Daily Current Affairs MCQ- August 22, 2022 - UPSC MCQ

Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) of the Ministry of Science and Technology and Earth Sciences, Dr. Jitendra Singh informed Lok Sabha about the Safforn Bowl Project.

• North East Centre for Technology Application and Reach (NECTAR) under Saffron Bowl project has identified few locations in Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya for saffron cultivation.
• In Arunachal Pradesh, there is a good growth of organic saffron with flowers. In Meghalaya, sample plantations were grown at Cherrapunji, Mawsmai and Lalingtop sites.
• The total cost of the whole project is Rs. 17.68 lakhs for Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya. Out of which, a tentative amount of Rs.6.00 lakhs has been earmarked for Barapani (Meghalaya) site.
• The following sites have been identified in Meghalaya under the said project:
  • Barapani,
  • Cherrapunji,
  • Mawsmai,
  • Shillong, and
  • Lalingtop.

Hence both statements are correct.

The Union Government has approved continuation of Scheme of Assistance to National Sports Federations (NSFs) with an outlay of Rs. 1575 crore for XV Finance Commission Cycle (2021-22 to 2025-26).

• The Scheme of Assistance to NSFs is the flagship Central Sector Scheme.
• It is the main source of funding for preparation of national teams for all major national and international competitions, including the Olympic Games, Para-Olympics, Asian Games, Para Asian Games, Commonwealth Games (CWG) and other major international tournaments.
• The outlay in the cycle will be extended to NSFs to train and field national teams for national and international competitions between 2022 and 2026, prime among them, the Commonwealth and Asian Games of 2022, Olympics and Paralympics 2024 and Asian and Commonwealth Games in 2026.
• The financial support extended by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports through this Scheme will be used by NSFs to conduct national coaching camps, procure sports equipment and consumables, provide training of international standards to athletes etc.

Hence (B) statements are correct.

The Emergency Credit Line Guarantee Scheme (ECLGS) will be extended to cover the next fiscal as well, with expanded guarantee cover of Rs 5 lakh crore, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said in her budget presentation.

• An additional guarantee amount of Rs 50,000 crore has been announced for the hospitality sector.
• Under ECLGS, which is for helping companies tide over liquidity crunch resulting from Covid-19 curbs, banks provide additional loans to existing borrowers without asking for extra collateral. To encourage banks, these loans are fully guaranteed by the government against credit losses. This scheme will be key to ensure that MSMEs impacted by intermittent lockdowns in states get funding to stay afloat.
• Sanctions and disbursements under the facility are relatively faster since lenders have the Central government guarantee in case of default against these loans.
• Hotels, restaurants, canteens, caterers, marriage halls, tour operators, as well as amusement parks and theatres can avail the facility. Accounts that are classified as non-performing assets or where overdues have crossed 60 days (SMA-II) are not eligible.

Hence both statements are correct.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced the launch of the Digital Rupee — a central bank digital currency (CBDC) — 2022-23 onwards.

• The Reserve Bank of India will launch the CBDC from the upcoming financial year. This follows the government’s plans to launch the CBDC that will be backed by blockchain technology.
• CBDC is a legal tender issued by a central bank in a digital form. It is similar to a fiat currency issued in paper and is interchangeable with any other fiat currency.
• The goal is to provide users with convenience and security of digital as well as the regulated, reserve-backed circulation of the traditional banking system.
• he RBI has on several occasions flagged concerns of money laundering, terror financing, tax evasion, etc with private cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, Ether, etc and had planned to announce its own CBDC.

Hence both statements are correct.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her Budget 2022 speech, announced a 30 per cent tax on income from virtual digital assets.

• She further clarified that no deduction in respect of any expenditure or allowance shall be allowed while computing such income except the cost of acquisition.
• Additionally, she also proposed a TDS on payment made in relation to the transfer of virtual digital assets at 1 per cent above a monetary threshold.
• Additionally, if a virtual digital asset investor incurs losses during the transaction, it can’t be set off against any other income. The gifting of virtual digital assets has also been proposed to be taxed in the hands of the recipient.
• In the explanatory memorandum of the Finance Bill, the government stated, “To define the term “virtual digital asset”, a new clause (47A) is proposed to be inserted to section 2 of the Act.

Hence both statements are correct.

Five persons were found dead after part of an open cast coal mine caved in, in Dhanbad district of Jharkhand.

• Officials said the deceased persons had illegally entered the open cast mine located at the Eastern Coalfields Limited (ECL) in Mugma.
• Open cast mining is a traditional ‘cone-shaped’ excavation done for surface mining of coal that does not deep shafts.
• Open-pit mining, also known as open-cast or open-cut mining and in larger contexts mega-mining, is a surface mining technique of extracting rock or minerals from the earth from an open-air pit, sometimes known as a borrow.
• This form of mining differs from extractive methods that require tunnelling into the earth, such as long wall mining. Open-pit mines are used when deposits of commercially useful ore or rocks are found near the surface.

Hence both statements are correct.

Signalling a move to protect domestic industries which are not necessarily capital, technology or labour intensive, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman introduced a slew of higher custom duties on items of daily use such as umbrellas, headphones, earphones, loudspeakers, smart meters, and imitation jewellery.

• The customs duty on umbrellas was doubled to 20 per cent, while exemptions provided on import of parts of umbrellas were withdrawn.
• Similarly, the customs duty on single or multiple loudspeakers, whether or not mounted in their enclosures was hiked to 20 per cent from 15 per cent.
• Apart from umbrellas, the customs duty on headphones and earphones, whether or not combined with a microphone, and sets consisting of a microphone and one or more loudspeakers, was also hiked to 20 per cent from 15 per cent, while those on smart meters was raised to 25 per cent from 15 per cent.
• Import duty, meanwhile, was reduced for cut and polished diamonds, asafoetida, cocoa beans, methyl alcohol and acetic acid along with proposing to phase out the concessional rates in capital goods and project imports gradually and apply a tariff of 7.5 per cent.

One station-one product

• The decision falls in line with the other Budget announcement of popularising one station-one product to popularise local businesses and supply chains.
• One station-one product as a concept aims to promote a local product from each stop of the Indian Railways by making the railway station of that area a promotional and sales hub for the product.

Hence only statement 1 is correct.

The Union Budget 2022-23 brought in some amendments to the Income Tax Act that would be effective retrospectively.

• Making a retrospective amendment to the Income-tax Act from 2005-06, the Budget has clarified that cess and surcharge will not be allowed to be claimed as deductions in the form of expenditure, a practice that some companies and businesses were resorting to in the absence of legal clarity.
• Citing some court rulings over the years that had given benefit to taxpayers in claiming cess as expenditure and not tax, the tax department said the retrospective amendment is being done to correct the anomaly.
• The court rulings differentiated between income tax and education cess on income tax, and in absence of a specific disallowance for ‘education cess’, courts had taken a view beneficial for taxpayers in many cases.
• In order to nullify the effect of such court rulings and to consider such rulings against the intention of the law, a clarificatory amendment has been introduced in the income tax law, providing that any surcharge or education cess on income tax shall not be allowed as business expenditure.

What are the other amendments done retrospectively?

• The Budget has allowed exemption of the amount received for medical treatment and on account of death due to Covid-19 retrospectively from April 1, 2020.
• Separately, gifts and freebies to doctors shall not be treated as business expenditure under section 37 of the Income-tax Act.

Hence both statements are correct.

Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will make its third venture to the Moon through the Chandrayaan-3 mission in August this year. This was stated by Union Minister Dr. Jitendra Singh in a written reply to Lok Sabha.

• Chandrayaan-3 is a planned third lunar exploration mission by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
• Following Chandrayaan-2, where a last-minute glitch in the soft landing guidance software led to the failure of the lander's soft landing attempt after a successful orbital insertion, another lunar mission for demonstrating soft landing was proposed.
• Chandrayaan-3 will be a mission repeat of Chandrayaan-2 but will only include a lander and rover similar to that of Chandrayaan-2. It will not have an orbiter.
• The spacecraft is planned to be launched in August 2022.
• This year is expected to be quite busy for ISRO as major projects such as Gaganyaan and Aditya solar mission are also in the pipeline. ISRO will conduct 19 missions till December this year.

Hence both statements are correct.

Minister for Jal Shakti informed Lok Sabha about the River Cities Alliance.

• The River Cities Alliance (RCA) has been launched with the objective to provide the member cities with a platform to discuss and exchange information on aspects that are vital for sustainable management of urban rivers, sharing best practices and supporting innovation.
• The alliance has been launched initially with 30 cities namely Dehradun, Rishikesh, Haridwar, Srinagar, Varanasi, Kanpur, Prayagraj, Farrukhabad, Mirzapur, Mathura, Bijnor, Ayodhya, Patna, Bhagalpur, Begusarai, Munger, Sahibganj, Rajmahal, Howrah, Jangipur, Hugli-Chinsurah, Behrampore, Maheshtala, Aurangabad, Chennai, Bhubaneshwar, Hyderabad, Pune, Udaipur and Vijaywada.
• The Alliance is open to all river cities of India. Any river city can join the Alliance at any time.
• State Governments are implementing Action Plans for restoration of water quality of the identified polluted river stretches.
• The implementation is being monitored regularly at State level by Chief Secretary of the respective State/UT and at Central level by the Central Monitoring Committee under the Chairmanship of Secretary, Ministry of Jal Shakti.

Hence only statement 2 is correct.