JANUARY

 MISCELLANEOUS

Ø  Oxford dictionary’s Hindi word of 2017

Ø  Oxford Dictionaries has chosen ‘Aadhaar’ as the Hindi word of 2017. It also becomes the first Oxford Dictionaries Hindi Word of the Year. Widespread discussions & debates around ‘Aadhaar’ was the reason it was selected as the word of the year. The Hindi Word of the Year was chosen by the Oxford Dictionaries team in India with the help of an advisory panel of language experts.

Ø  Indian-origin boy Mehul Garg sets new Mensa record

Ø  Indian-origin boy Mehul Garg (10) in United Kingdom became youngest applicant in decade to achieve highest score in Mensa IQ test, beating geniuses like Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking. He scored maximum score of 162 to become a member of Mensa. His score is two points higher than Einstein and Hawking. Mehul Garg is from Reading Boys Grammar School in Reading Boys Grammar School in Reading, southern England. He can solve Rubik’s Cube in 100 seconds. He has been shortlisted for ‘Child Genius 2018’ show on Channel 4.

Ø  Rachel Morrison 1st Oscar nominated female cinematographer

Ø  Rachel Morrison has become the first female cinematographer to receive an Oscar nomination in the 89-year-old history of the Awards. She has been nominated for her work in the film ‘Mudbound’. “The job of the cinematographer is to visualise emotion – things we as women are inherently good at,” said Rachel while speaking about her nomination.

Ø  Apple named the world’s most admired company for 2018

Ø  Technology giant Apple topped Fortune magazine’s list of the ‘World’s Most Admired Companies’ for 2018. E-commerce giant Amazon has retained its second spot, followed by Google’s parent Alphabet. Social media giant Facebook lost its place in the top ten most admired companies this year and was ranked 12th on the list.

Ø  Google awarded 72 lakh for finding bugs in Pixel phone

Ø  Google awarded nearly 72 lakh to researcher Guang Gong for finding bugs in its Pixel devices. The exploit chain consisted of two bugs which together could inject arbitrary code into system server by accessing a malicious URL in Chrome. Around 67 lakh of the reward was given from Google’s Android Security Rewards program, the highest in the program’s history.

Ø  World’s fifth largest diamond unveiled in Lesotho

Ø  A 910-carat diamond, which is believed to be the world’s fifth largest diamond, has been unearthed in Lesotho. The stone was discovered in Letseng mine by Gem Diamonds. The diamond is estimated to be worth at much as $40 million. The company described the diamond, which is the size of two golf balls, as being of ‘exceptional quality’. Since Gem Diamonds acquired Letseng in 2006, the mine has produced some of the world’s most remarkable diamonds, including the 603 carat Lesotho Promise.

Ø  5 Indian Tech companies feature in “Top 100 Global Tech Leaders” List

Ø  Thomson Reuters Corp on 17 January 2018 published its debut ‘Top 100 Global Technology Leaders’ list, which was topped by Microsoft, followed by Intel Corp and Cisco Systems at the 2nd and 3rd positions respectively. The list, which aims to identify the industry’s top financially successful and organisationally sound organisations, also features American tech giants such as Apple Inc, Alphabet Inc, International Business Machines Corp and Texas Instruments Inc amongst its top 10. According to the list, 45 percent of these 100 tech companies are headquartered in the United States. Japan and Taiwan are tied for second place with 13 companies each, followed by India with five tech leaders on the list. By continent, North America leads with 47, followed by Asia with 38, Europe with 14 and Australia with one.

Ø  Donald Trump awarded bravery medal for scolding Pakistan over terrorism

Ø  Afghanistan residents awarded Donald Trump a bravery medal for rebuking Pakistan over its failure in curbing terrorist havens. As per local media reports, the medal has been forged using funds collected by Afghans from the Logar province worth 45,000 Afghanis ($645) and consists of 15 grams of gold. The US Ambassador in Kabul John R Bass promised that he will soon hand over the medal to the US President. The Syed Farhad Akbari, a community leader in the province, said that more than 300 people at an informal “jirga,” or council, of concerned citizens, agreed to award the medal to the US president.

Ø  HP woman featured in WHO’s 2018 calendar

Ø  A health worker from Mandi district in Himachal Pradesh, Verma has featured in the World Health Organization (WHO) calendar for the year 2018. Verma has found mention in the WHO calender for her efforts to ensure hundred per cent coverage of her area of operation under the measles and rubella programme. Verma works to immunise the children of shepherds and the Gujjars community in the area.

Ø  GIA ranked Indian PM Narendra Modi as the No. 3 world leader

Ø  Gallup International Association (GIA) has ranked Indian PM Narendra Modi as the No. 3 world leader in its annual survey. This is the highest ever rank bagged by any Indian PM in the GIA global polls. The first rank went to French President Emmanuel Macron (net score 21), followed by German chancellor Angela Merkel (net score of 20). US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin were ranked at the eleventh and sixth position respectively in the survey.

Ø  India tops Domestic Air Traffic Demand at 16.4% in November: IATA

Ø  India’s domestic air passenger traffic grew by 16.4 percent in November 2017, topping the growth chart worldwide, according to the global aviation body, the International Air Transport Association (IATA). Globally, the total revenue passenger kilometres (RPK) increased 8 percent compared to November 2016. The available seat kilometres (ASKs) or capacity grew by 6.3 percent. The ASK for India was at 10.4 percent, second only to China where capacity grew by 12.9 percent, according to the IATA’s monthly data.

Ø  IndiGo rated world’s 4th most punctual ‘mega carrier’

Ø  India’s IndiGo is the fourth most ‘mega carrier’ in the world, beating British Airways and Lufthansa in a travel analyst company’s annual list. Japan Airlines takes the top spot in OAG’s list of the world’s most punctual ’mega carriers’. Its annual review, the Punctuality League 2018, takes into account airlines’ performance on timekeeping. OAG has two separate punctuality lists, one for all airlines, big and small, and another one for ‘mega carriers’. The company defines ‘on-time performance’ as flights that arrive or depart within 14 minutes and 59 seconds (under 15 minutes) of their scheduled arrival/departure times.

Ø   Jeff Bezos becomes Richest Person Surpassing Bill Gates: Bloomberg Report

Ø  Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon has become the richest man in the history, overtaking the wealth Bill Gates ever had to his name, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The Index showed that Bezos’ net worth had hit USD 105.1 billion. According to Forbes’ tracker, most of Bezos’ wealth comes from his 78.9 million shares of Amazon stock. According to Bloomberg Billionaires Index, the richest people in the world are Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Mark Zuckerberg, Amancio Ortega.

Ø  France to confer ‘Legion de Honour’ on actor Soumitra Chattopadhyay

Ø  France will confer its highest order of merit, the ‘Legion of Honour’ on legendary film and theatre actor Soumitra Chattopadhyay at the 42nd International Kolkata Book Fair. The honour will be bestowed on the actor who starred in many of Satyajit Ray’s iconic films by french culture and communication minister Francoise Nyssen in Kolkata. The Dadasaheb Phalke Award winner Chattopadhyay, 82, acted in several of Ray’s films, including Apur Sansar, Abhijan, Charulata, Aranyer Din Ratri, and Sonar Kella.

Ø   India’s first all-women station in Mumbai enters Limca records

Ø  The first all-women station in India, Matunga on Central Railway (CR) in Mumbai, manned by a staff of 41 women, has entered the Limca Book of Records. The unique initiative was taken by CR General Manager D.K. Sharma in July 2017 with the aim of empowering women. Accordingly, women staffers were posted across all departments, like 17 ladies for operations and commercial, six Railway Protection Force, eight for ticket checking, two announcers and two conservancy staffers, and five point persons, totalling 41.

Ø  MAS chief Ravi Menon named best central bank governor in Asia-Pacific

Ø  Ravi Menon, the Managing Director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), has been named the best central bank governor in Asia-Pacific for 2018 by UK-based magazine The Banker. The annual award by The Banker, is based on a selection process involving a survey of bankers and economists.

Ø  Bharat Biotech’s Typbar-TCV: WHO approves Indian typhoid vaccine for global use

Ø  The World Health Organisation (WHO) has given its pre-qualification to Typbar Typhoid Conjugate Vaccine (TVC) developed by Hyderabad based Bharat Biotech for global use. Typbar TCV is world’s first typhoid vaccine clinically proven to be administered to children from six months of age to adults, and confers long-term protection against typhoid fever. It has been evaluated in Human Challenge Studies at Oxford University.

Ø  UNESCO enters Turkey’s Endangered ‘Bird Language’ in Intangible Cultural Heritage List

Ø  The unusual and very efficient whistle language commonly called “bird language” used as a means of communication by villagers in remote northern Turkey entered the UNESCO list of Intangible Cultural Heritage. UNESCO has accepted the “bird language” of Black Sea villagers as an endangered part of world heritage in need of urgent protection.