Current Affairs Quiz 20th July 2022 : Daily GK Update

Exp. Expat Insider Rankings 2022: India ranks 36th topped by Mexico

InterNations has released the Expat Insider Rankings for 2022, In which Mexico has topped the ranking, followed by Indonesia, Taiwan, Portugal, Spain, UAE, Vietnam, Thailand. A total of 52 countries have been ranked on the list.

India has ranked 36 out of the 52 countries, between Egypt (35th) and the UK (37th), China was placed in 33rd position.

Bottom 10: Kuwait (52nd), New Zealand (51st), Hong Kong(50th), Cyprus (49th), Luxembourg(48th), Japan (47th), South Africa (46th), Turkey (45th), Italy (44th), Malta (43th)

About the Expat Insider Rankings

The Expat Insider survey is conducted every year by InterNations, a community for expatriates. The survey takes a look at some of the best possible ex-pat destinations around the world, which offer the best quality of life to the people who move abroad to improve their quality of life.

The Expat Insider 2022 survey report surveyed 11,970 respondents to evaluate their life abroad. These respondents represented 177 nationalities and lived in 181 countries or territories worldwide.

Recent Ranking

World Press Freedom Index 2022: India ranked 150th; Norway topped

World Air Power Index 2022: IAF ranked 3^rd

WEF’s Travel and Tourism Development Index 2021: 54^th

Global Environmental Performance Index 2022: 180th; Denmark topped

IMD’s World Competitiveness Index 2022: 37th; Denmark topped

Exp. NITI Aayog and WFP to launch Initiative on mainstreaming millets in Asia and Africa

NITI Aayog to launch the Mapping and Exchange of Good Practices initiative for mainstreaming millets in Asia and Africa in association with the World Food Programme.

NITI Aayog and WFP will prepare a compendium of good practices for scaling up the production and consumption of millets in India and abroad.

The event will be inaugurated by NITI Aayog Vice Chairman, Suman Bery.

NITI Aayog (National Institution for Transforming India)

Founded – 1st January 2015

Preceding – Planning Commission (15th March 1950)

Headquarters – New Delhi

Chairperson – Narendra Modi

Vice Chairperson – Suman K Bery

CEO – – Shri Parameswaran Iyer

NITI Aayog comes under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry

Exp. Rajasthan gets AI – powered Chatbot for fast disposal of cases in Lok Adalat

National Legal Services Authority (NALSA) Chairman, Uday Umesh Lalit has launched the country’s first Al-powered digital Lok Adalat during the 18th All India Legal Services Authorities’ meet held in Jaipur, Rajasthan.

The digital Lok Adalat by Rajasthan State Legal Services Authority (RSLSA) was designed and developed by Jupitice Justice Technologies (technology partner).

The Digital Lok Adalat will be used to dispose of pending disputes or disputes that are at the pre-litigation stage.

India’s growing case pendency has been in the headlines in the recent past, especially during the pandemic when courts came to a standstill for a while.

Recently, a district court in Bihar gave a verdict in a land dispute case after 108 years, making it one of the oldest pending cases in the country.

A NITI Aayog report also suggested it would take approximately 324 years to dispose all cases pending in India.

The report said that 75-97 per cent of legal problems never reach the courts — that means about 5 million to 40 million legal tangles arising in a month never reach the Court.

National Legal Services Authority (NALSA)

Founded – 9 November 1995

Headquarters – New Delhi

Chairman – Uday Umesh Lalit

Motto – Access to Justice for All

About Rajasthan

Capital – Jaipur

Chief Minister – Ashok Gehlot

Governor – Kalraj Mishra

Exp. ITBP creates 1st mountain-warfare training school in Northeast India

The Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) has created its first mountain-warfare training centre in northeast India, its second overall, to skill its troops in high-altitude combat and survival tactics as part of their mandate to guard the Line of Actual Control with China.

The facility has come almost after five decades of the establishment of its first such school called mountaineering and skiing institute (M&SI) during 1973-74 at Auli near Joshimath.

The M&SI is located at a height of more than 9,000 ft in the Himalayan ranges of Uttarakhand and has trained thousands of ITBP, army, Air Force and other security personnel in this domain and that for adventure sports.

The new centre has been established in remote Dombang, abutting the LAC, and is located at a height of 10,040 ft in Sikkim that shares a 220 km front of the India-China LAC.

The centre is being commanded by ITBP Commandant and ace mountaineer Ratan Singh Sonal, who has led numerous expeditions and rescue missions in the hills.

The Dombang centre has an ideal mountainous and rocky terrain and its glacier training area spreads across a height of 14,000-17,000 feet.

Exp. Jawaharlal Nehru Port becomes first 100% Landlord Major Port of India

Jawaharlal Nehru Port has become the first 100 percent Landlord Major Port of India having all berths being operated on PPP model.

The PPP mode of investment in Indian ports has made a remarkable progress in the last 25 years, beginning from the Jawaharlal Nehru Port, resulting in the capacity addition and productivity improvement.

JNP is one of the leading container ports of the country and is ranked 26th among the top 100 global ports. Currently, five container terminals are operated at JNP, of which only one is port owned.

The Jawaharlal Nehru Port Container Terminal (JNPCT) has 2 berths with total length of 680m and 15m draft which will be handed over under this PPP contract along with backup area of 54.74 hectares for 30 years.

Exp. Centre formed a committee to strengthen MSP system; chaired by Sanjay Agarwal

The Centre has formed a Committee on Minimum Support Price under the chairmanship of Former Agriculture Secretary Sanjay Agrawal.

The panel will comprise NITI Aayog member Ramesh Chand, Agri-economists CSC Shekhar from Indian Institute of Economic Development and Sukhpal Singh from IIM- Ahmedabad and Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP) senior member Naveen P Singh.

Among farmer representatives, the committee will have National award-winning farmer Bharat Bhushan Tyagi, three members from SKM, and five members from other farmer organisations include Gunwant Patil, Krishnaveer Choudhary, Pramod Kumar Choudhary, Guni Prakash and Sayyed Pasha Patel.

Two members of the farmers’ Cooperative and group include IFFCO Chairman Dilip Sanghani and CNRI General Secretary Binod Anand are also part of the committee.

Senior members of agricultural universities, five central government secretaries and chief secretaries of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Sikkim and Odisha are also part of the committee.

According to the notification, the committee will look at ways to make available MSP to farmers by making the system more effective and transparent.

Exp. 13th Petersburg Climate Dialogue concluded in Berlin

The 13th Petersburg Climate Dialogue has concluded in Berlin Germany.

The two-day informal ministerial meet has chaired by Germany and Egypt, hosts of this year’s annual climate meet (COP-27).

Since its inception in 2010, the Petersburg Dialogue has served as a forum for ministers to build political consensus that help resolve differences on issues holding up progress in negotiations.

During the dialogue, ministers and delegations from several countries recalled the urgency to move to the implementation of all the previous resolutions made during the last meeting in order to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

As per the previous resolution, the fight against climate change requires the preservation of the Congo Basin forests, which alone absorb 1.2 billion tonnes of carbon globally per year.

Exp. Gautam Adani becomes world’s fourth richest person on Forbes list

India’s richest person Gautam Adani has now become the world’s fourth richest person (net worth: $115.5 billion), toppling Microsoft founder Bill Gates, as per the Forbes world’s richest list.

Adani’s wealth has been surged by $2.9 billion due to sharp run-up in Adani Group stocks.

He has surpassed Microsoft cofounder, Bill Gates, who has announced to donate $20 billion of his wealth to the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Elon Musk is the richest person with $230 billion net worth, followed Bernard Arnault of Louis Vuitton at the second spot and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos at third on the list.

Mukesh Ambani was placed at 10th on the Forbes list (net worth: $88 billion).

In February this year, Adani overtook fellow countryman Ambani to take Asia’s richest spot on the back of the jump his personal fortune, which made him world’s biggest wealth-gainer this year.

Exp. Kotak General Insurance launched automation of vehicle inspection for insurance renewals

Kotak Mahindra General Insurance Company has launched automation of vehicle inspection for insurance renewals with Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based technology.

The insurance company has partnered Inspektlabs to implement this for its policies.

Aim: Help in the renewal process as well as to detect fraud thereby aiding the underwriting process.

Through this feature, policyholders can take photos or videos of their vehicle and upload them on the cloud-based application for policy renewal. The inspection report, including details of damages, if any, will be automatically generated within a few seconds after the customer uploads inspection photos or videos.

The automated process replaces humans in repetitive work at a very high accuracy level that saves cost and increases customer satisfaction by reducing the time required to renew a car insurance policy.

The technology will also help detect fraud based on pictures and videos uploaded, and hence aid the underwriting process.

Exp. Digit Insurance launched ‘pay as you drive’ for motor insurance

Go Digit General Insurance is the first insurer to offer a ‘pay as you drive’ (PAYD) add-on feature for motor insurance own damage (OD) policies.

Go Digit General Insurance has launched an add-on feature for motor insurance Own Damage policies, named ‘Pay as you Drive’.

Customers who drive less than 10,000 Km per year on an average, will now pay less with this add-on.

Digit will use odometer reading, telematics data and annual kilometer opted to give this discount (up to 25%).

IRDAI has also permitted to the general insurance companies to introduce such tech-enabled concepts in motor OD policies.

Exp. IndusInd Bank board gives nod to mobilise Rs 20,000 crore via debt

Private lender IndusInd Bank board has approved a proposal to raise Rs 20,000 crore in debt to fund business growth.

The board has approved raising funds through debt securities in any permitted mode on a private placement basis as may be decided, for an aggregate amount not exceeding Rs 20,000 crore.

It can also be raised in foreign currencies as may be necessary subject to approval of the members of the bank and receipt of other governmental or regulatory approvals.

Recently in July, RBI imposed a penalty of Rs 1 crore on IndusInd Bank for non-compliance with certain Know Your Customer (KYC) norms.

About IndusInd Bank

Founded – 1994

Founder – S.P. Hinduja

Headquarters – Mumbai, Maharashtra,

MD & CEO – Sumant Kathpalia

Tagline – We Make You Feel Richer

Exp. Morgan Stanley cuts India’s FY23 GDP forecast to 7.2% from 7.6%

American brokerage Morgan Stanley cut its FY23 real GDP expansion estimate for India by 0.40 percent to 7.2 per cent on slower global growth and GDP growth will slow down to 6.4 per cent in FY24.

A majority of watchers are expecting FY23 GDP growth to come at over 7 per cent levels. The RBI estimate also stands at 7.2 percent.

RBI has also estimated the GDP growth rate at 7.2 percent for the current fiscal.

GDP Forecast

World Bank – 7.5% (FY23), 7.1%(FY24)

MOODY’S. – 8.8% (FY23)

S&P – 7.3% (FY23)

IMF – 8.2% (FY23)

ADB – 7.5% (FY23)

RBI – 7.2% (FY23)

FITCH RATING – 7.8.% (FY23)

FICCI – 7.4% (FY23)

OECD – 6.9% (FY23), 6.2% (FY24)

CRISIL – 7.3% (FY23)

NSO – 8.7%.     Q4 – 4.1% (FY23)

SBI Ecowrap – 7.5% (FY23)

Morgan Stanley – 7.2% (FY23), 6.4%(FY24)

Exp. Lt. Gen. Raj Shukla appointed as member of UPSC

Former Army training command chief Lieutenant General Raj Shukla (retired) has appointed as member of the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC).

He commanded an Infantry Brigade in Counter Insurgency Operations, the Baramulla Division along the Line of Control in the Kashmir Valley and a Pivot Corps along the Western Borders.

He was awarded the Param Vishisht Seva Medal on Republic Day 2021.

Recent Appointment

• Director (Technical) of REC – VK Singh
• MD & CEO of NSE – Ashish Kumar Chauhan
• Non-independent non-executive director of IndiGo – M Damodaran as
• Deputy election commissioner – R K Gupta
• President of International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) – Alvaro Lario
• Director General of Federation of Indian Fantasy Sports (FIFS) – Joy Bhattacharjya

Exp. Brijesh Gupta appointed as MD of RattanIndia Power

RattanIndia Power has appointed Brijesh Gupta as managing director.

Gupta has over three decades of experience in the industrial sector, and has worked across the renewable, steel, mining and commodities sector in India and abroad.

He has held leadership positions in Adani Enterprises, Essar Group, Welspun and Atha Group.

RattanIndia Power is a private power generation company, with installed capacity of 2,700 MW thermal power plants at Amravati and Nashik (1,350 MW at each location) in Maharashtra, with investments of Rs.18,615 crores (US$ 2.5 billion).

The power plants are spread over an area of 2,400 acres

Recent Appointment

• India’s next Ambassador to Bhutan – Sudhakar Dalela
• NaBFID Managing Director – G Rajkiran Rai (recommend)
• Additional charge as NIACL CMD – Madhulika Bhaskar
• New president of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) -T Raja Kumar
• MD and CEO of Aviva India Life Insurance Company – Asit Rath
• MD & CEO of Manappuram Finance Company – VP Nandkumar

Exp. 20 July – International Chess Day

World Chess Day is celebrated annually on July 20 globally.

The day marks the date of the establishment of the International Chess Federation (FIDE) in Paris in 1924.

On this day, we can observe the day by teaching someone or learning how to play the game. Also, we can consider a 24-Hour Marathon or share your story about your own chess strategy.

The idea to celebrate the day was proposed by UNESCO & since 1966, the day has been celebrated every year.

Exp. 19 July – Mangal Pandey birth anniversary

The birth anniversary of Mangal Pandey, the leader of the legendary Revolt of 1857, was observed on 19 July.

He was born in Akbarpur on 19 July 1827 to a landowning family.

He played a key role in the events that led to India’s first major rebellion against the British Empire in 1857 which is also known as the First War of Independence.

Pandey was executed on 8 April 1857.