Test: October 2020 Weekly Current Affair - 2 - UPSC MCQ

Justice KK Usha, the former Chief Justice of Kerala High Court died at the age of 81 in Kochi.
KK Usha was the first woman to be directly elevated to the HC bench from the bar.

In a bid to increase credit flow to small businesses, the RBI raised banks’ maximum aggregate retail exposure limit to entities with turnover up to ₹50 crore to ₹7.5 crore, up from ₹5 crore.
In another notification, the RBI said it has been decided to extend the dispensation of the enhanced Held to Maturity (HTM) limit of 22 per cent for SLR securities acquired between September 1, 2020 and March 31, 2021, up to March 31, 2022.

Recalling the legacy of Rajmata Vijaya Raje Scindia on her birth centenary, Prime Minister Narendra Modi released a commemorative coin of Rs 100 in her honour.

Former India football captain Carlton Chapman, who had formed a deadly trio in club football with Bhaichung Bhutia and IM Vijayan in the 1990s passed away. He was 49.

The Reserve Bank of India in its bi-monthly Monetary Policy statement issued, has maintained a status quo keeping the key interest rates unchanged. The reverse repo rate remains unchanged at 3.35 per cent, the repo rate at 4 per cent.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman launched ‘MSME Prerana’ which is an online business mentoring programme for MSMEs launched by the public lender Indian Bank.

The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet appointed M Rajeshwar Rao as the deputy governor of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).
Currently, BP Kanungo, MK Jain and Micheal Patra are the deputy governors.Rao will take charge as the fourth deputy governor. The post became vacant after N S Vishwanathan demitted office in March citing health reasons just before his tenure was to end.

The World Day Against the Death Penalty is organised on the 10th October by the World Coalition against the Death Penalty (WCADP) of which FIACAT is a founding member and member of the steering committee.
The theme for 2020 is “Access to counsel – A matter of life or death.”

Lewis Hamilton has won the 2020 Eifel Grand Prix, held at the Nürburgring in Nürburg, Germany.

In the country’s first and unique drive, the Goa Agriculture department has collaborated with the Postal Department to enroll 11,000 farmers, eligible to avail the benefit of Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana (PM-KISAN), under which small and marginal farmers get up to Rs 6,000 per year as minimum income support.

India’s GDP is expected to contract by 9.6% in the fiscal year 2020-21 (FY21), the World Bank said in its report titled ‘South Asia Economic Focus’. The World Bank earlier in June had estimated the Indian economy to shrink by 3.2% in the current fiscal.
South Asia as a region is set to plunge into its worst ever recession with a sharper than expected contraction of 7.7%.
India’s growth is projected to rebound to 5.4% in FY22, mostly reflecting base effects, assuming Covid19 -related restrictions are completely lifted by 2022. As per the bank, weak activity, domestically and abroad, is also likely to depress both Indian imports and exports.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a scheme to distribute property cards under the Svamitva scheme through video conference.
The scheme aims to provide the ‘record of rights’ to village household owners in rural areas and issue Property Cards.

Merchant payment network BharatPe has elevated Dhruv Bahl as its chief operating officer (COO) with immediate effect.

The Delhi Cabinet at a meeting approved the ‘Tree Transplantation Policy’ for the preservation of trees in the Capital. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said the Cabinet also gave its nod for the installation of the second smog tower in the world at Connaught Place within ten months.

Emmanuelle Charpentier of France and Jennifer Doudna of the U.S. won the Nobel Chemistry Prize for the gene-editing technique known as the CRISPR-Cas9 DNA snipping “scissors.

Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries Limited, remains the wealthiest Indian for the 13th consecutive year on Forbes India list, which has recently been released.
List of India’s top 5 richest persons
1. Mukesh Ambani (88.7 billion dollar)
2. Gautam Adani (25.2 billion dollar)
3. Shiv Nadar (20.4 billion dollar)
4. Radhakishan Damani (15.4 billion dollar)
5. Hinduja brothers (12.8 billion dollar)

Nilesh Shah has been re-elected as the Chairman of Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI), at the recently concluded Board Meeting of AMFI.

The two-day half-yearly coastal security exercise, Sagar Kavach, along the Kerala and Karnataka coasts ended recently. Conducted by the Navy and the Coast Guard, the exercise had participation by all coastal security stakeholders.

India and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) signed a 300 million US dollar loan to finance inclusive and sustainable water supply and sanitation infrastructure and services in 14 secondary towns of the state of Rajasthan.

The Reserve Bank of India has said that the two per cent interest subvention scheme for micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) on loans offered by co-operative banks has been extended till 31st of March next year.

Goa has become the first Har Ghar Jal State in the country by providing tap water connection to every rural household. The state has provided tap water connection to two lakh 30 thousand rural households.

Under the Prime Minister Street Vendor’s AtmaNirbhar Nidhi (PM SVANidhi) Scheme, Shri Durga Shanker Mishra, Secretary of Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs, had launched the Application Programming Interface (API) integration between the PM SVANidhi Portal and the State Bank of India’s (SBI) e-Mudra portal.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has extended the tenure of Jammu and Kashmir Bank Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) R. K. Chhibber by another six months.

World Sight Day, observed annually on the second Thursday of October, is a global event meant to draw attention on blindness and vision impairment.
This year, World Sight Day will take place on 8 October 2020 with the theme: Hope In Sight.