April 5, 2017 ANB20170404

Abhyaas News Board …

For the quintessential test prep student
Election Results in 5 States
Uttar Pradesh
The Editor’s Column
BJP and its allies won by a thumping majority in
Uttar Pradesh. They garnered 325 seats whereas Dear Student,
the Samajwadi Party & Congress alliance managed
only 56 seats. Yogi Adityanath, the 5-time MP from The Elections in the 5 states and the action that
Gorakhpur and mahant of the Gorakhpur temple, ensued after the results was spectacular and had the
whose real name is Ajay Singh Bisht is the new entire country on the edge of their seats. BJP got an
Chief Minister while Keshav Prasad Maurya and overwhelming majority in UP even though they had
Dinesh Sharma are the deputy chief ministers. not announced a CM candidate and neither did they
have a single Muslim contestant. Though Congress
Punjab had won more seats than BJP in both Goa and
Congress won the elections with 77 seats while Manipur, they could not form the government in
AAP and its allies managed to get only 22 seats. either state.
Captain Amarinder Singh is the Chief Minister of
Punjab, also holding the Home Department while It is probably for the first time that four major high
Navjot Singh Siddhu is a Cabinet minister with courts in India are headed by women judges. The high
portfolios of Local Government and Tourism and courts at Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai and Kolkata have
Cultural Affairs, Archives and Museums. women chief justices now. Justice Indira Banerjee in
Madras High Court, Justice Manjula Chellur in Bombay
Goa High Court, Justice Nishita Nirmal Mhatre in Calcutta
The electorate did not return a clear verdict with High Court and Justice G Rohini in Delhi High Court.
Congress and allies gaining 18 seats and BJP and Incidentally there is only one Judge, Justice R
allies 14 seats. However, other smaller parties Banumathi in the Supreme Court.
promised to support BJP provided Manohar
Parrikar is made the Chief Minister. Manohar Happy Reading !!
Parrikar is now the Chief Minister of Goa holding
both the Home and Finance portfolios.

Uttarakhand
The electorate in Uttarakhand gave a clear
mandate to BJP and they won 57 seats. The
Padma Parupudi
Congress managed only 11 seats. Trivendra Singh
Rawat took oath as the Chief Minister of
Index:
Uttarakhand.
Page 2: Persons in News
Manipur
There was no clear majority. Congress got 28 seats
Page 4: Places in News
and BJP 21. 11 other MLAs supported BJP which Page 4: Events of Significance
paved the way for BJP to form the government.
Nongthombam Biren Singh, a national footballer is Page 8: Crossword
the new Chief Minister of Manipur.

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April 5, 2017

Persons in News
1. Captain of the Indian cricket team, ‘Virat Kohli’ has been named as the 'Captain of the Year' at the 10th
annual ESPNcricinfo Awards. Former captain of the Indian women’s cricket team, Ms. Shanta
Rangaswamy has been nominated for the BCCI Lifetime Achievement award to recognize the contribution
of women cricketers.
2. Norwegian mass killer Anders Behring Breivik lost a human rights case when an appeals court overturned
a lower court finding that his near-isolation in a three-room cell was inhuman. A lower Oslo court had
ruled in 2016 that the conditions violated a ban on “inhuman or degrading treatment” under the
European Convention on Human Rights.
3. Bakri Hassan Saleh, a former army general and top aide to President Omar Al-Bashir was sworn in as
Sudan’s first Prime Minister since the post was scrapped in a 1989 Islamist-backed coup.
4. Eminent Malayalam author and journalist M P Veerendra Kumar was presented the 30th Moortidevi
award by Bharatiya Jnanpith organization. Kumar was chosen for the prestigious award for his Malayalam
travelogue 'Hymavathabhoovil', which dwells upon ancient trails of Indian culture, myth, literature, and
people strewn in the plains, valleys, and mountains of India.
5. The Indian duo of Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja became the first set of spinners to be jointly
ranked number one in the ICC Test rankings for bowlers.
6. RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat was conferred honorary degree of Doctor of Science (DSc) by the Nagpur-based
Maharashtra Animal and Fishery Sciences University.
7. Assam's woman activist Sumitra Hazarika received the Nari Shakti Award from President Pranab
Mukherjee at Rashtrapati Bhawan. She is the President of Mission for Integration, Gender Equalisation,
Harmony and Fight against Threat and was the only Assamese to receive the award this year.
8. The second highest peacetime gallantry award ‘Kirti Chakra’ went to a young officer, Major Rohit Suri,
who was part of the surgical strikes last year. The seniormost Lieutenant General Eastern Army
Commander Praveen Bakshi was awarded the Param Vishisht Seva Medal, the highest Distinguished
Service Medal.
9. Photojournalist Raghu Rai was conferred with the Lifetime Achievement Award by the Information and
Broadcasting (I&B) ministry for “his remarkable contribution to the field.
10. Chief Justice appointments for High Courts - Acting Chief Justice of Patna High Court Hemant Gupta has
been appointed Chief Justice of Madhya Pradesh High Court. Acting Chief Justice of Jharkhand High Court
P K Mohanty has been appointed the ‘regular’ chief justice there. Justice Navniti Prasad, a judge in Patna
High Court has been appointed Chief Justice of Kerala High Court while Justice T B Radhakrishnan, acting
Chief Justice of Kerala High Court, has been made Chief Justice of Chhattisgarh High Court. Justice Indira
Banerjee, presently a judge of the Delhi High Court has been appointed by the President as the Chief
Justice of Madras High Court.
11. Three-time Member of Parliament and sitting MLA of Nandyal in Andhra Pradesh, Bhuma Nagi Reddy,
died of cardiac arrest.
12. Hungarian–American chemist George Olah, who was awarded the 1994 Chemistry Nobel prize for his
work on carbocations, died at his home in Beverly Hills, US.
13. Former national racing champion, Ashwin Sundar and his wife died in a car mishap. Sundar had won the
national title in car racing and two-wheeler events on several occasions.
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14. Senior Congress leader and Member of Rajya Sabha Haji Abdul Salam passed away after a brief illness at
Imphal. Salam was the first Manipuri Muslim to be a member of Rajya Sabha from Manipur.
15. David Rockefeller, the world’s oldest billionaire, passed away at the age of 101. Rockefeller, who held a
Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago, ran Chase National Bank for years.
16. John Hampshire, the former England and Yorkshire batsman who later became an international umpire,
passed away after prolonged illness.
17. Internet pioneer Ray Tomlinson, who is credited with the invention of email, passed away at the age of 74.
18. Eminent jurist and senior advocate T R Andhyarujina passed away in Mumbai. Andhyarujina, who also
served as Solicitor General during 1996-98, was part of the team of constitutional law expert H M Seervai
in his initial days as a lawyer and witnessed from close-quarters the history-defining hearings in the
‘Kesavananda Bharati Case'. Andhyarujina had also authored the books 'Judicial Activism and
Constitutional Democracy in India’ and 'Judges and Judicial Accountability'.
19. Renowned Meteorologist and former director of the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (Pune) Dev
Raj Sikka passed away. He is famously known as Monsoon Man and the Father of Indian Meteorology. He
was the first to propose a link between the El Nino phenomenon and the Indian monsoon in 1982.
20. An Indian-origin surgeon in the UK, Dr Daya Gahir of Royal Stoke University Hospital in West Midlands
region of England, with the help of a 3D printer, has successfully reconstructed a 53-year-old throat cancer
patient’s jaw using bone from one of his legs.
21. In Egypt, former President Hosni Mubarak has been freed from detention, six years after being
overthrown.
22. Four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel won the 2017 Australian Grand Prix for Ferrari. It was Vettel's
fourth win for Ferrari and his first since the Singapore Grand Prix in September 2015.
23. Chinese smartphone company OnePlus has roped in Bollywood star Amitabh Bachchan as its new brand
ambassador for India. Amitabh Bachchan is the first major face that OnePlus India is associating with
for its latest flagship smartphone, OnePlus 3T.
24. Tesla Inc founder and Chief Executive Elon Musk has launched a company called Neuralink Corp through
which computers could merge with human brains. Neuralink is pursuing what Musk calls the "neural lace"
technology, implanting tiny brain electrodes that may one day upload and download thoughts.
25. Argentina forward Lionel Messi has been banned from their next four competitive internationals starting
with the World Cup's qualifier in Bolivia for swearing at a match official.
26. Srinath Narayanan is set to become India's 46th Grandmaster after he defeated Spanish GM David Anton
Guijarro at the ongoing Sharjah Masters 2017 chess tournament.
27. The Union Defence Ministry has approved most of the proposals of a committee of experts, headed by Lt.
Gen. D.B. Shekatkar (Retd) to bring host of reforms in the military and improve financial management.

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April 5, 2017

Places in News
1. The world’s first university course to train intelligence analysts to fight cyber crime, has been announced to
be introduced in Australia. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is driving the initiative in the wake of innovative
methods of money transfer among organised crime and militant groups.
2. PM Narendra Modi has adopted Nagepur, a village dominated by backward castes, in his Lok Sabha
constituency of Varanasi under the second phase of Saansad Adarsh Gram Yojana (SAGY). In the first phase
of SAGY, the PM had adopted Jayapur village in Sevapuri Assembly segment of Varanasi.
3. Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal launched initiatives to develop Majuli as India’s first carbon
neutral district and as a biodiversity heritage.
4. El Salvador, Central America’s smallest nation, has become the first country in the world to ban metals
mining nationwide. The new law bans all exploration, extraction, and processing of metals both in open pits
and mines. The level of environmental pollution in El Salvador is one of the highest in the region and the
availability of drinking water is the lowest, according to UN data.
5. Odisha became the first state in the country to adopt Self Help Groups (SHG) based model for financial
inclusion model to extend banking services in the unbanked areas through SGHs. In this regard, state
government has inked agreement with the State Bank of India (SBI). The SHGs formed under the Odisha
Livelihood Mission (OLM) will be eligible to provide banking services.
6. For the first time in India, four states Odisha, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand have decided to
conduct a synchronised elephant census in May 2017. These four together have the maximum number of
human-elephant conflict-prone regions in India.
7. Haryana Government has announced Tirtha Darshan Scheme under which senior citizens above 60 years of
age in the state will be able to go on a pilgrimage within the country at government expense.

Events of Significance
1. LTE mobile network operator Reliance Jio has announced collaboration with the networking giant Cisco to
expand Jio’s existing multi-terabit capacity with the first All-IP converged network in India. With this Jio can
offer a combination of high-speed data, mobile video, VoLTE, digital commerce, media, and cloud and
payment services.
2. The government has shifted the responsibility of promoting digital transactions in the country to the Ministry
of IT and Electronics (MEITY) from NITI Aayog. MEITY is responsible for promotion of e-governance for
empowering citizens as well as promoting inclusive and sustainable growth of electronics and IT in the
country.
3. India successfully test-fired the supersonic interceptor missile from the Abdul Kalam Island off Odisha coast
after receiving commands from the radars on the incoming missile. The interceptor missile “Prithvi” detected
and tracked the enemy's ballistic missile, which was fired from Interim Test Range at Chandipur in Odisha.
4. Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) has entered the national Limca Book of Records for erecting maximum
number of girders in a month on a single Metro line project in the country.
5. The railways will soon move towards Aadhaar-based online ticketing system to prevent touts from blocking a
bulk of tickets, end fraudulent bookings and curb cases of impersonation.
6. The European Parliament has voted to end visa-free travel for Americans within the European Union. It
comes after the US failed to agree visa-free travel for citizens of five EU countries -- Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus,
Poland and Romania -- as part of a reciprocity agreement.

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7. The world's oldest aircraft carrier in active service, INS Viraat, has been decommissioned on 6th March,
2017 in Mumbai after serving the Indian Navy for nearly 30 years. INS Viraat was commissioned in Indian
Navy in 1987, before that the historic ship served Royal British Navy for 27 long years. It was built in 1943,
during the Second World War.
8. The tallest national flag in the country measuring 360 feet was hoisted on Sunday at the Attari-Wagah joint
checkpost in Punjab. The flag can be seen from Lahore in Pakistan.
9. Vijayawada Airport in Gannavaram has been renamed as ‘Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao-Amaravati Airport’
after the legendary actor and founder of the ruling Telugu Desam Party, and the new capital of Andhra
Pradesh. The Tirupati Airport has been renamed as ‘Sri Venkateswara Airport’.
10. Telecom operator Reliance Jio will provide free WiFi services at six cricket stadiums during the upcoming T20
World Cup matches. The WiFi network Jio Net will be available in Eden Garden at Kolkata, Wankhede
Stadium (Mumbai), IS Bindra Stadium (Mohali), HPCA stadium (Dharamshala), Chinnaswamy
Stadium (Bengaluru) and Feroz Shah Kotla (Delhi).
11. Patna Pirates has won the third season of Star Sports Pro Kabaddi League (PKL) by defeating U Mumba.
12. Manipur High Court has declared as illegal the over four month long economic blockade in Manipur called
by United Naga Council (UNC). The bench consisting of Chief Justice RR Prasad and Justices N Kotiswar Singh
and Justice Kh Nobin Singh passed the order on public interest litigation.
13. The Trade Mark Rules, 2017 have come into effect which will replace the erstwhile Trade Mark Rules 2002
and streamline and simplify the processing of Trade Mark applications. In the revamped rules, the number
of Trade Mark forms has been reduced from 74 to eight.
14. IDFC Bank has launched India’s first biometric-based payment system 'Aadhaar Pay' in New Delhi. The
Aadhaar Pay app has been developed by IDFC Bank under the guidance of the Ministry of IT, NITI Aayog,
Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), and National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).
15. IIT-Madras won the 2017 Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Spectrum Technology in the
Service of Society Award for its solar-direct current (DC) inverter system. The system converts in-home
power distribution from 230V Analog Current to 48V DC to directly power appliances and devices.
16. Bangladesh’s Parliament unanimously adopted a resolution declaring March 25 as Genocide Day, in
remembrance of the atrocities carried out by the Pakistani Army in the night of March 25, 1971.
17. The "wheat blast" disease, which first struck Brazil in 1985 and some other Latin American countries
destroying three million hectares of cultivation, has now invaded India, affecting wheat crop in two
bordering districts of West Bengal — Murshidabad and Nadia.
18. Britain's Parliament has passed the 'Brexit bill' paving the way for Prime Minister Theresa May to trigger
negotiations for the UK's exit from the European Union. Subsequently, the UK government has formally
submited its request to leave the European Union by triggering Article 50 of the EU’s Lisbon Treaty, setting
the clock ticking on a two-year negotiating period to end the U.K.’s 44 years of membership.
19. Heirs of those who migrated to Pakistan and China during Partition will have no claim over the properties
left behind in India, with Parliament passing the Enemy Property (Amendment and Validation) Bill, 2016,
which amends the Enemy Property Act, 1968. According to the Bill, “enemy property” refers to any property
belonging to, held or managed on behalf of an enemy, an enemy subject or an enemy firm.
20. New Zealand's Whanganui River has been granted the same legal rights as a Person. The Whanganui River,
considered part of the living landscape by the indigenous Whanganui Iwi people associated with it, has been
granted legal personhood under a parliamentary bill. Two representatives from the local indigenous
community — one appointed by the government, another elected by the community — will be entrusted
with acting in the river's interests.
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21. The Uttarakhand High Court has recognized the Ganga and the Yamuna as so-called living entities, giving the
rivers that have seen years of damage at the hands of humans, a legal voice. The river flows through
Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal and touches nearly 167 constituencies in the
Lok Sabha.
22. Medha, the made-in-India train was flagged off for the maiden run from Dadar to Borivali, at Lokmanya Tilak
Terminus, Mumbai. Medha has been manufactured by the Integral Coach Factory (ICF) in Chennai, which
has installed LED lighting to reduce energy consumption. The rake has a capacity of 6,050 passengers and
the number of seats is 1,168.
23. The U.S. state of Kansas has recognized March 16 as ‘Indian-American Appreciation Day’ to honour an Indian
techie Srinivas Kuchibhotla who was killed last month in a racially-motivated hate crime.
24. The Centre has designated 12 Olympians as National Observers in their respective disciplines to assist the
Government, Sports Authority of India, and National Sports Federations (NSFs) concerned in the preparation
and implementation of the long-term development plan with respect to high priority and priority sports. In
addition to shooter Abhinav Bindra, others named as National Observers are P T Usha and Anju Bobby
George (athletics), Sanjeev Kumar Singh (archery), Aparna Popat (badminton), MC Mary Kom and Akhil
Kumar (boxing), Jagbir Singh (hockey), Somdev Devvarman (tennis), Karnam Malleshwari (weightlifting),
Sushil Kumar (wrestling), I M Vijayan (football), Khajan Singh (swimming) and Kamlesh Mehta (table tennis).
25. After making Aadhaar mandatory for filing income tax returns and applying for PAN, the government has
now moved to make Aadhaar mandatory for mobile phone connections.
26. The Indian Council of Historical Research (ICHR) is set to undertake an archaeological exploration to find out
whether the Ram Setu is a natural or man-made phenomenon.
27. Railways has announced to set up Wi-Fi hotspot kiosks at about 500 stations and help people access an array
of online services, including various government schemes. The Wi-Fi kiosks will function like a PCO for Digital
India and enable people to use services like e-commerce, online banking, offer them access to open
school/university and insurance schemes, e-ticketing for train and bus services among others.
28. A powerful cyclone bore down on coastal towns in Queensland on 27th March, 2017. Cyclone Debbie has
been upgraded to Category Four cyclone with wind gusts up to 250 kilometres an hour.
29. A Yemeni court in territory controlled by the Houthi movement sentenced President Abd-Rabbu Mansour
Hadi and six other top officials in his government to death for high treason.
30. The Mental Healthcare Bill, which decriminalizes suicide and guarantees the right to better healthcare for
people with mental illness, was unanimously passed in the Lok Sabha. It mandates that a person
attempting suicide shall be presumed to be suffering from “severe stress” and, therefore, shall not be tried
or punished by law.
31. The Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) has launched an online certification system for films through
which producers need to submit their application digitally along with the film script to the website. The
objective is to move towards clean cinema, clean India. The move will eliminate middlemen, thereby
reducing corruption and ensuring transparency.
32. The Supreme Court has banned the sale and registration of Bharat Stage (BS)-III emission norm-compliant
vehicles from April 1, 2017 saying the health of millions was more important than commercial interests.
India will switch to the more efficient and stringent BS-IV norms, already in place in some parts of the
country, including Delhi, from April 1.
33. The Supreme Court upheld the Tripura High Court order terminating the jobs of 10,323 teachers for faulty
recruitment procedure.

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34. Lieutenant Governor of Delhi, Anil Baijal, on Wednesday directed Chief Secretary MM Kutty to recover Rs 97
Crore from the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) for projecting Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in
government advertisements.
35. The biggest river festival of India, Namami Brahmaputra, began in 21 districts of Assam on the banks of the
river Brahmaputra on 31st March 2017. The main purpose of the 5 day festival (31st March to 4th April) is to
give a boost to the investment and tourism prospects in the state.
36. Kanha has become the first tiger reserve in India to officially introduce a mascot, “Bhoorsingh the
Barasingha” to present the hard ground swamp deer as the spirit of the reserve and spread awareness to
save it from possible extinction. Barasingha, or swamp deer, is the state animal of Madhya Pradesh.
37. The Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has launched two mobile applications —e-challan and
m-parivahan to provide a comprehensive digital solution for enforcement of traffic rules.
38. Lok Sabha has passed four Bills relating to the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST). It paves
way for implementing a new, consolidated indirect tax regime from the proposed date of July 1, 2017. The
four bills passed were Central GST Bill, Integrated GST Bill, GST Compensation Bill, and the Union Territory
GST Bill, 2017. These Bills were passed as Money Bills.
39. Scientists from the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) have switched on world’s largest artificial sun – a device
developed to help shed light on new ways of making climate-friendly fuels. The artificial sun is giant
honeycomb-like set-up of 149 spotlights, officially known as Synlight. It is located in Juelich. It uses xenon
short-arc lamps normally found in cinemas to simulate natural sunlight.
40. The Law Commission of India (LCI) in its 267th Report has cautioned about the danger of hate speech to the
Union Government and called for action from the government and Parliament. It held that hate speech has
the potential to provoke individuals and society to commit acts of genocides, terrorism and ethnic cleansing.
The Supreme Court of India in 2014 had referred to the Law Commission for means to arm the Election
Commission to crack down on hate speech.
41. The Parliament has passed The Employees Compensation (Amendment) Bill, 2016. The Bill amends the
Employee’s Compensation Act, 1923. It ensures compensation up to Rs 1 lakh to employee if an injured in
an industrial accident and imposes hefty penalty in case of any violation by the employers.
42. The Lok Sabha has approved amendments to The Finance Bill, 2017 proposed by the Union Government to
wind up eight tribunals These eight tribunals currently exclusively deal with disputes pertaining to
employees’ provident fund (EPF), Competition law, Airports economic regulation, IT law, National highways,
railways, copyrights and Forex.
43. India’s longest surface tunnel in Jammu and Kashmir’s Udhampur district is complete. It will be open to
traffic soon, following successful completion of trial runs for peak and off-peak hours. The 9-km-long tunnel
at Chenani passes through the lower Himalayan mountain range on Jammu- Srinagar National Highway.
44. The Union Ministry of Agriculture has launched Mission Fingerling, a programme to enable holistic
development and management of fisheries sector in India with a total expenditure of about Rs. 52000 lakh
towards the Blue Revolution.
45. West Bengal Government has given official language status to endangered tribal language Kurukh, mother
tongue belonging to the Dravidian family.
46. The Defence Research and Development Organization (DRDO) formally handed over an indigenously
developed Weapon Locating Radar (WLR) system dubbed as ‘SWATHI’ to Indian Army. The DRDO also
handed over a Nuclear, Biological and Chemical (NBC) recce vehicle Mk-I and NBC treatment drugs to the
Indian Army.

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April 5, 2017

Crossword - 0009

Note: Solve this crossword and mail your solution with

Crossword – 0009 in the subject line to
[email protected] latest by 19th April 2017. First
correct solution entry will get a prize.

Key to Crossword - 0008

Note: No correct entry received.. Hoping to

see better enthusiasm in this month.

Feel free to write to: [email protected] to resolve your lawprep queries

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