Daily Current Affairs MCQ - July 23, 2021 - UPSC MCQ

The Union Cabinet has approved the establishment of an Integrated Multi-purpose infrastructure Development Corporation for the Union Territory of Ladakh

• The Cabinet also approved the creation of one post of Managing Director, for the corporation in the pay scale of Rs.1,44,200- Rs.2,18,200 level.
• The authorized share capital of the Corporation will be Rs.25 crore and recurring expenditure will be around Rs. 2.42 crore per year.
• It is a new establishment. Presently, there is no such similar organization within the newly formed UT of Ladakh.
• It is being developed on the lines of the Andaman & Nicobar Islands Integrated Development Corporation Limited (ANIIDCO), with an appropriate mandate to take up various developmental activities as per the specific needs of Ladakh.
• Hence both statements are correct.

Union Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Minister inaugurated the office of National Farmers Welfare Program Implementation Committee.

• The National Farmers Welfare Program Implementation Committee would act as a project monitoring unit for the implementation of
  • PM-Kisan Yojana,
  • Kisan Maandhan Yojana,
  • Agriculture Infrastructure Fund and
  • other schemes of the Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare.
• The Central Government has implemented the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan) scheme to make farmers self-reliant and to provide direct income support for agricultural expenditure.
• Under this scheme, an amount of Rs 1.37 lakh crore has been transferred to the accounts of more than 11 crore farmer families so far.
• Hence, option (a) is the correct answer.

Britain said that a Brexit treaty on Northern Ireland, negotiated by Prime Minister Boris Johnson and called the Northern Ireland Protocol, could create so many problems that it might have to be abandoned if it cannot be rewritten.

• The protocol aims to resolve one of the thorniest issues created by Brexit: what to do about the border between Northern Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom, and the Republic of Ireland, which remains part of the EU.
• The protocol sets out a plan to deal with this unique situation. It does so by effectively leaving Northern Ireland half inside the European system, and half inside the British one.
• The plan means more checks on goods entering Northern Ireland from mainland Britain, effectively creating a border down the Irish Sea and dividing the UK.

Under the protocol it was agreed that Northern Ireland would continue to follow EU rules on product standards (known as the single market) to prevent checks along the border.

Hence both statements are correct.

A special CBI court on July 16 convicted two policemen and awarded them life sentences for the custodial death of a murder accused, who was burnt alive inside a police station in Karnal.

• The judgment relied heavily on the ‘dying declaration’ made by the victim prior to his death.
• The law presumes that no person will meet their maker with a lie in their mouth. So Section 32 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 deals with cases in which statement of relevant fact is made by a person who is dead or cannot be found.
• The general rule under Section 60 of the Act is that all oral evidence must be direct — he heard it, saw it or perceived it.
• The grounds of admission under a dying declaration have been based on two broad rules —
  • one, the victim being generally the only principal eye-witness to the crime; and
  • two, the sense of impending death, which creates a sanction equal to the obligation of an oath.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

In response to the finding by a global collaborative investigative project that Israeli spyware Pegasus was used to target at least 300 individuals in India, the government has claimed that all interception in India takes place lawfully.

• Communication surveillance in India takes place primarily under two laws — the Telegraph Act, 1885 and the Information Technology Act, 2000.
• While the Telegraph Act deals with interception of calls, the IT Act was enacted to deal with surveillance of all electronic communication, following the Supreme Court’s intervention in 1996.

Supreme Court intervention

• In Public Union for Civil Liberties v Union of India (1996), the Supreme Court pointed out lack of procedural safeguards in the provisions of the Telegraph Act and laid down certain guidelines for interceptions.
• Among the guidelines issued by the court were setting up a review committee that can look into authorisations made under Section 5(2) of the Telegraph Act.
• The Supreme Court’s guidelines formed the basis of introducing Rule 419A in the Telegraph Rules in 2007 and later in the rules prescribed under the IT Act in 2009.
• Hence both statements are correct.

According to the definition adopted by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) in 2006, a dwarf planet is, “a celestial body orbiting a star that is massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity but has not cleared its neighboring region of planetesimals and is not a satellite.

In essence, the term is meant to designate any planetary-mass object that is neither a planet nor a natural satellite that fits two basic criteria. For one, it must be in direct orbit of the sun and not be a moon around another body. Second, it must be massive enough for it to have become spherical in shape under its own gravity. And, unlike a planet, it must have not cleared the neighborhood around its orbit.

Union Education Minister launched the National Initiative for Proficiency in Reading with Understanding and Numeracy (NIPUN Bharat) for ensuring that every child in the country necessarily attains foundational literacy and numeracy by the end of grade 3, by 2026-27.

The mission planned as per the new National Education Policy (NEP) has been launched under the aegis of the centrally sponsored scheme of Samagra Shiksha. It will focus on providing access and retaining children in foundational years of schooling, teacher capacity building; development of high quality and diversified student and teacher resources and tracking the progress of each child in achieving learning outcomes.

NIPUN Bharat aims to cover the learning needs of children in the age group of 3 to 9 years.

The Sargasso Sea, located entirely within the Atlantic Ocean, is the only sea without a land boundary. It is bounded by four ocean currents forming an ocean gyre.

It is distinguished from other parts of the Atlantic Ocean by its characteristic brown Sargassum seaweed and often calm blue water.

The sea is bounded on the west by the Gulf Stream, on the north by the North Atlantic Current, on the east by the Canary Current, and on the south by the North Atlantic Equatorial Current, the four together forming a clockwise-circulating system of ocean currents termed the North Atlantic Gyre.

• Mangroves can be found in over 118 countries and territories in the tropical and subtropical regions of the world. Hence, statement 1 is not correct.
• According to the State of Forest Report 2019, mangrove cover in the country is 4,975 sq km, which is 0.15% of the country’s total geographical area.
  • Mangrove cover in the country has increased by 54 sq km (1.10%) as compared to the previous assessment (2017). Hence, statement 2 is not correct.
• The deltas of the Ganges, Mahanadi, Krishna, Godavari, and the Cauvery rivers contain mangrove forests.
  • The backwaters in Kerala have a high density of mangrove forest.
  • The Sundarbans in West Bengal is the largest mangrove region in the world and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
  • The Bhitarkanika mangrove system in Odisha is India’s second largest mangrove forest.
  • Pichavaram in Tamil Nadu has a vast expanse of water covered with mangrove forests. It is home to many aquatic bird species.
• West Bengal has 42.45% of India’s mangrove cover, followed by Gujarat 23.66% and A & N Islands 12.39%. Hence, statement 3 is correct.

• Recently, the US has approved the Germany-Russia Nord Stream 2 Pipeline (NS2P) project - which significantly increases Europe’s energy dependence on Russia.
  • The US had previously imposed sanctions to prevent the completion of this gas pipeline between Russia and Germany. Hence, option A is correct.
  • This is a 1,200-km pipeline that runs from Ust-Luga in Russia to Greifswald in Germany through the Baltic Sea. It will carry 55 billion cubic metres of gas per year.

Nord stream 1 system is already completed and together with NS2P, it will supply 110 billion cubic metre of gas a year to Germany.
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