Daily Current Affairs MCQ - February 9, 2022 - UPSC MCQ

The Ministry of Home Affairs issued a gazette notification stating that the provisions of the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Act, 2021, would be deemed to have come into effect from April 27.

• The Bill amends the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi Act, 1991. The Act provides a framework for the functioning of the Legislative Assembly and the government of the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi.
• The Bill amends certain powers and responsibilities of the Legislative Assembly and the Lieutenant Governor.
• Restriction on laws passed by the Assembly: The Bill provides that the term “government” referred to in any law made by the Legislative Assembly will imply Lieutenant Governor (LG).
• Rules of Procedure of the Assembly: The Act allows the Legislative Assembly to make Rules to regulate the procedure and conduct of business in the Assembly. The Bill provides that such Rules must be consistent with the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the Lok Sabha.
• Inquiry by the Assembly into administrative decisions: The Bill prohibits the Legislative Assembly from making any rule to enable itself or its Committees to:
  • consider the matters of day-to-day administration of the NCT of Delhi and
  • conduct any inquiry in relation to administrative decisions.
• Assent to Bills:
  • The Act requires the LG to reserve certain Bills passed by the Legislative Assembly for the consideration of the President.
  • The Bill requires the LG to also reserve those Bills for the President which incidentally cover any of the matters outside the purview of the powers of the Legislative Assembly.
• LG’s opinion for executive actions:
  • The Act specifies that all executive action by the government, whether taken on the advice of the Ministers or otherwise, must be taken in the name of the LG.
  • The Bill adds that on certain matters, as specified by the LG, his opinion must be obtained before taking any executive action on the decisions of the Minister/ Council of Ministers.

Hence only statement 2 is correct.

A woman officer from the Maharashtra Prison Department was dismissed from service after an inquiry revealed that she violated the Maharashtra Civil Services (Declaration of Small Family) rules because she suppressed the information from the authorities that she has three children.

• The Maharashtra Civil Services (Declaration of Small Family) Rule of 2005 defines a small family as wife, husband and two children and stipulates that a person is not eligible for a job with Maharashtra Government if he or she has more than two children after 2005.
• Maharashtra is one of the few states in the country that have a ‘two children’ policy for appointment in government jobs or even for the elections of some local government bodies. Other states such as Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Gujarat, Odisha, Uttarakhand and Assam being the latest addition to the list in 2019.
• The set of norms came into force in Maharashtra as Maharashtra Civil Services (Declaration of Small Family) Rules on March 28, 2005. The rules mandate filing a small family declaration at the time of applying for a government job.
• The definition of child under these rules does not include adopted children.
• The rules make the Small Family norm an additional essential requirement for Groups A, B, C, D of Maharashtra government employees.
• Hence both statements are correct.

National Telecommunications Institute for Policy Research, Innovation and Training (NTIPRIT), the apex training institute of Department of Telecommunications, Government of India conducted a webinar on April 28, 2021 on the topic "NavlC — Opportunities for the Telecom Industry" in collaboration with ISRO and Telecom Industry.

• NavIC (Navigation with Indian Constellation) is an autonomous regional satellite navigation system established and maintained by ISRO.
• It covers India and a region extending up to 1 ,500 km beyond Indian mainland (primary coverage area).
• It provides position accuracy better than 20 m (20) and timing accuracy better than 50 ns (20).
• The actual measurements demonstrate accuracy better than 5 m and 20 ns respectively.
• NavIC based applications are being used in various civilian sectors, including, transport, map applications, and timekeeping. Some examples for NavlC enabled mobile phones include the Redmi Note 9 series from Xiaomi, the Realme 6 series, the OnePlus Nord, etc.
• NavlC is an indigenous positioning system that is under Indian control. There is no risk of the service being withdrawn or denied in a given situation.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

After the earthquake of 6.4 magnitude on the Richter scale, Assam's Sonitpur was again struck by six tremors.

• An earthquake of magnitude 2.7 on the Richter scale struck Assam's Sonitpur . The epicentre of the quake was 38 kilometres West-Northwest of Tezpur at a depth of 11 kilometres.
• The preliminary analysis shows that the events are located near to Kopili Fault closer to Himalayan Frontal Thrust (HFT).
• According to NCS, the area is seismically very active falling in the highest Seismic Hazard zone V associated with collisional tectonics where Indian plate subducts beneath the Eurasian Plate.
• HFT, also known as the Main Frontal Thrust (MFT), is a geological fault along the boundary of the Indian and Eurasian tectonic plates. The Kopili Fault is a 300-km northwest-southeast trending fault from the Bhutan Himalaya to the Burmese arc.
• The historical and instrumentally recorded earthquake data (NCS catalogue) reveals that the region is affected by moderate to large earthquakes and the most prominent events among those are the July 29, 1960, Assam earthquake of magnitude 6.0.
• The National Centre for Seismology (NCS) is an office of India's Ministry of Earth Sciences. The office monitors earthquakes and conducts seismological research.
• The Seismology Division and Earthquake Risk Evaluation Centre of the India Meteorological Department merged with NCS in August 2014 to more effectively monitor and research seismological activity.

Hence only statement 2 is correct.

India, Japan and Australia formally launched the Supply Chain Resilience Initiative (SCRI) to build resilient supply chains in the Indo-Pacific region as they seek to reduce dependence on China.

• The SCRI aims to create a virtuous cycle of enhancing supply chain resilience with a view to eventually attaining strong, sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth in the region.
• Expansion of the SCRI may be considered based on consensus, if needed, in due course.
• Hence, option (d) is the correct answer.

14,491 ha area of UT of A&N Islands becomes the first large contiguous territory to be conferred with organic certification under ‘Large Area Certification’ scheme.

• Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare (DAC&FW) is working to identify Traditional Organic Areas to transform them into certified organic production hubs.
• The Government of India has certified 14,491 ha of such area under Car Nicobar and Nancowry group of islands in UT of A&N Islands.
• This area becomes the first large contiguous territory to be conferred with organic certification under the ‘Large Area Certification’ (LAC) scheme of the PGS-India (Participatory Guarantee System) certification programme.

“Large Area Certification” (LAC) programme

• Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare under its flagship scheme of Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojna (PKVY) has launched a unique quick certification programme “Large Area Certification” (LAC) to harness these potential areas.
• LAC is a Quick certification process that is cost-effective and farmers do not have to wait for 2-3 years for marketing PGS organic certified products.
• Under LAC, each village in the area is considered as one cluster/group. Documentations are simple and maintained village-wise.
• All farmers with their farmland and livestock need to adhere to the standard requirements and on being verified get certified en-mass without the need to go under conversion period.
• Certification is renewed on annual basis through annual verification by a process of peer appraisals as per the process of PGS-India.

Hence only statement 2 is correct.

Human Rights Watch said that Israel is committing the crime of “apartheid” by seeking to maintain Jewish “domination” over Palestinians and its own Arab population.

• Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization, headquartered in New York City, that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. The group pressures governments, policy makers, companies, and individual human rights abusers to denounce abuse and respect human rights, and the group often works on behalf of refugees, children, migrants, and political prisoners.
• Human Rights Watch in 1997 shared in the Nobel Peace Prize as a founding member of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines and it played a leading role in the 2008 treaty banning cluster munitions.
• Human Rights Watch was co-founded by Robert L. Bernstein and Aryeh Neier as a private American NGO in 1978, under the name Helsinki Watch, to monitor the then-Soviet Union's compliance with the Helsinki Accords.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

Among various scientific terms that the Covid-19 pandemic has made part of the public vocabulary, one is the ‘Ct value’ in RT-PCR tests for determining whether a patient is positive for Covid-19.

• Short for cycle threshold, Ct is a value that emerges during RT-PCR tests, the gold standard for detection of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus.
• According to the ICMR advisory, the Ct value of an RT-PCR reaction is the number of cycles at which fluorescence of the PCR product is detectable over and above the background signal.
• The Ct value refers to the number of cycles after which the virus can be detected. If a higher number of cycles is required, it implies that the virus went undetected when the number of cycles was lower.
• The lower the Ct value, the higher the viral load — because the virus has been spotted after fewer cycles.
• According to the ICMR, a patient is considered Covid-positive if the Ct value is below 35. In other words, if the virus is detectable after 35 cycles or earlier, then the patient is considered positive.
• Hence both statements are correct.

Total global military expenditure rose to $1981 billion last year, an increase of 2.6 per cent in real terms from 2019, according to new data published today by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

• The five biggest spenders in 2020, which together accounted for 62 per cent of global military expenditure, were the United States, China, India, Russia and the United Kingdom.
• The 2.6 per cent increase in world military spending came in a year when global gross domestic product (GDP) shrank by 4.4 per cent (October 2020 projection by the International Monetary Fund), largely due to the economic impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic.
• In 2020 US military expenditure reached an estimated $778 billion, representing an increase of 4.4 per cent over 2019. As the world’s largest military spender, the USA accounted for 39 per cent of total military expenditure in 2020.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

People who take a commonly-prescribed drug for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) should not assume they are protected after a first dose of Covid-19 vaccine, say the authors of a large-scale study that found many had poor antibody responses.

• The research measured antibody responses after vaccination with the Pfizer-BioNTech or the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine in 865 people treated with infliximab, an anti-tumour necrosis factor (anti-TNF) biologic drug, prescribed to around two million people worldwide.
• One of the brand names under which infliximab is marketed is Remicade, which has got regulatory clearance in India.
• Anti-TNF drugs are effective treatments for immune-mediated inflammatory diseases, but by suppressing the immune system, they can reduce vaccine effectiveness and increase risk of serious infection, the researchers have suggested.
• Hence both statements are correct.