UPSC 2023: Weekly GK and Current Affairs Quiz Oct 15 - Oct 21

• The right to information has been recognised as a fundamental right under Part III of the Constitution by the Supreme Court in several cases.
• The RTI Act, 2005, provided an extended regime for enabling effective implementation of the fundamental right to information.
• Any citizen can request information by making an application in writing or through electronic means together with the prescribed fees.

• A person can be disqualified for being selected as and for being a member of the Legislative Assembly or Legislative Council of a State if he/she
  1. holds an office of profit under GOI or any State Government, other than that of a Minister at the centre or any state or an office declared by a law of the State not to disqualify its holder (many States have passed such laws declaring certain offices to be offices the holding of which does not disqualify its holder for being a member of the Legislature of that States).
  2. is mentally unsound as declared by a competent court.
  3. is an undischarged insolvent.
  4. is not an Indian citizen or has voluntarily got the citizenship of a foreign State or is under any acknowledgement of adherence/allegiance to a foreign nation.
  5. is so disqualified by or under any law made by Parliament.

Antimony, Lithium, Mercury, Arsenic and Lead have been barred from usage in firecrackers by the Supreme Court in 2017. These chemicals are proven to be hazardous for respiratory systems and can cause serious ailments like asthma, lung cancer, shortness of breath, hormonal imbalances, and many other respiratory diseases.

• Under the anti-defection law, the power to decide the disqualification of an MP or MLA rests with the presiding officer of the legislature. Consultation with the Election Commission of India is not required.
• The law does not specify a time frame in which such a decision has to be made. However, the Supreme Court observed that anti-defection cases should be decided by Speakers in three months’ time.

Read more on Anti-defection Law.

• Namdapha National Park has a climate that varies from tropical to subtropical, temperate and arctic.
• It is the largest protected area in the Eastern Himalaya biodiversity hotspot and is located in Arunachal Pradesh.
• Its habitat changes with increasing altitude from tropical moist forests to Montane forests, temperate forests and at the higher elevations, to Alpine meadows and perennial snow.

• The National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority is a government regulatory agency that controls the prices of pharmaceutical drugs in India.
• It was constituted by a Resolution in 1997 as an attached office of the Department of Pharmaceuticals, Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers as an independent Regulator for pricing of drugs and to ensure availability and accessibility of medicines at affordable prices.
• NPPA is required to monitor the prices of drugs and take corrective measures where necessary and has the power to fix and regulate such prices.

• Jahanpanah was the fourth medieval city of Delhi established in 1326–1327 to address the constant threat of the Mongols.
• It was established by Muhammad bin Tughlaq (1325–51) of the Delhi Sultanate.
• Muhammad bin Tughlaq wanted to unify the scattered urban settlements and that was the reason he built the fortified city. The areas included Lal Kot, Siri, and Tughlaqabad Fort.

• Rabindranath Tagore renounced his knighthood in condemnation of the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre of 1919.
• He was the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize for Literature.
• Bangladesh’s national anthem, “Amar Shonar Bangla” was penned by Rabindranath Tagore in 1905.

• Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) is a framework under which banks with weak financial metrics are put under watch by the RBI.
• It is a framework designed and invoked by RBI when banks breach certain key risk thresholds including asset quality, profitability and capital.

• The dugong is a marine mammal.
• Dugongs are generally found in warm waters around the coast with large numbers concentrated in wide and shallow protected bays.
• Dugongs are protected in India and occur in the Gulf of Mannar, Palk Bay, Gulf of Kutch and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
• It is given legal protection under Schedule I of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972.

• Under the DigiSaksham initiative, free of cost training will be provided to more than 3 lakh youth, in digital skills including basic skills & advance computing, in the first year. This training programme can be accessed through the National Career Service (NCS) Portal.
• This digital skills programme was launched with the objective of enhancing the employability of youth by improving their digital skills which have become an essential thing in an increasingly technology-driven era.
• Digi Saksham is a joint initiative of Microsoft India and the Ministry of Labour and Employment.

• The account aggregator framework will allow financial data to be exchanged between the holders of data and its users.
• Account aggregators will act as intermediaries who will collect data from one financial entity and exchange it with another.
  • Under the framework, a number of fin-tech entities have been granted the licence to operate as account aggregators.
• AAs were created through an inter-regulatory decision by RBI, SEBI, IRDAI, PFRDA and FSDC.
• RBI licenses and governs rules for AAs.

• Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant is the largest nuclear power station in India, situated in Kudankulam in the Tirunelveli district of the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
• The plant is scheduled to have VVER-1000 reactors built in collaboration with Atomstroyexport, the Russian state company and Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL). Know more about the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant in the link.

• Article 124(3) provides for the qualifications required for appointment as a Judge of the Supreme Court. The qualifications are:
  • The person should be a citizen of India; and
  • He/She should have been for at least five years a Judge of a High Court or of two or more such Courts in succession; or
  • He/She has been for at least ten years an advocate of a High Court or of two or more such Courts in succession; or
  • He/She is, in the opinion of the President, a distinguished jurist.
• Supreme Court Judges retire upon attaining the age of 65 years.

• Aurang is a Persian term for a warehouse – a place where goods are collected before being sold. The word also refers to a workshop for finished goods.
• The term banian is the Anglicised form of the Sanskrit and Bangla word banik (merchant). In Anglo-Indian society and among the natives too, a banian was one who was engaged by an individual western merchant or a firm to work for them as a broker, interpreter and agent.
• Mirasidar is a designated revenue payer to the State.

• There are no known prevention methods for Type 1 diabetes, while a healthy lifestyle can prevent Type 2 diabetes.
• Type 1 diabetes used to be called juvenile-onset diabetes. It is usually caused by an auto-immune reaction where the body’s defence system attacks the cells that produce insulin.
• People with type 1 diabetes produce very little or no insulin.
• People with this form of diabetes need injections of insulin every day in order to control the levels of glucose in their blood.
• Type 2 diabetes used to be called non-insulin dependent diabetes.
• It is characterised by insulin resistance and relative insulin deficiency, either or both of which may be present at the time diabetes is diagnosed.

• Juvenile Justice Act mandates automatic termination of inquiries against a minor alleged to be in conflict with law in case of “petty offences” if the probe remains “inconclusive” even after four months, and a maximum extension of two months.
• Various types of offences committed by children in conflict with law have been defined under the JJ Act, 2015 as follows:
  • Petty offences: Petty offences include the offences for which the maximum punishment under the Indian Penal Code or any other law for the time being in force is imprisonment up to three years.
  • Serious Offences: Serious offences include the offences for which the punishment under the Indian Penal Code or any other law for the time being in force is imprisonment between three to seven years.
  • Heinous Offences: Heinous offences committed by children in conflict with law include the offences for which the minimum punishment under the Indian Penal Code or any other law for the time being in force is imprisonment for seven years or more.

• National Mineral Development Corporation is India’s largest iron ore producer and exporter.
• It is a Navratna Company under the administrative control of the Ministry of Steel.
• In 1958, it was established as an owned and operated public company by the Indian government.
• It also maintains the nation’s sole diamond mine at Patna in MP, with an annual output of one lakh carats.

• In India, both a citizen by birth as well as a naturalised citizen are eligible for the office of President.
• In the USA, a naturalised citizen is not eligible for the office of President.
• Naturalization is the legal act or process by which a non-citizen of a country may acquire citizenship or nationality of that country.
• Citizenship is a matter dealt with by the Ministry of Home Affairs in the Government of India.

• The BioCarbon Fund Initiative for Sustainable Forest Landscapes (ISFL) is a multilateral fund, supported by donor governments and managed by the World Bank.
• It collaborates with countries around the world to reduce emissions from the land sector through smarter land-use planning, policies, and practices.

• The Langas and Manganiyars are communities of Muslim folk musicians residing mostly in western Rajasthan’s Jaisalmer and Barmer districts.
• The folk art practiced by these two communities includes ballads, folklore and songs.
• The major theme includes heroic ballads, romantic epic tales and the Sufi spiritual stories.
• The performances are in multiple languages and dialects including Marwari, Sindhi, Saraiki, Dhatti and Thareli.
• They play a traditional percussion instrument called “Khartal”.

Ganges river dolphins once lived in the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna and Karnaphuli-Sangu river systems of Nepal, India, and Bangladesh. But the species has been declining from most of its early distribution ranges.
Ganges river dolphins prefer deep waters, in and around the confluence of rivers. The distribution range of the Ganges river dolphins in India covers seven states namely, Assam, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.

• Researchers from University of Madras and Presidency College, Chennai, have isolated an alga that breaks down low density polyethylene. The alga identified is microalga Uronema africanum Borge. This is a species of microalgae that is commonly found in Africa, Asia and Europe.
• The alga used for the study has been harvested from a lake in Chennai.
• The microalga was found to produce enzymes, hormones, toxins such as cyanotoxins and some polysaccharides which were able to slowly degrade polyethylene into monomers which will not have harmful effect in the atmosphere.
  • Low-density polyethylene is highly resistant to degradation.

• As per a recent study the Indian Astronomical Observatory (IAO) located at Hanle near Leh in Ladakh is becoming one of the globally promising observatory site due to the advantages of more clear nights, minimal light pollution, background aerosol concentration, extremely dry atmospheric condition and uninterrupted monsoon.
  • Night observations at IAO Hanle from 2m-Himalayan Chandra Telescope (HCT) are possible throughout the year without any interruption due to monsoon.
• It is among the highest optical telescopes in the world and has optical, infrared and gamma-ray telescopes.
• The 3.6 m optical telescope set up at Devasthal, Uttarakhand is Asia’s largest fully steerable optical telescope.

• The merchant discount rate is charged to merchants for processing debit and credit card transactions.
• To accept debit and credit cards, merchants must set up this service and agree to the rate. The merchant discount rate is a fee, typically between 1%-3%, that merchants must consider when managing business costs.

The Battle of Saraighat was a naval battle fought in 1671 between the Mughal Empire and the Ahom Kingdom on the Brahmaputra river at Saraighat, Assam.

Tiger Reserve                           State

• Indravati                          Chhattisgarh
• Valmiki                                   Bihar
• Kawal                                  Telangana
• Mudumalai                        Tamil Nadu

• Chola inscriptions in Tamil Nadu have a reference to ‘Kudavolai’.
• Kudavolai refers to a system to elect members to the annual committee, garden committee, tank committee and other committees for 30 wards.

Trincomalee Harbour is a seaport in Trincomalee Bay.
It is one of the deepest natural harbours in the world, developed by the British during World War II.
It is on the northeastern coast of Sri Lanka.

When a bill is referred to a joint sitting of both the Houses of the Parliament, it has to be passed by a simple majority of members present and voting.