DAY – 48 ( INSTA REVISION TEST)INSTA REVISION PLAN 3.0, 2020

Solution: D

GPS Aided Geo Augmented Navigation (GAGAN) is a Satellite Based Augmentation System (SBAS) implemented jointly by ISRO and Airport Authority of India (AAI).

The main objectives of GAGAN are to provide Satellite-based Navigation services with accuracy and integrity required for civil aviation applications and to provide better Air Traffic Management over Indian Airspace. The system will be interoperable with other international SBAS systems and provide seamless navigation across regional boundaries. The first GAGAN navigation payload was flown on GSAT-8 which was launched on May 21, 2011 and the second on GSAT-10 launched on Sep 29, 2012.

The implementation of GAGAN has resulted into numerous benefits to the aviation sector in terms of fuel saving, saving in equipment cost, flight safety, increased air space capacity, efficiency, enhancement of reliability, reduction in work load for operators, coverage of oceanic area for air traffic control, high position accuracy, etc.
In addition to aviation sector, GAGAN is expected to bring benefits to other sectors like:

• Navigation and Safety Enhancement in Railways, Roadways, Ships, Spacecraft
• Geographic Data Collection
• Scientific Research for Atmospheric Studies
• Geodynamics
• Natural Resource and Land Management
• Location based services, Mobile, Tourism, etc.

https://www.sac.gov.in/Vyom/SatNavApplications.jsp

https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Hyderabad/500-passenger-trains-get-isro-enabled-gps/article29872470.ece

Solution: D

Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is an international, intergovernmental economic organization with 36 members.

As of now India is only member of various committees of OECD. India is not yet a member of OECD.

https://www.oecd.org/about/members-and-partners/

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/finance/indias-economy-to-grow-6-6-in-2020-24-oecd/articleshow/71864940.cms

Solution: C

Kalapani is located at an altitude of 3600m on the Kailash Manasarovar route. It borders Uttarakhand in India and Sudurpashchim Pradesh in Nepal.

Since the Indo-China war of 1962, Kalapani is controlled by India’s Indo-Tibetan Border Police. Nepal claims that the river located towards the west of the territory is the main Kali River and thus it falls in its territory, India claims a ridgeline towards the east of the Kalapani territory and hence, includes it in the Indian Union.

https://www.timesnownews.com/india/article/disputed-kalapani-territory-in-new-indian-map-why-the-territory-is-claimed-by-both-india-and-nepal/513125

Solution: C

The economic cost of food grains procured by the FCI is a total of MSP and bonus (if any) paid to the farmers plus the procurement incidentals and distribution cost.

The procurement incidentals are the initial costs incurred during procurement of foodgrains. The distribution costs include freight, handling charges, storage costs in godowns, losses during transit etc.

Solution: D

The largest portion are ECBs (commercial borrowings). Bilateral debt is the money India owes to foreign governments and Multilateral debt is the money India owes to international financial institutions such as the ADB or IMF. Clearly they are not the largest chunks.

India’s external debt is held in multiple currencies, the largest of which is the United States dollar. As on 31 December 2017, 48.2% of the country’s debt was held in U.S. dollars. The rest of the debt is held in Indian rupees (37.3%), special drawing rights (5.7%), Japanese yen (4.6%), Euros (3.2%) and other currencies (1%),

Solution: C

National Security Guard

Terrorism, both national and international raised its head in the west during the seventies. It manifested in many forms including hijacking of aircraft, taking of hostages, assassination of dignitaries and others.

The need for creating a special force for executing surgical operations based on tactical intelligence was felt in India when Operation Blue Star was carried out by the army at the Golden Temple, Amritsar in 1984.

National Security Guard (NSG) was conceptualised and created after studying and analyzing Special Force like SAS in the United Kingdom, GIGN in France, GSG-9 in Germany, Shar-etmatkal in Israel and Delta Force in the USA. Accordingly, NSG was raised in October, 1985 as a Federal Contingency Force under the MHA. It consists of selected and highly motivated personnel from the army as well as the central armed police.

53 per cent of the personnel are drawn from the army while the central armed police like BSF, CRPF and ITBP contribute 47 per cent.

NSG has a glorious heritage and is held in high esteem by the nation. Since raising, its commandos have been employed in 114 major successful counter terrorist operations, earning

numerous awards and rewards including three Ashok Chakras, two Kirti Chakras, three Shaurya Chakras and 10 PPMG. Nine NSG Commandos have also made the supreme sacrifice in living up to the NSG’s motto of Sarvatra Sarvottam Suraksha.

Solution: B

Lead-zinc ore

Rajasthan is endowed with the largest resources of lead-zinc ore amounting to 670.34 million tonnes (89.44 per cent), followed by Andhra Pradesh 22.69 million tonnes (3.02 per cent), Madhya Pradesh 14.84 million tonnes (1.98 per cent), Bihar 11.43 million tonnes (1.52 per cent) and Maharashtra 9.27 million tonnes (1.24 per cent).

Manganese Ore

Statewise, Odisha tops the total resources with 44 per cent share followed by Karnataka 22 per cent, Madhya Pradesh 12 per cent, Maharashtra and Goa 7 per cent each, Andhra Pradesh 4 per cent and Jharkhand 2 per cent.  Rajasthan, Gujarat and West Bengal together shared the remaining about 2 per cent resources.

Nickel

As per UNFC, as in 2015, the total resources of nickel ore have been estimated at 189 million tonnes. About 92 per cent resources; i.e., 175 million tonnes are in Odisha. The remaining 8 per cent resources are distributed in Jharkhand (9 million tonnes) and Nagaland (5 million tonnes). Nominal resources are reported from Karnataka (0.23 million tonnes).

Solution: c

Contingency Fund is created as an imprest account to meet some urgent or unforeseen expenditure of the government.

This fund was constituted by the government under Article 267 of the Constitution of India. This fund is at the disposal of the President.

Parliamentary approval for such expenditure and for withdrawal of an equivalent amount from the Consolidated Fund is subsequently obtained and the amount spent from Contingency Fund is subsequently recouped to the Fund. The corpus of the Fund authorised by the Parliament, at present, is ₹ 500 crore.

Solution: C

The Ministry of Communications has launched ‘National Broadband Mission’ that will facilitate universal and equitable access to broadband services across the country, especially in rural and remote areas.

The mission aimed at providing broadband access in all villages in the country by 2022. .

Under the mission, the government plans to lay incremental 30 lakh route km of Optical Fiber Cable. The Centre will work with States and UTs for having consistent policies pertaining to expansion of digital infrastructure including for Right of Way (RoW) approvals required for laying of optical fibre cable.

Solution: B

India Teacher Education Portal (Prashikshak): The Department of School Education and Literacy, launched ‘India Teacher Education Portal (Prashikshak)’ in 2016. This portal is helpful in monitoring of teacher’s education Institutions and in providing comprehensive information to prospective students and teachers to select the right institute as per choice.

SAKSHAM – a Scholarship for Differently-Abled Children

SAKSHAM – Scholarship Scheme for differently-abled children aims at providing encouragement and support to differently-abled children to pursue technical education. Scholarships amounting to ₹ 5 crore per annum as tuition fees and incidentals are to be provided to needy and meritorious students for pursuing technical education at AICTE approved institution. This is to help them to achieve their college goals, despite learning issues, environmental challenges or medical bills.

Solution: C

Swachh Survekshan 2020 report:

Context:

Swachh Survekshan 2020 report was recently released by the Union Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry.

• Swachh Survekshan 2020 covered 4,242 cities, 62 cantonment boards and 92 Ganga towns. This survey was carried out in 28 days.
• This year the Ministry has released rankings based on the categorisation of cities on population, instead of releasing overall rankings.

Performance of various cities:

1. Indore was ranked the cleanest city in the overall category this year followed by Surat and Navi Mumbai.
2. Chhattisgarh is the cleanest state in the category of states with more than 100 urban local bodies (ULBs).
3. Ahmedabad is India’s the cleanest Mega city.
4. New Delhi is the cleanest capital city.
5. Chhattisgarh’s Ambikapur is the cleanest smallest city.
6. Bengaluru wins the Best Self Sustainability award in the Mega city category.
7. Jharkhand is the cleanest state in the category of state with less than 100 Urban Local Bodies (ULBs).
8. Cleanest Cantonment: Jalandhar Cantt, Punjab.
9. Cleanest Town along the banks of river Ganga:
10. In cities with population less than one lakh, Karad in Mahrashtra is cleanest city.
11. Maximum citizen participation in keeping city areas clean – Shahjahanpur.
12. Cleanest megacity with more than 40 lac population – Ahmedabad (Gujarat).
13. Fastest-moving city in terms of cleanliness – Jodhpur (Rajasthan).
14. Self-sustainable city in terms of cleanliness (more than 10 lakh population) – Rajkot (Gujarat).
15. Mysuru (Karnataka) is ranked cleanest among the medium-sized cities with a population ranging between 3 lakh and 10 lakh.

What is Swachh Survekshan?

Launched by PM Modi in 2016.

It is meant to monitor the performance of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, which was launched on October 2, 2014, the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.

It was also aimed at inculcating a spirit of healthy competition among cities towards becoming India’s cleanest cities.

Who conducts the survey?

The Quality Council of India (QCI) is in charge of evaluating the performance of the participating cities. This is an autonomous accreditation body which was set up by the Government of India in 1997 for quality assurance in all fields, including governance.

Solution: C

India Cycles4Change Challenge:

It is an initiative of the Smart Cities Mission, Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs to inspire and support Indian cities to quickly implement cycling-friendly initiatives in response to COVID-19.

The Challenge aims to help cities connect with their citizens as well as experts to develop a unified vision to promote cycling.

Who can apply?

• Cities with a population of more than 5 lakh.
• Capital cities of states/UTs.
• Cities under the Smart Cities Mission.

Solution: D

Action Plan for Champion Sectors in Services

Context: The Union Cabinet has approved the proposal of the Department of Commerce to give focused attention to 12 identified Champion Services Sectors for promoting their development, and realizing their potential. The Cabinet has also directed the Ministries/Departments concerned with these sectors to utilize the available draft sectoral plans to finalize and implement the Action Plans for the identified Champion Services Sectors.

A dedicated fund of Rs. 5000 crores has been proposed to be established to support initiatives for sectoral Action Plans of the Champion Sectors.

Champion service sectors:

Champion service sectors include Information Technology & Information Technology enabled Services (IT & ITeS), Tourism and Hospitality Services, Medical Value Travel, Transport and Logistics Services, Accounting and Finance Services, Audio Visual Services, Legal Services, Communication Services, Construction and Related Engineering Services, Environmental Services, Financial Services and Education Services.

Solution: A

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) launched the Atal Jyoti Yojana (AJAY) to illuminate dark regions through establishment of solar street lights. It is a sub scheme under off –grid and decentralized solar application scheme of Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Govt. of India.

The Phase I was implemented during September 2016- March 2018. The Phase II is being implemented during 2018-19 and 2019-20.

Implementation agency

Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL) has been entrusted to implement the scheme.

Funding allocation

The total cost of the scheme is Rs 583 crore. MNRE will provide 75% of the cost of street lights and remaining 25% will come from Member of Parliament Local Area Development funds (MPLADS).

Implementation

Under the scheme, SSL with LED capacity of 12 W will be provided as per MNRE norms in the identified states. The estimated cost per light is Rs 25,000.

Solution: A

India Cooling Action Plan (ICAP)

Significance:

• India is the first country in world to develop such a document (ICAP), which addresses cooling requirement across sectors and lists out actions which can help reduce the cooling demand.
• The overarching goal is to provide sustainable cooling and thermal comfort for all while securing environmental and socio-economic benefits for the society.

The goals emerging from the suggested interventions stated in ICAP are:

1. Reduction of cooling demand across sectors by 20% to 25 % by year 2037-38.
2. Reduction of refrigerant demand by 25% to 30% by year 2037-38.
3. Reduction of cooling energy requirements by 25% to 40% by year 2037-38.
4. Training and certification of 100,000 servicing sector technicians by the year 2022-23, in synergy with Skill India Mission.
5. Recognize “cooling and related areas” as a thrust area of research under the national S&T Programme.

Solution: A

Context:

With an aim to bring foreign policy to the masses the External Affairs Ministry has come up with an initiative – SAMEEP – ‘Students and MEA Engagement Programme’.

About SAMEEP:

The main objective of SAMEEP is to take Indian foreign policy and its global engagements to students across the country.

How it works?

Under this programme, all the ministry officers – under-secretary and above – will be asked to go to their hometowns, particularly their alma maters. They will be expected to interact with the students about the way the MEA works, basic elements of its policies, how diplomacy is conducted, and generally give students an idea of what a career in the MEA would look like.

• The officials will be provided a basic standardized presentation by the ministry, but will be free to add their own improvisations and experiences.
• The agenda of the programme is not only to make students interested and aware of India’s place in the world and its global ambitions, but also to drive interest in diplomacy as a career option.

Solution: C

Project “LOcal Treatment of Urban Sewage Streams for Healthy Reuse) (LOTUS HR)

Department of Biotechnology (DBT) and NWO, the Netherlands Science Agency have announced a joint call for proposals for cleaning the Barapullah drain. Accordingly, work has begun on Cleaning the Barapullah Drain in New Delhi under the Project “Local Treatment of Urban Sewage Streams for Healthy Reuse (LOTUS HR).

What you need to know about LOTUS HR?

The project Local Treatment of Urban Sewage Streams for Healthy Reuse (LOTUS HR) is an Indo-Netherlands joint project funded by Department of Biotechnology(DBT), Govt of india and NWO/STW, The Govt of Netherlands.

• The project has stakeholders from both Academia and Industry from India and Netherlands. It is coordinated by Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi with participation of The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), New Delhi and National Environment Research Institute, Nagpur from India while Technical University Delft is coordinating it from The Netherlands, with participation of Environmental Engineering and Water Technology Department, UNESCO, Wageningen University and its Aquatic Ecology Department. There is also commitment from industry, especially from The Netherlands, in terms of both cash and kind towards the project.
• The project aims to demonstrate a novel holistic (waste-) water management approach, that will produce clean water that can be reused for various proposes (e.g. industry, agriculture, construction etc.), while simultaneously recovering nutrients and energy from the urban waste water, thus converting drain into profitable mines. Special attention will be paid to pathogen removal and removing conventional and emerging pollutants.
• The project will develop an innovative pilot scale plant, suitable to cope with Indian conditions in a location specific manner. The final design of the pilot plant will be scalable and modular, to fit into the highly populated urban terrain.

Solution: B

Mission Satyanishtha:

Context: Indian Railways has launched “Mission Satyanishtha”.

Aim: This mission aims at sensitizing all railway employees about the need to adhere to good ethics and to maintain high standards of integrity at work.

Objectives of the Mission are:

• To train every employee to understand the need and value of ethics in Personal and Public life.
• To deal with ethical dilemmas in life and Public Governance.
• To help understand the policies of Indian Railways on ethics and integrity and the employee’s role in upholding the same.
• To develop inner governance through tapping inner resources.

Solution: B

SANKALP Project

Context: Review meeting of World Bank loan assisted “Skills Acquisition and Knowledge Awareness for Livelihood Promotion (SANKALP)” programme was recently held.

About SANKALP scheme:

What is it? SANKALP is a Centrally sponsored scheme of Ministry of Skill Development & Entrepreneurship (MSDE). It is an outcome focused scheme marking shift in government’s implementation strategy in vocational education and training from inputs to results. SANKALP aims to implement the mandate of the National Skill Development Mission (NSDM).

SANKALP will provide market relevant training to 3.5 crore youth.

Objective: The Objective of the project is to enhance institutional mechanisms for skills development and increase access to quality and market-relevant training for the work force.

What it does? The scheme provides the required impetus to the National Skill Development Mission, 2015 and its various sub missions. It is aligned to flagship Government of India programs such as Make in India and Swachhta Abhiyan and aims at developing globally competitive workforce for domestic and overseas requirements.

The Key result areas for the project include Institutional Strengthening at the National and State Levels for Planning, Delivering, and Monitoring High-Quality Market-Relevant Training; Improved Quality and Market Relevance of Skills Development Programs; Improved access to and completion of skills training for female trainees and other disadvantaged groups; and Expanding skills training through private-public partnerships (PPPs).

Under SANKALP four key result areas have been identified viz: (i) Institutional Strengthening (at National, State & District level); (ii) Quality Assurance Quality Assurance of skill development programs; (iii) Inclusion of marginalised population in skill development; and (iv) Expanding Skills through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs).

Solution: D

Mission Purvodaya:

• The Centre unveils Mission Purvodaya to develop eastern region into an integrated steel hub.
• The eastern belt has the potential to add over 75 percent of the country’s incremental steel capacity envisioned by the National Steel Policy. 
• Through this programme, the government aims to transform logistics and utilities infrastructure which would change the socio-economic landscape in the eastern India.
• The steps, under mission, also include growth of steel industry along with employment opportunities across the entire value chain.

Ministry of steel in partnership with CII and JPC is organising the launch of Purvodaya-Accelerated Development of Eastern Region through an Integrated Steel hub, in line with Prime Minister’s Vision  for focused development of the Eastern States.

Solution: B

Context: India, a partner in the construction of one of the largest telescopes in the world, TMT, has said it wants the project to be moved out of the proposed site at Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano in Hawaii.

About TMT:

• The Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) is an astronomical observatory with an extremely large telescope (ELT).
• It is an international project being funded by scientific organisations of Canada, China, India, Japan and USA.
• Planned location: Mauna Kea on the island of Hawaii in the US state of Hawaii.
• Purpose: The TMT is designed for near-ultraviolet to mid-infrared observations, featuring adaptive optics to assist in correcting image blur.

Significance:

• TMT will enable scientists to study fainter objects far away from us in the Universe, which gives information about early stages of evolution of the Universe.
• It will give us finer details of not-so-far-away objects like undiscovered planets and other objects in the Solar System and planets around other stars.

Solution: D

Context: Interpol has issued a Blue Corner notice to help locate fugitive self-styled godman Nithyananda, weeks after the Gujarat Police sought the agency’s intervention for this. Nithyananda fled India last year amid allegations of rape and sexual abuse.

What is a Interpol notice?

• Notices are international requests for cooperation or alerts allowing police in member countries to share critical crime-related information.
• There are seven types of notices — Red Notice, Yellow Notice, Blue Notice, Black Notice, Green Notice, Orange Notice, and Purple Notice.

What is blue notice?

• Issued to “collect additional information about a person’s identity, location or activities in relation to a crime.”

What is Interpol?

• The International Criminal Police Organisation, or Interpol, is a 194-member intergovernmental organisation.
• Headquartered in Lyon, France.
• Formed in 1923 as the International Criminal Police Commission, and started calling itself Interpol in 1956.
• Interpol’s declared global policing goals include countering terrorism, promoting border integrity worldwide, protection of vulnerable communities, providing a secure cyberspace for people and businesses, curbing illicit markets, supporting environment security, and promoting global integrity.
• India joined the organisation in 1949.

Solution: C

Senna Spectabilis:

• It is a deciduous tree native to tropical areas of America.
• It grows up to 15 to 20 metres in a short period of time and distributes thousands of seeds after flowering.
• It is an invasive species.
• Concerns: The thick foliage of the tree arrests the growth of other indigenous tree and grass species. Thus, it causes food shortage for the wildlife population, especially herbivores. It also adversely affect the germination and growth of the native species.
• It is categorized as ‘Least Concern’ under IUCN Red List.

Why in News? The Kerala Government is planning to arrest the rampant growth of Senna spectabilis, in the forest areas of the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve (NBR), including the Wayanad Wildlife Sanctuary.

Solution: A

About NISHTHA:

• NISHTHA is the world’s largest teachers’ training programme of its kind in the world.
• The initiative is an Integrated Teacher Training Programme of the Department of School Education and Literacy, MHRD as part of its National Mission to improve learning outcomes at the Elementary level under the Centrally Sponsored Scheme of Samagra Shiksha during 2019-20.
• The basic objective of this massive training programme is to motivate and equip teachers to encourage and foster critical thinking in students.
• The initiative is first of its kind wherein standardized training modules are developed at national level for all States and UTs. However, States and UTs can contextualize the training modules and use their own material and resource persons also, keeping in view the core topics and expected outcomes of NISHTHA.

The prominent features of this integrated programme are:

• Activity based modules including educational games and quizzes, Social-emotional learning, motivational interactions, team building, preparation for school based assessment, in-built continuous feedback mechanism, online monitoring and support system, training need and impact analysis (Pre and Post training).

Expected outcomes:

• Teachers will get awareness and develop their skills on various aspects related to Learning Outcomes, Competency Based Learning and Testing, Learner-centered Pedagogy, School Safety and Security etc.
• This integrated programme aims to build the capacities of around 42 lakh participants covering all teachers and Heads of Schools at the elementary level in all Government schools, faculty members of State Councils of Educational Research and Training (SCERTs), District Institutes of Education and Training (DIETs) as well as Block Resource Coordinators and Cluster Resource Coordinators in all States and UTs.

Solution: D

Green good deeds:

• The campaign has been launched by the Environment Ministry.
• Aim: To sensitise the people and students, in particular, about climate change and global warming. The objective of the campaign is to restore and return the clean and green environment to the next generation.
• The Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change had drawn up a list of over 500 Green Good Deeds and asked people to alter their behaviour to Green Good Behaviour to fulfil their Green Social Responsibility.
• These small positive actions to be performed by individuals or organisations to strengthen the cause of environmental protection, were put on a mobile application named “Dr Harsh Vardhan App”.