Current Affairs Quiz - September, 2023

Notes:
Union Home Minister Amit Shah recently chaired 26th meeting of Western Zonal Council at Gandhinagar, Gujarat.
He also inaugurated an e-Resource web portal of Inter State Council Secretariat, Ministry of Home Affairs. This portal will facilitate functioning of Zonal Councils. The meeting was attended by Chief Ministers of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Goa and Administrator of Dadra & Nagar Haveli and Daman & Diu.

Notes:
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Fourth Partner Energy Private Limited signed a long-term loan of up to 1.2 billion Indian rupees to construct and operate a 25-megawatt solar photovoltaic-based power plant in the state of Tamil Nadu in India.
It is expected to generate about 50.7 gigawatt-hours of electricity annually and increase clean and low-cost energy supply to commercial and industrial customers.

Notes:
President Droupadi Murmu released the commemorative coin on Late NT Rama Rao on his centenary year at Rashtrapati Bhavan Cultural Centre.
NT Rama Rao, who founded the Telegu Desam Party (TDP), also served as the chief minister of Andhra Pradesh for three terms. He initiated many public welfare programs.

Notes:
The Goods and Services Tax (GST) revenues for August 2023 have shown a growth of 11 per cent year-on-year as it stands at Rs 1.59 lakh crore.
The increase is due to increased compliance and reduced evasion. In August 2022, the collection from GST was Rs 1,43,612 crore. Out of the Rs 1.59 lakh crore GST collected, CGST accounted for Rs 28,328 crore, SGST for Rs 35,794 crore, IGST for Rs 83,251 crore, and cess for Rs 11,695 crore.

Notes:
The Government of India has decided to organise a literacy week from 1st September to 8th September 2023 to celebrate International Literacy Day.
UNESCO will celebrate International Literacy Day (ILD) on 8 September 2023 under the theme ‘Promoting literacy for a world in transition: Building the foundation for sustainable and peaceful societies’.

Notes:
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft will come back through Earth’s atmosphere after a year-long journey to Bennu, a potentially hazardous asteroid with a 1 in 2700 chance of smashing cataclysmically into Earth.
The goal of the mission is to see whether life on Earth came from outer space. OSIRIS-REx is now returning from its mission with a 2-ounce sample of Bennu’s surface that could contain extraterrestrial precursors to life on our planet.

Notes:
The Union government has formed a committee under former President Ram Nath Kovind to assess the viability of the “one nation, one election” concept.
The members of the panel include Union home minister Amit Shah, ex-J&K chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, former Finance Commission chairman N K Singh, Constitution expert Subhash C Kashyap, senior advocate Harish Salve, and ex-Chief Vigilance Commissioner Sanjay Kothari.

Notes:
Recently, scientists from IIT Roorkee made a discovery by characterizing dinosaur fossils from the Middle Jurassic period, unearthed in the Thar Desert near the Jaisalmer Basin, by the Geological Survey of India. The fossils belong to a species known as Tharosaurus indicus, a member of the Dicraeosauridae family within the superfamily Diplodocoidea. These fossils represent the first dicraeosaurid sauropods ever found in India and are approximately 167 million years old, making them the world’s oldest known diplodocoid fossils.
The scientists coined the name Tharosaurus indicus, drawing from “Tharo” (referring to the Thar desert), “sauros” (Greek for lizard), and “indicus” (indicating its Indian origin). These dinos were distinct within their family, characterized by smaller size and shorter necks and tails compared to their long-necked sauropod counterparts. Sauropods originated during the Jurassic period around 200 million years ago and were a dominant group of dinosaurs, surviving until the late Cretaceous period, when dinosaurs met their demise. While dicraeosaurid fossils have been found in other parts of the world, this discovery sheds new light on prehistoric India’s biodiversity.

Notes:
North Korea has launched its first operational tactical nuclear attack submarine “Hero Kim Kun Ok” and assigned it to patrol the waters between the Korean peninsula and Japan.

Notes:
The Language Diversity Index (LDI) measures the probability that two people selected from a population at random will have different mother tongues, indicating the linguistic diversity of a country’s population. It ranges from 0 (everyone has the same mother tongue) to 1 (no two people have the same mother tongue).