Current Affairs Quiz - May, 2020

Notes:
Khudol initiative has been listed one among the top 10 global initiative for an inclusive fight against the prevailing COVID-19, by the United Nations Secretary-General’s Envoy on Youth.
Khudol meaning Gift is a crowdfunded initiative of Ya_All, which is an Imphal-based NGO founded in 2017. The NGO was known for having created the country’s first transgender football team. The project involves providing food and health care to the LGBTQI+ community, people living with HIV and other vulnerable people. With 100 volunteers, they have covered around 2,000 families and individuals now.

Notes:
Former Supreme Court Judge and the International Judge at Singapore International Commercial Court Justice A K Sikri has recently e- inaugurated the Indian Dispute Resolution Centre (IDRC).
IDRC provides a paperless dispute resolution environment through certain software portals. Its arbitration panel has former judges of the Supreme Court, High Courts, district courts and senior advocates, former bureaucrats, chartered accountants among others. The IDRCs are located at strategically commercial places in the country and its head office is in New Delhi.

Notes:
The Indian Air Force is set to operationalize its squadron called the Number-18 – ‘Flying Bullets’ with a fleet of the LCA (Light Combat Aircraft) Tejas.
Chief of the Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal R K S Bhadauria will launch the squadron at the Sulur base near Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. This is the second Indian Air Force squadron to operate with the modern light fighter aircraft Tejas, which is a fourth-generation supersonic aircraft developed by the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited.

Notes:
Africa Day is celebrated to commemorate the birth anniversary of the Organisation of African Unity, which was established 57 years ago, on May 25th, 1963 and its successor organization is the African Union, which was established in 2002.
The day highlights and celebrates the vitality and diversity of Africa and to promote African unity. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the day is celebrated virtually. As of now, Africa has 1.5 percent of the reported cases of COVID-19 in the world and less than 0.1 percent of the world’s deaths.

Notes:
Leading Indian multi-industry company ITC has recently announced that the company is set to make its biggest acquisition. It has entered into an agreement to acquire a 100 per cent stake in the spices manufacturing company Sunrise Foods.
The deal size is estimated to be about Rs 2,000 crore. Kolkata based Sunrise Foods made a turnover of around Rs 600 crore last year and it has an extensive market presence across east India.

Notes:
Indian Technology major Infosys announced a strategic partnership with Switzerland -based software company Avaloq, to provide wealth management services through digital platforms.
Avaloq is a wealth management software and digital technology provider. As per the agreement, Infosys will be a strategic implementation partner for Avaloq’s wealth management suite of solutions. This partnership will focus on providing industry-based wealth management solutions to their clients.

Notes:
Union Minister for Road Transport & Highways Nitin Gadkari recently inaugurated the Chamba Tunnel in Uttarakhand through video conference. The tunnel will be operationalised this October.
The tunnel has been constructed by the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) under Chardham Pariyojana scheme of Uttarakhand. It is a 12,000-crore project, to facilitate connectivity to Gangotri, Kedarnath, Yamunotri and Badrinath. The 440-metre long tunnel has been created under Chamba town on Rishikesh-Dharasu road.

Notes:
The Harry Potter fame author J K Rowling recently unveiled her story online for the kids across the world, during the lock-down.
The title of the story is ‘The Ickabog’ and it is her first children’s story not linked to Harry Potter. The chapters of the story will be published daily until July 10, in an exclusive website recently created for the story. The author also announced that she had written this story a decade ago.

Notes:
The historic first manned space flight of SpaceX for NASA is scheduled to take off for the International Space Station on May 27.
The mission is called Demo-2 and it will launch the two NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley into orbit. The Crew Dragon spacecraft of SpaceX onboard a Falcon 9 rocket is used in this historic launch. Since 2011, NASA has sent all its astronauts through Russia’s Soyuz capsule.

Notes:
The rating agency Fitch Ratings has made further slashed world GDP forecasts in its latest Global Economic Outlook (GEO).
The biggest estimate cut was for India, where the rating agency forecasts a contract of growth by 5%, which means -5% growth in 2020-21. Earlier, Fitch had estimated India’s growth to be 0.8% for FY21. The global GDP is also estimated to fall by 4.6% in 2020.