Top Best Current Affairs 8 July 2020

Virat Kohli has come under the scanner of conflict of interest following the question raised by Sanjeev Gupta on his current position. In this regard, Gupta wrote a mail to BCCI Ethics Officers DK Jain. Gupta had earlier raised such conflict-of-interest issues against Sachin Tendulkar, VVS Laxman and even present BCCI President Sourav Ganguly.

The Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee(IIT-R) announced that the IIT-R researchers team led by Prof. Soumitra Satapathi, Laboratory of Integrated Nanophotonics and Biomaterials, have developed the disinfection box - "Unisaviour" box, which can be used to sterilise various personal belongings to minimise the COVID-19 transmission.

India's First No-Permission No-Takeoff (NPNT) compliant drone flight on the A200 Remotely Piloted Aircraft System (RPAS) has been completed successfully by Quidich Innovation Labs and Asteria Aerospace in the green zone identified by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), near Tumkur in Karnataka. This NPNT drone flight is under the MoCA & DGCA comprehensive policy on use of UAVs, which came into effect on 1st Dec 2018.

For the 1st time in the world, Indian Railways will directly supply power to Overhead Traction System of train. To achieve this feat, Indian Railways has recently set up 1.7 MWp (mega watt power) at Bina (Madhya Pradesh) which shall be connected directly to Overhead Traction System. This has already been installed and is presently under extensive testing & will become operation in 15 days. Indian Railways has partnered with Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited under its Corporate Social Responsibility scheme for this first of its kind project in the world.

The Space Administration in the Directorate of Defense Research and Development (DDR&D), of the Israel Ministry of Defense (IMoD), and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), have successfully launched a new spy satellite "Ofek 16" into orbit by using a locally-developed Shavit rocket from a launchpad at Palmachim airbase in central Israel at 4:00 AM.

World Zoonoses Day is observed annually on July 6 to raise awareness of the risk of zoonotic diseases among people. The day commemorates French Biologist, Louis Pasteur who administered the first successful vaccine against the Rabies virus in July 6, 1885.

The 23 year-old G. Akash from Chennai, Tamil Nadu becomes the country's 66th Grandmaster with rating of 2495. The title was confirmed at the recent meeting of International Chess Federation (FIDE) Council.

In order to strengthen the bilateral development partnership, the Government of India has inked 5 Memoranda of understanding with Afghanistan under the former's high impact community development projects programme. The objective behind these MoUs is the development of educational infrastructure in four Afghan provinces namely Nooristan, Farah, Badakhshan and Kapisa.