Daily Current Affairs MCQ- February 20, 2023 - UPSC MCQ

The Geological Survey of India (GSI) will be taking up 111 public -health and public good geoscience activities during 2023-24.

• It was set up in 1851 primarily to find coal deposits for the Railways.
• Over the years, it has grown into a repository of geo-science information required in various fields in the country.
• The main functions of the GSI relate to the creation and updation of national geoscientific information and mineral resource assessment.
• Presently, GSI is an attached office to the Ministry of Mines.
• It is headquartered in Kolkata and has six regional offices located at Lucknow, Jaipur, Nagpur, Hyderabad, Shillong and Kolkata. Every state has a state unit.

Hence both statements are correct.

Prime Minister of India will inaugurate the year-long celebrations commemorating the 200th birth anniversary of Maharishi Dayanand Saraswati, at Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium, Delhi.

• Swami Dayanand Saraswati was a philosopher, social leader and founder of the Arya Samaj, a reform movement of Vedic dharma.
• He established the Arya Samaj on April 7, 1875, in Bombay -- with 10 principles that are beautifully based purely on God, soul and nature.
• This organisation brought about immense changes in the religious perceptions of Indians.
• He was the first to give the call for Swaraj as "India for Indian" in 1876.
• One of his most influential works is the book Satyarth Prakash, which contributed to the Indian independence movement.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

Recently, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) permitted all inbound travellers from the Group of Twenty (G-20) countries and non-resident Indians to access Unified Payment Interface (UPI) for their merchant payments (P2M) at select airports.

• Prepaid Payment Instruments are instruments that facilitate the purchase of goods and services, including financial services, remittance facilities, etc., against the value stored on such instruments.
• Open System PPIs: These PPIs are issued only by banks (approved by RBI) and are used at any merchant for the purchase of goods and services. Cash withdrawal at ATMs / Point of Sale (PoS) terminals / Business Correspondents (BCs) is also allowed through such PPIs.

Hence only statement 2 is correct.

Prime Minister will inaugurate the Sohna-Dausa stretch of the Delhi-Mumbai Expressway in Rajasthan's Dausa.

About Delhi-Mumbai Expressway:

• It will be India’s longest expressway with a length of 1,386 km. 
• This expressway will reduce the travel distance between Delhi and Mumbai by 12 percent from 1,424 km to 1,242 km.
• Travel time between Delhi Mumbai will be reduced from 24 hours to 12 hours.
• It is being built at an estimated cost of Rs 98,000 crore by National Highways Authority of India (NHAI).
• The expressway will pass through six states of Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat and Maharashtra and connect major cities like Kota, Indore, Jaipur, Bhopal, Vadodara and Surat.
• Features:
• It is an 8-lane access-controlled Greenfield Expressway with scope for future expansion upto 12-lane expressway.
• It is the first expressway in Asia and only the second in the world to feature animal overpasses to facilitate unrestricted movement of wildlife. 
• It is the first expressway that is developed with a 21-meter median on principles of forgiving highways allowing inward expansion.
• The expressway facilitates Rain Water Harvesting in 500m interval at over 2,000 plus water recharge points.
• It will also have an automated traffic management system.

Hence only statement 2 is correct.

Union minister for electronics and information technology recently said that Mission Bhashini’s capabilities have been integrated with the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) to make digital payments through the UPI 123 Pay available in more than 20 local Indian languages.

About Bhashini Mission:

• It is a local language translation mission that aims to break the barrier between various Indian tongues by using available technology.
• BHASHINI4 aims to build a National Public Digital Platform for languages.
• This government platform aims to make Artificial Intelligence and Natural Language Processing (NLP) resources available in the public domain to be used by -- Indian MSMEs, startups an and individual innovators.
• This will help developers to offer all Indians easy access to the internet and digital services in their native languages.
• This online platform also has a separate ‘Bhasadaan’ section which allows individuals to contribute to multiple crowdsourcing initiatives and it is also accessible via respective Android and iOS apps.

Hence both statements are correct.

An Oxford University-led study found alarming levels of toxic PFAS also known as “forever chemicals” in ice around Svalbard, Norway which pose a risk to the region’s wildlife.

About Forever Chemicals:

• PFAS (Per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances), also known as the Forever Chemicals, are a large chemical family of over 4,700 highly persistent man-made chemicals.
• They are the most persistent synthetic chemicals to date.
• These were first developed in the 1940s and are now found in a variety of products, including nonstick pans, water-resistant textiles and fire suppression foams.
• PFAS don’t easily degrade in the environment and are very mobile in water.
• PFAS’ indestructability comes from their carbon-flouride bonds, one of the strongest types of bonds in organic chemistry. 
• Over time, these pollutants have accumulated in the environment, entering the air, soil, groundwater and lakes and rivers as a result of industrial processes and from leaching through landfills.
• PFAS have been found in the environment all around the world, even in the most remote areas such as the Arctic. They have also been detected in the blood and breastmilk of people and wildlife globally.
• Chronic exposure to even low levels of PFAS has been linked to liver damage, high cholesterol, reduced immune responses, low birth weights and several kinds of cancer.

Hence only statement 2 is correct.

Scientists recently observed a large prominence near Sun’s north pole. 

About Solar prominence:

• Large, loop-like structures on the edge of the solar disk sometimes stand out brightly against the dark background of space. These enormous structures are called solar prominences.
• Prominences are anchored to the Sun's surface in the photosphere, and extend outwards into the Sun's hot outer atmosphere, called the corona. 
• They are much cooler and denser than the surrounding plasma in the Sun's corona.
• Prominences are shaped by the Sun's complex magnetic field, often forming loops with each end anchored to the Sun's surface.
• Prominences are enormous, extending out for many thousands of kilometers.
• They can last for several days or up to several months.
• Some prominences erupt and break apart, giving rise to coronal mass ejections (CMEs).

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

Recently, NASA’s astronomer explained the formation of the Mammatus clouds.

• Mammatus clouds refer to distinctive cloud formations that are separated by a bulge or protrusion emerging from the base of another cloud.
• They are usually formed in association with large cumulonimbus clouds.
• Typically, turbulence within the cumulonimbus cloud will cause Mammatus to form, especially on the underside of the projecting anvil as it rapidly descends to lower levels.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

A recent analysis by a group of scientists at the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), Ahmedabad, has revealed that two villages in Banaskantha, Gujarat hit by Aubrite meteorites.

• The pieces that fell in the two villages have been named the Diyodar meteorite, after the taluka in which the villages are located.
• Aubrite meteorites are coarse-grained igneous rocks that are formed in oxygen-poor conditions.
• They contain a variety of exotic minerals that are not found on Earth.
• The recently found aubrite meteorite in Gujarat is composed of orthopyroxene.

Hence both statements are correct.

India’s first frozen lake marathon is set to be held in Ladakh’s Pangong Tso.

About Pangong Tso:

• Pangong Lake or Pangong Tso is a long narrow, endorheic (landlocked) lake situated at a height of more than 14,000 ft (4,350 meters) in the Ladakh Himalayas.
• The lake is 5 kilometers wide and 134 kilometers long, with one-third of it lying in India & the other two-thirds in China. 
• It is the world's highest saltwater lake.
• The lake is also very deep and reaches a maximum depth of almost 328 feet.
• It is also known to change colors, appearing blue, green, and red at different times.

Hence both statements are not correct.