QUIZ – 2020: Insights Current Affairs Quiz, 3 November 2020

Solution: a)

Shoolpaneshwar Wildlife Sanctuary is a protected area in Gujarat, located in the western Satpura Range south of the Narmada River. It shares a common boundary with Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra. It encompasses mixed dry deciduous forest, riverine forest, few pockets of moist teak forest, agricultural fields and two water reservoirs.

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Solution: d)

Genomics for Public Health in India (IndiGen) programme:

• CSIR initiated the Program in April 2019.
• It aims to undertake whole genome sequencing of thousands of individuals representing diverse ethnic groups from India.
• The objective is to enable genetic epidemiology and develop public health technologies applications using population genome data.
• The human genome data sets would also be utilized for prioritizing Pharmacogenomics variants specific for Indian population for optimizing therapy and minimizing adverse events.

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Solution: c)

Recently Punjab enacted amendments to override the effects of the Centre’s new agriculture laws.

States can indeed amend central laws enacted under the Concurrent List, subject to the condition that provisions repugnant to the parliamentary Acts will have to get the President’s assent, without which they do not come into force.

The Punjab Bills note that agriculture is under the legislative domain on the States, as the subject falls under the State List in the Seventh Schedule. The Centre has enacted its farm sector Bills by invoking Entry 33(b) in the Concurrent List, which concerns trade and commerce in, and production, supply and distribution of, “foodstuffs”. By stretching the entry’s meaning to include agriculture, Parliament has managed to pass laws in the domain of the States. In these circumstances, States aggrieved by the farm sector laws will either have to adopt Bills that would require presidential assent or challenge the validity of the central laws in the Supreme Court.

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Solution: b)

The Economic Survey 2019-20 backed the government’s move to aggressively privatise central public sector enterprises (CPSEs) through divestment of government stake, which will have a multiplier effect on improving efficiency and profitability of the divested company while unlocking capital that can be used for building public infrastructure.
The Survey cited the case of Temasek Holdings Company in Singapore, a model which it said can be adopted for successful maximisation of government stake in CPSEs.
In the model, the government can transfer its stake in the listed CPSEs to a separate corporate entity which would be managed by an independent board and would be mandated to divest the government stake in these CPSEs over a period of time. “This will lend professionalism and autonomy to the disinvestment programme which, in turn, would improve the economic performance of the CPSEs,” the Survey said.

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Solution: c)

The flowers of sickle senna (Cassia tora), an edible weed that fills nearly every vacant plot, roadside, wasteland and riverbank in one’s neighbourhood as soon as the rains arrive, and grows profusely throughout the year.

Though many, particularly those in urban areas, consider it a weed and try to get rid of it, sickle senna is an excellent source of food and nutrition for several communities in Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Goa, where it is known by names such as chakunda, chakwad, chakod, chakramarda saag, tagrai and soru-medelua.