Daily Current Affairs MCQ- January 28, 2024 - UPSC MCQ

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) recently released final guidelines on information technology (IT) governance for regulated entities (REs) like banks, non-bank financial companies, credit information companies and other financial entities. 

What are the new guidelines on Information Technology (IT) Governance for Regulated Entities (REs)?

• The REs have been mandated to put in place a robust IT governance framework to cover focus areas like strategic alignment, risk and resource management performance, and Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery Management.
• This framework should specify the governance structure and processes necessary to meet the RE’s business/strategic objectives.
• The framework will specify the roles (including authority) and responsibilities of the Board of Directors, board-level Committee, and Senior Management. 
• It will also address the issue of adequate oversight mechanisms to ensure accountability and mitigation of IT and cyber/information security risks.
• The enterprise-wide risk management policy or operational risk management policy will incorporate periodic assessments of IT-related risks (both inherent and potential risks).
• The board of RE would approve the strategies and policies related to IT, Information Assets, Business Continuity, Information Security, and Cyber Security (including Incident Response and Recovery Management/Cyber Crisis Management). Theyshould review such strategies and policies at least annually.
• IT strategy committee (ITSC):
• The RE will establish a Board-level IT Strategy Committee (ITSC), which will comprise a minimum of three directors.
• Its chairman would be an independent director and carry substantial expertise in managing/guiding information technology initiatives.
• The ITSC should meet at least on a quarterly basis.
• The committee will ensure that the RE has put an effective IT strategic planning process in place and will guide in preparation of IT strategy and ensure that the IT strategy aligns with the overall strategy of the RE towards accomplishment of its business objectives.
• The guidelines mandate REs to establish an IT steering committee with representation at senior management level from IT and business functions.
• This committee will assist the ITSC in strategic IT planning, oversight of IT performance and aligning IT activities with business needs, and will oversee the processes put in place for business continuity and disaster recovery.
• It will also ensure the implementation of a robust IT architecture meeting statutory and regulatory compliance.
• Every IT application, which can access or affect critical or sensitive information, shall have necessary audit and system logging capability and should provide audit trails. 
• The audit trails shall satisfy a RE’s business requirements apart from regulatory and legal requirements.
• The audit trails must be detailed enough to facilitate the conduct of audit, serve as forensic evidence when required and assist in dispute resolution, including for non-repudiation purposes.

Hence both statements are correct.

The Supreme Court recently held that for admissibility under Section 27 of the Evidence Act, the fact discovered must be a direct consequence of information received from a person in custody.

About Section 27 of the Indian Evidence Act:

• Section 27 of the Evidence Act highlights an interesting and complex feature related to the admission of confessions within its legal framework.
• Sections 25 and 26 establish protection against self-incrimination and abuse of power by the police authority, deeming confessions made in police custody without the presence of a magistrate as inadmissible before a court of law.
• Section 27 adds an exception by enabling the admission of confessions that result in the discovery of facts. 
• Section 27 states: "Provided that, when any fact is deposed to as discovered in consequence of information received from a person accused of any offence, in the custody of a police officer, so much of such information, whether it amounts to a confession or not, as relates distinctly to the fact thereby discovered, may be proved."
• In simpler terms, any confession made by a person while in police custody that leads to the revelation of a fact is considered admissible in court.
• The basic idea embedded in Section 27 of the Evidence Act is the doctrine of confirmation by subsequent events. This doctrine is founded on the principle that every part of the statement made at the instance of the accused, in a police custody should necessarily be confirmed by the subsequent events of discovery, to make it admissible in court. 
• In the case of Asar Mohd. v. State of U.P, the Supreme Court held that the concept of "fact" mentioned in Section 27 is not limited to physical objects alone but also includes essential psychological or mental facts that may be directly relevant to the case.

Hence option c is the correct answer.

Russia formally withdrew from the Treaty of Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) recently.

About Treaty of Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE):

• Negotiated during the final years of the Cold War and signed a year after the fall of the Berlin Wall, CFE placed limits on the deployment of military equipment to maintain military balance between North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the then-Warsaw Pact countries.
• Its purpose was to stop Cold War rivals from building up forces that could be used in a swift assault. 
• Twenty-two member states of the two military alliances, the NATO and the Warsaw Pact, came together in Paris on 19 November 1990 to sign the agreement.
• It finally entered into force on 9 November 1992. The Warsaw Pact by this time had disintegrated and its treaty obligations were consequently passed to the pact’s successor states.
• Specifically, the Treaty required NATO and Warsaw Pact states to have in total no more than 40,000 battle tanks, 60,000 armoured combat vehicles, 40,000 pieces of artillery, 13,600 combat aircraft and 4,000 attack helicopters on the whole territory of the respective alliance.
• To reach these targets, the CFE states parties destroyed in subsequent years more than 50,000 weapons systems. 
• These steps were supervised under a treaty compliance mechanism requiring information sharing and reciprocal inspections.
• Moreover, the scope of the treaty was soon widened to cover troop numbers. The 1992 follow-up agreement known as the CFE-1A arranged limits on the level of military personnel.
• Meeting at the Istanbul summit of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), CFE Treaty partners finally agreed, on 19 November 1999, on an updated and modified arrangement: the Adapted CFE Treaty. 
• A major change was that limitations on conventional weapon systems were no longer aligned to two “blocs” but to the territorial borders of individual states.
• Russia suspended its participation in the treaty in 2007 and halted active participation in 2015.

Hence both statements are correct.

A second flood warning for five southern districts has been issued after the water level in Vaigai dam touched 68.50 ft. (the maximum permissible level is 71 ft.) recently.

About Vaigai Dam:

• It is constructed across the Vaigai River near Andipatti, in the Theni district of Tamil Nadu.
• It was built in 1959 and is often referred to as the lifeline of the region.
• It has a height of 111 feet and can store 71 feet of water.
• It was primarily built to provide water for irrigation in the Madurai district and the Dindigul district,as well as drinking water for Madurai and Andipatti. 
• Near the dam, the Government of Tamil Nadu has constructed an Agricultural Research Station for researching the growing of a variety of crops.
• There is a small garden, called Little Brindavan that is located in close proximity to this dam.

Hence option b is the correct answer.

Recently, researchers discovered a new species of jumping spider from the Shendurney Wildlife Sanctuary.

• The new species belongs to the jumping spider genus Pancorius Simon, 1902, and Salticidae family,
• It has been named Pancorius sebastiani after the late spider taxonomist P.A. Sebastian.
• The Pancorius genus of Asian jumping spiders is primarily distributed in southeast Asia.
• Its distribution was hitherto limited to the east and northeastern regions in India.
• The new species is the first to be reported from the south.
• Features
• The males and the females of Pancorius sebastiani exhibit reddish brown carapace, yellowish abdomen with black patches and chevron-shaped markings posteromedially.
• An analysis of Salticidae species in the country shows that only two States, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu, have reported high numbers, while the others including those harbouring biodiversity hotspots like the Western Ghats and northeastern India have relatively few numbers of species.

Hence option d is the correct answer.

Researchers from the Laboratory for the Conservation of Endangered Species (LaCONES) at the CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) in Hyderabad have developed new eDNA sequencing method to assess biodiversity.

• Environmental DNA (eDNA) is DNA shed by all organisms into their surroundings through natural processes during their lifetime or after death.
• Source: It originates from cellular material shed by organisms (via skin, excrement, etc.) into aquatic or terrestrial environments that can be sampled and monitored using new molecular methods.

Key points about new method

• The new non-invasive method can assess the total biodiversity of any ecosystem by sequencing the DNA fragments found in the environmental samples such as water, soil or air.
• This method can detect all kinds of organisms, including viruses, bacteria, archaea, and eukaryotes such as fungi, plants, insects, birds, fish and other animals.
• This method requires just a few litres of water sample without any direct capture or counting of species.
• The researchers filter out eDNA from environmental samples, read their sequences, and thus, identify the source of the eDNA.

Significance

• Such methodology is important for the early detection of invasive species as well as the detection of rare and cryptic species.
• eDNA can also reveal the presence of human remains
• The new method is cheaper, faster, and highly scalable to large freshwater and marine ecosystems which can help in monitoring and conserving the rich biodiversity of our country.

Hence both statements are correct.

Researchers at the University of Tokyo have successfully created “sustainable plastic,” which is based on an epoxy resin vitrimer.

• These represent a relatively recent category of plastics known for their impressive strength at low temperatures.
• They also possess the unique ability to be reshaped numerous times when exposed to higher temperatures. 
• It is also partially biodegradable.
• Nonetheless, they do have a notable drawback - extreme brittleness, as they cannot be stretched far before breaking.
• To address this issue, researchers introduced a molecule called polyrotaxane into the plastic synthesis process, resulting in a novel plastic variant they've dubbed VPR, an abbreviation for "vitrimer incorporated with polyrotaxane." 
• VPR is over five times as resistant to breaking as a typical epoxy resin vitrimer.
• At high temperature of around 150 degrees Celsius, VPR start to recombine, allowing the material to take on different forms.
• It also repairs itself 15 times as fast, can recover its original memorised shape twice as fast and can be chemically recycled 10 times as fast as the typical vitrimer.
• It even biodegrades safely in a marine environment, which is new for this material,”

Hence both statements are correct.

Scientists of the Botanical Survey of India (BSI) have discovered a new species of epiphytic plant Lysionotus namchoomii from Pakke-Kessang district of Arunachal Pradesh.

• It is named as Lysionotus namchoomii.
• Range: The native range of the genus Lysionotus is the Himalayas to Japan and Indo-China, and about 50% of the species found are endemic.
• Species of the genus are mostly epiphytic, lithophytic, or terrestrial evergreen erect or climbing subshrubs.
• The new species bears thick leaves and attractive purple flowers.
• The conservation status of this new species is provisionally assessed as ‘Critically Endangered’, in accordance with the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List. 
• It is epiphytic in nature and grows another plant.
• Epiphytic plants are mostly found in tropical and subtropical forests,

Key Facts about Botanical Survey of India

• It is the apex taxonomic research organization of the country which is under the Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change, Government of India.
• It was established on 13^th February 1890 under the direction of Sir George King.
• The mandate of the organization has been broadened to biosystematics research, floristic studies, documentation, databasing of National Botanical collection, digitization of herbarium specimens etc.
• Headquarter: Kolkata

Hence option a is the correct answer.

Physicists recently found evidence that tellurium is produced in neutron star mergers.

About Tellurium:

• Tellurium is a semi-metallic, lustrous, crystalline, brittle, silver-white element.
• Atomic Number: 52
• It has the properties of both the metals and the nonmetals.
• It forms many compounds corresponding to those of sulfur and selenium.
• When burned in the air, tellurium has a greenish-blue flame and forms tellurium dioxide as a result.
• Tellurium is a semiconductor material and is slightly photosensitive.
• It is one of the only elements that readily combine with gold (Au).
• Sources:
• Tellurium is sometimes found free in nature. 
• More commonly, it is found combined with metals, such as in the minerals calaverite (gold telluride, AuTe2) and sylvanite (silver-gold telluride).
• Commercially, tellurium is obtained as a byproduct of electrolytic copper refining.
• Applications:
• Tellurium is alloyed with copper and stainless steel to makethese metals more workable.
• It is added at very low levels to lead to decreases the corrosive actionof sulfuric acid in batteries and to improve the lead’s strength and hardness.
• It is used as a coloring agent in ceramics.
• It is also used in the electronics industry, for example, with cadmium and mercury to form photosensitive semiconductors.
• It is used in vulcanizing rubber, andin catalysts for petroleum cracking, and in blasting caps for explosives.

Hence both statements are correct.

The Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) recently decided to withdraw its elite CoBRA force from Jammu and Kashmir following objections to its deployment from some senior officials of the paramilitary force.

About Commando Battalions for Resolute Action (CoBRA):

• Established in 2008, CoBRA is a specialized unit of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF).
• It is one of the few units of the CRPF in the country that is specifically trained in guerilla tactics and jungle warfare.
• They are also known as ‘jungle warriors’.
• Originally established to counter the left wing extremism (Naxalite problem), CoBRA is deployed within India to address any insurgent group engaging in asymmetrical warfare.
• Personnel for CoBRA are selected from CRPF, as CoBRA is an integral part of CRPF.
• They undergo rigorous commando and jungle warfare training before being posted to CoBRA units for operations.
• It has 10 units, raised between 2008 and 2011
• The majority of CoBRA teams are deployed in various Maoist violence-affected states while a few are based in the northeastern states to undertake counter-insurgency operations.

Hence only statement 2 is correct.