Current Affairs Questions & Answers - Mar 01, 2016

ANSWER: Ross Prezelj

Explanation:
Slovenian high jumper Rozie Prezelj was on 27th February 2016 elected as chairman of the International Association of Athletics Federations Athletes Commission in Monaco. He took over as the commission’s chairman from Frank Fredericks w.e.f this date. British marathon world record holder Paula Radcliffe was nominated Vice Chairwoman of the commission. He was born in 1979 and represented the country in three Olympics. He holds a national record of 2.32 m in 2012 in EU nations.

ANSWER: Alok Kumar Verma

Explanation:
Verma will hold the post till July 2017. Bassi retired on the same day. Earlier, Verma was DG (Prisons) of Tihar Jail and a 1979 batch officer of AGMIT cadre. He has served in Delhi police in numerous positions such as Deputy Commissioner of Police, South District, Joint Commissioner of the Crime Branch, Joint Commissioner of Police, New Delhi Range, Special CP (Intelligence) and Special CP, Vigilance.

ANSWER: Commander in Chief of Andaman & Nicobar Command

Explanation:
Vice Admiral Bimal Verma AVSM took over as the CINCAN or 13th Commander in Chief of Andaman and Nicobar Command on 19th February 2016. He is the 13th CINCAN and succeeded
Vice Admiral Pradeep Kumar Chatterjee PVSM, AVSM, NM, ADC who retired after a career spanning 3 decades. Verma is an alumnus of the prestigious Rashtriya Indian Military College (RIMC) and National Defence Academy and his other appointments include commissioning crew of INS Viraat, Signal Communication Officer of INS Ganga and Fleet Communication Officer of Western Fleet and Commanding Officer of amphibious platforms such as INS Shardul and Magar, missile destroyer INS Ranjit and guided missile destroyer INS Mysore.

ANSWER: Eastern

Explanation:
Vice Admiral Atul Kumar Jain, AVSM, VSM took over as the Chief of Staff, Eastern Naval Command from Vice Admiral Bimal Verma on 27th February 2016 and has held Operational, Staff and Command Appointments. He is an alumnus of Rewa’s Sainik School and previously held posts like the Director Naval Intelligence (Protocol), Director Foreign Liaison and Principal Director Staff Requirement at Integrated Headquarters, Ministry of Defence (Navy).For his distinguished service, the Flag Officer was awarded Vishisht Seva Medal in 2009 and Ati Vishisht Seva Medal in 2015.

ANSWER: HCS Bisht

Explanation:
Vice Admiral HCS Bisht, AVSM took over as the Flag Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Eastern Naval Command from Vice Admiral Satish Soni, PVSM, AVSM, NM, ADC on 29 February 2016. Soni retired after a career spanning 4 decades and was an alumnus of Sainik School (Ghorakhal, Nainital), the National Defence Academy (Pune), Royal Naval Staff College (Greenwich, UK), College of Naval Warfare (Mumbai) and the National Defence College (New Delhi).
He has previously worked as Executive Officer of the ASW Corvette INS Ajay, Commander Work Up in the Indian Naval Work Up Team (INWT) at Kochi, Fleet Gunnery Officer of the Eastern Fleet at Visakhapatnam, commissioning Commanding Officer of the Missile Corvette INS Kora and Command of the stealth frigate, INS Tabar.

ANSWER: Kumarimurthu

Explanation:
The actor passed away on 28th February 2016 at the age of 77. He served in politics as the celebrity face of Karunanidhi headed DMK party. He debuted in the field of acting in 1978. He has acted in more than 500 films in Kollywood and finished a variety of roles through humorous acts. His last movie was Villu in 2009.

ANSWER: Nihal Ahmed Maulavi Mohammed Usman

Explanation:
Nihal Ahmed Maulavi Mohammed Usman , Socialist leader of Maharashtra has passed away on 29th February 2016 at Nashik at the age of 90. Popularly known as Nihalbhai, he was the first mayor of Malegaon Municipal Corporation. He is also state president of Janata Dal Secular and was former minister of technical and higher education of Maharashtra. He was a State Assembly legislator for 3 decades and associated with veteran socialist leaders like VP Singh and Deve Gowda.

ANSWER: Philippines

Explanation:
Japan has signed an agreement to supply defence equipment and technology to Philippines, the first such defence pact with Japan in a region where US allies have been concerned regarding security. This accord serves as a framework for transfer of defence equipment and technology and details being settled in further talks. Japan and Philippines have expressed alarm over the assertive behaviour in disputed waters.

ANSWER: Alejandro González Iñárritu

Explanation:
The 88th Academy Awards called the Oscar Awards was conferred on 29th February 2016 held at Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, LA. Spotlight won the best picture and director Alejandro González Iñárritu won best director for The Revenant. For the first time, the best actor award was won by Leonardo Di Caprio for the Revenant. Brie Larson won the best actress award for Room while Alicia Vikander for the Danish Girl. Maximum number of awards were won by Mad Max: Fury Road.

ANSWER: Kosovo

Explanation:
Foreign Minister Hashim Thaci was on 26th February 2016 elected as president of Kosovo by MP amid protests. He succeeds Atifete Jahjaga as head of state after winning the required simple majority in voting held in Pristina. Thaci was a guerrilla leader during a conflict that led to Kosovo, mainly ethnic Albanian province declaring independence from Serbia.

ANSWER: Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat

Explanation:
The Ek Bharat Shrestha Bharat programme will be launched in States and Districts in an annual programme that connects people though exchanges in areas of language, trade, culture, travel and tourism. The programme aims to create closer interactions between districts and states in a phased, structured manner.

ANSWER: Bosnia-Herzegovina

Explanation:
India’s president, Shri Pranab Mukherjee has extended his greetings and felicitations to the Government and people of Bosnia and Herzegovina on the eve of their National Day (March 1, 2016). The Chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina is currently Dragan Covic. 20th anniversary of the year of establishment of bilateral ties between the 2 nations is being celebrated in 2016.

ANSWER: Narmada

Explanation:
In a massive discovery, paleantologists have gone on to discover a 9 crore year old rare coral fossil in the Bagh beds of Narmada Valley region. This indicates the presence of marine life and sea in Central India during the period of evolution. Discovery of coral fossil also enables experts to get a view of the environment of that particular era. The fossil has been discovered in Man River Basin in Dhar district of the state by palaeontologist VIshal Verma. This is one of the oldest evidence of sea incursion in Narmada valley. This is a rare discovery from Narmada valley and presence of this coral had earlier not been confirmed in earlier times in India. Palaeontologists have confirmed coral presence in Mesozoic era divided into 3 major periods- Cretaceous, Triassic and Jurassic.

ANSWER: 2016

Explanation:
Google has celebrated the 29th of February as a leap year google doodle. Season 2016 has an extra day due to planetary orbits. Gregorian calendar measures the year to be 365 days following earth’s orbit around the Sun. The earth’s orbit takes 365.24 days to finish its solar orbit and an extra day every 4 years is added to ensure synchronisation of calendar seasons with solar seasons. February was chosen as the month for the leap day as it is the only month without either 30/31 days. If someone is born on February 29th in the UK, their legal date of birth is treated on leap years as March 1st.

ANSWER: Both a and b

Explanation:
Facebook led firm WhatsApp has over billion users per year globally and major chunk of these users are from markets such as India. At the time when OS was basically associated with Blackberry and Nokia, the service was associated with WhatsApp. Mobile OS offered by Google, Microsoft and Apple account for 99.5% of sales, were less than 25% of mobile devices sold at the time. In February 2014, WhatsApp was acquired by social networking giant Facebook which marks its largest buyout till date for USD 19 billion.