Current Affairs November 2020 | NOTES, PDF, VIDEO | All Important Events with bullet points | 3 in 1 | EXAM FOCUS Channel

Top selected current affairs of November 2020 for competitive exams and interviews (PDF at bottom of page)

India’s first seaplane service in Gujarat
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has launched the country’s first seaplane service between the Statue of Unity (Sardar Patel statue) near Kevadiya in Gujarat’s Narmada district and Sabarmati Riverfront in Ahmedabad.

• The 19-seater seaplane will be operated by SpiceJet

• Can accommodate 12 passengers and tickets will cost Rs 4,800 per person

• There will be four flights a day between Ahmedabad and Kevadia (4 arrivals - 4 departures)

NATO to set Space center in Germany

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) alliance in Ramstein in Germany, in preparation of Chinese treats. It will also help in weather forecast, communication among NATO nation, security and vigilance on enemies. 

• Number of NATO countries - 30 

• Founded - April 4th, 1949

• Headquarters - Brussels, Belgium

"KAPILA kalam" program launced by Union education ministry

KAPILA stands for Kalam Program for Intellectual Property Literacy and Awareness campaign. Union Education Minister, Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ has virtually launched the campaign ‘KAPILA’, on 15th October 2020 on the occasion of 89th birth anniversary celebration of former President Dr APJ Abdul Kalam.

• To create awareness on importance of patenting an invention.

• Ministry has decided to celebrate the week from 15 to 23 October as ‘Intellectual Property Literacy Week.

SERB Power scheme to support woman scientists

SERB-POWER stands for Science and Engineering Research Board – Promoting Opportunities For Women in Exploratory Research. It is launched by union minister of Science & Tech Harsh Vardhan.
Scheme will facilitate two categories of research

• SERB – POWER Fellowship - This scheme will encourage emerging and eminent women researchers for the individual-centric and competitive mode of research funding.

• SERB – POWER Research Grants - Reward outstanding women researchers and innovators working in Indian academic institutions and R&D laboratories, holding Ph.D.degree in any branch of science and engineering.

• SERB is a statutory body under the Department of Science and Technology, GOI, established by an Act of the Parliament of India in 2009 (SERB ACT,2008).

China's new space mission - Became 3rd nation after USA, Russia to do so

• China has successfully launched an unmanned spacecraft to the moon on November 24, 2020, to collect samples and bring them back to Earth.

• It is named after the ancient Chinese Goddess of the moon, Chang’e-5.

• Launched by China from the Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site in the Southern Province of Hainan

• Spacecraft has been was launched by a Long March-5 rocket at 4.30 am (Beijing Time).

• China also plans on retrieving the samples from Mars by 2030

G20 Summit in 2023 will be hosted by India

• G20 announced on November 22, 2020 that India will now host the Group of 20 Summit in 2023
• Next meetings in Italy in 2021, Indonesia in 2022, India in 2023 and Brazil in 2024
• The focus of 2020s summit, which mostly took place virtually was the Coronavirus pandemic
• The leaders of G20 also extended support to the Anti-Money Laundering, Counter-Terrorist Financing policy responses detailed in the paper of Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF) on COVID-19 pandemic.

World's 1st bank with million twitter followers

• RBI, the apex bank of India became 1st bank to get 1 M twitter follower on its official handle.
• Shaktikanda Das, RBI Governor congratulated his mates on this occasion. He also has a separate Twitter Handle with 1.37 lakh followers
• Next meetings in Italy in 2021, Indonesia in 2022, India in 2023 and Brazil in 2024
• The focus of 2020s summit, which mostly took place virtually was the Coronavirus pandemic

Top 5 banks with twitter followers

India-Singapore joint maritime exercise update : SIMBEX 2020

• 27th edition of India - Singapore Bilateral Maritime Exercise (SIMBEX-20) from November 23-25, 2020 
• Location: Andaman sea
• The exercise is regularly conducted between the two navies since 1994 to boost navy capabilities, war preparation, anti-terror operation and mutual sharing of tactics and war readiness. 
• SIMBEX-20 will witness participation from INS Rana, corvettes Kamorta and Karmuk from the Indian side

Asia's 1st ever solar power textile mill to be established in Maharastra

• Location - Parbhani district, Maharashtra
• Many women in the region will get direct and indirect employment on commission of project. 
• The Jai Bhawani Women cooperative textile mill is spread across 30 acres of land. It will majorly process cotton to cloth.
• Cost of the project will be Rs 100 crore

31st district of karnataka confirmed : Will be carved out from Ballari

• Name - Vijayanagara, named after the capital of the historic Vijayanagara empire
• 6 out of 11 talluks from Ballari will be carved out for Vijayanagara
• The Jai Bhawani Women cooperative textile mill is spread across 30 acres of land. It will majorly process cotton to cloth.
• Chief minister BS Yediyurappa agreed to the proposal of Anand singh (MLA and Forest minister of Karnataka) who played crucial role in establishing BJP government back in Karnataka
• Proposal will be approved by cabinet by next meeting

Rs 234.68 crores approved under Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana by government

• It was introduced in 2016 as SAMPADA, 
• Later in 2017, it was renamed as Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana
• There are seven components included in the scheme are

1. Infrastructure for Agro-Processing Clusters
2. Mega food parks
3. Clusters, Integrated Cold Chain and Value Addition Infrastructure
4. Human resource and institutions
5. Food Safety and Quality Assurance Infrastructure
6. Creation and Expansion of Food Processing and Preservation Capacities
7. Infrastructure for agro-processing clusters

• On November 24, 2020, the Union Minister Shri Narendra Singh Tomar approved food processing projects of Rs 234.68 crores
• As per National Food Processing Policy, India aims to boost investment in the food processing sector by six times by 2035.

120 million USD to modernize transport sector : India and World Bank signed  in the state of Meghalaya

• Total roads connectivity of 300 km proposed (all-weather and resilient).  
• Plan is to organize Meghalaya as major hub for export and Import and transport to countries like Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan. 
• It will also help in security and military movement in case of emergency.
• The project is expected to generate direct employment of 8 million person days
• It will also boost “Restart Meghalaya Mission”
• The speed of development activities in the North East Region was increased by GoI after the standoff with China in Siliguri Corridor. Due to present government higher focus on North-East, the developmental activities in Norh -East India has increased.
• In 2018, Rs 1.9 lakh crores were sanctioned to build 14,000 km of roads in the North East region.

World's strongest super typhoon struck Philippines

• Name - Goni (Typhoon Rollyin in Philippines)
• The Typhoon Goni has attained its maximum speed of 310 km per hour
• The typhoon is expected to damage more than 928,000 hectares of land
• Corn farm damaged upto 58,431 hectares.
• 347,000 people have been evacuated
• Typhoons with speed more than 194kmph are called super strong typhoons

Cyclone Nivar struck south India : Update

• Name Nivar given by Iran
• Region affected  - Tamil Nadu and Puducherry
• Wind Speed - 120 kmph - 145 kmph

India's AI supercomputer "PARAM SIDDHI" ranked 63 among top 500 super computers. 

• Param Siddhi is a high-performance computing-artificial intelligence (HPC-AI) supercomputer that was established at C-DAC under the National Supercomputing Mission
• Developed by Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology and Department of Science and Technology.
• Speed - 5.267 petaflops which has now got credits of non-distributed supercomputer system
• China has maximum number of super computers followed by US, Japan, France, and Germany

"The Promised Land" book written by former US president Barack Obama released

• It is the first of the two volumes that Obama had written during his tenure as President (2009-2017)
• He was 1st African-American president of USA
• Highlights of book

1. Mention of Ramayana and Mahabharata in his book.
2. killing of Osama bin Laden in 2011
3. Fascinations about Mahatma Gandhi
4. Iraq war and many more

 book is to be translated in several foreign languages such as Chinese, Polish, German, Hungarian, Hebrew, French and many more

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