GK & Current Affairs Quiz: April 11, 2017

Notes:
Bengaluru city police has launched “Pink Hoyslas” police patrol vehicles for women safety. Pink Hoysalas will be stationed at 51 hot spots’ that have been identified on the basis of the crime pattern in various city areas, especially those related to safety of women and children. The vehicles will also patrol during the night to extend a moral support for women of Bengaluru. Apart from this, an emergency panic alarm app “Suraksha” has also launched for women to send emergency alerts directly to the city police control room in case of threat. The Suraksha app is available from Android and iOS platforms.

Notes:
Lewis Hamilton, a British Formula One racing driver from England, has won the 2017 Formula One Chinese Grand Prix at the Shanghai International Circuit in Shanghai, China.

Notes:
The International Cricket Council (ICC) has named Intel as its official Innovation Partner for the upcoming ICC Champions Trophy 2017. The ICC has collaborated with Intel to transform the cricket experience for fans and help coaches and players improve performance. The 2017 season will be the 8th edition of the Champions Trophy, which will begin on June 1 and end on June 18. 8 teams will participate and a total of 15 matches will be played. The opening game will be played between England and Bangladesh, while the India Pakistan rivalry will be played on June 4 at Birmingham.

Notes:
The Uttar Pradesh will launch cheap food canteen “Annapurna Bhojnalayas” across all 14 municipal corporations in the state. Under the scheme, breakfast will be provided at Rs 3, while lunch and dinner will cost Rs 5 only. As per scheme, breakfast will consist of porridge, poha and idli-sambhar along with tea and snacks while for lunch and dinner, dal and rice, seasonal vegetables and chapatis will be served.

Notes:
Anuja Ravindra Dhir, an Indian-origin woman, has become the first non-white judge to sit at the Old Bailey Court of London. She is also the youngest circuit judge to sit at the court. The Old Bailey Court of London is the central criminal court of England and Wales. It houses 15 judges including 10 men and 5 women.

Notes:
The Union Minister for Information & Broadcasting, M Venkaiah Naidu has recently released a book titled “Gandhi in Champaran” authored by noted author Dinanath Gopal Tendulkar at National Mahatma Gandhi Museum in New Delhi. Naidu also released a book containing a collection of letters and articles of the correspondence between Nobel laureate Romain Rolland and Mahatma Gandhi as well as DG Tendulkar’s 8 volume biography of Mahatama Gandhi.

Notes:
Dr. Harsh Vardhan, the Union Minister of Science and Technology, has recently launched the Nakshe Portal in New Delhi to mark the 250th anniversary of the Survey of India (SoI). These topographic maps or Open Series Maps (OSM) have been made available for free download from “nakshe” web portal in PDF format on 1:50,000 scale through Aadhaar – enabled user authentication process, in line with Digital India programme of the Government of India (GoI).

Notes:
Colson Whitehead from United States has won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize in fiction for his novel “The Underground Railroad”. The novel had received the 2016 National Book Award of the US. This is for the first time in more than 20 years that the same work won the Pulitzer and National Book Award for fiction. The novel depicts the journey of a young woman that escaped from slavery via a fantastical train system.

Notes:
As per Amnesty International Global Report ‘Death Sentences & Executions 2016’, China has executed most people in 2016, despite the number of executions worldwide dropped by 37%. The report stated that it is difficult to get a clear number as Beijing classifies most information related to the death penalty as “state secrets”. The agency said it believes that China executed thousands each year. Excluding China, states around the world executed 1,032 people in 2016, according to Amnesty’s records. Iran has acquired 2nd position followed by Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Pakistan and Egypt. The report further stated that 104 countries were recorded to have abolished the death penalty in law or practice. Amnesty collects its statistics using official figures, media reports and information passed on from individuals sentenced to death and their families and representatives.

Notes:
The first-ever G20 Digital Ministerial Meeting on Digital Economy was held in Dusseldorf, Germany on April 6-7, 2017 with theme “Digitisation: Policies for a Digital Future”. The conference established a general agreement on how to maximize the benefits of digitalisation and highlighted the importance of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) as the backbone of today’s digital economy.