News Flash (11th June 2020): Top 10 Stories Of The Day

1. Mizoram postpones class 12 board exams, will resume on July 1

Class 12 board exams of the Mizoram students were again postponed due to the Covid-19 outbreak. Now the exams will resume from July 1. The Mizoram Board of School Education, MBSE, had previously scheduled the HSSLC examinations from, June 16, 2020. Now, the remaining class board examinations will be held between July 1 and July 3, as notified by the Mizoram Board of School Education on.

2. Asiatic Lions’ population at the Gir Forest up by almost 29%: PM Modi

Our Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently gave out positive news through his twitter handle. He congratulated the people of Gujarat and lauded their efforts taken to increase the population of Asiatic lions, living in the state’s Gir forest. The number of these lions s increased by 29% to 674, according to the Gujarat Forest Department. Additionally, the area inhabited by lions too has increased by 36% from 22,000 sq km in 2015 to 30,000 sq km in 2020. The population of 674 lions consists of 161 males, 260 females, 116 sub-adult lions, and 137 cubs.

3. Johnson & Johnson to start human trial of COVID-19 vaccine by July

Drugmaker, Johnson & Johnson will soon start  human clinical trials for its experimental vaccine against COVID-19 sometime in the mid of July. J&J signed contracts with the U.S. government to build sufficient production capacity to manufacture approximately 1 billion doses of the vaccine by 2021, even before it has evidence that it works. 

4. US senate appoints General Charles Brown Jr, as 1st black US Air Force Chief

The US Senate unanimously decided to appoint General Charles Brown Jr as chief of staff of the US Air Force. With this, he will be the first African American to serve as a service chief in the US military. Previously Brown served as the commander of US Pacific Air Forces. This decision of the US Senate comes after the worldwide protests over George Floyd’s death.

5. Scientists capture world’s largest green turtle colony in Australia in drone video

A drone video of the world’s largest green turtle rookery at Raine Island located in Australia was captured by the scientists of the Queensland Government’s Department of Environment and Science (DES). The largest population of nesting green turtles is almost twice as big as previously thought, scientists said. Scientists have assumed that about 64,000 green turtles are waiting to lay eggs on Raine Island. These turtles which are green in color are known after the color of their cartilage and fat. They are found mostly in tropical and subtropical waters, and migrate to long distances between feeding grounds and the beaches. 

6. As company’s stock doubles day after IPO, Zoominfo Founders become billionaires

The co-founders of ZoomInfo, an American business-intelligence company, Henry Schuck and Kirk Brown have become billionaires after the company’s stock more than doubled post it’s June 4 IPO(Initial Public Offer), Bloomberg reported. The Nasdaq-hosted IPO raised over $900 million. ZoomInfo, founded in the year 2000, is known to provide access to its database of information about business people and firms to sales, marketing and recruiting experts.

7. ED brings back jewellery of Nirav & Choksi’s firm worth Rs 1,350 cr to India

Enforcement Directorate (ED), in a major development in the Punjab National Bank (PNB) scam, has brought back, pearls, polished diamonds, gems and other jewelry from Hong Kong which is worth approximately Rs 1,350 crore. It is owned by Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi. “Values of these goods have been declared as Rs 1,350 crore approx. These include polished diamonds, pearls and silver jewellery…The consignments were brought to Navi Mumbai today (Wednesday) and they weigh approximately 2,340 kg,” an ED official told ThePrint. 

8. Anand Mahindra invests $1 mn in Hapramp startup.

Anand Mahindra, chairman of the Mahindra Group has invested $1 million in Hapramp, a social media startup. On his official Twitter handle, Anand Mahindra announced the investment and said that he has finally found the startup he had been looking for since the past two years. “Took 2 yrs, but I finally found the start-up I was looking for! Hapramp is indigenous, built by 5 young founders & brings together a best-in-class combination of creativity, technology & data protection. Look out for GoSocial, their social networking platform,” his tweet read.

9. Cryostat base made by L&T installed at world’s largest nuclear fusion project

L&T Heavy Engineering has made a 1,250-tonne cryostat base which is now installed at France’s International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER). It is the world’s biggest nuclear fusion project. This science experiment, worth $22 billion is backed by the EU, the US, China, India, Japan, South Korea and Russia. The cryostat base is the single largest and heaviest tokamak component.

10. Maha CM says if lockdown turns risky, will have to impose lockdown again.

Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray of Maharashtra, during a press conference today said that if people failed to abide by the current guidelines of restrictions, imposed to contain the spread of COVID-19, the state government will be forced to reimpose lockdown in the state. “The government is taking cautious steps for ‘Mission Begin Again’. Like we imposed the lockdown in phases, it will have to be lifted in a phased manner. The danger is yet to pass. But, we cannot bring the economic cycle to a grinding halt even as we fight coronavirus,” CM Thackeray said during the press conference. As reported by PTI, he also added, “If the relaxations to the lockdown start turning out to be risky, we will be compelled to re-impose the lockdown.”