Current Affairs - October 2014

TNPSC Current Affairs October 2014
Miscellaneous 

• India's First Olive oil refinery was inaugurated at lukransar in Rajasthan. The oil produced in this refinery will be marketed under the brand name of 'Raj Olive oil'.
• Patna Stampede
• 33 people have been killed in a stampede at Gandhi maidhan in Patna during the Dasera celebration.
• Rajasthan Govt imposed restrictions for joining government jobs 
• The tobacco users are barred to appear certain exams,
• The candidates having more than two children and those who have a second wife or husband without legally separated from the first will also be barred.
• Awards
• Nobel Prize
• Medicine
• British-American researcher John O'Keefe and a Norwegian couple, Edvard Moser and May-Britt Moser have been awarded the Nobel Prize for their discovery of Brain's GPS System, which helps us to navigate to different places.
• Physics
• Isamu Akasaki, Hiroshi Amano and Shuji Nakamura have been awarded Nobel Prize in Physics for inventing blue light-emitting diodes.
• Chemistry
• `Eric Betzig and William Moerner and Stefan Hell won the Nobel prize in Chemistry for finding the ways to make the microscope more powerful.
• Peace
• Kailash Satyarthi and Malala Yousufzai won the nobel peace prize.
• Economics
• Jean Tirole won the nobel prize in economics for his research on market power and regulation
• Literature
• Patrick Modiano won the nobel prize in literature
• Indian Actor Shah Rukh Khan has been awarded the Global Diversity Award 2014 by the British parliament.
• Sanjaya Rajaram has been awarded the World Food prize.
• Malala Yousufzai has been awarded the 2014 Liberty medal.
• Books in News:
• I Shall Not Hear The Nightingale - by Khushwant Singh [A contest to rename this book has been announced recently]
• I am Malala: the girl who stood up for education and was shot by the Taliban - by Malala Yousafzai [This book is to be translated into four India languages like Kannada, Tamil, Malayalam and Marathi]
• The Narrow Road to the Deep North - by Richard Flanagan Australian writer [won the Man booker prize 2014]
• Final Test: Exit Sachin Tendulkar - by Dilip D’Souza [about the final test macth of Sachin Tentulkar at wankhade stadium]
• Untold Story of the Indian Public Sector - by UD Choubey
• Important Days
• October 11th - International Day of the Girl Child.
• October 15th - Global hand washing Day
• October 16th - World Food Day
• October 17th - International Day for the Eradication of Poverty
• October 20th - World Osteoporosis Day
• October 31st - National Unity Day (Ekta Diwas)
• Kazhuperumbakkam
• A village near Puducherry which has banned bursting of crackers several years before to protect the fruit bats in their locality.
• Important Appointments
• Surya Prakash - was appointed as the new chairman of Prasar Bharti Board.
• Operation Neptune Spear
• A Military Operation (2011), in which Osama Bin Laden was killed. 

Polity

• Saansad Adarsh Gram Yojana
• A scheme launched by PM recently, in which each MP will adopt 3 villages in their constituency and develop physical and institutional infrastructure by 2019. 
• NDA government has planned to transfer the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) from the Labour ministry to Health ministry and merged with the Universal Health Assurance Mission (UHAM).
• Important Appointments
• Manohar Lal Khattar - appointed as the 21st Chief Minister of Haryana.
• Devendra Fadnavis - appointed as the new Chief Minister of Maharashtra.
• Sandeep Saxena to be appointed as the new Chief Election commissioner of Tamil nadu succeeding Praveen Kumar.
• Section 66-A (b) of the IT Act
• A hyderabad law student was arrested following his Facebook post on Hudhud cyclone under the section 66-A (b) of the IT Act and Section 153 of IPC.

Economy

• RBI's Monetary Policy released on September 30th 2014
• CRR - 4 % [Unchanged]
• Repo Rate - 8% [Unchanged]
• Inflation target by January 2015 - 8 %
• Inflation target by January 2016 - 6 %
• Global Hunger Index (GHI)
• India Ranks 55th position in the Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2014 which was recently published by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
• India ranks 142nd in the latest World bank's 'Ease of doing Business report'.
• Important Appointments
• Arvind Subramanium - appointed as the new chief economic adviser.
• Rajiv Mehrishi - appointed as the new finance secretary.
• Universal Account Number
• A scheme launched by PM Modi which allows the PF account portability throughout India.
• An All India Institute of Ayurveda (AIIA) - Delhi
• AIIA is India's First AIIMS like medical institute for Ayurveda to be inaugurated very soon at Jasola in Delhi.
• Vishwanathan committee
• Vishwanathan committee was constituted by the finance ministry to suggest bankruptcy code for small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
• It will be headed by T. K.Vishwanathan 

World

• US Pivot to Asia doctrine (Obama's rebalancing strategy)
• It envisages on deeper cooperation with Asian countries in military and economic fields. 
• Important Appointments
• Khaled Bahah - selected as the new Prime Minister of Yemen
• Joko Widodo - become the new President of Indonesia.
• Canadian parliament was attacked by a terrorist, later he was shot down by the soldiers.
• Asian Infrastructure Investment bank (AIIB)
• India signed MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) for the setting up of the AIIB.
• The head quarters of AIIB is in Beijing.
• Vietnam PM's India Visit
• Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung to sign important MoU in the field of Defence and Oil exploration.
• The 10th World Islamic Economic Forum was held in Dubai.

Sports

• Asian Games
• Varsha Gautam and Aishwarya Nedunchezhiyan won the bronze medal in Sailing, thus becoming the first indian women to win in this category at the Asian games.
• Dutch Open Grand Prix Badminton tournament  
• Ajay Jayaram (India) defeated Ihsan Maulana Mustofa (Indonesia) in the final to win the title.

Environment 

• Hudhud cyclone
• Hudhud cyclone is expected to hit the coastal areas between vishakapatnam (Andhra pradesh) and Gopalpur (Odisha) with estimated wind speed of 170 - 200 kmph.
• It originated from a low pressure area over the Andaman Sea.
• The name 'Hudhud' was suggested by the country Oman and it means the bird hoopoe.
• Typhoon Vongfong 
• Typhoon Vongfong attacked Japan with wind speed upto 180 kmph.
• Hurricane Gonzalo
• Hurricane Gonzalo attacked Bermuda with wind speed about 180 kmph.
• WHO declared Nigeria an African nation as EBOLA Free nation recently.
• Cyclone Nilofar 
• Cyclone Nilofar is expected to attack the coast of Gujarat.

Science and Tech

• Windows 10
• Microsoft, the software giant released the latest OS version named Windows 10. 
• Antrix Corporation
• It is the commercial arm of ISRO, which was given the Miniratna status in 2008.
• It commercializes the space products to customers across the world.
• Dongfeng-31B
• China test fired its Dongfeng-31B, a 10,000 Km long range missile.
• Capable of delivering multiple nuclear war head.
• World's Largest Telescope
• World's largest 30 meter telescope to be constructed in Hawaiian island by five countries (India, US, Japan, China and Canada) in a joint collaboration at a cost of 1.4 Billion USD.
• Kerala State has decided to provide high speed internet connections to all panchayats. It might become the first state to provide such high speed connections to panchayats. 
• Parikshit
• It is a nano satellite to be constructed by the students of MIT (Manipal Institute of Technology) which will be launched by the ISRO.
• The main objective of the Parishit satellite is to study the urban heat islands.
• Himadri - India's Station in arctic. 
• Full Mobile Number Portability
• Department of Telecommunication (DoT) sets March 2015 as target to implement full Mobile number portability.
• Full MNP allows users to switch from one telecom circle to any other telecom circle within the country.
• IRNSS - 1C
• IRNSS - 1C, third of the IRNSS series was successfully placed in its orbit by the PSLV C26. 
• GSLV Mark III - Planned to be launched in the December Month.
• Nirbhay
• A long range subsonic cruise missile which was test fired successfully from the Integrated Test Range at Chandipur in Odisha.
• Range 1000 - 1500 km
• Developed by DRDO.

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