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

The Election Commission ordered a ban on bike rallies 72 hours before polling and on the day of voting itself in the Assam, Kerala, Puducherry, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal Assembly elections, citing instances of “anti-social elements” on bikes intimidating voters.

• The EC wrote to the Chief Electoral Officers of the four States and the Union Territory of Puducherry.

• The EC decided that bike rallies would not be allowed at any place 72 hours before the date of poll and on the poll day in all constituencies where elections are being held.

• The complaints came up particularly during the EC’s meetings with parties in Kolkata, adding that the ban had been in place during the previous elections as well.

• Originally the commission had only a Chief Election Commissioner. It currently consists of Chief Election Commissioner and two Election Commissioners.

• For the first time two additional Commissioners were appointed on 16th October 1989 but they had a very short tenure till 1st January 1990. Later, on 1st October 1993 two additional Election Commissioners were appointed. The concept of multi-member Commission has been in operation since then, with decision making power by majority vote.

Telecom Minister Sanjay Dhotre represented India at the World Summit on Information Society Forum 2021.

• The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) Forum 2021 represents one of the world's largest annual gathering of the ‘ICT for development’ community.

• It is co-organized by International Telecommunications Union (ITU), UNESCO, UNDP and UNCTAD.

• The telecom minister mentioned that under the flagship program BharatNet, nearly 6,00,000 villages are being connected through laying of more than 4,00,000 Km length of optical fiber cable and use of satellite communication services.

• Through submarine cable networks small and remote islands of Andaman & Nicobar and Lakshadweep and other inaccessible areas are being connected with funding from Government.

• Establishment of ITU Area office and Innovation Centre in India with involvement of SMEs, Academia and Startups in the region will go a long way in development of technologies, standards and solutions best suited for rural and remote areas of developing nations.

Gandhi Peace Prize for the Year 2019 and 2020 were announced.

• The Gandhi Peace Prize for the year 2019 is being conferred on (Late) His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said Al Said of Oman.

• The Gandhi Peace Prize for the year 2020 is being conferred on Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.

• Gandhi Peace Prize is an annual award instituted by Government of India since 1995, the 125th Birth Anniversary commemoration year of Mahatma Gandhi.

• The award is open to all persons regardless of nationality, race, language, caste, creed or sex.

• The Jury for Gandhi Peace Prize is chaired by Hon’ble Prime Minister, Sh Narendra Modi ,and comprises of two ex-officio members, namely the Chief Justice of India and Leader of the single largest Opposition Party in Lok Sabha.

• Two eminent members are also part of the Jury, namely Shri Om Birla, Speaker of the Lok Sabha, and Shri Bindeshwar Pathak, Founder of Sulabh International Social Service Organisation.

• The award carries an amount of Rs. 1 crore, a citation, a plaque and an exquisite traditional handicraft/ handloom item.

Ganga Quest 2021, an online competitive quiz was launched.

• Ganga Quest is an international bilingual (Hindi and English) online quiz on Ganga.

• It is being organized by

  • National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG), an authority under Government of India which implements the ‘Namami Gange’ programme and

  • TREE Craze Foundation (TCF), a not for profit organization committed to Ganga, Rivers, and Environment.

•  The online competition was conceptualized in 2019.

Minister for Jal Shakti informed Rajya Sabha about the 'Buldhana Pattern' for water conservation.

• NITI Aayog has prepared draft guidelines for convergence of the activities of (i) sourcing earth for improvement/construction of national highways, state roads and railways and (ii) water conservation works through desiltation/ deepening of water bodies.

• This two-fold activity has already been successfully implemented as a pilot project in the Buldhana district of Maharashtra state.

• This Information was given by the Minister of State for Jal Shakti & Social Justice and Empowerment, Shri. Rattan Lal Kataria Rajya Sabha today.

United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) entered into a partnership with the Government of Denmark to support the Union Government’s flagship programme, Jal Jeevan Mission in Uttar Pradesh.

• The purpose of partnership between the Government of Denmark and UNOPS is to provide strategic technical support to Jal Jeevan Mission (Water program).

• UNOPS shall be focussing on instituting scalable delivery models in focused 11 water-scare districts of Uttar Pradesh in Bundelkhand and Vindhya regions.

• The Jal JeevanMission aims to provide functional household tap connection to every rural household by 2024. This coincides with the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goal-6.

• The United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS) is an operational arm of the United Nations, dedicated to implementing projects for the United Nations System, international financial institutions, governments and other partners around the world.

• The organization's global headquarters is located on the UN City campus in Copenhagen, Denmark.

• UNOPS was established in 1973 as part of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). It became an independent, self-financing organization in 1995.

The Jury for the 67th National Film Awards announced the winners for the year 2019. The announcement of the awards was delayed by almost a year because of the pandemic.

• Priyadarshan’s Marakkar Arabikadalinte Simham was chosen as the best feature film and Sanjay Puran Singh Chauhan won the best director award for Hindi film Bahattar Hoorain at the 67th National Film Awards.

• Headlined by Mohanlal, Marakkar Arabikadalinte Simham, or the Lion of Arabian Sea, is a period action drama about a 16th century Malayali naval chieftain who fought the Portuguese invasion.

• Manoj Bajpayee and Dhanush shared the best actor award. While Manoj was awarded for his measured performance as a retired police constable in Bhonsle, Dhanush won it for depicting a range of emotions in Vetrimaaran’s multi-layered revenge drama Asuran.

• Kangana Ranaut won the best actress award for her varied performances in Manikarnika: The Queen of Jhansi and Panga.

• Sikkim has bagged the award for being Most Film Friendly State.

• Established in 1954, National Film Awards has been administered by the Indian government's Directorate of Film Festivals since 1973.

The government has decided to increase the interval between the first and second doses of Covishield to up to eight weeks in its ongoing vaccination drive against Covid-19.

• Covishield is Serum Institute of India’s version of AZD1222, the vaccine developed by AstraZeneca in collaboration with the University of Oxford.

• Some data from global trials of AZD122 suggests that extending the duration between doses to 12 weeks increased its efficacy much more.

• The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare took the decision on the recommendation of two expert groups – the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (NTAGI) and National Expert Group on Vaccine Administration for Covid-19 (NEGVAC).

• The groups, after looking into available scientific evidence from clinical trials of the vaccine, concluded that the protection that it provides against Covid-19 is “enhanced” if the second dose is administered between 6-8 weeks.

The government has readied a draft district-wise export promotion plan for 451 districts in the country after identifying products and services with export potential in 725 districts, Commerce Secretary said.

• Aiming for double-digit export growth from 500 districts over 3-5 years, the Commerce Ministry has asked States to prepare an annual ‘export ranking index’ of districts on export competitiveness with the assistance of the Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT).

• While foreign trade constitutes 45% of India’s GDP, most export promotion efforts are driven by the Centre.

• The district-specific approach, that involves the States in identifying potential export sectors and the logistics bottlenecks to be fixed, was taken up after Prime Minister Narendra Modi pushed for each district to aim to be an export hub during his Independence Day address in 2019.

• In the initial phase, products and services with export potential in each district have been identified and an institutional mechanism of State and District Export Promotion Committees (SEPC) are being created, with an action plan to grow exports from each district.

• District Export Promotion Committees have been notified in the districts of all the States except West Bengal.

US President Joe Biden has nominated former Senator Bill Nelson to serve as the 14th NASA Administrator.

• Nelson will serve as NASA’s chief executive officer and will be directly accountable to President Biden.

• In this role, he will articulate the space agency’s vision, will set its programmatic and budget priorities, internal policies and assess the agency’s performance.

• A one-time astronaut, Nelson flew aboard the space shuttle Columbia as a payload specialist on the STS-61C mission in 1986.

• Last month, NASA appointed Indian-American Bhavya Lal as the agency’s acting chief of staff.

• Lal had previously served as a member of the Biden Presidential Transition Agency Review Team for the agency and oversaw the agency’s transition under the administration of President Joe Biden.