Current Affairs - June 16, 2020 Current Affairs

On June 12, 2020 Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh launched mobile based app 'Ghar ghar nigrani' app through video conference to conduct house-to-house surveillance in the state to eliminate the COVID-19 pandemic.

The National Anti-Doping Agency has issued notices to Indian cricketers Cheteshwar Pujara, Ravindra Jadeja and KL Rahul for not disclosing their whereabouts. The NADA has issued similar notices to women cricketers Deepti Sharma and Smriti Mandhana. These five cricketers are members of National Registered Testing Pool and they need to disclose their whereabouts on quarterly basis.

An earthquake of 5.5 magnitude hit Gujarat on June 14. Tremors were felt around 8 pm on Sunday evening. People rushed out of homes and collected on the streets. The epicentre of the quake was 118 km north-northwest of Rajkot. Tremors were felt in Kutch, Rajkot, Ahmedabad, Patan etc.

Texas Pacific Group to buy 0.93% equity stake in Jio Platforms Ltd for Rs. 4,546.80 crore.

Juneteenth, also known as Freedom Day, Jubilee Day, and Cel-Liberation Day, is an American holiday celebrated annually on June 19. It commemorates June 19, 1865, when Union general Gordon Granger read federal orders in Galveston, Texas, that all previously enslaved people in Texas were free.

Board of Unit Trust of India Mutual Fund had appointed Imtaiyazur Rahman as Chief Executive Officer of the UTI Asset Management Company. He had been already serving as the interim CEO for the past two years.He will succeed Leo Puri whose 5-year tenure was over in August 2018.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will hold a virtual meeting with the Chief Ministers of all States/UTs on June 16-17, 2020 through video conferencing. This will be PM Modi's 6th virtual meet with the Chief Ministers since the outbreak of novel Coronavirus outbreak and lockdown in March 2020. The Prime Minister's last meeting with the CMs was held on May 12, 2020.

Actor Sushant Singh Rajput was found dead at his residence in Mumbai's Bandra. The actor was found dead at his sixth floor apartment in Bandra. While the police have confirmed that he has died by suicide, no 'note' was found from his residence.

NCLT allows Jet Airways to sell its premises in Bandra Kurla Complex in Mumbai to settle debts.

India has got its first infectious disease diagnostics lab as a part of PM Narendra Modi's 'Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyaan'. This mobile laboratory has been built in a record time of only 8 days after the receipt of Automotive Chassis from Bharat Benz. The Department of Bio-Technology has supported the development of this lab.

Kathy Lueders has been appointed as the new Associate Administrator of Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate. With this, she becomes the first female to head the human space flight program of NASA. Lueders has been assisting NASA in sending astronauts to space since 2014 on private spacecraft.

Export-Import Bank of India , a specialized financial institution wholly owned by Government of India ,has provided a line of credit of $215.68 million to the Malawi government.

The 68-year-old Kathy Sullivan, Former NASA astronaut and Geologist became the first woman to reach the Challenger Deep, the deepest point in the ocean. It is located in the Mariana Trench, 7 miles below the surface of the Pacific Ocean which is 200 miles southwest of Guam.

Railway Protection Force, Pune, under the Central Railways, has launched a Robotic 'CAPTAIN ARJUN' to intensify the screening and surveillance. The robot will screen passengers while they board trains and keep a watch on anti-social elements.

On June 12, 2020 Veteran Urdu poet & freedom fighter Anand Mohan Zutshi 'Gulzar' Dehlvi passed away at 93 due to cardiac arrest at his residency in Noida after his recovery from COVID-19. He was born in Gali Kashmeerian, Old Delhi in 1926. Anand Mohan Zutshi 'Gulzar' Dehlvi was the editor of the 1st Urdu science magazine, Science ki Duniya, published by the Government of India in 1975.

Odisha, the land of Lord Jagannath, celebrates 13 festivals in 12 months ( a popular proverb among the locals ) meaning Odisha celebrates endless festivals throughout the year. Among all this one important festival is Raja Parba which is celebrated for three days during the mid of June, preferably starts from 14th June and ends in 16th. During this period, the state remains in a state of jubilation and celebration.

A green frog with slender body, webbed feet known as Malabar gliding frog (Rhacophorus malabaricus), a rare amphibian that can glide in the air up to 10 to 12 metres, was spotted in the orchard of a house at Pullad, near Kozhencherry, Kerala.

China reports fresh new cases of novel coronavirus. A total of 75 new cases have been reported in last two days in Beijing. All these cases are being linked to a food & meat market in Beijing. Following this, China has locked down around 10 areas and started testing and tracing programme. This new virus cluster has fuelled fears for second wave of COVID-19 infections in the country.

Shri Rajesh Bhushan, the officer on Special Duty of Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has launched a National Healthcare Supply Chain Portal Aarogyapath (https://www.aarogyapath.in) to provide real-time availability of critical healthcare supplies with the involvement of manufacturers, suppliers and customers.

Pankaj Tripathi, Bollywood Actor, was appointed as the brand ambassador of Bihar's Khadi by the Government of Bihar. He will promote the usage of Khadi product as well as the Patna's Khadi Mall. The Khadi Mall in Patna is India's first ever Kadhi mall & it was inaugurated by Nitish Kumra, Chief Minister of Bihar in November 2019.