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Vol. XXVI No. 09, August 16-31, 2016
Quizzin with Ramanan
(Current Affairs questions are from the period July 16th to 31st. Questions 11 to 20 pertain to Chennai and Tamil Nadu.)
1. Who bought the pioneering portal Yahoo! for $4.83 billion in cash, ending the latter’s over 20-year run as an independent corporation?
2. Name the craft that recently became the first solar-powered aircraft to travel around the world without fuel.
3. Name the eminent Bengali author and social activist, winner of the Jnanpith and Ramon Magsaysay Awards, who passed away recently.
4. Name the young javelin thrower who set a world record and became India’s first-ever gold medallist in any world athletics championships.
5. In the recently released 2016 Fortune Global 500 list of the world’s biggest firms, which oil major was India’s top-most company at 161st place with revenues of $54.7b?
6. How did Rohit Khandelwal make news recently?
7. Malcolm Turnbull has become the Prime Minister for the second time of which Commonwealth and cricket-playing country?
8. On July 17th, the youngest Prime Minister (aged 37) of the country was sworn in. Name him and the nation.
9. Which online giant has successfully tested Aquila, the first ever high-altitude solar plane, to bring Internet access to remote parts of the world.
10. Kerala’s 86-year-old Dakshyani is all set to enter the Guinness World Records. For what achievement?
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11. At which prominent Mylapore building did the RBI’s Cash and Issue Department function during the World War II years?
12. Name the celebrated scriptwriter for films like Mullum Malarum and Sakalakala Vallavan, who passed away recently.
13. An Oregon State University team led by Dr. Mas Subramanian, who did his schooling and college in Chennai, has created a unique shade of blue. What is it called?
14. Which popular restaurant chain began as a small sweet shop founded by K.S. Thirupathi Raja and is now set to open its first outlet in the US?
15. What item of significance (that can’t be photographed) to Tyagaraja followers is kept in a house at Varahappa Iyer Lane, Thanjavur?
16. Where in the State was the country’s first green train corridor opened recently?
17. After which literary giant is the Taramani campus of the University of Madras named?
18. Which Chennai resident won the Ramaon Magsaysay Award recently?
19. The dome of which specific ratha at Mamallapuram served as the inspiration for the dome atop the multi-speciality hospital at Government Estate, Mount Road?
20. How do the resident’s of Madras remember the British peer Richard Plantagenet Campbell Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville?
1. Verizon; 2. Solar Impulse 2; 3. Mahasweta Devi; 4. Neeraj Chopra; 5. Indian Oil Corporation; 6. The actor, model and TV personality became the first Indian and first Asian to win the Mr. World title; 7. Australia; 8. Pema Khandu (Arunachal Pradesh); 9. Facebook; 10. The oldest living elephant.
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11. Lakshmi Vilas that later became Kamadhenu Theatre (and is now a marriage hall); 12. ‘Panchu’ Arunachalam; 13. YInMn Blue as it is a combination of Yttrium, Indium, and Manganese; 14. Adyar Ananda Bhavan; 15. The Rama idol that the great composer used to worship; 16. Between Rameswaram and Manamadurai; 17. Sekkizhar; 18. Musician T.M. Krishna; 19. Draupadi ratha; 20. He was the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos after whom the famous canal is named!
