Two-time Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova said 0n jan 1 that  she was pregnant and putting her career on hold as the new season is due to start in Australia.

The 33-year-old world number 17 married her coach Jiri Vanek in July 2023.

Kvitova, the Wimbledon champion from 2011 and 2014, has won 31 WTA singles titles.

Q1. Name the  one of the most important figures in German politics and an icon of budgetary rigour in the eurozone who  has died aged 81 ?

1. Wolfgang Schaeuble
2. Bernhard von Bülow
3. Angela Merkel
4. Konrad Adenauer
5. None of These

Q2. Name the Information technology company  which has filed a lawsuit against its former chief financial officer Jatin Dalal who joined rival Cognizant this month ?

1. Coforge
2. Wipro
3. Tata Consultancy Services
4. Infosys
5. None of These

Q3. Name country’s largest telecom service provider  which is working with the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay to launch a Bharat GPT programme ?

1. Bharti Airtel
2. Vodafone Idea Limited
3. Reliance Jio
4. Tata Communications
5. None of These

Q4. Name the latest Stealth Guided Missile Destroyer which has been inducted by the Indian Navy at Naval Dockyard in Mumbai  on Dec 26 ?

1. INS Vishal
2. INS Vikramaditya
3. INS Vikrant
4. INS Imphal
5. None of These

Q5. Name the African country in which 20 people were killed by the RED-Tabara rebel group recently ?

1. Niger
2. Mali
3. Senegal
4. Burundi
5. None of These

Answers

1-----------------1 Wolfgang Schaeuble

2-----------------2   Wipro

3------------------3  Reliance Jio

4-----------------4  INS Imphal

5----------------4  Burundi

The pro-talks faction of the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) on  Dec 29  signed a peace accord with the central and Assam governments agreeing to shun violence and join the mainstream.

The agreement, signed in the presence of Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, came after 12 years of unconditional negotiations between the ULFA faction led by Arabinda Rajkhowa and the government.

The peace pact is expected to end decades old insurgency in Assam.

However, the hardline faction of the ULFA headed by Paresh Baruah is not part of the agreement. Baruah is believed to be residing at a place along the China-Myanmar border.

Since then, it has been involved in subversive activities that led to the central government declaring it a banned outfit in 1990.

The Rajkhowa faction joined peace talks with the government on September 3, 2011, after an agreement for Suspension of Operations (SoO) was signed between it and central and state governments.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar was elected Janata Dal (United) president on Dec 29  with the party projecting him as the "hope of backwards, extremely backwards, minorities and unemployed youth" and urged bigger parties in the INDIA bloc to "show a big heart" to make the alliance successful.

The national council meeting followed the party's national executive meeting in which Lalan Singh stepped down as its president and Kumar was elected in his place at a time when the JD(U), whose political fortunes have been on a decline, gears up for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

The council unanimously endorsed Kumar's election. Both he and Singh also slammed the reports about a rift within the party, with Singh asserting that it will remain one and will never go back to allying with the BJP.

China on Dec 29  named former navy commander Dong Jun as its new defence minister, state media said, filling a vacancy created by the surprise removal of Li Shangfu in October.

Dong's promotion comes at a sensitive time as Beijing ups military pressure on the self-ruled island of Taiwan ahead of presidential elections next month.

It also comes as China and the United States seek to re-establish military-to-military lines of communication -- crucial if the two powers are to stop competition from turning into conflict.

Dong, born in 1961, was made commander of the navy in August 2021. He was replaced by Hu Zhongming earlier this month.

Dong previously served as deputy commander of the Chinese military's Southern Theater Command, which includes as its area of operation the South China Sea, where Beijing has territorial disputes with neighbouring countries.

His promotion comes as a surprise, however.

Many analysts had expected Liu Zhenli, a 59-year-old general and head of China's joint staff department, to become the new defence minister.

Firdaus Kharas, an India-born entrepreneur and thought leader, has been appointed as an officer of the Order of Canada, one of the country's highest honours, for advancing social change through human-centred media.

The annual list of 2023 appointees to the Order of Canada was released by Governor General of Canada Mary Simon on Dec 28.

The Order of Canada is one of our country's highest honours.

Veteran industrialist and former Tata Group Chairman Ratan Tata is looking to sell all 77,900 shares of Brainbees Solutions Ltd, which owns omnichannel baby and mother-care product platform FirstCry, in the upcoming IPO.

Tata became an investor in the company in 2016 by infusing Rs 66 lakh initially. He was allotted preference shares of the company.

According to the draft red herring prospectus (DRHP) filed on Dec 28 , Tata is offering to sell his entire 77,900 shares, amounting to a 0.02 per cent stake, of FirstCry.

The Pune-based company's proposed Initial Public Offering (IPO) comprises a fresh issue of equity shares aggregating up to Rs 1,816 crore and an Offer For Sale (OFS) of up to 5.44 crore equity shares by existing shareholders, as per the draft papers.

As a part of the OFS, SVF Frog, a Cayman Islands-registered entity of Softbank, will sell 2.03 crore equity shares of Brainbees Solutions Ltd, and automaker Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) will offload 28.06 lakh shares of the company.

Apart from Softbank and M&M, other selling shares in the OFS are PI Opportunities Fund, TPG, NewQuest Asia Investments, Apricot Investments, Valiant Mauritius, TIMF Holdings, Think India Opportunities Fund and Schroders Capital.

Indian start-up ecosystem faced multiple challenges including funding winter and layoffs in 2023 amid a tough macroeconomic environment. As per data sourced from Tracxn, start-ups managed to raise only $8.1 billion compared to nearly $25.2 billion in 2022. However, in December alone, start-ups managed to raise close to $860 million. Only two start-ups, Zepto and InCred, turned unicorns this year as against 24 in 2022 and 43 in 2021.

Also, this year saw over 16,000 layoffs in India, with Byju’s laying off over 3,500 employees and Paytm firing 1,000 employees. Somdutta Singh, Serial Entrepreneur, founder and CEO Assiduus Global, said start-up funding in India has reached its lowest point in five years, emphasising need for strategic pivoting and a renewed focus on resilience, sustainability, and operational efficiency.