Current Affairs – November 2, 2009

October 28, 2009

Quick Head Lines:

Barrie Osborne, the producer of ‘The Lord of the Rings’ is planning to make an epic film on Prophet Mohammad.
Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd will set up 30,000 broadband kiosks in rural and remote areas in the next two years on a franchisee basis.BSNL is the largest broadband Internet service provider in the country with a subscriber base of 3.9 million.
Counter Terror India 2009 the new high-level conference organised with Internal Security India and IFSEC from October 28-31 in New Delhi.

National

“Sanjha Chulaha Yojna” of Madhya Pradesh
Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has launched the Sanjha Chulha Yojana.
Freshly cooked food prepared in schools’ kitchen shades by local self-help groups is served under Midday Meal Scheme. Now these groups will provide nutritious food to children ranging from 3 to 6 years of age under Integrated Child Development Scheme in the rural areas under Sanjha Chulha Yojana.
‘Save Himalaya’ of Bahuguna
Padmabhusan Sunder Lal Bahuguna has embarked on another mission to save the Earth named “Save Himalaya” He has embarked on a movement to save the Himalayas ahead of the Copenhagen meet where world leaders would converge from December 7 to discuss about the climate change and carbon emissions.
Aim: To sensitise people on the fragile ecology of the Himalayan region and the need to protect it.
As part of this campaign, the delegation has reached the NE. The members are visiting all the Himalayan states besides, neighbouring countries to hold consultations with heads of governments, eminent citizens, media and civil society groups in an attempt to create awareness and consolidate opinion on the need to push for specific developmental policies for the region in view of increasing threats to the eco-system, lives and livelihoods.

Village Dynamics Studies (VDS) project of ICRISAT
The International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), will reduce poverty in drylands through the recently-launched Village Dynamics Studies (VDS) project.
Aims of the Project:
The project aims at informing smallholder farmers about programmes and policies to help lift themselves out of hunger and poverty. Seeking to improve the quantity and quality of village-based information for better decision-making, the five-year project will be implemented by ICRISAT together with National Centre for Agricultural Economics and Policy Research (NCAP) in the humid tropics of East India.

The International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), Phillipines will implement it in Bangladesh.

Nagaland Retirement from Public Employment (Second Amendment) Act, 2009
The Nagaland Retirement from Public Employment (Second Amendment) Act 2009, passed by the nagaland legislative Assembly.

Following the verdict of Gauhati High Court in favour of the state government to implement the Nagaland Retirement from Public Employment (Second Amendment) Act, 2009, the government has implemented the Act from Saturday, affecting over 4000 employees.
Those employees who were 60 years of age or completed government service for 35 years by October 31, will have to retire as per the provision of the Nagaland Retirement from Public Employment (Second Amendment) Act, 2009.

Appointments:
Chattar Singh appointed Haryana CMs Principal Secretary The Haryana Government has appointed Chhatar Singh, a 1980 batch IAS officer as Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister, against a vacant post.He was earlier Resident Financial Commissioner, Haryana Bhawan, New Delhi and was also the Additional Principal Secretary to the Chief Minister.
Awards:
Golden Joystick Awards:
The Golden Joystick Awards are the world’s oldest gaming award ceremony, awarding the best computer and video games of the year, as voted for by the general public. The ceremony is in its 27th year running (as of 2009).
Here are the latest Winners:
Family game of the year: LittleBigPlanet
Bliss handheld game of the year: Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars
Retailer of the year: GAME
Mobile game of the year: Metal Gear Solid Touch
Nintendo game of the year: Call of Duty: World at War
MSN multiplayer game of the year: Call Of Duty: World At War
The Rampage soundtrack of the year: Guitar Hero World Tour
Xbox Game of the Year: Gears of War 2
PC game of the year: Fallout 3
Amiqus games UK developer of the year: Jagex
PlayStation game of the year: Killzone 2
Publisher of the year: Activision Blizzard
Online game of the year: Left4Dead
ShortList one to watch: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
Ultimate game of the year, together with Zavvi.co.uk: Fallout 3

International :
Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity Satellite (SMOS) of European Space Agency launched
The Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity Satellite (SMOS) is a part of ESA’s Living Planet Programme intended to provide new insights into Earth’s water cycle and climate. In addition, it will provide better weather forecasting and will also monitor snow and ice accumulation.
SMOS (Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity) spacecraft will make the first global maps of the amount of moisture held in soils and of the quantity of salts dissolved in the oceans. The mission will run for three years in the first instance.

The SMOS programme cost is about $465 million. It is led by ESA but with significant input from French and Spanish interests.
The satellite is part of ESA’s Earth Explorer programme – eight spacecraft that will do innovative science in obtaining data on issues of pressing environmental concern. The first is already in orbit – a mission called GOCE, which is mapping variations in the pull of gravity across the Earth’s surface. SMOS is the second Explorer to launch; and a third spacecraft, known as CryoSat-2, is due to go into space in December 2009. CryoSat will assess the state of the world’s ice cover.
The satellite was launched on 2 November 2009 (04:50 (01:50 GMT)) to a nearly circular orbit of 763 km by a “Rockot”, a modified Russian Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) SS-19 launched from a decommissioned SS-19 launcher from Northern Russia’s Plesetsk Cosmodrome.The SMOS satellite was launched together with the Proba-2, a technology demonstration satellite

It carries 69 antennas positioned on a central structure and along the lengths of its three arms.

Uses:

Information from SMOS is expected to help improve short and medium-term weather forecasts, and also have practical applications in areas such as agriculture and water resource management.
In addition, climate models should benefit from having a more precise picture of the scale and speed of movement of water in the different components of the hydrological cycle. Smos shares its ride into space with a small ESA demonstration satellite called Proba-2 (PRoject for OnBoard Autonomy).

Sports:
WTA Tour Championships
The WTA Tour Championships is a tennis tournament played annually at the end of the season for the top-ranked players on the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) tour. The event’s current sponsored name is the Sony Ericsson Championships. Doha, Qatar hosted the 2008 and 2009 events and is scheduled to host the 2010 edition before passing the flag to Istanbul, Turkey, which is expected to host the 2011, 2012, and 2013 events
The Latest Info is as follows:
2009 Champion: Serena Williams who defeated 2008 Champion and her sister Venus Williams. After this victory Serena will return home as the rightful number one after winning both the Australian Open and Wimbledon titles, broke serve twice in a one-sided first set.

Vienna Open Results 2009:
The Bank Austria-Tennis Trophy is a professional tennis tournament played on indoor hard courts. It is currently part of the ATP World Tour 250 series of the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) World Tour. It is held annually at the Wiener Stadthalle, in Vienna, Austria, since 1974.
2009 winner is Jurgen Melzer (Austria) & runner up is Marin Cilic (Croatia)

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