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 GS SCORE Current Affairs March 2021 Week 3 PDF

1)  India-Finland Virtual Summit 2021

•The India-Finland Virtual Summit was held on March 16, 2021, with the participation of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi and Prime Minister of the Republic of Finland Ms Sanna Marin. The virtual summit was organised to discuss the entire gamut of bilateral issues as well as other regional and multilateral issues of mutual interest.

2)  Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Principal Advisor P K Sinha resigns

•Former Cabinet Secretary and Principal Advisor in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) P.K. Sinha has relinquished his high-profile position on personal grounds. He was appointed in the PMO first as Officer on Special Duty (OSD) briefly and then as Principal Advisor, a specially created position for him, in September 2019 after the 2019 parliamentary polls. Besides him, two senior officials are serving as Advisors in the PMO: Bhaskar Khulbe and Amarjit Sinha, both 1983 batch retired IAS officials.

•Mr. Sinha is a retired 1977 batch IAS officer of Uttar Pradesh cadre and served in various capacities during the UPA and the NDA regimes. His is the second high profile exit from the PMO after PM’s Principal Secretary Nripendra Misra had resigned after the last Lok Sabha polls. Earlier, he was Secretary, Ministry of Power in the government of India and served as Cabinet Secretary for four years from 2015.

3)  WHO declares El Salvador malaria-free

•El Salvador is the first country in Central America to be certified malaria-free by the World Health Organization. WHO grants a certification of malaria elimination when a country proves “beyond a reasonable doubt” that there has been no indigenous transmission of the disease nationwide for the previous three consecutive years.

•El Salvador hasn’t had a malaria outbreak since 1996 and has reported no indigenous cases since 2017. In 1990, the country had 9,000 cases per year, a figure that declined to 26 by 2010. WHO credited El Salvador’s sustained domestic funding for malaria prevention, detection, and treatment for the success.

4)  Nokia to Develop New 5G Radio Solutions

•The Finnish telecom equipment maker, Nokia has announced on March 16 that it has partnered with Microsoft, Amazon web services and Google so as to develop a new cloud-based 5G radio solution. This solution will be developed with its radio access network (RNA) technology. This partnership was gone with the objective of developing new business cases.

5)  RBI: Image-based Cheque Truncation System in all branches by Sep 30

•The Reserve Bank of India has asked banks to implement the image-based Cheque Truncation System (CTS) in all branches by September 30 this year. The move is aimed at faster settlement of cheques resulting in better customer service. The Apex bank said that to leverage the availability of CTS and provide a uniform customer experience irrespective of the location of her/his bank branch, it has been decided to extend CTS across all bank branches in the country. To facilitate this, banks will have to ensure that all their branches participate in image-based CTS under respective grids by September 30.

6)  WEF honours ReNew Power named as Global Lighthouse Network

•ReNew Power has been named to the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Global Lighthouse Network, which recognises companies using new technologies to achieve environmentally sustainable, community supportive, profitable growth. ReNew Power is an Indian renewable energy company. It has an asset base of over 8 GW, with around 5 GW operational. ReNew Power is one of the two Indian companies to be recognised by the Global Lighthouse Network this year.

•The WEF Global Lighthouse Network is a group of 69 factories that serve as a platform to develop, replicate, and scale innovations, creating opportunities for cross-company learning and collaboration while setting new benchmarks for the global manufacturing community.

7)  Hurun India Wealth Report 2020 announced

•The Hurun India Wealth Report, 2020 was released on March 16, 2020. The report identifies a novel household category in India called the ‘New Middle Class’ which accounts for an average savings of Rs 20-lakh per annum. The report highlights that these households have a major allocation towards physical assets like primary residential property and automobiles. As per the report, the total number of such cumulative households in India stands at 633,000.

8)  Samsung sets up Innovation Lab at Delhi Technological University

•Samsung India has announced that it has inaugurated a Samsung Innovation Lab at Delhi Technological University (DTU) to focus on collaborative research and training. It has set up the innovation lab under the Samsung Innovation Campus initiative as part of its new #PoweringDigitalIndia vision. With this addition, Samsung now has eight technical labs spread across the country as part of its Samsung Innovation Campus initiative, which was earlier called Samsung Digital Academy.

📰 Cabinet gives nod to Bill for setting up DFI

 NEW NCERT SOCIAL and POLITICAL LIFE II 07th PDF

1)  National Vaccination Day: March 16

•The National Vaccination Day, (also called the National Immunization Day), is celebrated every year on March 16 in India, to convey the importance of vaccination to the entire nation. The prime purpose behind the celebration of National Vaccination Day is to make all people aware of arming against polio and eradicating it completely from the world. In 2021, the National Vaccination Day is important as the country has started its biggest Covid-19 immunization programme.

2)  ISRO launches sounding rocket RH-560 to study attitudinal variations

•Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has launched the sounding rocket (RH-560) to study attitudinal variations in the neutral winds and plasma dynamics, at Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC), Sriharikota Range (SHAR). ISRO has developed a series of sounding rockets called Rohini series, important among them being RH-200, RH-300 and RH-560, number in the name indicating the diameter of the rocket in mm, according to the Bengaluru-headquartered space agency.

•Sounding rockets are one or two-stage solid propellant rockets used for probing the upper atmospheric regions and for space research. They also serve as easily affordable platforms to test or prove prototypes of new components or subsystems intended for use in launch vehicles and satellites.

3)  India’s Forex Reserves Surpass Russia’s to become World’s 4th Biggest

•India’s foreign-exchange reserves surpassed Russia’s to become the world’s fourth-largest reserve. The foreign currency holdings of India stood at $580.3 billion as of March 5, as per the data by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). The reserve of Russia was $580.1 billion. Overall, China has the largest reserves, followed by Japan and Switzerland, as on the International Monetary Fund table.

•Reserves for both countries have mostly flattened out this year after months of rapid increase. India pulled ahead as Russian holdings declined at a faster rate in recent weeks. India’s reserves, enough to cover roughly 18 months of imports, have been bolstered by a rare current-account surplus, rising inflows into the local stock market and foreign direct investment.

4)  Govt announces new scheme for tourist vehicle operators

•The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has announced a new scheme for tourist vehicle operators, under which any tourist vehicle operator may apply for an “All India tourist authorization and permit” through online mode. The new set of rules will be known as “All India Tourist Vehicles Authorization and Permit Rules, 2021”. This will come into effect from April 01, 2021.

5)  World Bank economist Deepak Mishra appointed as director of ICRIER

•Deepak Mishra, Practice Manager in the World Bank’s Macroeconomics, Trade, and Investment Global Practice, has been appointed as the next director and chief executive of the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER). He will take the charge of Rajat Kathuria who has been the director and chief executive of ICRIER since 1st September 2012.

•Mishra has held various positions at the World Bank, including co-director of the World Development Report 2016 (Digital Dividends), country economist for Ethiopia, Pakistan, Sudan, and Vietnam.

6)  Gowsalya Shankar honoured with International Woman of Courage 2021

•The U.S. Consulate honoured Tamil Nadu-based anti-caste activist and human rights defender Gowsalya Shankar with a nomination for the International Woman of Courage (IWOC) Award. The IWOC Award Certificate of Nomination was handed over to her by U.S. Consul General in Chennai Judith Ravin at an event ‘Courageous Women Inspire a Better World’ held in the city.

•Ms Gowsalya was U.S. Mission India’s nominee for the 2021 U.S. Secretary of State’s IWOC Award, which honours women who have demonstrated exceptional courage, strength, and leadership in acting to improve the lives of others.  Ms Gowsalya launched the Shankar Social Justice Trust in March 2017 to fight atrocities against caste-based violence. The trust provides psychological, legal and moral support to victims and builds awareness against social discrimination and injustice.

7)  Bhavani Devi becomes first ever Indian fencer to qualify for Olympics

•Bhavani Devi became the first-ever Indian fencer to qualify for the Olympics. The sabre fencer secured an Olympic spot due to events in the ongoing Fencing World Cup. Hosts Hungary lost in the quarterfinals of the team event, allowing Korea to progress to the semis.

•Therefore, Bhavani Devi qualifies through the Adjusted Official Ranking (AOR) Method. Currently, she is ranked 45th in the world. In 2017 She won India’s 1st international gold medal in fencing.

📰 ‘India’s arms imports down by 33%’

Forum IAS Prelims 2021 Test 13 With Solution PDF