General Awareness Questions

India’s space agency on Feb 15th, 2017 launched a record 104 satellites from a single rocket as it crossed another milestone in its low-cost space-exploration program. The satellites from seven countries were carried by the Indian Space Research Organization’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle on its 38th consecutive successful flight. On board was a 714kg satellite for earth observation and more than 100 smaller satellites weighing less than 10kg each. Three were Indian-owned, 96 were from US companies, and the rest belonged to companies based in Israel, Kazakhstan, the Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates. Most were owned by Planet Labs Inc, a US-based Earth-imaging company. 

The Robe

The mesosphere lies above the stratosphere and extends to an altitude of about 85 km. This is layer is often referred to as the cold layer, as the lowest readings in the atmosphere are found here.

Temperature decreases with height, reaching a minimum average value of -90 ºC at the top of the layer.

BP Kanungo was appointed as Deputy Governor in Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for three years. The Appointments Committee of Cabinet (ACC) has approved his appointment to the post with effect from the date of taking over the charge on or after April 3, an order issued by Personnel Ministry said. He has been appointed in place of R Gandhi, it said.
Kanungo was in March last year appointed as Executive Director in the central bank.

The State Bank of India (SBI) has tied-up with Tirumala Milk Products to provide loans to dairy farmers who supply milk to the latter. As per the scheme for financing dairy units, SBI offers loans for construction of shed, and purchase of milch animals, milking machine, and chaff cutter. Apart from this, the bank also provides loans to dairy societies for modernisation and creation of infrastructure such as purchase of automatic milk collection system, purchase of transport vehicles and bulk chilling unit. The Tirumala Milk Products is a South- based company, which was acquired by France-based Groupe Lactalis in 2014.