DAILY GK: 8 APRIL 2021

 DAILY GK: 8 APRIL 2021

1. 3-MEMBER PANEL REPORT ON AGRICULTURAL REFORM LAWS

•      The 3-member committee appointed by the Supreme Court for Studying 3 Agricultural reform laws passed by Parliament has submitted its report to the Supreme Court.

•      Members of the Committee –  P K Joshi, Former Director of South Asia, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI); Anil Ghanwat, President of Shetkari Sanghatana & Ashok Gulati, Agri-Economist and former Chairman of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP).

3-Farm laws

•      The Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act

•      The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act

•      The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Act

 

2.BLOCKCHAIN-POWERED TRACEABILITY INTERFACE

•      Spices Board India under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry & UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) India’s Accelerator Lab signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for developing a blockchain-based traceability interface for Indian Spices to enhance transparency in supply chain and trade.

•      UNDP and Spices Board India are working towards integrating the Blockchain Traceability Interface with the e-Spice Bazaar portal developed by Spices Board India for connecting spices farmers with markets.

 

3.MEETING OF EDUCATION MINISTERS OF E9 COUNTRIES

•      Minister of State (MoS) for Education, Sanjay Dhotre attended the consulting meeting of Education Ministers of E9 Countries.

•      Theme – ‘E9 Initiative: Scaling up digital learning to accelerate progress towards SDG4 (Sustainable Development Goal-4)’.

•      E9 Countries: It was launched in 1993 at the EFA Summit in New Delhi, India.  

•      It was set up to achieve the goals of UNESCO’s Education for All (EFA) initiative.

•      The 9 Countries are – Bangladesh, Brazil, China, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria & Pakistan.

 

4.CLIMATE & DEVELOPMENT MINISTERIAL MEET IN RUN UP TO COP26

•      Prakash Javadekar, Union Minister, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change(MoEF&CC) participated in the virtual climate and development ministerial meet hosted by the United Kingdom (UK) in a run-up to the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties(COP26) 2021.

•      The event was hosted by COP26 presidentAlok Sharma and UK foreign secretary Dominic Raab, with a focus on how to set international agenda in the run-up to COP26.

•      The COP26 UN climate change conference is set to take place in Scottish Event Campus, Glasgow, the United Kingdom in partnership with Italy.

 

5.BASE RATE OF NBFC-MFIS BORROWINGS

•      RBI has informed 7.81% as the applicable average base rate to be charged for the loans that are borrowed from Non-Banking Financial Company – Micro Finance Institutions (NBFC-MFIs) for the first quarter of Financial Year 2022 (Q1FY22).

•      The base rate for the Q1FY22 was lower than that of Q4FY21 by 15 basis points (0. 15%).

•      In Q1FY21 the base rate was about 8.76%.

 

6.IMF HAS PROJECTED INDIA’S GDP GROWTH

•      International Monetary Fund (IMF) in its biannual World Economic Outlook report has hiked its growth projection of India for FY22 by 1% to 12.5% from 11.5% of its January 2021 estimation, due to the normalization of economic activity.

•      For FY21, it estimated an 8%(-8%) contraction of the Gross Domestic Product(GDP) and for FY23 the growth forecast was revised to 6.9% from 6.8%.

•      The report projected the global economy to grow at 6% in 2021 and 4.4% in 2022 as against a contraction of 3.3% (-3.3%)in 2020.

 

7. FORBES’ 35TH ANNUAL WORLD’S BILLIONAIRES LIST

•      Jeff Bezos, Founder of Amazon.com Inc topped the Forbes’ 35th Annual world’s Billionaires list with a net worth of 177 billion USD followed by Elon Musk CEO of SpaceX and Tesla with a net worth of 151 billion USD and French Billionaire Bernard Arnault chairman of LVMH Moët Hennessy – Louis Vuitton SE with a net worth of 150 Billion USD with 2nd and 3rd rank.

•      Ranked 10, MukeshAmbani, chairman of Reliance Industries Ltd became Asia’s richest person, replacing Jack Ma.

•      With 140 billionaires, India has the 3rd highest number of billionaires on the list.

 

8.48TH CHIEF JUSTICE OF INDIA APPOINTED BY PRESIDENT

•      The President of India Appointed Justice Nuthalapati Venkata Ramana, Judge of the Supreme Court, as the 48th Chief Justice of India.

•      The notification regarding the appointment was issued by the Department of Justice, Ministry of Law and Justice.

•      He will take over as the Chief Justice of India on 24th April 2021 for a 16-month tenure till 26th August 2022.

•      The Chief Justice of India is appointed by the President of India under clause (2) of Article 124 of the Constitution.

 

9. NEW CMD OF SIDBI

•      S Ramann, the Chief Executive officer(CEO) of National e-Governance Services Ltd (NeSL), has been appointed as the Chairman and Managing Director (CMD)of Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI).

•      He will hold the post of CMD of SIDBI for a period of 3 years from the date of his assuming charge or until further orders.

 

10. BYJU’S THE EDU-TECH COMPANY ACQUIRED AESL

•      Byju’s, India’s biggest online education startup has announced its acquisition of Aakash Educational Services Limited (AESL), a provider of test preparation services for $1 billion (about Rs 7,300 crore).

•      This deal is the biggest acquisition by Byju’s until now.

•      Byju’s aims to increase its presence in the test prep space as its competitors/rival Unacademy made close to six acquisitions in the test prep space and Amazon India made an entry with Amazon Academy in 2020.

 

11. INDIA ADOPTED ADVANCED DISEASE SURVEILLANCE SYSTEM

•      Union Minister of Health & Family Welfare, Dr Harsh Vardhan virtually launched the Integrated Health Information Platform (IHIP), an integrated Digital Platform for Disease Surveillance in India.

•      It is an advanced version of the Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP), which is being used currently.

•      With the launch, India became the 1st Country in the World to adopt an Advanced Digital Disease Surveillance System.

•      IHIP is capable of tracking 33 diseases (previously it was 18).

 

12. SUPACE – AI DRIVEN RESEARCH PORTAL OF S.C.I.

•      CJI SA Bobde launched “Supreme Court Portal for Assistance in Court’s Efficiency (SUPACE)” an Artificial Intelligence (AI) driven tool, which is 1st of its kind in the World that collects relevant facts and laws related to the case, thereby easing the research process for Judges.

•      Efficient use of AI for collecting information related to the case, to reduce the workload of Judges.

 

13. ‘SUPER TORPEDO’ THAT CAN CAUSE ‘RADIOACTIVE TSUNAMIS’

•      Russia is Testing a new ‘Super Torpedo’ namely Poseidon 2M39 Torpedo in the Arctic region.

•      The Super Torpedo is capable of producing Radioactive Tsunamis.

•      The Unmanned Stealth Torpedo is powered by a nuclear reactor and has a range of 10, 000 km.

•      The Torpedo can reach a speed of 100 Knots (around 115 miles per hour) with a 100 MW Nuclear Reactor.

•      Russia is also testing a Hyper-sonic missile called ‘Tsirkon’, which is capable of flying at speeds of up to Mach 6-7.

 

14. BOOK “EXAM WARRIORS” (REVISED AND UPDATED EDITION)

•      The  new revised and updated version of book titled “ Exam Warriors” written by Prime Minister(PM) Narendra Modi was released with many new mantras & range of engaging activities for students as well as parents and also reaffirms the need to remain stress free before an exam.

 

15. INTERNATIONAL DAY OF SPORT FOR DEVELOPMENT AND PEACE 2021

•      The United Nations(UN)’s International Day of Sport for Development and Peace(IDSDP) is annually observed across the globe on 6th April to recognise the role of sports in communities and in individuals towards building resilience.

•      The theme of 2021 IDSDP is focused on – recovery from the pandemic

 

16. WORLD HEALTH DAY 2021 – APRIL 7

•      The day is celebrated under the sponsorship of the WHO and other related organizations.

•      The theme of World Health Day 2021 is “Building a Fairer, Healthier World”.

 

17. WORLD BACKUP DAY 2021

•      World Backup Day is annually observed on 31st March to remind us to protect our digital documents.

•      The Day was originally started as the World Backup Month instituted by Maxtor, a hard drive company which was later acquired by Seagate Technology.

 

18. RBI TWIN THE DEPOSIT LIMIT OF PAYMENTS BANKS

•      “With a view to furthering financial inclusion and to expand the ability of payments banks to cater to the growing needs of their customers, the current limit on maximum end of day balance of 1 lakh per individual customer is being increased to Rs.2 lakh,” RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das reported.

•      Also RBI has decided to enhance the aggregate limit of ways and means advance (WMA) limitfor all States and Union Territories to Rs.47,010 crore, which is an increase of 46 per cent from the current limit of 32,225 crore.

 

19.  AJAI SETH BECAME NEW ECONOMIC AFFAIRS SECRETARY

•      The government appointed Ajai Seth as new Economic Affairs Secretary.

•      He will replace Tarun Bajaj who will be new Revenue Secretary.

•      Senior bureaucrat Tarun Bajaj was appointed revenue secretary as part of a top-level bureaucratic reshuffle by the Centre.

•      Bajaj, a 1988-batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of the Haryana cadre, is currently secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs (DEA).