Current Affairs Questions & Answers - Sept 26, 2015

ANSWER: 26th September

Explanation:
Year long birth centenary celebrations for Pt. Deendayal Upadhyay have started from September 26th, 2015. Deenadayal Upadhyay was the proponent of Antyodaya principle of economic and political philosophy. A film on Deendayal Upadhyay was also screened titled ‘Ekatm Bharat - Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyay Ki Jeevan Yatra’.

ANSWER: All of the above

Explanation:
A judgement issued by division Bombay HC bench headed by Justice W. M. Kanade has stayed the implementation of circular on edition issued in August 2015 in Marathi. The circular against sedition was issued on August 27, 2015 to halt misuse of Section 124 of the IPC dealing with sedition and laid down specific conditions for initiating action against a person through it. Bombay HC has asked the state government to not undertake circular implementation and asked state to reply to petitions challenging its constitutional validity. 2 petitions challenged the circular-one by well known cartoonist Aseem Trivedi and 3 others and another by advocate Narendra Sharma.

ANSWER: Angry Indian Goddesses

Explanation:
Indian film “Angry Indian Goddesses” on women empowerment has been judged runner up at TIFF. Film has been directed by Pan Nalin and was judged the first runner-up for the Grolsch People’s Choice Award at the festival. It is a powerful portrayal of girl power. TIFF was founded in 1976 and is a key event in the film world.

ANSWER: Italcementi SpA

Explanation:
German company Heidelberg announced plans to purchase Italcementi SpA for 3.7 billion Euros. According to the deal,Heidelberg will acquire primary shareholder Italmobiliare’s 45% stake in Italcementi and make open offer to numerous stakeholders. Heidelberg Cement was founded in the 1870s by Johann Philipp Schifferdecker, at Heidelberg, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany. This MNC is the world’s third largest cement producer in the world. Italicementi is an Italian MNC formed in 1864 at Bergamo, Italy. It is the fifth largest cement producer across the globe.

ANSWER: Rear Admiral Sanjay Mahindru

Explanation:
Rear Admiral Sanjay Mahindru has assumed duties of Flag Officer Submarines from Rear Admiral S. V. Bokhare on 25th September 2015. Mahindru was commissioned on January 1st, 1985 and has served 27 years in the submarine unit. Prior to command of nuclear submarine Arihant, he commended a conventional submarine, destroyer and frigate. An alumnus of the College of Naval Warfare, he has also finished a staff course in the UK.

ANSWER: Preeta Bansal, Nipun Mehtal and Jasjit Singh

Explanation:
Preeta Bansal, Nipun Mehtal and Jasjit Singh along with 14 others have been named for inclusion in faith based neighbourhood partnership advisory council by American President Barack Obama. The advisory council aims to bring together religious and secular leaders in faith based networks and neighbourhood organisations. Bansal is an MIT lecturer and President of NPO Social Emergence Corporation as well as erstwhile Solicitor General of NY state. Mehta is the founder of NPO Service Space and he was a software engineer at Sun Microsystems prior to this. he is also a member of Advisory Circle of the Seva Foundation, the International Advisory Council of the Dalai Lama Foundation, and the Advisory Board of the Greater Good Science Centre. Singh is the ED of SALDEF (Sikh American Legal Defence and Education Fund) and founder of Sikh Student Association at Illinois university.

ANSWER: Dr. Uma Rajan

Explanation:
An Indian Singaporean doctor aged 75 years has been honoured by Indian community for contributing 38 years in healthcare and community service through construction of nursing homes.
Dr. Uma Rajan became the first women recipient of the fifth edition of the award by Minister of State for Law and Education Indranee Rajah. As part of the award, she received $10,000 which she contributed to numerous voluntary welfare organisations. Dr. Rajan is also a founding members of the Singapore Indian Fine Arts Society and recipient of Natyakala Bushanam (ornament of dance) title from the Indian Institute of Fine Arts in Chennai in 1954.

ANSWER: 7

Explanation:
Following the merger with SEBI, FM’s 7 director level officers will be employed by the regulatory while 41 remaining employees will be included in the central government employee pool. Merger is FM with SEBI is aimed for on September 28. It will create a unified regulatory authority. From the 7, there are 2 directors, deputy directors and assistant directors and one is a joint director. Tenure of officers shall be co termed with tenure at FMC or extend for six months or till further office, whichever of these being the earliest. SEBI has also formed a Commodity Cell besides setting up 2 international department committees in the surveillance department and market intermediaries regulation and supervision department in a run up to the merger. Currently, there are 12 commodity exchanges which are recognised. 6 of these are non operation while of the operational exchanges, three are national and three are regional bourses.

ANSWER: Andhra Pradesh

Explanation:
Centre has decided to provide continued support for development of backward districts of Andhra Pradesh and work for creation of new capital of AP including Raj Bhawan, High Court, Government Secretariat, Legislative Assembly, Legislative Council, and such other essential infrastructure. Centre has also announced special assistance of INR 1000 crore during current fiscal. It will also give special assistance of INR 350 crore for development of 7 backward districts, another INR 350 crore for development of state capital and INR 300 crore for Polavaram Irrigation Project. AP Reorganisation Act 2015 divided AP into two- creating the new state of Telangana from 2nd June 2014. Special assistance is to be provided to backward areas of the state as well and amount of INR 4403 crore was released to successor AP state during 2014-2015.

ANSWER: National Cadet Corps

Explanation:
Certificate was given by Mrs Vijaya Ghose, Editor Limca Book of Records to Lt Gen A Chakravarty in the august presence of Defence Minister Shri Manohar Parrikar. NCC created this record with 9,50,210 NCC cadets performing Yoga simultaneously at 1767 venues across India on 21 June 2015. Lt Gen A Chakravarty is the DG of NCC.

ANSWER: Arvind Panagariya

Explanation:
Government of India has established a committee led by Niti Aayog Vice Chairman Arvind Panagariya for restoration of urea plants and progress of a gas pipeline entailing investment of INR 23,000 crore. The revival of closed state run urea plants in Barauni, Gorakhpur and Sindri will be taken up by the committee. Committee will work on to establish the single window mechanism to provide required approvals for revival of three urea plants, and the gas pipeline, and provide an investment of Rs 5,000 with each urea plant attaining investment of Rs 6,000 crore. The government has already invited bids for revival of urea plants at Gorakhpur and Sindri through bidding process and the selected investor will have to set up, design, finance, construct, establish, operate and maintain a gas-based urea plant for a term of 33 years. State-operated GAIL is setting up about 2000 km Jagdishpur-Phulpur-Haldia pipeline to meet NE state demands. India's annual requirement of urea is 30 million tonnes, while the domestic production is static at 22 million tonnes, the remaining is met through imports.

ANSWER: 23

Explanation:
As many as 23 key sectors of export declined in August on account of demand downturn and falling global prices. 23 of 30 sectors monitored by Commerce Ministry were in negative zone in March. FIEO sought immediate intervention of government to stop the slide. India's exports declined 20.66 percent in August to USD 21.26 billion, increasing the trade deficit to USD 12.47 billion. Two top sectors engineering and petrol products contracted by 29 and 47.88 percent while textile exports shrank by 7.32 percent to USD 1.28 billion in August 2015. These 3 sectors constituted 47% of the total exports of the country in the previous fiscal. 11 of 13 key agricultural products fell into negative zone too. Exports of rice, spices and tobacco fell 26.32 percent to USD 443 million, 8.7 percent to USD 209 million and 15.25 percent to USD 62 million and negative growth was observed in cereals (43.94 percent), cashew (7.75 percent), oil meals (19.5 percent), carpet (22 percent), leather (12.78 percent), iron ore (34.28 percent) and chemicals (5 percent). This pushed down overall merchandise export and India aims for USD 900 billion exports in 2202 and 3.5% share in world’s total exports. Previous 4 years have seen exports hovering at USD 300 billion.

ANSWER: 55669

Explanation:
Government is looking to provide mobile connectivity to 55,669 uncovered villages across the nation by the year 2018 as part of Digital India programme, and mobile services will be provided in phased manner with USOF funding. Providing high speed internet and mobile connectivity across the country, providing government services online, promoting electronic manufacturing and creating jobs for youth are some of the priorities of government under Digital India programme. GoI has formed optic fibre cable (OFC) in 23,604 gram panchayats till July to ensure high speed broadband connectivity under the NOFN project. Project is to be rolled out to 50,000 villages by the end of March. NOFN project was set up in 2011. Committee was formed under ex IT secretary J Satyanarayana to suggest alternatives for its faster implementation.

ANSWER: Ebola

Explanation:
Researchers have come up with chip based technology which can be included in portable instruments for use in the field to detect Ebola. System is sensitive and accurate enough to provide valuable clinical assay. Current standard for Ebola virus detection is based on the PCR method/polymerase chain reaction to amplify the genetic material of the virus for detection. PCR works on DNA molecules and Ebola is an RNA virus. This is why the reverse transcriptase enzyme is used to make DNA copies of the viral RNA before PCR amplification and detection. But the PCR detection system is more complex and requires use of labs against current method Schmidt's lab at UC Santa Cruz worked with scientists at Brigham Young University and UC Berkeley for setting up the system. Virologists at Texas Biomedical Research Institute in San Antonio put together the viral samples for testing. System included a microfluidic chip for sample preparation and an optofluidic chip for optical detection.

ANSWER: Supermoon

Explanation:
A complete lunar eclipse will occur along with a supermoon on 27th/28th September 2015 and the combination has not been observed since 1982. It will not occur till 2033 again. A supermoon is a full or new moon making its closest approach to earth. While it will be 220,000 miles away, the moon will look larger and brighter. But this supermoon will be the closest full moon of the year close to 20,000 mobiles than average distance. This is because the orbit of the moon is not a perfect circle. The eclipse marks an end of tetrad or series of 4 total lunar eclipses set 6 months apart. The series commenced in April 2014. Eight of the tetrads will be observed in the 21st century while there were none from 1600 to 1900.