UPSC 2024: Weekly GK and Current Affairs Quiz Sep 30 - Oct 06

• Statement 01 is correct, The 74th Constitutional Amendment act, 1992 provides for a five-year term of office for every municipality. However, it can be dissolved before the completion of its term.
  • In case of premature dissolution, a fresh election has to be conducted within 6 months from the date of dissolution. A municipality reconstituted after premature dissolution does not enjoy the full period of five years but remains in office only for the remainder of the period.
• Statement 02 is incorrect, 74th Constitutional Amendment Act of 1992  provides for the reservation of seats for the scheduled castes and the scheduled tribes in every municipality in the proportion of their population to the total population in the municipal area.
• • Further, it provides for the reservation of not less than one-third of the total number of seats for women (including the number of seats reserved for women belonging to the SCs and the STs).
• The state legislature may provide for the manner of reservation of offices of chairpersons in the municipalities for SCs, STs and women.
• It may also make any provision for the reservation of seats in any Municipality or offices of chairpersons in municipalities in favour of backward classes.

• Pair 01 is correctly matched, BSF is deployed on the Indo-Pakistan International Border, Indo-Bangladesh International Border, and Line of Control (LoC) along with the Indian Army.
• Pair 02 is incorrectly matched, ITBP is deployed on border guarding duties from Karakoram Pass in Ladakh to Jachep La in Arunachal Pradesh covering 3488 km of the Indo-China Border.
• Pair 03 is incorrectly matched,  SSB is deployed to guard the Indo-Nepal and Indo-Bhutan Borders.
• Pair 04 is correctly matched, Assam Rifles is a Central Paramilitary Force under the Central Armed Police Forces. They have been guarding the 1,643 km long Indo-Myanmar border since 2002.

• Statement 01 is correct,  The Dadasaheb Phalke Award is part of the National Film Awards and is considered the highest honour in the field of Indian cinema.
• Statement 02 is correct, It is presented annually at the National Film Awards ceremony by the Directorate of Film Festivals, an organisation set up by the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting.
• Statement 03 is correct, The first recipient of the award was actress Devika Rani, who was honoured at the 17th National Film Awards in 1970.
• Statement 04 is correct, As of 2022, there have been 52 awardees including two actors who were awarded posthumously.

• A preliminary prospectus is a document that issuers disseminate to prospective investors during the waiting period in the initial public offering process (IPO) to describe their business operations and their offering.
• A preliminary prospectus may also be referred to as a “red herring.”

• In the northern hemisphere, the longest day of the year is called the summer solstice.
• The maximum amount of sunlight received by the Northern Hemisphere during this time is usually on June  21 or 22.

Read more on Solstice and Equinox.

• UNESCO put “Durga Puja in Kolkata” on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2021.

• ‘Optimus’ is a humanoid robot created by Tesla.
• The prototype robot was introduced during an annual Tesla AI [artificial intelligence] Day presentation.

• Statement 01 is correct, LaCONES is the only laboratory in India that has developed methods for collection and cryopreservation of semen and oocytes from wildlife and successfully reproducing endangered blackbuck, spotted deer and Nicobar pigeons.
• Statement 02 is correct, It is a dedicated facility of CSIR’s Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) in Hyderabad which uses modern biotechnologies for conservation of endangered wildlife.

• Pair 01 is correct, Corbett tiger reserve is a part of Jim Corbett National Park which is located in the Nainital district of Uttarakhand state. The first national park in India, it was established in 1936 during the British Raj and named Hailey National Park after William Malcolm Hailey, a governor of the United Provinces.
• Pair 02 is incorrect,  Kalagarh Tiger Reserve is located in Uttarakhand and it is a part of Jim Corbett national park.
• Pair 03 is incorrect, The Palamau Tiger Reserve is located in Jharkhand. It forms part of Betla National Park and Palamau Wildlife Sanctuary.
• Pair 04 is incorrect, Valmiki Tiger Reserve is a part of Valmiki National Park in the West Champaran District of Bihar.

• Statement 01 is incorrect, The Gajapati rulers ruled over Kalinga, large parts of Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal, and the eastern and central parts of  Madhya Pradesh and Jharkhand from 1435 to 1541 CE.
  • Whereas the Dutch East India Company established factories in India at Masulipatnam in 1605 AD, Pulicat (1610 AD), Surat (1616 AD), Bimlipatam (1641 AD), Karaikal (1645 AD).
• Statement 02 is correct, Alfonso de Albuquerque captured Goa from the Sultan of Bijapur, Ismail Adil Shah in 1510 AD.
• Statement 03 is correct, English East India Company established a factory in Madras in 1639 on land leased from representatives of the Vijayanagara Empire called the Nayakas.

• Pair 01 is correctly matched, Badrinath or Badrinarayana Temple is a Hindu temple dedicated to Vishnu that is situated in the town of Badrinath in Uttarakhand, India.
  • Badrinath is located at an elevation of around 3,100 m. Located in the Garhwal Himalayas, on the banks of the Alaknanda River, this town lies between Nar and Narayana mountain ranges.
• Pair 02 is correctly matched, Sri Varaha Lakshmi Narasimha temple is a Hindu temple situated on the Simhachalam Hill Range, which is 300 metres above sea level in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh. It is dedicated to Vishnu, who is worshipped there as Varaha Narasimha.
• Pair 03 is correctly matched, The Vaishno Devi Temple is a prominent Hindu temple dedicated to Goddess Vaishno Devi. It is located in Katra, Reasi on the slopes of Trikuta Hills within the union territory of Jammu & Kashmir.

Read more on Famous Temples in India.

• Statement 01 is correct,  PNS Ghazi was a Tench-class diesel-electric submarine, the first fast-attack submarine in the Pakistan Navy. It was deployed during the Indo-Pakistani war of 1965 and 1971.
• Statement 02 is correct, PNS Ghazi was assigned with a two-fold objective. The primary goal was to find and sink INS Vikrant and the second one was to lay mines on India’s Eastern seaboard with or without accomplishing the primary objective.

• Statement 01 is correct, Quit India movement, also known as the India August Movement or August Kranti was launched at the Bombay session of the All India Congress Committee by Mahatma Gandhi on August 08, 1942.
• Statement 02 is correct, The movement gave the slogans ‘Quit India’ or ‘Bharat Chodo’. Gandhi gave the slogan to the people – ‘Do or die’.

• Itai-itai disease is caused by cadmium exposure, produced as a result of human activities related to industrialisation, and this condition was first recognised in Japan in the 1960s. Itai-itai disease is characterised by osteomalacia with severe bone pain and is associated with renal tubular dysfunction.

• A Fractional Orbital Bombardment System (FOBS) is a warhead delivery system that uses a low earth orbit towards its target destination. Just before reaching the target, it de-orbits through a retrograde engine burn.
• It was developed by the Soviet Union in the 1960s. The system is used to launch nuclear warheads from space.
•  In August 2021, China tested a weapon that combined a FOBS with a hypersonic glide vehicle.

• Pair 1 is not correct, Lambadi is a folk dance associated with the Banjara tribes of Telangana.
• Pair 2 is correct, Garba is a form of dance which is traditionally performed during Navratri and has its roots in Gujarat.
• Pair 3 is not correct, Laho Dance is a folk dance of Meghalaya.
• Pair 4 is not correct, Dhol Cholam is a folk dance of Manipur.

• Statement 1 is not correct, NMMSS is a central sector scheme as 100% of the funds are provided by the central government.
• Statement 2 is not correct, Under the Scheme, one lakh fresh scholarships @ of Rs.12000/- per annum per student are awarded to selected students of class IX every year and their continuation/renewal in classes X to XII for study in a State Government, Government-aided and Local body schools.
• Statement 3 is correct, The scholarships are awarded to students directly into their bank accounts by Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) through the Public Financial Management System (PFMS).

• Statement 1 is not correct, The Purchasing Manager’s Index (PMI) is an economic indicator derived from the monthly survey of the private sector companies.
• Statement 2 is correct, The headline PMI is a number which ranges from 0 to 100.
• Statement 3 is correct, If a PMI is above 50, it represents an expansion when compared with the previous month and if the PMI value falls below 50, it indicates a contraction.

• Turtuk is a small village located in the Nubra Valley.
• It is said to be the northernmost village of India situated in the Leh district.

• Statement 1 is correct, Foreign currency earnings of India’s IT sector help reduce the risk of a crisis.
• Statement 2 is not correct, Increasing government expenditure will not help reduce the risk of crisis.
• Statement 3 is correct, Remittances from Indians abroad also help reduce the risk of a currency crisis.

• Statements 1 and 3 are correct, The Tigray Region is the northernmost of the nine regions of Ethiopia.  It is the homeland of the Tigrayan, Irob and Kunama peoples.

Image Source: Aljazeera

• Statement 2 is incorrect, It is bordered by Eritrea to the north, Sudan to the west, the Amhara Region (Ethiopia) to the south and the Afar Region (Ethiopia) to the east and southeast.

• Statement 01 is incorrect, India became the largest producer, and second largest exporter of sugar in May 2022. About 80 percent of sugar is produced in Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka
• Statement 02 is correct, Government in 2014 notified the scheme (SEFASU-2014) envisaging interest-free loans by banks as additional working capital to sugar mills, for clearance of cane price arrears of previous sugar seasons and timely settlement to cane price of current sugar season to sugarcane farmers.
  • The National Policy on Biofuels, 2018 allows the conversion of surplus quantities of food grains to ethanol. The policy allows the use of sugarcane juice, sugar-containing materials like sugar beet, and sweet sorghum as raw materials which supports sugarcane production.
• Statement 03 is incorrect, Fair and Remunerative Prices are determined on the recommendation of the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices (CACP) and are announced by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs, which is chaired by the Prime Minister.

• Recently, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), the world’s first planetary defence technology demonstration successfully smashed its asteroid target using kinetic impact.
• Kinetic impaction involves sending one or more large, high-speed spacecraft into the path of an approaching near-earth object. This could deflect the asteroid into a different trajectory, steering it away from the Earth’s orbital path.

• North Korea test-fired an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) named Hwasong-17. This missile is the biggest ICBM ever developed.
• The Hwasong-17 is assumed to be a two-stage, liquid-fuelled road-mobile ICBM carried by a 22-wheeled transporter erector launcher (TEL) vehicle.

• A mycorrhiza forms a symbiotic alliance between fungi and plants.
•  This association results in the growth and development of plants and their roots.
• Mycorrhiza fungi act as a bio-fertilizer and help in maintaining soil biology and chemistry.
• Mycorrhizal fungi play a crucial role in plant nutrient uptake, water relations, ecosystem establishment, plant diversity, and productivity of plants.
• Mycorrhizas also protect plants against root pathogens and toxic stresses.
• Mining activities affect soil nutrients, pH, toxicity, bulk density, biological activity, and soil moisture. Therefore Mycorrhizal biotechnology has been used in rehabilitating these degraded mining sites.

• Statement 01 is correct, During the rule of Raja Raja Chola, the texts of the Tamil poets Appar, Sambandar and Sundarar were collected and edited into one compilation called Thirumurai. Thirumurai is a twelve-volume compendium of songs or hymns in praise of Shiva in the Tamil language.
• Statement 02 is incorrect, During the rule of Raja Raja Chola, Sri Lanka was known as Anuradhapura.
  • He invaded Anuradhapura in 993 AD and conquered the northern part of the country and incorporated it into his kingdom as a province named “Mummudi-sola-mandalam” after himself.

• The Union Ministry of Science and Technology has undertaken to set up India’s first-ever Night Sky Sanctuary in Ladakh.
• The proposed Dark Sky Reserve will be located at Hanle in Ladakh as a part of Changthang Wildlife Sanctuary.
• It will boost Astro tourism in India and will be one of the world’s highest-located sites for optical, infrared, and gamma-ray telescopes.

• Statement 01 is correct, Lai-Haraoba is a popular festival of Manipur, which is associated with the worship of traditional deities and ancestors. It is the earliest form of dance that forms the basis of all stylised dances in Manipur.
• Statement 02 is incorrect, The Raas Leela was first started as a dance form in 1779 by Ningthou Ching-Thang Khomba, also known as Rajarshi Bhagya Chandra, an 18th-century Meitei monarch.
• Statement 03 is correct, In Manipuri Ras, the main characters are Radha, Krishna and the gopis. The themes often depict the pangs of separation of the gopis and Radha from Krishna.

• The Alaska Current is a southwestern shallow warm-water current alongside the west coast of the North American continent in the Pacific Ocean.
• The Kuroshio Current  Japan Current is a north-flowing, warm ocean current on the west side of the North Pacific Ocean basin.

• Statement 01 is correct, G20 Common Framework is the Common Framework for Debt Treatments beyond the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI). It is endorsed by the G20 members together with the Paris Club.
• Statement 02 is correct, It was announced in November 2020 to deal with the issue of unsustainable debts faced by various countries.