Daily Current Affairs MCQ - February 16, 2022 - UPSC MCQ

Union Minister of Women and Child Development informed Lok Sabha about the steps related to Child Beggars.

• The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015 (JJ Act) is the primary law for children in the country.
  • As per Section 2 (14) (ii) of the JJ Act,2015, a child who is found working in contravention of labour laws or is found begging is included as a “child in need of care and protection”, among others.
  • As per Section 76 of JJ Act, whoever employs any child for the purpose of begging shall be punishable with imprisonment upto five years and fine of one lakh rupees.
• The Ministry implements a centrally sponsored scheme i.e. Child Protection Services (CPS) under the umbrella Integrated Child Development Services scheme, for supporting the children in difficult circumstances including child beggars and destitute children.
  • Under the scheme, institutional care is provided through Child Care Institutions (CCIs), as a rehabilitative measure.
  • The scheme supports 24x7 emergency outreach/ helpline service for children in distress conditions. The service is accessible through a dedicated toll free number, 1098 from anywhere in India.
• The Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, has undertaken a pilot project for Comprehensive Rehabilitation of Persons engaged in the act of begging in ten (10) cities. It includes education of children engaged in begging/children of persons engaged in the begging.
• Hence both statements are correct.

Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar paid tributes to Swami Dayanand Saraswati on his birth anniversary on February 12, 2021.

• Dayananda Saraswati (12 February 1824 – 30 October 1883) was an Indian philosopher, social leader and founder of the Arya Samaj, a reform movement of the Vedic dharma.
• He was the first to give the call for Swaraj as "India for Indians" in 1876, a call later taken up by Lokmanya Tilak.
• Denouncing the idolatry and ritualistic worship, he worked towards reviving Vedic ideologies.
• Subsequently, the philosopher and President of India, S. Radhakrishnan called him one of the "makers of Modern India", as did Sri Aurobindo.
• Those who were influenced by and followed Dayananda included Madam Cama, Swami Shraddhanand, Shyamji Krishna Varma, Bhagat Singh, Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, Lala Lajpat Rai etc.
• He was a sanyasi (ascetic) from boyhood and a scholar. He believed in the infallible authority of the Vedas. Dayananda advocated the doctrine of Karma and Reincarnation.
• Among Dayananda's contributions were his promoting of the equal rights for women, such as the right to education and reading of Indian scriptures, and his commentary on the Vedas from Vedic Sanskrit in Sanskrit as well as in Hindi.
• Hence both statements are correct.

Educated youngsters are showing the way forward to reduce caste and community tensions in India by tying the knot in inter-marriages, the Supreme Court said in a recent judgment.

• Educated younger boys and girls are choosing their life partners, which, in turn, is a departure from the earlier norms of society where caste and community play a major role.
• Possibly, this is the way forward where caste and community tensions will reduce by such inter-marriages
• Justice Kaul quoted B.R. Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste, in which the Father of the Constitution said, “I am convinced that the real remedy is intermarriage. Fusion of blood can alone create the feeling of being kith and kin and will vanish the separatist feeling created by caste.
• Consent of the family or community or clan is not necessary once the two adult individuals agree to enter into a wedlock and that their consent has to be piously given primacy.

Only 5.8% of Indian marriages were inter-caste, according to Census 2011. Marrying person of choice is a fundamental right. It is the fundamental right of any adult in India to marry the person of his or her choice, irrespective of caste and religion, and that right cannot be encroached upon by anybody.

Hence both statements are correct.

The disappearance of three established international mountaineers while attempting to scale the world’s second highest peak, K2, in winter has spotlighted the extreme version of the sport – winter climbing.

• ‘Alpine style’ mountaineering involves ascending with only the minimum number of breaks, and without the assistance of porters.
• The mountaineer carries all of his/her load, including food, equipment, tents, etc. There is no scope for acclimatisation – which may take several days at high altitudes – as climbers make a dash for the summit.
• The alpine style contrasts with the ‘expedition’ or ‘siege’ style of climbing, in which climbers go from one camp to another to acclimatise.
• Winter climbing is always tougher than pre-monsoon, post-monsoon and summer climbing.
• Many consider alpine style to be the most aesthetically "pure" form of mountaineering.
• The benefits of alpine style include spending much less time on the route, thereby reducing objective dangers such as avalanches or blizzards.
• The problems encountered while alpine style climbing are related to lack of support and potentially the lack of acclimatization associated with spending less time at very high altitudes.
• Hence both statements are correct.

Earlier this week, the prototype of a new rail travel class, AC-III Economy, was finalised for oscillation trails at the Indian Railways’ Research Designs and Standards Organisation (RDSO) in Lucknow.

• This class is meant to be an affordable, air-conditioned version of the non-AC Sleeper class.
• The job of creating this was given last year to state-owned Rail Coach Factory (RCF), Kapurthala, the maker of the Linke Hoffmann Busche coaches in India.
• The design philosophy was to take a non-AC Sleeper coach as reference and try and turn that into an AC coach.
• AC-III tier is the only travel class that makes a clear profit for Railways, and is also said to be the most popular. AC-III Economy is expected to maintain that — and provide AC travel to the masses while keeping it affordable.
• The Research Designs & Standards Organisation (RDSO) is an ISO 9001 research and development organisation under the Ministry of Railways of India, which functions as a technical adviser and consultant to the Railway Board.
• It was founded in 1921 and is Headquartered in Lucknow.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

• Earth observation satellites are the satellites equipped with remote sensing technology. Earth observation is the gathering of information about Earth's physical, chemical and biological systems.
• Many earth observation satellites have been employed on sun-synchronous orbit. Hence, statement 1 is NOT correct.
• Other earth observation satellites launched by ISRO include RESOURCESAT- 2, 2A, CARTOSAT-1, 2, 2A, 2B, RISAT-1 and 2, OCEANSAT-2, Megha-Tropiques, SARAL and SCATSAT-1, INSAT-3DR, 3D, etc. Hence, statement 2 is correct.

• In August, 2021, the government has announced the National Edible Oil Mission-Oil Palm (NMEO-OP) scheme for self-reliance in edible oil and involves investment of over Rs. 11,000 crore (over a five year period).
  • NMEO-OP is a new Centrally Sponsored Scheme. It is proposed to have an additional 6.5 lakh hectares for palm oil by 2025-26. Hence, statement 1 is correct.
• According to the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food, and Public Distribution the total domestic demand of edible oils in the country is approximately 250 lakh metric tonnes per year.
  • From which around 60% of the edible oils consumed in the country is met through imports. Palm oil (crude + refined) import constitutes around 60% of the total edible oil imported, out of which 54% is imported from Indonesia and Malaysia. Hence, statement 2 is correct.

Mission Indradhanush

• It was launched to fully immunize more than 89 lakh children who are either unvaccinated or partially vaccinated under UIP.
• It provides vaccination against 12 Vaccine-Preventable Diseases (VPD) i.e. diphtheria, Whooping cough, tetanus, polio, tuberculosis, hepatitis B, meningitis and pneumonia, Haemophilus influenzae type B infections, Japanese encephalitis (JE), rotavirus vaccine, pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV) and measles-rubella (MR). Hence statement 1 is correct.
  • However, vaccination against Japanese Encephalitis and Haemophilus influenzae type B is being provided in selected districts of the country.
• Mission Indradhansuh was also identified as one of the flagship schemes under Gram Swaraj Abhiyan and Extended Gram Swaraj Abhiyan. Hence statement 2 is correct.

The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has issued orders that all steel – whether produced from ore, billets, pellets or melting of scrap - would be allowed to be used for National Highway construction, as long as it meets the standards required for specific grades of steel.

• The steel proposed to be used would be tested in NABL-accredited laboratories as a third party check before approval.
• Earlier, the contract provisions required use of steel produced by primary/integrated steel producers only.
• In view of the increase in steel prices, which can impact the cost of building national highways, Union Minister for Road Transport & Highways had suggested the need to re-look at all conditions which could be restrictive.
• With this step, the supplier base for steel used in the construction of national highways would increase, leading to more competition and better price discovery by the markets.
• This is also part of the continuous effort by the Minister to reduce costs through use of new technology, reducing restrictions on suppliers and making the procurement system transparent.
• Hence both statements are correct.

Floating in the Maguri-Motapung beel (or wetland) in Assam’s Tinsukia district for over a week is the spectacular and rare Mandarin duck. First spotted on February 8 by Madhab Gogoi, the duck has since become the star of the wetland.

• Considered the most beautiful duck in the world, the Mandarin duck, or the (Aix galericulata) was first identified by Swedish botanist, physician and zoologist Carl Linnaeus in 1758.
• It is a “small-exotic looking bird” native to East Asia.
• The migratory duck breeds in Russia, Korea, Japan and northeastern parts of China, explained Gogoi. It now has established populations in Western Europe and America too.
• The duck, however, rarely visits India as it does not fall in its usual migratory route.
• Its IUCN Status is Least Concern.
• While the duck is not a globally threatened species, spotting one is always considered significant because they only make “rare appearances.”
• The Maguri Motapung wetland — an Important Bird Area as declared by the Bombay Natural History Society — is located close to the Dibru Saikhowa National Park in Upper Assam.
• In May 2020, the beel was adversely affected by a blowout and fire at an Oil India Limited-owned gas well.

Hence, option (a) is the correct answer.