1. Sherpa Lakhpa first woman to scale Mt.
Everest seven times

(i)
Nepalese woman Sherpa Lakhpa has scaled the Mt. Everest for the seventh time,
breaking her own record for the most summits of the world’s highest mountain by
a woman.

(ii) The
42-year-old, who works in a 7-Eleven store in the US, reached the peak of the
8,850-metre Everest from the Tibetan side.

(iii) Two other
Sherpa climbers share between them the record for 21 ascents of Everest.

2. Brussels bomber’s brother wins gold at European
Taekwondo Championships

(i) Mourad
Laachraoui, brother of suicide bomber Najim Laachraoui, has won the 54 kg final
at the European Taekwondo Championships by overcoming Spaniard Jesus Tortosa
6-3 in Montreux, Switzerland.

(ii) The
21-year-old Mourad will now proceed to participate in the 2016 Rio Olympics.

(iii) Najim,
was one of men who orchestrated the bomb attacks in the check-in area of
Zaventem airport on March 22 this year. Later, a third bomb was made to explode
at Maelbeek metro station, as a result of which 32 people died.

3. Emmy-winning actor Alan Young dies at 96

(i) Emmy award-winning
actor Alan Young has passed away at the age of 96. He will be remembered for
his role in the sitcom Mr Ed. which ran for six seasons from 1960-1966.

(ii) Young
also starred in many films, including The Time Machine. In 1951, he won a
Primetime Emmy award as best actor for The Alan Young Show.

(iii) Later,
he also wrote cartoons and gave voice to several characters. He was the voice
of Scrooge McDuck in Disney’s TV series Duck Tales. He also lent voice for cartoons like Scooby-Doo and The Smurfs.

(iv) He was
born in the UK, educated in Canada and later acquired US citizenship.

4. US House approves amendment to place India
on par with NATO allies

(i) The US
House of Representatives has approved amendments to a defence bill which would bring
India on par with NATO allies as regards sale of weapons and technology
transfer besides strengthening bilateral defence ties.

(ii) The
amendment has been made a part of the National Defence Authorisation Act (NDAA)
2017.

(iii) For
the US, the legislation encourages the executive branch to appoint an official
to concentrate on US-India defence cooperation, enable defence technology transfer,
maintain a special office in the Pentagon exclusively for the US-India Defence
Technology and Trade Initiative (DTTI), bolster India’s military abilities by combined
military planning and encourage co-development opportunities.

(iv) Further,
it encourages the Indian government to allow combined military planning with
the US for missions of mutual benefit such as humanitarian assistance and
disaster relief, counter piracy, and maritime domain awareness.

5. HIFiRE hypersonic superjet technology test
fired in Australia

(i) A joint
US-Australian military research team has successfully tested the hypersonic
superjet technology as part of the Hypersonic International Flight Research
Experimentation (HIFiRE) program.

(ii) The scramjet
attached to a rocket booster was sent to an altitude of 278 km at Mach 7.5
(seven times the speed of sound).

(iii) The scramjet
was a supersonic combustion engine that uses oxygen from the atmosphere for
fuel, making it lighter and faster than fuel-carrying rockets.

(iv) The
HIFiRE program aims to delve into the fundamental science of hypersonics and
the potential for next generation aeronautical systems.

 (v) The jet was tested at the world’s largest
land-based testing range in Woomera, South Australia.

6. World Health Statistics 2016: Monitoring
Health for the SDGs released

(i) As per
the World Health Organisation’s ‘World Health Statistics 2016: Monitoring for the
SDGs’, life expectancy in the world has risen by five years since 2000. This is
the fastest increase in lifespans since the 1960s.

(ii) Babies
born in 2015 can expect to live another 71.4 years (73.8 years for females;
69.1 years for males). The longest lifespans are in Japan, where last year’s
newborns are expected to live to almost 84, followed by Switzerland, Singapore,
Australia and Spain.

(iii)
Africa still has the shortest life expectancy; babies born in Sierra Leone in
2015 have a life expectancy of just over 50 years. Those in Angola, Central
African Republic, Chad and Ivory Coast are likely to live only a little longer.

(iv)
Improved child survival rates, malaria control and better access to drugs to
keep HIV at bay have led to a substantial rise in life expectancy in the
African region- it is up by 9.4 years to an average age of 60.

7. Sebi announces stricter P-Note norms

(i) The
Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has toughened up norms for
participatory notes (P-notes or PNs) in order to curb money laundering through
this medium.

(ii) The
Sebi board has decided to increase disclosure requirements for issuance of
P-notes, which would enable the regulator to know the beneficial owners of
these instruments at any point of time. 
To enhance control over issuance and transfer of offshore derivative
instruments (ODIs) or PNs, Sebi has announced that ODI subscribers will have to
seek prior permission of the original ODI issuer for further/onward
issuance/transfer of ODIs.

(iii) P-notes are derivative instruments issued by registered
foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) to overseas investors to enable them to
trade in Indian stocks without having to register with the regulator. Presently,
P-note subscribers do not have
to take permission of the P-note issuer before transferring it to another offshore
investor.

(iv) The issuer FPIs have been made more accountable because
Sebi cannot directly exercise control over the downstream purchasers and that is
where the PN route is highly misused.

8. Indian-American
professor Dr Rakesh Jain to receive National Medal of Science

(i) US President Barack Obama will present Indian-American Dr
Rakesh Jain with the National Medal of Science, the highest honour in the field
of science and technology.

(ii) Dr Jain, Dr Rakesh K Jain is an alumnus of IIT-Kanpur and
professor of tumor biology at Massachusetts General Hospital in the Harvard
Medical School.

(iii) Jain has received various awards for his work on tumor
biology, especially research on the link between tumor blood vessels and enhancing
the effects of chemotherapy and radiation treatment.

(iv) The National Medal of Science was established in 1959
and is annually presented by the National Science Foundation. The Medal
recognises individuals for their remarkable contributions in the field of science
and engineering.

9. G-7 FMs and
central bank governors’ meeting ends

(i) The meeting between finance ministers and central bank
heads of the G-7 nations, which was held in Japan’s Sendai city on May 20 and
21, focussed on bolstering and balancing global economic growth as the Chinese
economy remains sluggish along with other emerging economies.

(ii) Central bank governors and finance ministers of the
seven most developed countries, namely Japan, the US, Germany, Britain, France,
Italy and Canada, and their European Union counterparts converged for the two-day
event.

(iii) Heads of major financial institutions, including the International
Monetary Fund (Christine Lagarde), World Bank (Jim Yong Kim), Eurogroup (Jeroen
Dijsselbloem) and OECD (Angel Gurria) along with professors from top
universities discussed significant macroeconomic challenges in order to
identify ways to fuel growth.

(iv) However, the meeting ended with disagreements as
regards fiscal policies. While Japan and the US called for members to boost
fiscal stimulus, Germany and Britain stressed on fiscal austerity. However, G-7
officials agreed that countries are free to take measures to cater to their individual
economic situation.

10. Cabinet approves ordinance
to keep state out of NEET for 1 year

(i) The Union Cabinet
has approved an ordinance to keep state boards out of the uniform medical
entrance examination – NEET – for this year.

(ii) The ordinance aims
to “partially” countermand a Supreme Court verdict that said all government
colleges, deemed universities and private medical colleges would fall under the
NEET.

(iii) Though the
exemption is only for state government seats, state seats that are earmarked in
private medical colleges have also been exempted. States allocate around 12-15%
seats in private medical colleges for state quota so that students from one state
can get a seat in another.

(iv) The remaining
seats in such colleges are reserved for domicile students. With this ordinance,
remaining seats meant for domicile students will come under NEET.

11. Ratan P Watal appointed as Principal Adviser for social sector in NITI Aayog

a) Former finance Secretary Ratan P Watal has been appointed as the Principal Advisor for Social Sector in NITI Aayog.

b) Watal, a retired IAS officer of Andhra Pradesh cadre, had been Finance Secretary between August last year and April this year.He has been appointed to the post for three years.

c) National Institution for Transforming India, also called NITI Aayog, was formed via a resolution of the Union Cabinet on 1 January 2015. It replaces the decades old Planning Commission of India.

12. Anurag Thakur unanimously elected BCCI president

a) Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) unanimously elected Anurag Thakur as its president while Ajay Shirke was chosen as secretary in a smooth change of guard at a time when the world’s richest Board is sailing through choppy waters.

b) Anurag will replace Shashank Manohar who quit the post to take up ICC’s Chairman position. He will stay in charge till 2017.

c) Thakur (41) will be the second youngest president to BCCI, first being Fatehsinghrao Gaekwad who was appointed at the age of 33.

d) Thakur, the son of former Himachal Pradesh chief minister Prem Kumar Dhumal, is a three-time member of the Lok Sabha from Hamirpur. Thakur also leads the party’s youth wing-Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha.

13. UN appoints Mary Robinson, Macharia Kamau as special envoys for El Nino, climate

a) UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has appointed former Irish president Mary Robinson and Kenyan diplomat Macharia Kamau as special envoys for El Nino and climate.

b) El Nino occurs every two to seven years and affects rainfall patterns and causes both drought and flooding. The four worst affected regions are East Africa, Southern Africa, Central America and the Pacific. Ethiopia is facing its worst drought in 50 years.

c) The new envoys will be responsible for dealing with the upcoming challenges and build a long term approach to build the resilience of the most vulnerable.

14. Oldest Olympic champion Sandor Tarics dies

a) World’s oldest living Olympic champion Sandor Tarics dies at the age of 102 in San Francisco. He was a member of Hungary’s gold-medal winning waterpolo team in the 1936 Games.

b) A keen mathematician since his early age and an engineer by profession, he left Hungary after the Communist Party takeover in 1948 and settled in San Francisco where he was a university professor.

c) He attained prominence for his work in earthquake research, and in particular his design of earthquake-proof building technologies. He attended the 2012 London Olympics as the oldest living champion.

15. Kiran Bedi appointed Lieutenant Governor of Puducherry

a) Former IPS Officer and BJP member, Kiran Bedi has been appointed as the Lieutenant Governor of Puducherry, the post that was vacant for two years.

b) The appointment came three days after the Congress-DMK alliance won 17 seats in the 30-member state Assembly.

c) A sports lover and an author, Bedi is a recipient of Ramon Magsaysay Award as well as UN Medal for outstanding service.

16. India’s first reusable space shuttle, RLV-TD launched from Sriharikota

a) India successfully launched the first technology demonstrator of indigenously made Reusable Launch Vehicle (RLV), capable of launching satellites into orbit around earth and reentering the atmosphere, from Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.

b) This hypersonic flight experiment lasted for about 10 minutes. The 6.5 metre-long ‘aeroplane’-like structure weighing 1.75 tons was hoisted into the atmosphere on a Solid rocket motor weighing nine tonnes.

c) RLV-TD is a series of technology demonstration missions that have been considered as a first step towards realising a Two Stage To Orbit (TSTO) fully reusable vehicle.

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