Current Affairs - October 20, 2020 Current Affairs

Religare Health Insurance has re-christened itself as Care Health Insurance. The company covers 80 cashless healthcare providers in Coimbatore and over 900 in Tamil Nadu, It believes that while the world is becoming fast-paced and automated, the personal human touch the essence of 'care' continues to remain cardinal and relevant.

The 36th Raising Day of National Security Guard (NSG) is observed on 16 October. NSG plays a crucial role in India's security apparatus. It has been associated with the utmost courage and professionalism.

Advocate Rohan Jaitley, the son of late Union Minister Arun Jaitley, has been elected unopposed as the President of the Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA). He was the single candidate left for the post, as the lone candidate who had filed his nomination against him withdrew his candidature.

ISA Confers the Very First ISA Solar Awards at Third Assembly. The assembly witnessed the conferment of the Visvesvaraya award which recognises the countries with maximum floating solar capacity in each of the four regions of ISA. The awards went to Japan for the Asia Pacific region and the Netherlands for Europe and other regions. Mahendra Jain, Additional Chief Secretary to the Government of Karnataka, announced the awards named after Bharat Ratna M. Visvesvaraya to the representatives of the countries of Japan, and the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The winners received USD 12,330 prize money.

The 8th edition of the annual Indian Navy (IN) Sri Lanka Navy (SLN) bilateral maritime exercise SLINEX-20 starts at Trincomalee, Sri Lanka from 19 to 21 October 2020. The Indian Navy will be represented by the indigenously built ASW corvettes Kamorta and Kiltan. The Sri Lanka Navy will be represented by SLN Ships Sayura (Offshore Patrol Vessel) and Gajabahu (Training Ship).

India and Chile held their first joint commission meeting yesterday and agreed to add new momentum to their relations in a wide range of fields including trade and commerce, agriculture, health and social security, defence and space. The meeting held virtually was co-chaired by External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and his Chilean counterpart Andres Allamand Zavala. Both sides noted that the Joint Commission was a significant development in India - Chile relations, being the first institutionalized dialogue between the two countries at the level of Foreign Ministers. India welcomed Chile's decision to designate India as a priority country in its foreign policy. Chile will also be opening its Consulate General in Mumbai.

A 23-year-old, Mumbai based girl, Aishwarya Sridhar became the first Indian woman to win the 2020 Wildlife Photographer of the Year award. It is the 56th year of the prestigious award. Her image titled "Lights of passion", won among 50,000 entries from over 80 countries across the world.

With an international airport coming up at Jewar in Gautam Budh Nagar, it will become the first aerotropolis of the country, ushering in economic activities, mainly in the MSME and agriculture sectors, said additional chief secretary, MSME and exports promotion, Navneet Sehgal while addressing a meeting to review functioning of his department held here on Friday.

Pakistani pace bowler, Umar Gul has announced that he will retire from all forms of cricket. The 36-year-old Gul, who played his last match for Pakistan an ODI in 2016, featured for Balochistan team in the National T20 Cup.

India and the Netherlands on Friday discussed a joint thrust in e-health sector with the purpose of providing digital health facilities and security to Indians and helping the Netherlands accelerate the digital transformation of health. Part of India's ambitious National Digital Health Mission (NDHM), this collaboration will see the two countries work closely to create capacities and put in place the requisite technology backbone to enable this revolutionary initiative, according to a statement.

Tata Motors on Saturday said it has parterned with HDFC Bank for financing of its passenger vehicles. Through the partnership, the company said it has introduced two new schemes -- 'Gradual Step Up Scheme' and 'TML Flexi Drive Scheme' with an eye on making its products more accessible and driving up sales in the festive season.

Noted Bengali elocutionist, Pradip Ghosh passed away. Ghosh was a prominent recitor and renowned vocal artist, who was well-known for his inimitable style of recitation. His most notable works included his recitation of Tagore's poems, especially those for children.

The Managing Director and CEO of Union Bank of India, Rajkiran Rai G has been elected as the Chairman of Indian Bank Association (IBA) for the term 2020-21. He succeeds Rajnish Kumar as the IBA Chairman after Kumar recently retired as SBI Chief.

India successfully test-fired the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile, from the Indian Navy's indigenously-built stealth destroyer INS Chennai with the weapon hitting a pre-designated target in the Arabian Sea. The missile hit the target in the Arabian Sea successfully with pinpoint accuracy after performing high-level and extremely complex manoeuvres.

UNICEF and India Chapter of International Advertising Association (IAA) have entered into a partnership to support research on gender representation in advertisements in India based on evidence and real-time validation. This is based on the understanding that marketing plays a powerful role in shaping gender roles and perceptions and advertising is an important tool that can influence women and girl empowerment. The changing and evolving landscape of advertisements have a huge potential to promote gender-equitable practices, especially among young people.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman participated in the 102nd meeting of the World Bank Development Committee Plenary through video conferencing on Friday and said the hard-fought gains in reducing the level of poverty, achieved over a number of years, are at great risk of being lost due to COVID-19. She said developing and developed countries continue to be impacted by COVID-19. An official release said Sitharaman told the meeting that the government has taken several measures to contain the spread of the pandemic and also to mitigate its social and economic impact. "COVID -19 pandemic which started before our last meeting in April continues to impact the developing and developed countries till date and the hard-fought gains in reducing the level of poverty, achieved over a number of years, are at great risk of being lost," she said.

India's first multi-wavelength space-based observatory, Astrosat, completed five successful years of operation on September 28. The observatory has provided access to a number of young students and professors, apart from seasoned astronomers, to dig into scientific data for carrying out advanced research in this field.

India has successfully conducted the night trial of its nuclear-capable Prithvi-2 missile from Integrated Test Range (ITR) at Chandipur near Balasore, off Odisha coast. The user flight trial was carried out by the Strategic Forces Command of the armed force under the watch of DRDO scientists as part of a training exercise.

The Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), the country's largest para-military force deployed for the internal security of the nation, has collaborated with IIT Delhi, Defence Research and Development Organisation, and Joint Advanced Technology Centre (JATC) -- DRDO and IIT Delhi joint initiative -- to augment its Research and Development capabilities. "The emerging challenges and engagement with technology in the everyday world entail that the force remains updated not just with most recent technologies and gadgets but also with the technical expertise required by its personnel. The force has made persistent efforts at keeping pace with the latest technologies by adopting them in its core functions," the CRPF said in a press release on Saturday.

The 7th meeting of Ministers of (Law and) Justice of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Member States was virtually hosted by Indian Minister of Law & Justice, Communication and Electronics & Information Technology, Ravi Shankar Prasad. The Indian side urged the SCO Member States to promote the exchange of ideas, best practices and experiences in identified areas through the platform. He also mentioned initiating Pro Bono Legal Services to provide free legal aid to marginalized sections of the society.