DAILY GK: 30, 31 MAY 2021

 DAILY GK: 30, 31 MAY 2021

1. MONETARY ASSISTANCE TO STUDENTS UNDER MDM SCHEME

•      As a special welfare measure, Union Minister for Education Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ approved the proposal to provide monetary assistance to 11.8 Crore students  through Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) of the cooking cost component of the Mid-Day-Meal Scheme (MDM).

•        INR 1200 Crore has been allocated to State Governments/UT for this purpose.

•        Beneficiaries – Class 1-8 students who are studying in 11.20 Lakh Government and Government aided schools across   India will be benefitted.

•        Each Child will get approximately INR 100 under the One-time welfare measure.

 

2. SEPARATE SECTION ON HATE SPEECH IN IPC

•        The 5-member Committee for Reforms in Criminal Laws headed by Vice Chancellor of National Law University         (NLU), Delhi (Currently – Srikrishna Deva Rao).

•        The Committee is appointed by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) to reform Indian Penal Code (IPC) is set to       propose a separate Section in IPC on ‘Offences relating to speech and expression’.

•        Purpose – At present there is no definition of what is ‘Hate Speech’ in IPC, The Committee for Reforms in Criminal    Laws is attempting for the 1st time to define it.

•        Several ‘hate speech’ cases are pending in courts across India, as there is no clear definition of it in the Indian Penal    Code, 1860.

 

3. NATO CONDUCTS WAR GAMES ‘STEADFAST DEFENDER 21’

•        North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is conducting War Games ‘Steadfast Defender 21’ from May-June 2021. 

•        Majority of the exercise will take place in Germany, Portugal and Romania.

•        Objective – to improve the ability of the Allied forces to move quickly across the Atlantic and Europe to protect each    other, if need arises.

 

4. INDIA’S FIRST CRYPTO BASED LENDING PLATFORM

•        ZebPay launched India’s 1st lending platform under the cryptocurrency exchange for the investors to invest their coins and earn returns (interest).

•        Currently the exchange will support the bitcoin (BTC), ether (ETH), tether (USDT) and dai (DAI) tokens.

•        Under the ZebPay Lending Platform, the investors could deposit their Bitcoins/other coins and earn returns like the       bank’s fixed deposits(FD).

 

5. UCO BANK ALLOTED PREFERENTIAL SHARES TO GOVT

•        UCO Bank allotted 203,76,17,554 preferential shares (PS) (equity shares of Rs 10 each) to the Government of India at an issue price of Rs 12.76 per share against a capital contribution of Rs 2,600 crore received by the Bank on March 31, 2021.

•        The bank’s board has approved a proposal to raise up to Rs 3,000 crore equity capital in 2021-22.

 

6. 2021 RUDOLF V SCHINDLER AWARD

•        The American Society of Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ASGE) has honoured Dr Duvvur(D) Nageshwar Reddy with the renowned Rudolf V Schindler Award 2021.

•        He is the first Indian medical practitioner to win this award.

•        He won the award for his work in the field of endoscopy.

•        The award was presented at the ASGE’s 2021 Annual Crystal Awards virtual ceremony.

 

7. INDIA’S 1ST PRIVATELY BUILT HALL-EFFECT THRUSTER

•        Bellatrix Aerospace, a Bengaluru based Space Transportation company has successfully tested India’s 1st Hall-effect     Thruster, a highly efficient electric propulsion system for microsatellites.

•        The tests were conducted at the Spacecraft Propulsion Research Laboratory (Asia’s largest privately funded lab) set up by Bellatrix at Society for Innovation and Development-Indian Institute of Science (SID-IISc), Bengaluru, Karnataka.

 

8. 8 FEATURES ON MOON WITH CHINESE NAMES

•        International Astronomical Union (IAU)’s Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature (WGPSN) gave           approval for naming 8 features in the Moon with Chinese names around the location where China’s Chang’e-5 Spacecraft landed in December 2020.

•        Chang’e-5 brought back fresh Lunar samples to Earth, which was previously bought 40-years back by the USA’s 1969 Apollo 11 Mission.

 

9. BOOK-“SAVARKAR: A CONTESTED LEGACY (1924-1966)”

•        Bangalore based Historian VikramSampath has authored a new book titled “Savarkar: A Contested Legacy (1924-      1966)”, the 2nd & concluding volume of the life and works of VinayakDamodarSavarkar(Veera Savarkar).

•        The release of the book was announced on the occasion of the 138th birth anniversary of Veer Savarkar, the Hindutva    ideologue.

 

10. BOOK- ‘STARGAZING: THE PLAYERS IN MY LIFE’

•        Cricket legend, commentator and one of Team India’s most successful coaches, Ravi Shastri has penned a book titled ‘Stargazing: The Players in My Life’.

•        It will be published by  Harper Collins India.

•        The Book is about some 60 extraordinary talents that Ravi Shastri has met from across the world who have inspired       him.

 

11. INTERNATIONAL DAY OF UN PEACEKEEPERS 2021

•        The United Nations (UN)’s International Day of UN Peacekeepers is annually observed across the globe on 29th May.

•        The theme of the International Day of UN Peacekeepers 2021 is “The road to a lasting peace: Leveraging the power of   youth for peace and security.”

 

12. INTERNATIONAL EVEREST DAY 2021

•        International Everest Day is annually observed across the globe on 29th May to mark the first summit of Mount        Everest by Sir Edmund Hillary of New Zealand and Tenzing Norgay Sherpa of Nepal on 29th May 1953.

•        Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay Sherpa became the first people to scale the world’s highest mountain.