(Current Affairs questions are from the period April 1st to 15th. Questions 11 to 20 pertain to Chennai and Tamil Nadu.)

1. What landmark law for children came into effect in India on April 1st?

2. Who was the first person to be ‘houselisted’ in the massive National biometric census launched on April 1st?

3. It was recently announced that three new species from Phylum Loricifera with a unique trait, generally inconceivable for living beings, have been discovered in the depths of the Mediterranean Sea. What trait?

4. Which legendary tennis star, winner of multiple Wimbledon tennis titles, has announced that she has been diagnosed with breast cancer and described it as ‘my own personal 9/11’?

5. That new element with atomic number 117, that American and Russian scientists have created by accelerating an atom of calcium in a cyclotron and smashing it into an atom of berkelium, has been (for the moment) named...?

6. Which European country’s President was killed along with his entourage when their plane, going to mark the 70th anniversary of the Katyn massacre, crashed in Severny in Smolensk Oblast, Russia?

7. On April 10th, a famous linen cloth measuring 1.21m by 4.42m went on display for the first time in a decade in an Italian city. Name the exhibit.

8. To which eminent institution in the U.S. is Twitter donating its archives of tweets, going back to the first one posted by co-founder Jack Dorsey on March 21, 2006?

9. According to a recent report from the United Nations University’s Institute for Water, Environment and Health (IWEH), what disturbing ‘telecom’ statistic has been noted in India? (Hint: It has something to do with sanitation.)

10. Name the Icelandic volcano, whose second eruption on April 14th, caused extensive air travel disruption all over Northern Europe.

* * *

11. Which public official from Chennai was given the Prime Minister’s award for Excellence in Governance for 2008-09 for ‘Cervical Cancer Screening evolving a new methodology – a life-saving initiative of Chennai Corporation’?

12. Who was the First Agent of Madras? He took office in March 1640.

13. Name the Deputy Mayor of Chennai.

14. Which imposing edifice in Nagapattinam District was built in 1620 by Ovo Gedde?

15. Where can you see the ‘Tamra Sabha’ (hall of copper) associated with Lord Nataraja?

16. Who wrote Prathapa Mudaliar Charithram, considered the first novel in Tamil language?

17. To which Nobel Laureate is this quote about the Thirukkural attributed: “There hardly exists in the literature of the world a collection of maxims in which we find such lofty wisdom”?

18. Traditionally, in measuring grain, how many aazhaakkus are there to a padi?

19. Name the three districts in Tamil Nadu whose names start with the letter ‘V’.

20. What does WIA stand for in the name of the Cancer Institute (WIA), Adyar?