GK & Current Affairs Quiz: August 31, 2017

Notes:
Rajiv Mehrishi, the former home secretary, will be the new Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India. He will replace the present incumbent Shashi Kant Sharma who completes his term on September 30, 2017. Meanwhile, three senior bureaucrats were appointed as Deputy Comptroller and Auditor General. They are Ashwini Attri, Anita Pattanayak and Ranjan Kumar Ghose.

Notes:
Sushma Swaraj, the Union External affairs minister, is leading the Indian delegation at the Indian Ocean Conference 2017 (IOC 2017), which is started in Colombo, Sri Lanka on August 31, 2017. The theme of the conference is “Peace, progress, and prosperity”. The 2-day conference is being co-hosted by the India Foundation, a Delhi-based think tank, in collaboration with Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Singapore and National Institute of Fundamental Studies (NIFS), Colombo. The conference will see participation from around 35 countries and have speakers from 25 countries.

Notes:
Rajiv Gauba, A 1982-batch IAS officer of Jharkhand cadre, has recently taken charge as the Union Home Secretary after incumbent Rajiv Mehrishi retired from service. He will have tenure of two years. As the Union home secretary, he will have to handle issues like internal security, militancy in Jammu and Kashmir and the Northeast, Maoist problems in the central and east India besides other issues. Earlier, Gauba was serving in the Home Ministry as Officer on Special Duty. Prior to this, Gauba was Secretary in the Ministry of Urban Development. He also represented India on the board of International Monetary Fund (IMF) for four years.

Notes:
Dr. R.K. Raghavan, a 1963 cadre IPS officer, has been appointed as the new High Commissioner of India to the Republic of Cyprus and is expected to take up the assignment shortly. Raghavan, who was Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) director from January 1999 to April 2001, had investigated high profile cases like Priyadarshini Mattoo murder case, 2000 South Africa cricket match fixing, 2002 Gujarat riots. Prior to this, he was the director-general of Tamil Nadu’s State Vigilance Directorate from 1993 to 1999. He oversaw probe into corruption cases against AIADMK leader J Jayalalithaa. After his retirement, Raghavan was also corporate security adviser with Tata Consultancy Services and served as consulting adviser to O P Jindal’s Board of Management.

Notes:
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has launched its navigation satellite IRNSS-1H into the orbit by the rocket PSLV C39 from the Satish Dhavan Space Centre at Sriharikotta, Andhra Pradesh on August 31, 2017. Though, the IRNSS-1H mission was failed as heat shield did not open up for the deployment of the satellite. The IRNSS-1H was a part of the indigenous navigation system called ‘NavIC,’ that was initially planned to have a constellation of seven satellites. NavIC system is equivalent to the GPS service, having footprint over the whole of India and about 1500 kilometers from its borders on all sides. It helps user agencies to plan and monitor their vehicular movement on the road and on the sea. It can alert fishermen while approaching international maritime boundaries and help public to locate precisely the addresses they require.

Notes:
The Ujjivan Small Finance Bank (SFB) Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ujjivan Financial Services Ltd., has been included in the Second Schedule to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Act, 1934. With this, Ujjivan SFB has attained the status of a Scheduled Bank. This status will enhance the market acceptability of the bank in its effort to garner institutional deposits at a competitive price and participate more actively in the inter-bank market. It also opens the door for issuing Certificates of Deposits (CDs), which will be an important source of funding. Currently, Ujjivan SFB has 65 full-fledged brick and mortar branches in eight states and two Union Territories. It plans to convert 160 existing branches and 29 new Unbanked Rural Centres (URCs) by the end of FY 2017-18 and the remaining branches will be converted over a period of two years in line with RBI approval. The headquarters of Ujjivan SFB is located in Bengaluru.

Notes:
The researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Guwahati have successfully created an implantable bioartificial pancreas model grown within a 3D silk scaffold. The bioartificial pancreas, which encapsulates insulin-producing cells, is capable of naturally producing insulin in a sustained manner. If successful in animal and human trials, it can be used for treating people with type 1 diabetes. The silk scaffold was found to be biocompatible (not toxic to living tissue) as it did not trigger any immune reaction or cause any adverse reaction when implanted. In Type 1 diabetes, the pancreas produces little or no insulin. Insulin is a hormone needed to allow sugar (glucose) to enter cells to produce energy. The results were published in the journal ACS Biomaterials Science & Engineering.

Notes:
The Tanintharyi National Park (TNP) is located at the Tenasserim Hills, Myanmar and covers an area of 2072 km2. The main purposes of the park are habitat conservation. It is home to Sambar Deer, Asian Elephant, Barking Deer, Serow, Red Goral, Malayan tapir, tiger, Leopard and a number of bird species.

Notes:
The 10th India-European Union Counter Terrorism Dialogue was held at New Delhi on August 30, 2017. The Indian delegation was led by Mahaveer Singhvi, Joint Secretary for Counter Terrorism at the Ministry of External Affairs of India, while the European Union side was led by Pawel Herczynski, Director for Security Policy of European External Action Service (EEAS). Both sides agreed to strengthen institutional linkages between Indian agencies and their European Union counterparts including Europol for closer interaction and cooperation in the field of counter-terrorism. They also agreed to identify relevant training programmes for capacity building of individuals on both sides working in the sphere of countering terrorism and violent extremism. Prospects for deepening counter-terrorism cooperation under the UN and Financial Action Task Force (FATF) were also emphasised. The 11th India-European Union Counter Terrorism Dialogue will take place in Brussels in 2018 on a mutually convenient date.

Notes:
Sunil Arora, a 1980 batch IAS officer of the Rajasthan cadre, has been appointed as the new Election Commissioner (EC). The appointment will take effect from the date he assumes the charge. Presently, Achal Kumar Joti is the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) & Om Prakash Rawat is the other Election Commissioner. Arora is the former Information and Broadcasting Secretary and Secretary in the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship.