Current Affairs - October 21, 2017 Current Affairs

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's parliamentary constituency Varanasi will soon get two sewage treatment plants as part of the government's bid to curb Ganga water pollution. The sewage treatment plants, having a total 260 million liters daily capacity, will be commissioned at Varanasi's Dinapur and Goitha before March next year. The government had recently awarded a contract for constructing 50 MLD (million liters daily) capacity STP (sewage treatment plants) at Ramana in Varanasi.

Software industry association National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) is setting up centres of excellence on artificial intelligence (AI) and data sciences for a better understanding on the emerging technologies. These centres of excellence are being set up in Bengaluru and Hyderabad. Work related to mapping the resources available in India for developing AI will be carried out at these centres. These centres will also promote AI-based start-ups and will enlist global best practices including regulatory aspects.

The Gujarat is celebrate their New Year a day after Diwali. The Gujarati New year is also called Bestu Varas. It is celebrated on the first day of the Kartik month in the Shukla Paksha. On this day, People cleaned their houses, prepared rangolis and wore new clothes and offered pujas at the temples. The most important work of the day was the beginning of the new accounting books for businesspersons.

WhatsApp rolled out the option to share "live location" for its users. The "live location" sharing feature of WhatsApp enables a user to let a contact or a group trace his/her location or movement on a map in real time for a defined window of time. This is different from the current "share location" feature which shares a static location. Like the static location, live location also will be visible only to the contacts or groups the user chooses to share it with.

As per an internal circular of Kerala Information and Public Relations Department, words 'Dalit' and 'Harijan' will not be used in its official communications. This circular is based on the directive from Kerala State Commission for Scheduled Castes (SC) and Scheduled Tribes (ST) Chairman Justice PN Vijayakumar. It is believed that usage of words 'Dalit' and 'Harijan' promotes discrimination for the lower castes.

Lebanon's parliament approved country's first budget in 12 years. This budget is aimed towards reforming the fragile economy and preventing rising debt from becoming a crisis-like situation.Political crisis gripped Lebanon since assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik al-Hariri in 2005, thereby preventing successive government from passing the budget.

Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh restored the Special Family Pension for widows of government employees killed by extremists. The scheme was revoked in 2016 by the erstwhile Shiromani Akali Dal Government. Restoring this scheme was one of the pre-poll promises made by Captain Amarinder Singh before the February 2017 State elections.

Goods and Services Tax Network (GSTN) launched an Excel-based offline tool for businesses to file initial GSTR- 3B returns. They stated that taxpayers can download the offline utility from the GSTN portal and after fill in the data the file can be uploaded on GST portal. After uploading of the return to the GST Portal, the taxpayer has to preview the form, complete formalities like submit, offset the liability and file their GSTR-3B Return using a digital signature or electronic verification code.

As per a report titled "Levels and Trends in Child Mortality 2017", India along with Pakistan, Nigeria, Congo and Ethiopia is responsible for half of all new-born deaths in the world. This report has been authored by United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), World Health Organization (WHO), World Bank Group and United Nations. As per the report, 6 million children died before reaching the age of five in 2016. This marks a decrease as compared to year 2000 in which 9.9 million children had died before turning five.

The National Police Commemoration Day is observed every year on 21st October remembering the brave policemen who sacrificed their lives while discharging their duties. Rich tributes are paid to the martyrs on this day. This altercation between the troops led to the death of ten policemen. Seven of the others who were also imprisoned managed to escape from the Chinese troops.

The State government will organize a four days International seminar and Global Ayurveda meet in Kochi on February 2018. The main focus of this seminar will be showcasing Kerala's achievements in health tourism, healthcare, and Ayurveda, she said after inaugurating the Ayurveda Day celebrations the other day. The festival is being organised by the Centre for Innovation in Science and Social Action in association with the State government, Department of Ayurveda, yoga and naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy (AYUSH), Ayurvedic Medicine Manufacturers Organisations of India, Ayurveda Drug Manufacturers Association and Kerala State Indian Systems of Medicine of Medicine Self Financing Management Association, State Department of AYUSH, Department of Tourism and Department of Industry.

National Research Centre for Banana (NRCB) signed a memorandum of cooperation (MoC) with Andhra Pradesh State Government to develop technologies relating to banana production. The MoC was signed between Andhra Pradesh's Industries and Commerce Department Secretary M.Girija Shankar and NRCB Director S. Uma in presence of Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu. They will also provide necessary training and will support growers and entrepreneurs in the initial phase to promote indigenous and commercial varieties of banana for domestic and export markets.

World's first floating wind farm located over 15 miles off the coast of Peterhead, Aberdeenshire in Scotland. The turbines used in this wind farm have been towed all the way from Norway by Norwegian multinational company named Statoil which has developed this wind farm. The farm consists five 6MW turbines. It is expected that this floating wind farm will generate 135GWh of electricity each year.