Current Affairs 2nd July 2017

Current Affairs 2nd July 2017 - Important Points

• Indian-origin boy Arnav Sharma gets - 162 IQ points
• PM Modi to discuss counter-terrorism at G20 Summit - World leaders
• Confidence vote in parliament won by - British PM Theresa May
• International Day of Cooperatives 2017 observed on - 1st July 2017
• Next Chief Election Commissioner - Achal Kumar Jyoti
• The oldest mummy on Silk Road unearthed by - China
• Who has been appointed as Attorney General of India? - KK Venugopal
• Who has taken over as Director-General of Indo-Tibetan Border Police? - RK Pachnanda
• Who has sworn in as Chief Executive of Hong Kong? - Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor

Current Affairs 2nd July 2017 - Details

Indian-origin boy Arnav Sharma gets - 162 IQ points

Arnav Sharma who is an 11-year-old Indian-origin boy in the United Kingdom, secured the top possible score of 162 on a Mensa IQ test. He secured two points more than astrophysicist Stephen Hawking and physicist Albert Einstein, making him one of the brainiest children in the world.
The Indian-origin boy passed the infamously difficult test a few weeks back without any preparation.
Sharma’s score in the exam, which mainly measures verbal reasoning ability, puts him among the top one percent of the nation in terms of IQ level.
The boy currently attends Crossfields School on the outskirts of Reading town in southern England, has been selected for Eton College and Westminster, both highly competitive and sought-after schools, with zero preparation.

More about Mensa

• Mensa founded in 1946 in Oxford by Lancelot Lionel Ware, a scientist and lawyer and Roland Berrill, an Australian barrister, is the largest and oldest high IQ society in the world.
• Its membership is open to anyone who can demonstrate an IQ in the top 2 percent of the population, measured by a recognized or approved IQ testing process.

PM Modi to discuss counter-terrorism at G20 Summit - World leaders

Leaders of the world’s 20 largest economies will converge at the upcoming 12th G20 Summit on 7th and 8th July 2017 at Hamburg, a major port city in northern Germany. The topics that are expected to dominate the discussion will be including counter-terrorism and economic reforms.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be leading the Indian delegation at the summit. Some of the other members of the delegation include NITI Aayog vice-chairman, India’s G20 Sherpa Arvind Panagariya and the Department Of Economic Affairs Secretary. The theme of the summit this year is shaping an interconnected world and it has been mainly organized around three pillars- Sustainability Stability and Responsibility.

Confidence vote in parliament won by - British PM Theresa May

British Prime Minister Theresa May narrowly won the confidence vote in the parliament on 30th June 2017 winning her first major test as the Prime Minister of a minority government in the United Kingdom (UK).

After this, May was finally confirmed as the British Prime Minister three weeks after the election, after winning the vote on her legislative program also called the Queen's Speech.

After getting support from the small ultra-conservative Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) supported her that leads to the of approval of 323 votes in favor of May legislative program and 309 against in the 650-seat parliament. In order to get the victory of her minority government, May struck a deal with the DUP and its 10 MPs at Westminster. However, in return, she had to agree for funding a package worth a billion pounds for DUP's projects in Northern Ireland. The vote on the Queen's Speech is taken as a vote of confidence on the Government as a whole which means that May had to quit incase she lost it. Rejection of the legislative plan would have been a major blow to May's already weak administration.

International Day of Cooperatives 2017 observed on - 1st July 2017

The International Day of Cooperatives 2017 was observed across the world on 1st July 2017 with the theme International Day of Cooperatives is Co-operatives ensure no-one is left behind. As per the United Nations, co-operatives' open membership model affords access to wealth creation and poverty eradication. This results from the co-operative principle of member's economic participation: 'Members contribute equitably to, and democratically control, the capital of their co-operative.'
More about International Day of Cooperatives

• This day is celebrated annually for the co-operative movement.
• Since 1923, this day is celebrated on first Saturday in July by the International Co-operative Alliance.
• On 16th December 1992, the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed in resolution 47/90 "the first Saturday of July 1995 to be International Day of Cooperatives, marking the centenary of the establishment of the International Cooperative Alliance."
• Co-operatives around the world celebrate the day in various ways and every year the organizing institutions agree on a common theme for the celebrations.

Next Chief Election Commissioner - Achal Kumar Jyoti

AK Jyoti, a 1975-batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer of Gujarat cadre, will be the next Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) of India. Zaidi is due to retire from his post on 6th July 2017. He took over as the CEC on 19th April 2015.After his retirement Mr. Jyoti will be taking the charge.
Achal Kumar Jyoti and O P Rawat is currently the Election Commissioner of India.
Currently, he is the senior-most official in the Election Commission.
An EC or a CEC has a total tenure of six years in office or till he/she attains the age of 65 years, whichever comes earlier.
More about Achal Kumar Jyoti

• Jyoti born on 23rd January 1953 is an IAS officer from the Gujarat cadre.
• He has also served as the Chairman of the Kandla Port Trust between 1999-2004 and Managing Director of the Sardar Sarovar Narmada Nigam Ltd (SSNNL).
• He has also served as the Chief Secretary of Gujarat and then State Vigilance Commissioner of Gujarat after the retirement as the chief secretary in January 2013.

The oldest mummy on Silk Road unearthed by - China

China has unearthed the mummified remains of 1700 years old a middle-aged man at the less frequented section of the ancient Silk Road on the edge of China's Qinghai-Tibet plateau.
It was found on the construction site in the town of Mang'ai. A senior Chinese official stated that the mummy is in a good shape. It is perhaps the oldest and the best-preserved mummy so far discovered on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.

Important Details

• The body measures 162 centimeters and features perfectly preserved skin and hair remnants with his hands crossed over the abdomen.
• It is believed that the body is of a man in his 40s.
• Archaeologists will be conducting his DNA tests to know further about the man's ethnicity and identity.
• Mummies are usually formed in a very dry environment which prevent bodies from decaying.

Who has been appointed as Attorney General of India? - KK Venugopal

Senior advocate and constitutional expert KK Venugopal was appointed as the 15th Attorney General of India on 30th June 2017 by President Pranab Mukherjee after his name was proposed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Venugopal will going to succeed Mukul Rohatgi, who is returning to private practice after a three-year term as the Attorney General of India, country's top law position. He is returning as a law officer after four decades. Earlier, in 1977, he had served as Additional Solicitor General.

More about KK Venugopal

• Venugopal belongs to Kerala’s Kasargode district and he started his legal career in Mysore in 1954, before practising at the Madras High Court under his father, late barrister M K Nambiar.
• He started appearing in the Supreme Court in the early 1960s while being based in erstwhile Madras and was designated as a senior advocate by the Supreme Court in 1972.
• After five years, he was appointed as an Additional Solicitor General in 1977.
• The Royal Government of Bhutan also appointed him to serve as the Constitutional adviser to draft the Constitution of Bhutan.
• He was conferred with Padma Vibhushan award in 2015 and the Padma Bhushan, the third-highest civilian honor.
• He is a collector of antiquarian books and owns a large personal library , including many books published in the 17th and 18th century.
• He also donates a huge sum of his income for legal education, medical facilities in tribal areas of Kerala and other charitable purposes.

Who has taken over as Director-General of Indo-Tibetan Border Police? - RK Pachnanda

Former Calcutta Police Commissioner RK Pachnanda took over as the Director-General of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) on 30th June 2017. He was handed over the baton of the approximately 90000 mountain warfare-trained force by outgoing Director General Krishna Chaudhary.

He is a 1983 batch IPS officer of Bengal cadr and serving as the Director General of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) presently. Pachnanda owns the rare distinction of serving in all the major central para-military forces and organizations including the CISF,the CRPF, the Special Protection Group (SPG), the BSF,the CBI and the NDRF.

He also took charge of the paramilitary force in the backdrop of a face-off between and Chinese troops and Indian troops on the border in Sikkim. The ITBP guards the 3488km border with China that passes through five states - Himachal Pradesh, Sikkim,Arunachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Jammu and Kashmir.

Who has sworn in as Chief Executive of Hong Kong? - Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor

Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor was sworn in as the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) on 1st July 2017. Lam took her oath before President Xi Jinping, who was presented in the swearing-in ceremony.

With this, Lam has become Hong Kong's fifth Chief Executive since 1997 and the first female in the history to hold the post. Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor and her Cabinet had sworn to serve China and Hong Kong and to uphold the Basic Law, the territory's mini-constitution. The other Members of the Executive Council of the HKSAR were sworn in by Lam afterwards.