Monthly Current Affairs Quiz - July, 2018

Notes:
On July 21, the Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh has launched the Student Police Cadet Programme to build a bridge between the Police and the larger community through school students by inculcating values and ethics in them. The programme focuses on students of Class 8 and 9th and special care has been taken to ensure that it does not lead to increase the workload of students. The programme does not have any prescribed text book nor is any exam envisaged. Only one class in a month is proposed. The programme seeks to cover broadly two kinds of topics: Crime prevention and control, and Values and ethics. Under the first part, the topics covered are – Community Policing, Road Safety, Fight against Social Evils, Safety of Women & Children, Fight against Corruption and Disaster Management. The topics covered under the second part are – Values & Ethics, Respect for Elders, Empathy & Sympathy, Tolerance, Patience, Attitude, Team Spirit and Discipline. The programme will first be implemented in government schools in both urban and rural areas.

Notes:
The Odisha police has launched a drive to bust an international syndicate that peddles “endangered” pangolin, one of the world’s most illegally traded mammals. Through Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT), the Odisha police will crack the international pangolin smuggling racket. MLAT is an agreement between nations to exchange information or provide legal assistance for enforcing laws. Pangolins are the only known mammals with large keratin scales and they use those scales to protect themselves from predators in the wild. They are toothless, nocturnal, live in burrows and feed mainly on ants and termites. Of the 8 species found worldwide, two are found in India: Indian Pangolin (Manis crassicaudata) and Chinese Pangolin (Manis pentadactyla). Both the species are listed in Schedule I of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. Hence, hunting, trade or any other form of utilisation of the species or their body parts and derivatives is banned. Beside this, In the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) Red List, Chinese pangolin are listed as “critically endangered” and Indian Pangolin as “endangered”.

Notes:
According to the Public Affairs Index (PAI) for 2018, Kerala stands as the best-governed state in the country, followed by Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Karnataka and Gujarat. Apart from this, Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Odisha ranked the lowest on the index, indicating higher social and economic inequalities. The Bengaluru-based think tank Public Affairs Centre (PAC ) has been releasing the index annually since 2016 and ranks the states according to their socio-economic development. The think tank PAC was founded in 1994 by renowned Indian economist and scholar late Samuel Paul. It works to mobilize a demand for better governance in the country.

Notes:
The Andhra Pradesh government has launched ‘e-Pragati core initiative’ at Undavalli to provide integrated services to citizens. The aim of the digital initiative is to connect citizen to 34 departments, 336 autonomous organisations and 745-plus government services. In simple words, e-Pragati will act as a platform to connect all departments and stand alone to resolve the issues. As of now, the initiative offers around 20 services and 100 more will be added by the year-end. The e-Pragati authority will achieve the goals of the project by supporting the seven development missions launched in the areas of e-Governance, Social Empowerment, Skill Development, Urban Development, Infrastructure, Industrial Development and the Services sector. Through this project, the State government intends to realise the vision of ‘Sunrise AP 2022’.

Notes:
The men’s team event of the World Junior Squash Championships 2018 has started in Chennai, Tamil Nadu on July 24. A total of 24 countries, divided into 8 groups, are taking part. India has been seeded 5th and placed in Group ‘E’ with Switzerland and Saudi Arabia. Egypt, which has dominated in the individual events of the world junior championship, has been given the top billing. It had finished runner-up at the last edition in Poland in 2016. Canada has been seeded two and England three. Pakistan, winner of the title in 2016, has been seeded a lowly 11th. The final is scheduled on July 29.

Notes:
The Assam government has recently decided to set up a separate directorate for the Divyangs. The Social Welfare minister, Pramila Rani Brahma said that appointment to Divyangs will be given at around 4500 posts by December 2018. Beside this, the Social Welfare department will also give Rs 1000 per month to all Divyangs as stipend. The minister said that the new Anganwadi centres to be constructed for the benefit of the women and children.

Notes:
The Global Disability Summit 2018 was held at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London, England on 24th July 2018. It was co-hosted by the UK government with the International Disability Alliance (IDA) and the Government of Kenya to galvanize global efforts to address disability inclusion around the world. The motto of the Conference was to firm up the commitments of the country leaders towards the cause of persons with disabilities. From India, Thaawarchand Gehlot, the Union Minister for Social Justice & Empowerment, attended the summit. Besides India, global leaders from more than 40 countries attended the summit and have committed themselves to work in the direction of economic empowerment of persons with disabilities. The purpose of the summit was to raise global attention and focus on a neglected area.

Notes:
The citizen centric online portal “Innovate India Platform” has been jointly launched by NITI Aayog’s Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) and MyGov on July 26, 2018. The portal will serve as the common point for all the innovation happening across the nation. Through the portal, users can view, comment, share, and rate the innovations crowdsourced on the #InnovateIndia platform. They can view the leaderboard which is calculated based on the votes on each innovation. Citizens can also share their or other organisations’ innovation on the platform by logging into the MyGov website. These innovations can also be shared on various social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook, and Twitter.

Notes:
Shivangi Pathak (17) from Haryana, who became the India’s youngest women to scale Mt Everest from Nepal side, has recently scaled the highest peak of Africa “Mt Kilimanjaro”, which is located in Tanzania. The mountain is about 4,900 metres from its base to 5,895 metres above sea level. Her next target is to scale Europe’s highest peak.

Notes:
On 2018 World Hepatitis Day (WHD), the National Viral Hepatitis Control programme has been launched by the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in collaboration with the World Health Organisation (WHO) in New Delhi to combat the disease by 2030 in the country. Under the initiative, free drugs and diagnostics for Hepatitis B and C will be provided at all government hospitals. This initiative will provide laboratory testing and management of viral Hepatitis with a de-centralized approach. The aim of the programme is prevention and treatment of Hepatitis which is inflammation of the liver due to a viral infection. It is among the leading causes of liver cancer, cirrhosis of the liver and acute failure of the organ. According to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG-2030), diseases like AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, neglected tropical diseases, hepatitis, water-borne diseases and other communicable diseases should be eliminated by 2030. Viral hepatitis was included as a focus area in the health related goal Goal 3.3 with world leaders pledging to fight and eliminate it by 2030.