Monthly Current Affairs Quiz - October, 2017

Notes:
Birendra Sasmal, a Ghana-based Indian entrepreneur, has won a prestigious International Business Person of the Year at the Asian Achievers Awards in London for his efforts to bring innovative IT solutions to Africa. Sasmal is CEO of Subah Group, which employs around 350 people with offices in Guinea, Sierra Leone, New York City and Dubai. Under Sasmal’s leadership, the group’s revenues have increased by over 3,000% and it has been named among one of Africa’s fastest growing tech companies.

Notes:
The United Nations’ (UN) International Day of Non-Violence is observed every year on October 2 to mark the birthday of Mahatma Gandhi, leader of the Indian independence movement and pioneer of the philosophy and strategy of non-violence. The day is an occasion to disseminate the message of non-violence, including through education and public awareness. This day is referred to in India as Gandhi Jayanti.

Notes:
The 8th Conference of the Association of SAARC Speakers and Parliamentarians will be held in Colombo, Sri Lanka from October 4, 2017. The 3-day conference will be inaugurated by Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena. The Indian delegation will be lead by Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan, who will deliver the lead speech on the topic Association of the SAARC Speakers and Parliamentarians, a platform for the Parliamentarians of South Asia to work together to reach the 2030 agenda for Sustainable Development. She is accompanied by a delegation of MPs and senior officials of Lok Sabha.

Notes:
President Ram Nath Kovind has recently appointed a Commission to examine the sub-categorisation of the Other Backward Classes (OBCs). Justice (Retd.) G. Rohini will be the chairperson of the Commission which will present its report to the President within 12 weeks. The Commission will examine the extent of inequitable distribution of benefits of reservation among the castes or communities included in the broad category of OBCs with reference to such classes included in the Central List. It will work out the mechanism, criteria, norms and parameters in a scientific approach for sub-categorisation within such OBCs. On receipt of the report, the Central Government will consider ways and means for equitable distribution of the benefits of the reservation in Central Government jobs and admission in Central Government Institutions amongst all strata of the OBC.

Notes:
The Global Wildlife Programme (GWP) conference has started in New Delhi on October 2, 2017. India is hosting the programme jointly with World Bank (WB) and United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) to address illegal wildlife trade across 19 Asian and African countries. In it, Environment Minister Dr. Harsh Vardhan unveiled the 3rd National Wildlife Action Plan (NWAP) for 2017-2031 to spell out the future road map for wildlife conservation. The 4-day conference will act as a platform for knowledge exchange and coordination on the action taken on the ground to combat illegal poaching of wildlife and improve governance on wildlife conservation. It will provide an opportunity for India to showcase its conservation efforts through joint forest management, vana sanrakshan samitis, eco-development committees in and around protected areas.

Notes:
The 3rd National Wildlife Action Plan (NWAP) for 2017-2031 has recently unveiled by Dr. Harsh Vardhan , the Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change(MoEFCC), at the 2017 Global Wildlife Programme (GWP) conference in New Delhi. This NWAP plan was drafted by a 12-member committee chaired by JC Kala, a former secretary to the ministry. The plan is unique as this is the first time India has recognised the concerns relating to climate change impact on wildlife and stressed on integrating actions that need to be taken for its mitigation and adaptation into wildlife management planning processes. The plan adopts a landscape approach in conservation of all wildlife – uncultivated flora and fauna – that have an ecological value to the ecosystem and to mankind irrespective of where they occur. It gives special emphasis to recovery o hreatened species of wildlife while conserving their habitats.

Notes:
The 2017 Nobel Prize in Physics has been jointly awarded to three US scientists – Rainer Weiss, Kip S. Thorne and Barry C. Barish – for the detection of gravitational waves. The ripples were predicted by Albert Einstein and are a fundamental consequence of his General Theory of Relativity. The winners are members of the Ligo-Virgo observatories, which were responsible for the breakthrough. The winners join a prestigious list of 204 other Physics laureates recognised since 1901. The trio will share the prize sum of nine million kronor prize. Prof Weiss gets half of the prize money, while Barish and Thorne will share the other half. Gravitational waves describe the stretching and squeezing of space-time that occurs when massive objects accelerate.

Notes:
British writer Kazuo Ishiguro has won the 2017 Nobel Prize for Literature. The novelist was praised by the Swedish Academy as a writer “who, in novels of great emotional force, has uncovered the abyss beneath our illusory sense of connection with the world”.The prize of 9 million Swedish kronor will be awarded to him. The literature prize is given for a lifetime of writing rather than for a single work. Ishiguro has written eight books, which have been translated into over 40 languages. His most famous novels “The Remains of the Day” and “Never Let Me Go” were adapted into highly acclaimed films. He won the Booker Prize in 1989 for The Remains of the Day and made an Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1995.

Notes:
The HDFC Life Insurance Company has launched ‘Neo’, that uses artificial intelligence for customer service. This is the second bot put in operation by HDFC Life, after the launch of SPOK, which was an email bot to answer customer queries. The Neo bot will be available 24/7 and has the capability to authenticate customers and give frequently sought details, like fund value, sum assured and premium amount.

Notes:
Banwarilal Purohit, a veteran political leader from Vidarbha district of Maharashtra, has been sworn-in as the new Governor of Tamil Nadu in a function held at Raj Bhavan in Chennai on October 6, 2017. Mr Purohit was sworn in as the State’s 20th Governor. The Madras High Court Chief Justice Indira Banerjee administered the oath of office and secrecy to him.