Today's Event – 15th October 2021

• 1582 – Adoption of the Gregorian calendar begins, eventually leading to near-universal adoption.

• 1783 – The Montgolfier brothers' hot air balloon makes the first human ascent, piloted by Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier.

• 1793 – Queen Marie Antoinette of France is tried and convicted of treason

• 1809 – The Viceroy the Río de la Plata, Baltasar Hidalgo de Cisneros, opens the port of Buenos Aires to trade with nations other than Spain.

• 1815 – Napoleon begins his exile on Saint Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean

• 1878 – The Edison Electric Light Company begins operation.

• 1888 – The "From Hell" letter allegedly sent by Jack the Ripper is received by investigators.

• 1910 – Airship America is launched from New Jersey in the first attempt to cross the Atlantic by a powered aircraft.

• 1923 – The German Rentenmark is introduced in Germany to counter hyperinflation in the Weimar Republic.

• 1928 – The airship Graf Zeppelin completes its first trans-Atlantic flight, landing at Lakehurst, New Jersey, United States.

• 1932 – Tata Airlines (later to become Air India) makes its first flight.

• 1939 – The New York Municipal Airport (later renamed LaGuardia Airport) is dedicated.

• 1940 – President Lluís Companys of Catalonia is executed by the Francoist government.

• 1956 – FORTRAN, the first modern computer language, is first shared with the coding community.

• 1989 – Wayne Gretzky becomes the all-time leading points scorer in the NHL.

• 1990 – Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to lessen Cold War tensions and open up his nation.

• 1991 – The "Oh-My-God particle", an ultra-high-energy cosmic ray measured at 40,000,000 times that of the highest energy protons produced in a particle accelerator, is observed at the University of Utah HiRes observatory in Dugway Proving Ground, Utah.

• 1997 – The Cassini probe launches from Cape Canaveral on its way to Saturn.

• 2001 – NASA's Galileo spacecraft passes within 180 km of Jupiter's moon Io.

• 2003 – China launches Shenzhou 5, its first manned space mission

National Events- 

• Punya Salila Srivastava, a1993 batch AGMUT cadre officer, was on Thursday appointed as Additional Secretary in the Prime Minister’s Office. She was Additional Secretary in the Union Home Ministry and was holding the charge of spokesperson of the Ministry, especially during Covid times.  

•  The first-term board examinations for Classes 10 and 12 will be conducted offline in November-December and the date-sheet for the same will be announced on October 18, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) said on Thursday.

•  The employment and earning generating “Hunar Haats” for artisans and craftmen may soon be linked with  the popular marketing websites like Amazon and flipkart and will also  be increasingly focussing on the artisans belonging to socially backward Muslims.

• Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya on Thursday met former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, admitted to the AIIMS here after complaining of weakness following a fever, and enquired about his health even as Prime Minister Narendra Modi wished his predecessor a speedy recovery.  

• Voicing dissatisfaction over the probe into the Lakhimpur violence case after the "red-carpet arrest" of MoS Home Ajay Mishra's son, BKU leader Rakesh Tikait on Thursday said a fair investigation is not possible till the minister is removed from his post.

International Events- 

• Lebanon's interior minister says five people have been killed in armed clashes in Beirut that erupted Thursday during protests against the lead investigator into last year's massive blast at the city's port. Bassam Mawlawi told reporters Thursday that many of those injured were shot by snipers from buildings. 

•  China's Foreign Ministry on Thursday warned against what it called possible “political manipulation” of a renewed probe by the World Health Organization into the origins of the coronavirus, while saying it would support the international body's efforts.

•  The United States and Israel said on Wednesday they are exploring a “Plan B” for dealing with Iran if the Islamic Republic does not return in good faith to negotiations to salvage the languishing landmark 2015 nuclear deal.

•  China is preparing to send three astronauts to live on its space station for six months — a new milestone for a program that has advanced rapidly in recent years. 

• The Sri Lankan Navy has arrested 23 Indian fishermen and seized two trawlers for allegedly poaching in the country’s territorial waters, an official statement said on Thursday. The Navy arrested the fishermen off the coast of Vettilaikeni in the northern province’s point Pedro area. 

Job alerts-

• Goa Police Jobs for 773 Posts and other posts. Last date 08th November 2021

• Railway recruitment Cell, West Central Railway Jobs for Apprentice and other posts. Last date 10th November 2021

• Airport Authority of India Jobs for Apprentice and other posts. Last date 31st October 2021

Sports-

•  Kolkata Knight Riders captain Eoin Morgan has won the toss and elected to bowl first against Chennai Super Kings in the final of IPL 2021 at the Dubai International Stadium here on Friday.

•  Handed the leadership role for a second time just a few days ago, Afghanistan cricket team captain Mohammad Nabi acknowledged that he has a tough job at hand in the ICC T20 World Cup but is nonetheless hopeful of steering his strife-torn country "until the end" of the showpiece.

•  MS Dhoni’s experienced Chennai Super Kings will lock horns with resurgent Kolkata Knight Riders, led by Eoin Morgan, in the high-octane grand finale of IPL 2021 at Dubai International Stadium, here on Friday. 

•  Former Pakistan captain Javed Miandad believes a fearless approach would be crucial to his country’s chances of upstaging a star-studded India when the two arch-rivals clash in their highly-anticipated T20 World Cup opener on October 24. India have never lost to Pakistan in an ICC World Cup, either 50-over or T20.

• A couple of hours after its launch, the new jersey of the Indian cricket team was showcased in a scintillating light show on Burj Khalifa, the worlds tallest building, in Dubai.

Technology-

• HTC has launched a new entertainment and health focused VR headset 'Vive Flow' to take on Facebook's Oculus Quest 2. Priced at $499, it will be available via company's online store, as well as retailers around the world. 

•  India may not see a billion smartphone users even by the end of this decade and there are seven key challenges to achieve 100 per cent smartphone penetration, according to a new report.

•  Google recently announced that it will be launching Pixel 6 series smartphones on October 19 and now a new report has claimed that the upcoming Pixel phones will get four major Android updates as well as five years of security patches after their official launch later this month.

Economy – 

•  After a report accused Amazon of secretly exploiting internal data from its marketplace to copy products sold by other companies and manipulate search results in India, a group of US Senators has announced plans to introduce a non-discrimination bill that could rejig Amazon's online marketplace.

•  After slashing the import duty, the Department of Food and Public Distribution has asked all major oil producing states to take appropriate and immediate action to bring down the prices of edible oils in line with the import duty reductions.

•  NLC India Limited, A Navratna Company, Government of India Enterprise under administrative control of Ministry of Coal is operating Talabira II&III OCP (20.00 MTPA capacity) in Odisha State

•  Going past the 61,000-mark for the first time ever, the BSE Sensex soared 568.90 points or 0.94 per cent to finish at a new closing peak of 61,305.95. The index also marked its fresh intraday record of 61,353.25 during the day's trade.Similarly, the NSE Nifty surged 176.80 points or 0.97 per cent to a new lifetime closing high of 18,338.55.  

• In the ongoing Zee-Invesco tussle, the company's Managing Director and CEO Punit Goenka has now broken his silence charging the company's largest shareholder with hiding facts that prevented it from bringing facts about a merger proposal earlier.

Local –

•  Case filed against an AIIMS Delhi senior student on the grounds of rape and assault on a lady doctor in Delhi

•  Shiv Sena to hold Dusshera rally in Maharashtra

•  West Bengal registers 530 covid cases and 10 deaths

•  Tight security in Tripura over concerns of covid infection

• PM Modi to launch Rs. 5300 crore projects in Varanasi (U.P.)

GK – 

Which institution has formed a Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins on Novel Pathogens (SAGO)?

[A] UNICEF
[B] World Health Organisation
[C] FAO
[D] John Hopkins University

Malabar series of exercises began as a bilateral naval exercise between India and which country, in 1992?

[A] USA
[B] France
[C] Sri Lanka
[D] Bangladesh

Which institution releases the ‘Fiscal Monitor’ Report?

[A] World Bank
[B] Reserve Bank of India
[C] International Monetary Fund
[D] Reserve Bank of India