insurance, residential township with school, transport service, canteens, rest rooms, recreation, sports activities and regular training programs on various key topics.

Notes:
On 3rd January 2018, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has welcomed six new non-permanent members — Equatorial Guinea, Ivory Coast, Kuwait, the Netherlands, Peru, and Poland. The six new countries, voted on by the 193-member General assembly for two-year terms, will have a strong voice in matters dealing with international peace and security during their time on the U.N.’s most powerful body. The U.N. Security council has primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. It has 15 members — five of which (Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States) hold permanent membership and veto power. The six countries who left the UNSC on 31st December 2017 are Egypt, Italy, Japan, Senegal, Ukraine and Uruguay.

Notes:
Turkey’s endangered ‘bird language’ has entered the UNESCO list of Intangible Cultural Heritage. It is an unusual and very efficient whistle language used as a means of communication by villagers in remote northern Turkey. UNESCO has accepted the “bird language” of Black Sea villagers as an endangered part of world heritage in need of urgent protection. Around 10,000 people, mostly in the district of Canakci in Giresun province, still use the highly-developed and high pitch system of whistling to communicate in the rugged terrain where most of the times they cannot see each other. This form of communication which dates to some 500 years ago, during the Ottoman Empire, was widespread across the Black Sea regions, but 50 years ago it suffered the impact of the progression of technology and nowadays the ever rapid growing of cellular mobile systems has put this cultural heritage under serious threat.

Notes:
Abhay, the 1986-batch police officer of Odisha cadre, has taken charge as the new chief of the of the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) at the NCB headquarters in Delhi on January 2, 2018. He will hold the post the post till 18th of November 2019. Prior to this appointment, he was Additional DG (Training) in the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF). The post of the NCB DG was lying vacant since April 2017 when the incumbent R R Bhatnagar was appointed as the CRPF DG. Special Secretary in the home ministry Rina Mitra was handling the additional charge of NCB DG since then. The NCB, under the command of the Union Home Ministry, is the apex coordinating and enforcement agency in the country against drug crimes and for countering drugs abuse.

Notes:
Nitin Gadkari, the Union Minister of Road Transport & Highways, Shipping and Water Resources, River Development & Ganga Rejuvenation, will inaugurate the 2018 ASEAN-India Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) in Singapore on January 6. The theme of the 2-day PBD Convention is “Ancient Route, New Journey: Diaspora in the Dynamic India-ASEAN Partnership”. The PBD is celebrated every year to strengthen the engagement of the overseas Indian community with the Government, reconnect them with their roots and celebrate their achievements and contributions.

Notes:
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has initiated Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) against public sector lender Allahabad Bank, owing to its high net Non-Performing Assets (NPAs) and negative Return on Assets (RoA) for two consecutive years. The action would contribute to the overall improvement in risk management, asset quality, profitability, efficiency of the bank. The RBI has initiated similar action against other public sector banks, including IDBI Bank, Indian Overseas Bank and UCO Bank. The RBI in April 2017 had issued a new set of enabling provisions under the revised PCA framework with a clause that if the bank does not show improvement then it could be either be merged or taken over by other bank.