UPSC Current Affairs Quiz : 17 December 2025

Solution: C

• Statement I is correct: The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has launched safety drives specifically to detect nitrofurans, which are banned veterinary drugs in food-producing animals. Their presence undermines consumer trust and violates established food law compliance due to their toxicity and carcinogenic nature.
• Statement II is incorrect: The rationale for the ban and the surveillance drive is precisely because these compounds or their metabolites can persist. If they were rapidly metabolized without leaving detectable residues within 24 hours, the public health risk regarding long-term cumulative exposure and the need for such stringent testing drives to detect “residues” would be negligible. The drive is to detect residues, implying they persist and pose a cumulative health hazard.

Solution: C

• Statement 1 is correct: The UNAOC was established in 2005 as a political initiative of UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, with the governments of Spain and Türkiye acting as co-sponsors. Its headquarters are in New York.
• Statement 2 is correct: The UNAOC focuses on several priority areas to counter polarization. These include Education, Youth, Migration, Media, and explicitly, Women as peace mediators, recognizing the importance of strengthening women’s roles in peacebuilding efforts.

Solution: B

• Statement 1 is correct: India is a founding member of the ADB, which was established in 1966.
• Statement 2 is correct: The headquarters of the Asian Development Bank is located in Manila, Philippines.
• Statement 3 is incorrect: India is the largest recipient of ADB’s financial commitments (accounting for about 14%), India is not the largest shareholder. Historically, Japan and the United States hold the largest shares in ADB.
• Statement 4 is incorrect: The ADB provides loans, grants, and technical assistance not just to governments but also makes equity investments and supports the private sector and Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs). It does not focus exclusively on public sector lending.

Solution: A

• Pair 1 is incorrectly matched: Operation Searchlight was the military crackdown launched by the Pakistan Army on 25 March 1971 in Dhaka and elsewhere, which intensified the violence and drove the liberation movement. It was not the air strike on India.
• Pair 2 is correctly matched: Operation Trident (along with Operation Python) refers to the Indian Navy’s offensive on the Karachi harbour on 4/5 December 1971, which dealt major blows to Pakistan’s fuel storage and shipping capacity.
• Pair 3 is incorrectly matched: Operation Chengiz Khan refers to the pre-emptive air strikes launched by Pakistan on multiple Indian airfields on 3 December 1971, which served as the trigger for India’s formal entry into the full-scale war.

Solution: D

• Statement 1 is incorrect: A trade deficit occurs when the value of imports exceeds exports, not the other way around. If exports exceed imports, it is a trade surplus.
• Statement 2 is correct: The trade deficit (specifically merchandise) is a major driver of the Current Account Deficit (CAD). However, positive flows from services exports (like IT) and remittances can offset the goods deficit, potentially moderating the overall CAD.
• Statement 3 is incorrect: A trade deficit is not always “bad”. If the deficit is driven by the import of capital goods, machinery, or technology (productive investments), it can aid future productivity and growth. It is highly cyclical and depends on the composition of imports.

Solution: D

• A-2: Mount Ras Dejen is identified as the highest peak in the Ethiopian Highlands (often called the “Roof of Africa”).
• B-1: The Denakil Depression is described as one of the hottest and lowest places on Earth, featuring active volcanoes like Erta Ale.
• C-3: The Great Rift Valley is the geological feature running north-south through the country, marked by tectonic activity, volcanoes, and lakes.

Solution: A

• Statement I is correct: Nitrofurans are classified as chemotherapeutic This classification is distinct from “antibiotics” in strict pharmacological terms, which often implies a natural origin (though usage is loose in common parlance).
• Statement II is correct: They are synthetic nitrofuran-based
• Statement II explains Statement I. Because they are synthetic and created chemically rather than being secretions of microorganisms (like penicillin), they are accurately classified as chemotherapeutic agents rather than “natural” antibiotics.

Solution: C

• Option (c) is correct: Mukti Bahini was the Bengali resistance force. Following the military crackdown by Pakistan, the resistance consolidated into the Mukti Bahini. India provided training, logistics, and sanctuary to these forces, who fought alongside Indian forces against the Pakistan Army.

Solution: B

• Option (b) is correct: Eritrea is a neighbouring nation of Ethiopia to the north.
• Uganda, Tanzania, and Chad do not share a direct border with Ethiopia.
• The other neighbouring nations are Djibouti, Somalia, Kenya, South Sudan, and Sudan.

Solution: A

• Statement-I is correct: The East African Rift is widely attributed to the presence of a deep mantle superplume (the African Superplume). This plume pushes magma and heat upwards towards the crust.
• Statement-II is correct and explains Statement-I: The upwelling of hot mantle material generates thermal buoyancy, which uplifts the overlying crust (creating the Ethiopian and Kenyan domes). This heat also weakens the lithosphere, making it brittle and susceptible to stretching (extension) and faulting, which creates the rift valley.
• Thus, the physical process in II explains the geological phenomenon in I.