Monthly Current Affairs Quiz - June, 2018

Notes:
The high-level Conference on “International Decade for Action: Water for Sustainable Development, 2018-2028” will be held in Tajikistan from June 20, 2018. The two-day conference is being organized by the United Nations and Government of Tajikistan to discuss key water-related issues of sustainable development goals adopted by UN member countries. India will be represented by Nitin Gadkari, the Union Minister for Water Resources, River Development & Ganga Rejuvenation. In it, Mr. Gadkari will share the initiatives, solutions and best practices that Government of India (GoI) is taking in the field of Drinking Water & Sanitation, Water Resource Assessment, Resource Distribution, Management, Conservation and Harvesting. He will outline key policy initiatives and flagship programs of the Government of India including rejuvenation of river Ganga.

Notes:
The world’s first International Centre for Humanitarian Forensics was launched at Gandhinagar in Gujarat on June 20, 2018. It is a joint venture of the Regional delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross in India, Bhutan, Nepal and the Maldives and also Gujarat Forensic Science University. This is a centre of excellence which will use forensics for humanitarian services. The purpose of this Centre is to provide service to the nation and to the entire world when the need arises. The launch of the Centre was followed by an International Symposium on Humanitarian Forensics. Over the next two days, international experts will participate in the symposium and discuss issues in the area of humanitarian forensics. Speakers from India, Ireland, Germany and Sri Lanka will speak at the symposium.

Notes:
The Parliament of Canada has passed a landmark law that legalizes the recreational use of marijuana nationwide. The Cannabis Act (or Bill C-45) passed its final hurdle on June 20 in a 52-29 vote in the Senate. The bill controls and regulates how the drug can be grown, distributed and sold. Canadians will be able to buy and consume the drug legally as early as September 2018. The new law allows adults to possess up to 30 grams of dried cannabis in public, but the minimum legal age to buy and consume the drug has been set federally at 18. It makes Canada the first G7 country to legalise the drug’s recreational use and the second to have a nationwide, legal marijuana market, after Uruguay. The Group of Seven (G7) is a group consisting of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Marijuana is a psychoactive drug from the Cannabis plant intended for medical or recreational use.

Notes:
The Union Human Resource Development Minister, Prakash Javadekar launched the new digital initiative of HRD Ministry ‘National Digital Library of India (NDLI)’on the occasion of National Reading Day (NRD) in New Delhi on June 19, 2018. It is a project of the Ministry of Human Resource Development (HRD) under the aegis of National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NMEICT). The purpose of NDL is to make digital educational resources available to all citizens of the country to empower, inspire and encourage learning. The NDLI, which is developed by IIT Kharagpur, is the single window platform that collects and collates metadata from premier learning institutions in India and abroad, as well as other relevant sources. It is a digital repository containing textbooks, articles, videos, audio books, lectures, simulations, fiction and all other kinds of learning media.

Notes:
The 19th all India Conference of Directors of Finger Prints Bureaux 2018 has been inaugurated by Hansraj Gangaram Ahir , the Union Minister of State for Home Affairs, in Hyderabad on June 21. It was hosted by Telangana Police. The purpose of 2-day conference is to discuss and deliberate the challenging issues faced by fingerprint fraternity. It is a forum to evolve better solutions for the problems faced by FP experts in the course of their duty. During the conference, participants will deliberate on latest Automatic Fingerprint Identification Systems (AFIS), usage experience of AFIS in Maharashtra and Telangana, integration of Finger Prints with CCTNS/ICJS. The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), in cooperation with CMC Ltd., Secunderabad, developed the first indigenous AFIS called FACTS. Now this technology has improved a lot and within seconds it is possible to match the finger prints of more than a million individuals. Incidentally, the world’s first finger print bureau was established in 1897 at Calcutta during British period.

Notes:
On 22nd June 2018, the annual Ambubachi Mela has started at Nilachall hillock where the Kamakhya temple is situated in Assam. The temple will remain close from this evening and re-opened for public in the morning of 26th this month. Over 10 lakh devotees are expected to attend the mela. Temporary camps have been set up in and around the temple. Special thrust is being given in maintaining cleanliness. Around three thousand security personnel have been deployed. 80 buses have been pressed into services by the Assam State Transport Corporation to ferry passengers.

Notes:
Kim Jong-pil (92), the founder of South Korea’s spy agency, has passed away in Seoul, South Korea on June 23, 2018. The spy agency is widely-known as the “perennial No. 2 man” in modern Korean politics. He also served as prime minister twice from 1971–1975 and from 1998–2000. A retired lieutenant colonel, Kim was a key member of a 1961 coup that put army, Maj. Gen. Park Chung-hee in power until his 1979 assassination. After Park seized power, Kim created and headed the Korean Central Intelligence Agency, a predecessor of the current National Intelligence Service.

Notes:
The 22nd edition of Sindhu Darshan Festival (SDF) has started on the bank of Indus River in Leh district of Ladakh region, Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) on June 24, 2018. The 3-day annual fest is organised by Sindhu Darshan Yatra Samiti and Ladakh Phandey Tsogspa (Leh). It will be inaugurated by RSS General Secretary Bhaiya Ji Joshi. The programme is focused at national integration, communal harmony and national pride. It will be marked by holy dip in the Indus River, hosting of national flag and cultural programme of different areas of the country. The festival was started by the former Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani in 1997. The fest is a celebration of River Sindhu, also known as the Indus. The main reason behind the celebration of the festival is to endorse the Indus River as an icon of the communal harmony and unity of India.

Notes:
Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje has been conferred with the ‘Chief Minister of the Year’ award for her remarkable work in e-governance. The award was given at the 52nd Skoch Summit 2018 held in New Delhi.

Notes:
Dharampal, the Sarpanch of Godikan village panchayat in Haryana, has passed a ‘No Toilet No Bride’ resolution to ensure the safety and well-being of its womenfolk. The move is aimed at ensuring the security of their daughters in addition to hygiene. With this move, the Godikan panchayat has become the first panchayat in the country to marry off girls only to families who have a toilet in their house. The village apparently was inspired by the super hit Hindi movie starring Akshay Kumar – ‘Toilet-Ek Prem Katha’. Godikan panchayat has already been declared an Outdoor Defecation Free (ODF) panchayat.