06 August 2019 - Daily Current Affairs

06 August 2019 - Daily Current Affairs

1. Udaipur to host India’s Largest Education Brainstorm

• The 3rd edition of India’s largest education brainstorming event, the ScooNews Global Educators Fest (SGEF) will be held in the city of lakes, Udaipur, Rajasthan (9 & 10th August 2019).
• The theme for this year's fest is 'Education for Sustainability: Moving on from conformity to creativity'.
• It will bring together over 500 educators to discuss the way towards establishing India as the next global education powerhouse.
• SGEF will also be recognizing individuals and organizations excelling at innovation in the field of Education by assisting the industry with trendsetting solutions and best practices.

Source: Asian Age

2. Bihar gets Centre's nod for Kosi-Mechi river interlinking

• The Union Government has approved a project worth Rs. 4,900-crore Kosi-Mechi river interlinking project in Bihar.
• This is the second major river interlinking project in the country to be approved after the Ken-Betwa project in Madhya Pradesh.
• The project will prevent recurring floods in north Bihar and also irrigate over 2.14 lakh hectares of cultivable land in Bihar.
• The central government has approved construction of 76.20 km canals on the eastern bank of Kosi for irrigation purpose,
• The project is aimed at alleviating hardships of the people resulting from the floods and has the potential to usher in a green revolution in the Seemanchal region.

Source: Business Standard

Honour & Awards

3. Statue of Unity shortlisted for UK-based structural award

• The ‘Statue of Unity’ (182-metre-tall) has been shortlisted for 'The Structural Awards 2019' of the UK-based Institution of Structural Engineers (IStructE).
• The Objective of the award to increase awareness of the important work that structural engineers do.
• Statue of Unity (memorial to Sardar Patel) was unveiled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Gujarat's Kevadia town on 31^st October 2018.
• It is among the 49 structures that will vie for the prestigious award.

Note:

• The awards will be announced in a function in London on 15^th November 2019.
• Past winners of this award include iconic structures such as the Sydney Opera House in Australia, the Pompidou Centre in Paris and the Severn Bridge in England.

Source: The Hindu

Important days

4. Japan marks the 74th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima

• Today, Japan marked the 74^th anniversary (6th August) of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
• Prime Minister Shinzo Abe led commemorations at the Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima as residents offered silent prayers, lit candles and placed wreaths to remember those killed in the August 6, 1945 bombing.

Note:

• Japan suffered two nuclear attacks (1st Hiroshima & 2nd Nagasaki) by the United States at the end of World War II.
• The bombings claimed 1 Lakh 40 thousand lives in Hiroshima and 74 thousand in Nagasaki.

Source: AIR News

5. WCD Ministry observes World Breastfeeding Week

• The Women and Child Development Ministry are observing the World Breastfeeding Week (1-7^th August) with a focus on protection, promotion and support of breastfeeding.
• The objective of the WBW is to create awareness among parents about breastfeeding, the importance of initiation, exclusive breastfeeding, and adequate and appropriate complementary feeding.
• The ministry is organizing a number of activities on the theme “Empower Parents, Enable Breastfeeding”.

Source: AIR News

6. Lalit Kala Akademi celebrates 65th Foundation Day

• The Ministry of Culture and Tourism Minister has celebrated the Lalit Kala Akademi’s 65th Foundation Day in New Delhi.
• The Minister also inaugurated art camp and artwork & painting exhibition and released a book ‘Mithila Ki Lok Chitrakala’.
• Lalit Kala Akademi (or National Academy of Art) was established in New Delhi in 1954 by the government to promote and propagate understanding of Indian art, in and outside the country.
• LKA provides scholarships and a fellow program, and sponsors and organises exhibitions in India and overseas.

Source: PIB

Appointment

7. Congress Rajya Sabha MP Bhubaneshwar Kalita resigns from membership of the House

• Congress Rajya Sabha MP Bhubaneshwar Kalita resigned from the membership of the House on opposing the party's stand on the abrogation of Article 370.
• Rajya Sabha Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu announced in the House that he has accepted Mr Kalita's resignation.
• Mr Kalita was upset with the Congress when he was asked to issue a whip to party members against the government's move on the Kashmir issue.

Obituaries

8. Cricket commentator Anant Setalvad passes away

• Cricket commentator Anant Setalvad (84-years) passed away in Mumbai.
• Setalvad had started his radio commentary stint in the pre-TV days and had shared the mike with the likes of former Test opener and ex-selection panel chief Vijay Merchant on All India Radio.
• He used to draw pictures of the game's progress on airwaves with his fine command of the English language.

Science & Defence

9. ISRO sets up SSAM in Bengaluru

• ISRO Chairman K Sivan laid the foundation stone for Space Situational Awareness Control Centre at Peenya in Bengaluru.
• Isro has set up a directorate of space situational awareness and management aiming at protecting high valued space assets from space debris close approaches and collisions.
• The control centre would facilitate the intensified activities foreseen for SSAM, in view of increasing debris population and operational space assets.
• The control centre would host a range of activities pertaining to the protection of Indian space assets from inactive satellites, pieces of orbiting objects, near-earth asteroids and adverse space weather conditions.

Source: ISRO

Banking & Finance

10. Indian Bank net profit rises 75% on lower provisioning and higher income

• The bank had recorded net profits at Rs 209.31 crore during the corresponding quarter the previous year.
• Indian Bank has posted a 74.55% jump in its net profits for the April-June quarter, at Rs 365.37 crore, on lower provisioning and higher income.
• The Indian bank had recorded net profits at Rs 209.31 crore during the corresponding quarter the previous year.
• The total income grew by 13.6% to Rs 5,832.12 crore during the quarter, as against Rs 5,131.97 crore last year.
• During the quarter, there was a progressive reduction in the accretion of fresh NPAs to Rs 1,035 crore as against Rs 1,391 crore a year-ago period.

Source: Business Standard

11. SBI becomes 1st Indian bank to link up with China's National Advance Payment System

• The State Bank of India's Shanghai branch is now connected to China's National Advance Payment System (CNAPS), becoming the first Indian Bank to operationalise it.
• The CNAPS, launched in 2008 by People's Bank of China (PBOC) provides real-time settlement services for all payments cleared in mainland China, as well as in all clearing banks in offshore yuan centres, such as Hong Kong.
• The CIPS already has participants from multiple countries across the globe.

Source: Business Today

12. Debashis Chatterjee becomes MD and CEO of Mindtree

• Indian IT company Mindtree Ltd has appointed Debashis Chatterjee as its new Managing Director (MD) and Chief Executive Officer (CEO).
• The S.N. Subrahmanyan (CEO of Larsen & Toubro Ltd (L&T) has been appointed as non-executive vice-chairman.

Note:

• Mindtree Limited is an Indian multinational information technology and outsourcing company headquartered in Bangalore, India and New Jersey, USA.
• The company deals in e-commerce, mobile applications, cloud computing, digital transformation, data analytics, enterprise application integration and enterprise resource planning.

Sports

13. Rohit Sharma becomes the batsman with most-number of sixes in T20Is

• India's opening batsman Rohit Sharma (32 years) has become the batsman with the most- number of sixes in the T20I format.
• He blasted two sixes to go past West Indies's Chris Gayle at the top spot.
• Now, the right-handed batsman Rohit Sharma has 106 sixes in the format whereas Gayle has 105.
• Kiwi opening batsman Martin Guptill sits on the third position with 103 sixes.
• Currently, Rohit Sharma holds the record for the most number of centuries (four) and highest run-scorer in the T20I format.

Total Matches	Runs	100s	4s	6s
Test (27)	1585	3	151	32
ODI (215)	8658	27	766	232
T20I (96)	2422	4	215	107
IPL (188)	4898	1	431	194