Daily Current Affairs MCQ - January 13, 2021 - UPSC MCQ

In Leh, the first ever Ice climbing festival was celebrated in Nubra valley. Nubra Adventure Club organized the Seven Day event. Ice climbing is a popular winter sport abroad. Taking the cue, local adventure sports lovers have explored several ice climbing spots in Nubra valley to attract the adventure tourists to the region.
Nubra is a subdivision and a tehsil in the union territory of Ladakh. Its inhabited areas form a tri-armed valley cut by the Nubra and Shyok rivers. The Shyok River meets the Nubra River (or Siachen River) to form a large valley that separates the Ladakh and Karakoram Ranges. The Shyok river is a tributary of the Indus river.

India has expressed serious concern over the Sahel and Lake Chad region's security situation in West Africa. India also condemned terrorist attacks by Boko Haram in Nigeria and Lake Chad region and by Islamic State in West Africa.

• Lake Chad is a historically large, shallow, endorheic lake in central Africa, which has varied in size over the centuries.
• The freshwater lake is located in the Sahelian zone of West-central Africa. Lake Chad is mainly in the far west of Chad, bordering on northeastern Nigeria.
• Lake Chad provides water to more than 30 million people living in the four countries surrounding it (Chad, Cameroon, Niger, and Nigeria) on the central part of the Sahel.
• It is the largest lake in the Chad Basin.
• The Chari River, fed by its tributary the Logone, provides over 90% of the lake's water, with a small amount coming from the Yobe River in Nigeria/Niger.
• Despite high levels of evaporation, the lake is freshwater.

Wular Lake is one of the biggest freshwater lakes in Asia. Chilika Lake in Odisha is the largest saline water lake in India.

Shijiazhuang has become China's new hotspot of Coronavirus surge.

• Shijiazhuang, formerly known as Shimen and romanized as Shihkiachwang, is the capital and largest city of North China's Hebei Province.
• Shijiazhuang is situated east of the Taihang Mountains.
• The city stands at the edge of the North China Plain, which rises to the Taihang Mountains to the west of the city, and lies south of the Hutuo River.
   

Atal Innovation Mission, NITI Aayog launched its new edition of Atal Tinkering Lab handbook which reinforces detailed establishment and operational processes of the Atal Tinkering Labs and its journey towards an innovative ‘Atma Nirbhar Bharat’.

• The handbook named ‘The Atal Tinkering Lab Handbook 2.0’ outlines practical guidance on structural, selection, establishment and celebration aspects of the AIM’s flagship ATL programme.
• The ATL Handbook encompasses the AIM team's work in a framework using 4 key pillars of the ATL initiative – Selection, Establishment, Enablement, and Celebration.
• An Atal Tinkering Lab provides a makerspace where young minds can shape their ideas through hands-on do-it-yourself mode; and learn innovation skills.
• To foster entrepreneurship and innovation, Atal Innovation Mission, NITI Aayog has established over 7000 ATLs across the country so far enabling over 3 Million+ students between Grade VI to Grade XII acquire a problem solving, tinkering and innovative mindset.

Public and Private Health Facilities were felicitated with Kayakalp award for high standards of Sanitation and Hygiene.

• The government had launched a National Initiative ‘Kayakalp’ on 15th May 2015 to ensure hygiene, sanitation and cleanliness in Public Health Facilities in India.
• The scheme, which saw 716 District Hospitals' participation and central government institutions in its first year, has spread to 26 thousand 172 public health facilities now.
• Health Ministry collaborated with Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation and launched the Swachh Swasth Sarvatra programme. One community health centre (CHCs) situated within ODF block receives a one-time grant of 10 lakh rupees for undertaking improvement activities, so that the CHC becomes Kayakalp CHC.

Crop Insurance Scheme- The Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) successfully completes 5 Years of operations on 13th January 2021.

• The Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) was launched in 2016 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
• It is an insurance service scheme for farmers for their yields. It aims to reduce the premium burden on farmers and ensure early settlement of crop assurance claims for the full insured sum.
• It was formulated in line with One Nation–One Scheme theme by replacing earlier two schemes National Agricultural Insurance Scheme (NAIS) and Modified National Agricultural Insurance Scheme (MNAIS).
• The Scheme covers all Food & Oilseeds crops and Annual Commercial/Horticultural Crops for which past yield data is available and for which requisite number of Crop Cutting Experiments (CCEs) are being conducted under General Crop Estimation Survey (GCES).
• Empanelled general insurance companies implement the scheme. The Ministry of Agriculture is administering the scheme.
• The scheme is compulsory for loanee farmers availing Crop Loan /KCC account for notified crops and voluntary for others.

Zanskar Winter Sports & Youth Festival 2021 is being organized from 18th to 30th January 2021 by the Dept. of Sports & Youth Services under the Khelo India banner in collaboration with the Ladakh Tourism Department.

• Zanskar, Zahar (locally) or Zangskar is also known as Janskar or Jangskar.
• It is a subdistrict or tehsil of the Kargil district, in the union territory of Ladakh.
• The administrative centre is Padum.
• The Zanskar Range is a mountain range in the union territory of Ladakh that separates Zanskar from Ladakh. Geologically, the Zanskar Range is part of the Tethys Himalaya, an approximately 100-km-wide synclinorium formed by strongly folded and imbricated, weakly metamorphosed sedimentary series.
• The average height of the Zanskar Range is about 6,000 m. Its eastern part is known as Rupshu.

The Supreme Court has put a stay on the implementation of the three farm laws until further orders. It has also set up a committee of agricultural experts to facilitate talks between the Centre and farmers' unions to resolve the impasse.
The members includes

• Bhupinder Singh Mann, the national president of the Bhartiya Kisan Union and All India Kisan Coordination Committee;
• Dr Parmod Kumar Joshi, an agricultural economist who is also the Director for South Asia, International Food Policy Research Institute;
• Ashok Gulati, agricultural economist and former chairman of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices;
• Anil Ghanwat, the chief of Shetkari Sanghatana, who in articles written in the media have expressed views in favour of the farm laws.

The Chief Justice said that the committee will not pass an order or punish and submit a report to the Supreme Court. He said the committee is the judicial process in this case.

Actor Anuskha Sharma and her husband, Indian cricket captain Virat Kohli, became parents to a girl on January 11. While the Indian team is on a tour to Australia, Kohli came back to India after the first Test, on paternity leave.

• Unlike maternity leave, which is legally mandated, the private sector is not bound to provide paternity leave in India.
• There is a legal stipulation for central government employees –– a “male civil servant (including an apprentice, probationer) with less than two surviving children may be granted Paternity Leave for a period of 15 days before or up to six months from the date of delivery of the child.”
• The “less than two surviving children” means the employee can take paternity leaves only for his first two children.
• Thus, the decision on how long a paternity leave they wish to provide rests with a particular company.
• For women, on the other hand, the law mandates that female workers of all establishments with 10 or more workers can take 26 weeks of paid leave, up to eight weeks of which can be claimed before the delivery of the child.

Manipur has become the 4th State in the country to successfully undertake “Urban Local Bodies (ULB)” reforms stipulated by the Department of Expenditure, Ministry of Finance in its letter to the States dated 17th May, 2020.

• Thus, the State has become eligible to mobilise additional financial resources of Rs.75 crore through Open Market Borrowings.
• Manipur has now joined the three other States: Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Telangana, who have completed this reform.
• Reforms in the Urban Local Bodies and the urban utilities reforms aim to financial strenghtening of ULBs in the States and enable them to provide better public health and sanitation services.
• Economically rejuvenated ULBs will also be able to create good civic infrastructure.

The reforms stipulated by the Department of Expenditure to achieve these objectives are:

• The State will notify (a) floor rates of property tax in ULBs which are following the prevailing circle rates (i.e. guideline rates for property transactions) and (b) floor rates of user charges in respect of the provision of water-supply, drainage and sewerage which reflect current costs/ past inflation.
• The State will put a system of periodic increase in floor rates of property tax/ user charges in line with price increases.