GK & Current Affairs Quiz: June 28, 2018

Notes:
According to data on language released by the Union government as part of Census 2011, Hindi is the most spoken language in India. As per data, the percentage of Indian population with Hindi as their mother tongue has risen to 43.63% from 41.03% in 2001. Bengali has taken the second spot, followed by Marathi, Telugu, Tamil and Gujarati. Urdu is the 7th most spoken language in India, while Sanskrit was the least spoken of the country’s 22 scheduled languages. Out of unscheduled languages, the most spoken language was Bhili or Bhilodi, native to Rajasthan with 1.04 crore speakers and is followed by Gondi with 29 lakh speakers. According to Census authorities, mother tongue is defined as the language spoken in childhood by the person’s mother to the person or, where the mother has died in the person’s infancy, the language mainly spoken in the person’s household during childhood.

Notes:
Yousaf Saleem, who belongs to Lahore, has been sworn-in as the first-ever visually impaired judge of Pakistan. He was among 21 judges who took the oath to be sworn in as a civil judges on June 26, 2018. Yousaf is the son of a charted accountant and is visually impaired by birth. He has four sisters and two of them are also visually impaired. His sister Saima Saleem became first visually impaired civil servant in 2007 and is currently serving with Prime Minister Secretariat while the other sister is a university lecturer.

Notes:
Jinson Johnson, representing Kerala, has broken the legendary Sriram Singh’s four-decade-old 800m National record at the 58th National Inter State Senior Athletics Championships in Guwahati on June 27, 2018. He clocked one minute and 45.65 seconds to clinch the gold in men’s 800m title and to better the earlier record of 1:45.77 in the name of Sriram set during the 1976 Olympic Games. He also booked a ticket for the Asian Games as the qualification mark is 1:47.50.

Notes:
The Ministry of Shipping’s flagship programme for port-led-prosperity ‘Sagarmala’ received the ‘Gold Award’ in infrastructure sector in the recently concluded 52nd Skoch Summit 2018 in New Delhi. The award recognizes the programmes’s contribution to India’s socio-economic transformation and it’s role in propelling fast-track growth and infrastructure development. The Sagarmala Programme also received the ‘Order of Merit’ at the Summit. The Skoch Awards recognize leadership and excellence in accelerating socio-economic changes. These awards have become a benchmark of best practices in India in the fields of governance, infrastructure, finance, banking, technology, corporate citizenship, economics and inclusive growth.

Notes:
For screening cervical cancer, a new Liquid Based Cytology (LBC) technique — Direct to Slide — has launched in Tamil Nadu. The LBC technique would help in detecting cervical cancer during the pre-cancerous stages. In LBC, a soft brush is used to touch the cervix and take cells from the neck of the uterus. This is transferred into a bottle containing a preservative and sent for laboratory analysis. The cell contents are processed on a slide. In the conventional method, the total number of cells collected may not get transferred onto the slide, while in LBC, whatever sample is taken gets transferred onto the slide.

Notes:
In a bid to boost environmental protection around the world, India will increase its grant from $12 million to $15 million to the Global Environment Facility (GEF)’s new four-year investment cycle, known as GEF-7. It was announced by India’s representative to GEF Council Aparna Subramani, during a meeting of the GEF Council in Da Nang, Vietnam. The meeting was part of a 4-day-long conference scheduled to conclude on June 28. Apart from her home country, Subramani also represents Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal and Sri Lanka in the GEF Council. India, which is both a donor and a recipient of GEF, is among the world’s most vulnerable countries to climate change. The GEF is an international partnership of 183 countries, which is a multilateral financial mechanism to provide grants for environmental projects.

Notes:
The Maharashtra government has announced a new scheme called ‘Kanya Van Samruddhi Yojana’, wherein farmers families where girl children are born, will be given saplings for plantation. The purpose of the scheme is to empower women and promoting tree plantation. The farmer family blessed with a girl child between April 1 and March 31 can make an application with the Gram Panchayat after which they will get 10 saplings free of cost from the forest department. The saplings will be of different varieties, including teakwood, mango, jackfruit, black plum and tamarind. The scheme will be applicable for maximum two girls. The beneficiaries will also be helped under the horticulture scheme. It is expected that at least two lakh farmers families will benefit from the scheme every year.

Notes:
The Maharashtra government has constituted a committee to study issues related to the development of a 1,000-MW floating solar power plant at Ujani dam in Solapur district. The committee will be headed by Satish Chavan, the Director (Commercial) of Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company Ltd (MSEDCL). Beside this, the committee will also study the environmental impact of the project and monitor the month-wise water level of the dam. Ujani dam is an earthfill cum Masonry gravity dam located near Ujjani village of Madha Taluk in Solapur district. The dam is on the Bhima River, a tributary of the Krishna River, and has a total capacity of 110 TMC.

Notes:
To mark the 500th death anniversary of mystic poet and saint Kabir Das, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has inaugurated the two-day ‘Kabir Mahotsav’ at Maghar in Sant Kabir Nagar district of Uttar Pradesh on June 28, 2018. The festival, organised by the Union Culture Ministry, will feature folk music, dance performances and musical theatre in which artistes from all over the country will participate. Mr Modi also visited the Sant Kabir cave and unveils a plaque to mark the laying of foundation stone of the Kabir Academy, which will highlight the great saint’s teachings and philosophy.

Notes:
The Raja Lakhamagouda dam is situated at Hidkal village in Hukkeri Taluk of Belagavi district in North Karnataka. It is build across the Ghataprabha River in the Krishna River basin. The dam with the height of 62.48 m and 10 Vertical Crest Gates, impounds a large reservoir with a gross surface area of 63.38 Sq Km, and storage capacity of 51.16 Tmcft. The dam is named after Raja Lakhamagouda Sardesai, philanthropist and Zamindar of Vantamuri.