24 April 2015 Current Affairs

1) The famous Gorkha Rifles of the Indian Army completed how many years of its existence on 24 April 2015? – 200 years

Explanation: Gorkhas are considered one of the fiercest fighters in the world. They have made a name for themselves throughout the world for their courage. The Gorkhas completed 200 years of soldiering in India under the British, and, later, the Indian flag, on 24 April 2015. Comprising not just the gritty Gorkhas, but also men from Kumaon and Garhwal regions, Sir Robert Colquhuon had raised the first battalion of Gorkhas on 24 April 1815 in Uttaranchal’s Almora. Only a few others including the Madras and Grenadiers Regiments (1758), Punjab Regiment (1761), Rajputana Rifles (1775), Rajput Regiment (1778), Jat Regiment (1795) and Kumaon Regiment (1813) are among the other native infantry regiments that preceded them. The unit that was raised on that day still serves with the Indian Army.

2) Which personality of Indian origin was sworn-in as the 19th Surgeon-General of the United States on 22 April 2015 to become the highest ranking Indian-American in the Obama administration? – Vivek Murthy

Explanation: 37-year old Vivek Murthy was sworn in as U.S. Surgeon-General by Vice-President Joe Biden at a ceremony held at Fort Myer in Virginia. He thus became the youngest-ever in-charge of the country’s public health. Murthy is a Vice Admiral in the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps. He comes from an immigrant family from Karnataka (India). He was just three when his family migrated from England to Miami (Florida). He received his bachelor’s degree from Harvard. From there, he earned his medical degree and master’s in business administration at Yale University. In addition to practising internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, he in 2009 started a non-profit organisation called, “Doctors for America”.

3) Union Cabinet on 22 April 2015 cleared amendments to the Juvenile Justice Act. What is the most important clause of this proposed Act? – It would allow juveniles aged between 16 and 18 to be tried as adults for heinous crimes such as murder and rape

Explanation: The proposed new law gives the Juvenile Justice Board the power to assess whether the perpetrator of a heinous crime aged between 16 and 18, had acted as a ‘child’ or as an ‘adult.’ The Juvenile Justice Act of 2000 came under intense scrutiny after the 2012 Delhi gang rape in which a juvenile was found to be guilty, along with four adults. On April 6 this year, the Supreme Court had asked the government to re-visit the law so that a juvenile cannot get away with rape and murder by claiming he is too young to understand the consequences of his crime. The bill associated with this proposed Act will now be presented before the Parliament.

4) The popular video-sharing site YouTube on 23 April 2015 completed how many years of its existence? – 10 years

Explanation: YouTube was created by three former employees of PayPal – Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim – in February 2005. However, the first video on this site was uploaded on titled “Me at the Zoo” featuring Jawed Karim at the San Diego was uploaded on 23 April 2005. Thus the site completed 10 years of its first video upload on 23 April 2015. Search engine company Google acquired YouTube for $1.65 shares of Google in November 2006. YouTube is now world’s third most visited site on the Internet after Google and Facebook. Today, YouTube has 800 million unique users a month and 300 hours of new videos are uploaded to the site every minute, three times more than in 2014. Since 2010 the company has been headquartered in San Bruno, California.

5) The Hubble Telescope completes 25 years of its launch on 24 April 2015. It has provided breathtaking images, produced fundamental discoveries and brought about a paradigm shift in our understanding of the universe since its launch in 1990. This iconic telescope is a joint venture between which two space entities? – NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA)

Explanation: The Hubble, which has so far travelled more than 3 billion miles, has made more than 1.2 million observations since 1990 by completing an orbit around the Earth every 97 minutes at a speed of about 8 km per second. It was launched in its orbit 552 km above Earth on 24 April 1990 by NASA’s space shuttle Discovery. It has now become almost a household name with the innumerable discoveries it has made in its 25 years lifespan.

6) What is the name of the volcano in Chile which erupted for the first time in more than 42 years on 22 April 2015 resulting in evacuation of residents from nearby areas? – Calbuco Volcano

Explanation: Calbuco Volcano is located in southern Chile and is little more than 1,000 kilometres south of Chile’s capital, Santiago. It is considered one of the top three most potentially dangerous among Chile’s 90 active volcanoes. It last erupted in 1972. This eruption resulted in the evacuation of the 1,500 inhabitants of the nearby town of Ensenada along with residents of two smaller communities.

Get Rs. 10 Free Recharge Daily : Click here