Important Current Affairs 13th August 2017

Important Current Affairs 13th August 2017

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Current Affairs 13th August 2017: NATIONAL NEWS

Thaawarchand Gehlot Inaugurates ‘Inclusive Independence Day Celebrations of National Trust’ 

Shri Thaawarchand Gehlot, Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment inaugurated the ‘Inclusive Independence Day celebrations’ organised by the National Trust here today. Minister of State for Social Justice & Empowerment Shri Krishna Pal Gurjar also graced the occasion. 
●    Smt. Meenakshi Lekhi, Member of Parliament, New Delhi and Shri K K Sharma, Director General, Border Security Force were the Guests of Honour.
●    Addressing on the occasion, Shri Thaawarchand Gehlot said that his ministry is fully committed to the welfare of Divyangjans and several new schemes and programmes have been initiated during past three years. 
●    He said that the categories of Divyangjans have been increased from Seven to Twenty One to cover more Divyangjans. 
●    He praised the National Trust for organizing such an Inclusive Independence Day celebrations, as a part of its ‘Inclusive India Initiative’, an awareness campaign with the participation of around 2500 people from all walks of life along with 500 people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. 
●    The Inclusive Independence Day celebrations is a pan-India effort and similar activities were also conducted at Bangalore, Guntur, Jorhat, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Kanyakumari, Trivendrum, Varanasi, Patna, Raigarh, Ahmadabad, Udaipur, Dhanbad, Bhopal, Bhubaneshwar and Hoshiarpur, he added.

Environment Minister launches ‘Gaj Yatra’ to mark World Elephant Day 2017

Union Environment, Forest and Climate Change Minister, Dr. Harsh Vardhan, launched ‘Gaj Yatra’ here today, a nationwide campaign to protect elephants on the occasion of World Elephant Day. 
●    The campaign is planned to cover 12 elephant range states.
●    Addressing the gathering on the occasion, Dr. Vardhan urged the people to prepare a strategy for a more even distribution of the elephant population in all the states of the country. 
●    The Minister emphasised that an attempt must be made to bring to an end the chapter of man-animal conflict. 
●    He added that a war must be waged against poachers and hunters who harm elephants and other wildlife. 
●    Calling for proactive, innovative and out-of-the-box ideas, Dr. Vardhan said that efforts for elephant conservation must bring about a qualitative improvement by the next World Elephant Day.

No renewal of insurance for vehicles without pollution certificate, says Supreme Court

In a bid to curb pollution, the Supreme Court on Thursday issued a directive that insurance of a vehicle will not be renewed unless the owner provides pollution under control (PUC) certificate.
●    Among the other slew of directions, the bench headed by Justice Madan B Lokur also asked the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways to ensure that all fuel refilling centres in the National Capital Region (NCR) have PUC centres.
●    The apex court granted four weeks time to the Centre to ensure that there are functional PUC centres in NCR to ensure that vehicles plying have PUC certificate.
●    The court considered the suggestions given by Environment Pollution Control Authority (EPCA).
●    The bench was hearing a PIL filed by environmentalist M C Mehta way back in 1985 dealing with various aspects of pollution.

Kerala has the highest lifespan of 74.9 years

Post-60 life expectancy is highest in a state you would least expect -J&K. People of this state who are 60 years old will live for another 21.1 years on an average. 
●    At the other extreme is Chhattisgarh, where such life span is 15.6 years.On an average, in India, a man will live for another 17 years and a woman for 19 years after turning 60.
●    These facets of life and death across all states, and over the years, emerge from recently released ' Life Tables ' which showcase yearly mortality data collected from a sample of about 7.4 million people across the country. 
●    This work is done by the Sample Registration System (SRS) under the Census office. The most recent data is from 2010-2014. 
●    Life expectancy can be calculated at birth or at various points in life. `At birth' calculations average out death rates at all subsequent ages.
●    This is usually said to be life expectancy of people in any country or a state within a country ," demographer P M Kulkarni, formerly of JNU, said.

Government to develop green airports in Andhra Pradesh

As a part of Government of India’s initiative to develop green airports, two airports in Andhra Pradesh- Tirupati and Vijayawada are going to go completely green!
●    The work on the same has already begun with the Airports Authority of India (AAI) commencing the process of installing 1 Mega Watt solar power plant at both the airports.
●    The AAI has set up Solar Power Plants at various locations/airports for its captive power consumption based on the capacity permissible under Net-Metering policy of States.
●    It has also completed installation of solar power plants at 29 airports/locations with a total capacity of 12.84 MWp.
●    The Cochin International Airport Limited (CIAL) in Kerala is the first airport in the world to be completely powered by solar energy.

 

Current Affairs 13th August 2017: GLOBAL NEWS

Israel launches first environmental research satellite 'Venus'

Israel has successfully launched its first spatial environmental research vehicle designed for orbital monitoring of Earth's vegetation, the Israel Space Agency (ISA) said on Wednesday. 
●    The Venus satellite (Vegetation and Environment Monitoring New Micro-Satellite) is an earth-observation micro-satellite designed jointly by Israel's agency and France's National Centre for Space Studies ( CNES), Efe news reported. 
●    Venus has a dual mission: one scientific and the other technological. The scientific mission will monitor Earth's vegetation using a camera capable of recording 12 narrow spectral bands. 
●    The technological mission will test the operation of an innovative electric propulsion system based on the Israeli-designed Hall Effect Thrusters. 
●    A Hall-effect thruster (HET) is a relatively low power device used to propel a spacecraft after entering orbit or farther out into space. 
●    Venus' launch took place on board an Arianespace Vega launcher from Kourou, French Guyana, in a joint project between ISA and France's space agency CNES. 
●    It will be inserted into a near polar sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 720 km with a two-day flyover revisiting time.
 

Current Affairs 13th August 2017: APPOINTMENTS

Milkha Singh appointed WHO’s ambassador for physical activity

Sprint legend Milkha Singh has been appointed as the World Health Organisation’s goodwill ambassador for physical activity in South-East Asia Region (SEAR), the global health body said on Friday.
●    As WHO goodwill ambassador, Singh, also known as ‘the Flying Sikh’, will promote WHO SEAR’s non-communicable diseases (NCDs) prevention and control action plan which seeks to reduce the level of insufficient physical activity by 10 per cent and NCDs by 25 per cent by 2025, Poonam Khetrapal Singh, Regional Director, WHO South-East Asia said.
●    “Promoting physical activity for health is an important intervention, which is expected to get a significant boost in the region with the support of octogenarian Milkha Singh, a champion for the cause,” she said. 
●    According to her, an estimated 8.5 million people die due to non-communicable diseases every year in WHO South-East Asia Region and many of these deaths are premature and nearly all are lifestyle related.

Prasoon Joshi appointed Chairperson of Central Board of Film Certification

The Union Government on 11 August 2017 appointed lyricist Prasoon Joshi as Chairman of the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) for a period of three years. 
●    With this appointment, Joshi has replaced former Chairman Pahlaj Nihalani.
●    In addition to this, the government has also reconstituted the existing CBFC with immediate effect for a period of three years or until further orders.
●    Government has appointed Prasoon Joshi as the chairman of the CBFC by exercising its powers conferred by sub-section (1) of section 3 of the Cinematograph Act, 1952 (37 of 1952) read with rule 3 of the Cinematograph (Certification) Rules, 1983.
●    Information and Broadcasting Ministry in a release said, there are 12 members of the new board, which include Gautami Tadimalla, Narendra Kohli, Naresh Chandra Lal, Vivek Agnihotri and Vidya Balan.