Current Affairs - 2019-20

Notes:
India will host a meeting of WTO member countries in February 2018 to muster support for food security and other issues. This was stated by Commerce and Industry Minister Suresh Prabhu while speaking at an event organised by Apparel Export Promotion Council, AEPC in New Delhi on December 18, 2017. He further stated that the government is trying to call a meeting of almost 30 to 40 countries in Delhi to help multi-lateral process. India has been keenly pushing agriculture issues at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). It has also been raising its voice against bringing new issues, especially those which are not directly linked to trade, on the negotiating table.

Notes:
Under the Part XXI of the Constitution of India, which deals with “Temporary, Transitional and Special provisions”, Article 370 is a temporary provision granting special autonomous status to Jammu and Kashmir. However, all sections of article 370 except article 370(1) have been abrogated in 2019.

Notes:
Before 5 August 2019, Part VI was not applicable to Jammu & Kashmir state. On 6 August 2019, parliament of India declared all the clauses of Article 370 except clause 1 to be inoperative. After this, Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act was passed dividing the state of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories viz. Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh.

Notes:
India is the most populous democracy in the world. As of 2022, India has a population of over 1.4 billion people, making it the second most populous country in the world after China, which is a communist country.

Notes:

AC = BC = 5 cm
∴ AB

Hence option [A] is the right answer.

Notes:
Acclaimed Bengali writer Ramapada Chowdhury (95), whose story ‘Abhimanyu’ was made into a Hindi movie ‘Ek doctor ki maut’, has passed away in Kolkata, West Bengal on July 29, 2018. ‘Abhimanyu’ was based on the life and work of Dr Subhas Mukhopadhyay who created India’s first and the world’s second test-tube baby in 1978. Director Tapan Sinha turned the story into a award winning Hindi film ‘Ek doctor ki maut’ in 1990. Mrinal Sen’s Hindi film ‘Ek din achanak’ (1989) was also based on Chowdhury’s story ‘Beej’. Chowdhury had penned famous literary works such as ‘Pratham Prahar’ (1954), ‘Banpalashir padabali’ (1960), ‘Ekhoni’ (1969), ‘Kharij’, ‘Bari badle jay’ (1988), ‘Abhimanyu’ (1982). His last book ‘Harano Khata’ was published in 2015. He was conferred the Sahitya Academy award for ‘Bari badle jay’ in 1988 and was also the recipient of Rabindra Puraskar, Ananda Puraskar and Rabindranath Tagore Memorial International Prize.

Notes:
Generally, diabetes patients are advised to avoid eating rice. But recently, researchers in India have identified a high-yielding variety of white rice with low Glycemic Index (GI) that is not harmful for diabetic patients and hence can be consumed by them. The newly identified variety of white rice has low Glycemic Index (GI), a measurement that indicates a particular type of carbohydrate-containing food’s impact on a person’s blood glucose (also called blood sugar) level. This white rice variety was found on the “Chapati Gurmatiya” race of rice, which is a traditional cultivated variety of paddy in Chhattisgarh.

Notes:
Astrosat is India’s first dedicated multi-wavelength space observatory. It has recently accomplished the extremely strenuous job of X-ray polarisation, putting up a strong challenge to prevailing theories of high energy radiation from pulsars. The 18-month old study of the Crab Pulsar in the Taurus constellation and measurement of the variations of polarisation as this highly-magnetised neutron star spins around 30 times every second is a commendable task. A pulsar is a celestial body, believed to be made up on neutrons, and rotates 30 times per second. Even though they are comparatively tiny in size, they have mass more than that of the entire Sun, and hence are known as compact objects. Scientists and astronomers, who participated in the project hail from the country’s top scientific institutes — the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai; the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, Thiruvananthapuram; ISRO Satellite Centre (ISAC), Bengaluru; The Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA), Pune; and Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), Ahmedabad.

Notes:
Petroleum coke, or pet coke, is a byproduct of oil refining. It is a key input material for cement producers and is a highly polluting fuel. The Supreme Court requested all states and union territories to move forward towards a blanket ban on the use of pet coke. Pet coke is a dirtier alternative to coal. The use of pet coke has come under scrutiny due to rising pollution levels in major cities. Pet coke is most widely used in the cement industry. It is also used as a primary material for electrodes used in electric steel furnaces for smelting and refining steel scrap.
The majority of pet coke is produced in the US but is transported to India and China. In 2016, the US sent more than 8 million metric tons of pet coke to India.

Notes:
Recently, scientists discovered a new species of moth in the Talle Wildlife Sanctuary in Arunachal Pradesh. The new species has been named as Elcysma Ziroensis. They are generally brightly coloured, day-flying Moths found in tropical and temperate regions. They tend to be slow fliers and store the distasteful and poisonous compound hydrogen cyanide within their bodies. The discovered specimen has a wingspan of 7 cm, and a cream colour with black markings on the wings, and prominent large red spot on the forewing.