The Daily Brief – 5th July, 2017

The Daily Briefs are a comprehensive update of current affairs for the day. If you’d like to receive updates for current affairs every day, you’ll need to subscribe by entering your email address at the right side of this page. The previous Briefs can be accessed at the archives here. You can thank Sayan Bhattacharya in the comments below for this brief! Also, check out our test series!

• The MERIT (Merit Order Despatch of Electricity for Rejuvenation of Income and Transparency)’ and the e-bidding portal for offering an e-Bidding solution to States was launched by the Minister of State for Power. The app and the portal would help the states to select Independent Power Producers (IPPs) for procurement of power by transferring their domestic coal under the scheme of flexibility in utilisation of domestic coal.
• North Korea claims to have successfully tested its inter-continental missile Hwasong-14 near around sea of into water near Sea of Japan. The launch appeared to be North Korea’s most successful missile test since its ballistic missile programme gathered pace in the late 1990s. The successful test also marks North Korea’s the final step in becoming confident and powerful nuclear state that can strike anywhere on Earth.
• 97% of all debt of states claims to have been covered under Ujwal DISCOM Assurance Yojna (UDAY) according to a statement by the Union Ministry of Power. The UDAY Scheme was launched by Union Power Ministry for the financial turnaround and revival package for electricity distribution companies of India (DISCOMs)
• Former DGP of Himachal Pradesh, Sanjay Kumar was appointed as Director General (DG) of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF). He will succeed R K Pachnanda who was has taken charge as DG the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP).

  

• A joint military exercise between Indian Army and Royal Thailand Army commenced Bakloh in Chamba district of Himachal Pradesh called Maitree 2017. The previous edition of the exercise was held at Krabi in Thailand in 2016 and its held annually.
• The United States of America (USA) has rolled out pre-approved expedited entry clearance for low-risk Indian travellers under its Global Entry programme (GEP). With this initiative, India became 11th country whose citizens are now eligible to enroll in the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) initiative. Under this initiative, international GEP member traveller can enter in US through automatic kiosks, rather than queuing up to clear immigration check by meeting an immigration officer at selected airports.
• International Centre for Climate Governance(ICCG) ranked Delhi based think tank The Energy Resources Institute(TERI) as the second best in the world under the category – ‘2016 Top Climate Think Tanks in the Rest of the World-Absolute Global Rankings’ during ICCG’s 23rd annual conference of the European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists (EAERE) in Athens, Greece.
  

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  Today’s Quiz
  

  1. What is the name of e-bidding portal for states recently launched by Ministry of Power?

  
  UDAY
  MERIT
  SJVN
  THDCIL
  

  2. What is the name of the inter-continental missile recently tested by North Korea near the sea of Japan?

  
  Scud-B
  Scud-C
  Unha-1
  Hwasong-14
  

  3. Who was recently appointed as Director General of National Disaster Response Force?

  
  Sanjay Kumar
  RK Pachnanada
  KJ Ramesh
  Keshari Nath Tripathi
  

  4. What is the name of the Indo-Thai joint military exercise to be held at Himachal Pradesh?

  
  Austral-Index
  Pagoda
  Maitree
  Indra
  

  5. Which Indian think-tank was recently ranked second best in the world by ICCG ?

  
  Centre for Policy and Research
  TERI
  South Asia Analysis Group
  Centre for Public Policy