[Mission 2024] QUED ( Questions from Editorials ) 11 August 2023

Solution: c)

When India won its waiver at the Nuclear Suppliers Group in 2008, it was France (it had done much of the heavy lifting for the waiver), and not the U.S., that India signed its first civil nuclear deal with.

Source

Solution: b)

Statement 2 is incorrect.

Atoms are the basic building blocks of all matter, such that they cannot be “broken down” further by simple chemical processes. From our bodies to the air we breathe, everything is made up of atoms.

Most of an atom is empty space. The rest comprises three basic types of subatomic (smaller than, or occurring within an atom) particles — positively charged protons, negatively charged electrons, and the neutral neutrons. The protons and neutrons combine to form the atom’s nucleus, around which circle a “cloud” of electrons.

The number of protons in an atom determines the element, and the number of neutrons determines the isotope of that element. Different isotopes of the same element have the same chemical properties, but very different nuclear properties.

Source

Solution: d)

Constitution bench:

It is the name given to the benches of the Supreme Court of India which consist of at least five judges of the court which sit to decide any case:

○       Involving a substantial question of law as to the interpretation” of the Constitution of India

○       For the purpose of hearing any reference” made by the President of India under Article 143.

• This provision has been mandated by Article 145 (3) of the Constitutionof India.
• The Chief Justice of India has the power to constitute a Constitution Bench and refer cases to it.

Solution: b)

Tarapur Atomic Power Station (TAPS), Maharashtra

Kaiga Generating Station (KGS), Karnataka

Narora Atomic Power Station (NAPS), Uttar Pradesh

Kakrapar Atomic Power Station (KAPS), Gujarat

Solution: c)

On May 11, 1998, India conducted three nuclear bomb test explosions at the Indian Army’s Pokhran Test Range. Two days later, on May 13, two more bombs were tested.

Codenamed Operation Shakti (literally, “strength”), these tests would display India’s capability to build fission and thermonuclear weapons with yields up to 200 kilotons, helping India enter the highly guarded club of countries with capability to deploy nuclear weapons.

However, Pokhran-II, as the series of tests is more popularly known, was also the culmination of a long journey that began back in the 1940s-50s.

On May 18, 1974, India carried out its first nuclear test at the Pokhran test site. Pokhran-I, codenamed Operation Smiling Buddha, would be billed as a “peaceful nuclear explosion”, with “few military implications”.