Monthly Current Affairs Quiz - June, 2017

Notes:
India has topped the global remittance-receiving list of 2016, as per the latest United Nations report ‘One Family at a Time’. As per the report, Indians working across the globe sent home 62.7 billion US dollars in 2016, followed by China (61 billion), Philippines (30 billion) and Pakistan (20 billion). The ‘One Family at a Time’ study by the UN International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) stated that about 200 million migrants globally sent more than 445 billion dollars as remittances in 2016 to their families. Remittance flows have grown over the last decade from 296 billion in 2007 to $445 billion in 2016. It has risen at a rate averaging 4.2 per cent annually. The study is the first-ever of a 10-year trend in migration and remittance flows over the period 2007-2016. The report has made several recommendations for improving public policies and outlines proposals for partnerships with the private sector to reduce costs and create opportunities for migrants and their families to use their money more productively.

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The Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations for coordinating economic, social and environmental issues, as well as for implementing internationally agreed development goals.

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Indian shuttler Kidambi Srikanth has become the first Indian men’s singles player to win the Indonesia Open Super Series men’s singles tournament by defeating Kazumasa Sakai of Japan in the final at Jakarta by 21-11, 21-19. With this win, Srikanth clinched his third Super Series title after he had notched up victories at the 2014 China Open and the 2015 India Open.

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Sahapedia, an open online interactive heritage portal on Indian arts, in partnership with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has recently launched a fellowship programme, to inspire and provide an opportunity for young people to expand their knowledge and encourage documentation of India’s rich cultural heritage. The Sahapedia-UNESCO Fellowships will be available to post-doctoral scholars, doctoral candidates, post-graduates, and graduates. The fellowships will be available in two variants — the Sahapedia Project Fellowship (SPF) and the Sahapedia Research Fellowship (SRF) — that gives the applicants the option of participating either at the level of primary documentation or in the content curation process.

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The Union Minister for Science & Technology Dr. Harsh Vardhan has launched a mobile app “Celebrating Yoga” in New Delhi to connect people through Yoga for scientific healthy living. The mobile app has been developed by Department of Science & Technology on the occasion of International Yoga Day (IYD) 2017. The aim of the app is to popularize Yoga and encourage people to practice yoga for a scientifically healthy living.

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The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has signed a loan agreement of 275 million with Government of India (GOI) for improving urban services in 64 small towns in Madhya Pradesh. As part of the agreement, the project will develop sustainable, inclusive, and climate-resilient water supply in 64 small and medium-sized towns, and integrated storm water and sewerage infrastructure in two heritage towns of Khajuraho and Rajnagar. Along with ADB’s loan, the Government of Madhya Pradesh will provide counterpart support of 124 million. The project will run for almost 5 years with an expected completion date of June 2022.

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The world’s first-ever data embassy will be established by the Estonian government in Luxembourg in 2018. For this, Prime Minister of Estonia Jüri Ratas and Prime Minister of Luxembourg Xavier Bettel has signed an agreement on housing data and information systems, that will pave the way to open data embassy in Luxembourg. Its establishment is part of the Estonian general strategy of data management and fundamentally a double guarantee to their data and services. In addition, the data embassy will have the same rights as any other physical embassy of Estonia.

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The Bhawal National Park is located at Gazipur in Dhaka Division of Bangladesh.The core area of the park covers 940 hectares but extends to 5,022 ha of surrounding forest. Its purpose is to protect important habitats as well as to provide opportunities for recreation. The park has 345 plant species, including 152 different tree species, 53 shrubs, 106 herbs and 34 climber species.

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Nisha Dutt, the CEO of Intellecap, has been honoured with the “Social Entrepreneur of the Year” award at The 7th Asian Awards in London in recognition of her work in making Intellecap a globally known enterprise that focuses on social capital. With this, Dutt has become the first Indian woman leader to be honoured with this award. Her key contribution has been integrating technology with challenges of healthcare, financial services, incubation and conceptualizing programs such as Innovations Labs and Credit-tree.

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The book titled ‘The Emergency – Indian Democracy’s Darkest Hour’ has been authored by Surya Prakash, the chairman of Prasar Bharati. The book has recently launched by Union Minister for Urban Development M Venkaiah Naidu in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. The purpose of the book is to honor all those who fought for the restoration of democracy in the country in the mid-1970s.