Current Affairs - March 13, 2020 Current Affairs

Edtech startup Byju's Founder Byju Raveendran and Zomato's Co-founder Gaurav Gupta are among the five Indians on World Economic Forum's (WEF) list of 115 Young Global Leaders. The other Indians on the list are Tara Singh Vachani (Antara Senior Living), Vinati Mutreja (MD and CEO, Vinati Organics Limited) and Swapan Mehra (CEO, Iora Ecological Solutions).

The Hubballi-Ankola railway line project saw stiff opposition from a majority of the board members of the Karnataka State Wildlife Board. The proposed 164.44-km railway line passes through forests between two major protected areas - Kali Tiger Reserve and Bedthi Conservation Reserve.

The Two-Judge bench of High Court of Bangladesh has ordered that 'Joy Bangla' will be the national slogan of Bangladesh. The court also directed the authorities to ensure that teachers and students use the slogan after assembly. Joy Bangla was the main slogan during the liberation war of Bangladesh fought against Pakistan in 1971

India secured 46th rank in the Inclusive Internet Index 2020 released by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU). Pakistan got the 76th rank on the list. In this index, Sweden ranks first, New Zealand is second and America is third. The worst countries are Burundi (100), Liberia (99), Madagascar (98), Malawi (97) and Burkina Faso (96).

World bronze-medallist Manish Kaushik in 63kg category became the ninth Indian boxer to qualify for Tokyo Olympics after a win at the Asian Qualifiers in Amman, Jordan.The other Indians to have qualified for the Olympics are MC Mary Kom (51kg), Simranjit Kaur (60kg), Lovlina Borgohain (69kg), Pooja Rani (75kg), Amit Panghal (52kg), Ashish Kumar (75kg) and Satish Kumar (91kg).

Max von Sydow, the Swedish actor who was nominated for two Oscars during his career passed away. The actor featured in various films and TV series. Max Von Sydow was nominated for Oscars as best actor in 1988 for Pelle the Conqueror. He was also nominated for Academy awards in the category of best supporting actor for his role in movie "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close".

Indian mountaineer Bhawna Dehariya has successfully scaled Mount Kosciuszko, the highest mountain peak in Australia. Bhawna Dehariya had scaled Mount Kilimanjaro on the occasion of Diwali on November 27th, last year.

Pankaj Advani clinches National 6-Red Snooker Championship in Ahmedabad.

Google India has launched a skilling programme for women called 'DigiPivot', where the woman who wishes to return to their company careers after a break or just planning to make mid-career shifts to digital advertising and marketing. The programme will end on August 28, 2020 with a day-long graduation occasion on the Google Hyderabad (Telangana) Campus.

World Kidney Day is observed on 12 March. It is celebrated on the second Thursday of March every year. The day aims to create awareness and educate people about the importance of kidneys to overall health and to reduce the frequency and impact of kidney disease and associated health problems worldwide. As a part of the 2020 campaign, the #MyGr8Rule challenge was launched on 8 February.

The third edition of WION's global summit was held in Dubai recently. Theme: "Navigating and negotiating global imperatives". Several topics, including balancing and recalibrating Pakistan's diplomatic strategy and getting the youth to participate in democracy, were discussed at the summit. At the event, Former Pakistan Minister Kasuri recalled the plan for Sir Creek pact. Sir Creek is a 96-km strip of water disputed between India and Pakistan in the Rann of Kutch marshlands.

Asian Olympic Qualifiers Boxing tournament in Amman (Jordan): Vikas Krishan (men's 69 kg) gets silver medal.

World Economic Forum launched 'COVID Action Platform' with WHO's support for collective action by global business community to combat coronavirus impact.

On March 11, 2020, the World Bank, Government of India and Government of Himachal Pradesh signed a loan agreement of 80 million USD to increase agricultural productivity and improve water management practices in Himachal Pradesh.

The annual "Attukal Pongala", one of the largest all-women religious congregations began recently amid the COVID-19 virus threat. Pongala is a ten-day-long festival of Attukal Bhagavathy Temple.

Recently, on the occasion of 130th Foundation Day of National Archives of India, an exhibition "Jallianwala Bagh" was inaugurated, to mark the Jallianwala Bagh massacre centenary. The National Archives of India is an attached office under the Ministry of Culture. It was established on 11 March 1891 at Kolkata (Calcutta) as the Imperial Record Department.

SBI waives minimum balance requirement for all savings bank (SB) accounts and interest rate on all SB accounts lowered to 3%.

PhonePe inks partnership with private sector lender ICICI Bank to form a partnership and offer Unified Payments Interface (UPI) -based digital transactions to its customers. PhonePe earlier partnered with Yes Bank, but after YES Bank has been placed under moratorium by Reserve Bank of India due to which UPI transactions at PhonePe got disrupted.

Tamil Nadu State government is to host the first-ever regional event "Divya Kala Shakti: Witnessing the abilities in disabilities a unique cultural" event at Kalaivanar Arangam, Chennai on 12 March 2020. The event will be witnessed by Governor of Tamil Nadu Shri Banwarilal Purohit.

Wasim Jaffer has scored more than 20 thousand runs in first class cricket. He is also the highest run-scorer in Ranji Trophy. He is known as Sachin Tendulkar of domestic cricket. He has made many records with his bat in domestic cricket.