DAILY GK UPDATE 8TH FEB.

1.    India, Bhutan to boost cooperation in hydro-power sector

i. India and Bhutan are to boost cooperation in hydro-power sector.

ii. India is to import almost 5,000 MW of hydel power from Bhutan by 2020.
NOTE: i. The Bhutanese Prime Minister Mr. Jigme Y Thinley is accompanied by Minister of Foreign Affairs Lynopo Khandu Wangchuk, Foreign Secretary Yeshey Dorji and other government officials of Bhutan.

ii. This was the focus of discussions between the visiting Bhutanese Prime Minister Jigme Y Thinley and Prime Minster Dr Manmohan Singh and other Indian leaders.

iii. Thinley's visit comes nearly a fortnight after Bhutan King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuckhad visited the country.

iv. The King was the chief guest at this year's Republic Day parade.

2.    EU leaders meet in Brussels to bridge deep divisions over Budget

i. European Union leaders are meeting in Brussels to try to bridge deep divisions over the Union's budget for the next seven years.

ii. The formal start of the summit was delayed by several hours as a series of bilateral meetings took place and serious difference emerged about the form of a possible compromise.

3.    India teledensity registers decrease:TRAI

i. As cellphone operators continued disconnecting inactive SIM cards, India's total telecom subscriber base declined by 25.97 million to 895.51 million in December. In November, the country had 921.47 million telecom subscribers.

ii. Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, Trai said that total wireless subscriber base decreased from 890.60 million in November 2012 to 864.72 million at the end of December 2012.

iii. Trai said, this decline is majorly due to large scale disconnections of inactive SIMs by some of the service providers. With this, the overall teledensity in India decreased to 73.34 per cent at the end of December, 2012 from 75.55 per cent in the previous month.

4.    India developing Agni-VI ballistic missile

i. India is developing a long-range nuclear-capable Agni-VI ballistic missile that would carry multiple warheads allowing one weapon system to take out several targets at a time.

ii.  DRDO Chief V.K. Saraswat said : "Agni-V is major strategic defence weapon. Now we want to make Agni-VI which would be a force multiplier,"

iii. Once Agni-6 is developed, it would propel India into the elite club of nations with such a capability including the US and Russia.

NOTE: The Agni-5 ballistic missile, which was test-fired in April last year, has a range of upto 5,500 kmsand it is believed that the Agni-6would have a range longer than its predecessor.

5.    Army gets its first indigenously-made Rudra attack chopper

i. The first ndigenously-developed weaponised helicopter 'Rudra' was on Friday handed over to the Army which has successfully raised an attack chopper fleet on its own.

ii. It will be the first platform (of choppers) which is weaponized. In any battle, fire (power) and manoeuvrability should be closely integrated to support ground operations and provide immediate help if and when required.

NOTE: i. This is the first of the 60 armed helicopters provided to the Army by the Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) after the defence ministry handed over the control of all attack helicopters to the land force.

6.    Big B wins `Timeless Style Icon` title

i. Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan has been named `Timeless Style Icon' in a recent poll conducted by a leading daily.

ii. The winners, which were announced at an event - Mumbai's Most Stylish 2013- on Thursday night, also included actors Sonam Kapoor and Akshay Kumar, who were chosen as Reader''s Choice Style Icons.

7.    Delhi to host literature festival

i. The national capital is all set to host its very own literature festival later this week featuring book launches, interaction with authors as well as a music show.

ii. Coming close on the heels of the Jaipur Literature Festival, the two-day literary event beginning 9th Februarywill host 10 sessions on different themes at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts.

iii.The two-day event, supported by the Delhi government, will come to an end on 10th February with a musical performance by Iranian folk lore music band Zakrus.

8.    Music festival to begin from 13th Feb

i. Over 350 artistes from different parts of the country will give 40 musical performances in Pushkar during the six-day long Blue Lotus festival in Rajasthan.

ii. In its first edition which will commence from 13 February, a series of events  will present the richness of genres such as sufi, folk, traditional, gypsy, tribal devotional, spiritual and indigenous music.

iii. Sambhav Bohra, festival director, said: “Concerts will be themed on wedding festivities, spiritual ceremonies, tribal rituals, folk dances of ancient communities, love songs from the desert peripheries and mythological tales of wandering ascetics,”

9.    World’s Largest Prime Number Discovered

i. Researchers from the University of Central Missouri in Warrensburg discovered the largest prime number of the world, Contains 17 Million Digits beating an earlier record of largest prime number by more than 4 million digits.

ii. The new largest prime number discovered by the researchers has more than 17 million digits and is an only 48th Mersenne prime found so far. It is the 14th discovery by GIMPS.

NOTE: i. All the prime numbers in the world can be divided by themselves and 1 only.

ii. However there are certain rare kinds of prime numbers called Mersenne primes which have the form 2 multiplied by itself p times minus 1, where p denotes a prime number.

iii. The new number now shot to 2 multiplied by itself 57885161 times minus 1 and this broke the record of finding the new and even larger primes.

10.  First Complete Bionic Man of the World Unveiled

i. First bionic man of the world called Rex was unveiled on 7 February 2013 at London's Science Museum.

ii. The bionic man was created using 1 million US dollar limbs as well as organs.

iii. Rex has a human face with brown eyes and a height of 6.5 feet. 

iv. It was designed jointly with assistance from 18 universities and companies.

v. Rex gave a hope that it was possible to replace the body parts with the artificial alternatives, for the very first time.

vi. Rex would remain in display at London's Science Museum from 7 February 201 to 11 March 2013.

NOTE: It is important to note that it is not possible for certain technology to function without the help of human input.

For example bionic hands require signals from brain and muscles to work properly. Other parts however, such as pancreas and heart can be designed to work automatically.  

11.  Sachin Tendulkar equals Sunil Gavaskar's record of first class 100s

i. Sachin Tendulkar on Friday equalled Sunil Gavaskar's record of most first-class hundreds by cracking a superbunbeaten century against Rest of Indiaon day three of the Irani Cup in Mumbai.

NOTE: i. Gavaskar had notched up 81 first-class hundreds between 1971 and 1997, including 34 in 125 Tests for India.

ii. Tendulkar, who has 51 Test hundreds in 194 games, needed 104when he went out to bat in his 479th innings in first class cricket for reaching the second landmark.