DAY – 23 ( INSTA REVISION TEST – 23)INSTA REVISION PLAN 2.0, 2021 – INSIGHTSIAS

Solution: B

Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is an intergovernmental organization founded in 1989 on the initiative of G7 to develop policies to combat money laundering. It also included terrorism financing in 2001.

As of now there are only two countries in the blacklist — Iran and North Korea — and seven on the grey list, including Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Syria and Yemen.

The FATF reviews money laundering and terrorist financing techniques and continuously strengthens its standards to address new risks, such as the regulation of virtual assets, which have spread as crypto currencies gain popularity.  The FATF monitors countries to ensure they implement the FATF Standards fully and effectively, and holds countries to account that do not comply.

Solution: D

Solution: D

Ways and Means Advance (WMA) scheme was introduced in 1997 to meet mismatches in the receipts and payments of the government.

The government can avail of immediate cash from the RBI, if required. [But it has to return the amount within 90 days. Interest is charged at the existing repo rate]

Recently, the Government has hiked Ways and Means Advance (WMA) limit with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) by 60%.

WMA limit is proposed to be revised to Rs 1.20 lakh crore and would be reviewed on a need basis (from Rs 75,000 crore last year) due to COVID-19.

There is no provision of raising fund through the prior approval of President of India.

Solution: A

NIDHI (National Initiative for Developing and Harnessing Innovations) program was launched by Department of Science & Technology

The purpose of the program is to provide technological solutions not only to the pressing needs of the society but also targets to create new avenues for wealth and job creation.

The programme will focus on helping startups to meet their funding, infrastructure and other mentorship needs.

It aims to accelerate the journey of idea to prototype by providing initial funding assistance to startups.

Solution: B

PM CARES Fund:

• The Prime Minister’s Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations Fund (PM CARES Fund) was created on 28 March 2020 following the COVID-19 pandemic in India.
• The fund will be used for combating, containment and relief efforts against the coronavirus outbreak and similar pandemic like situations in the future.
• The Fund will strengthen disaster management capacities and encourage research on protecting citizens.
• The Prime Minister is the chairman of the trust. Members will include the defence, home and finance ministers.
• This Fund has been set up owing to a number of requests made by the people to support the government in the wake of the COVID-19 emergency.
• The Ministry of Corporate Affairs clarified on recently, that while contributions made to the ‘PM CARES Fund’ shall qualify as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) expenditure, donations made to the ‘Chief Minister’s Relief Fund’ or ‘State Relief Fund for COVID-19’ do not.
• The fund will also enable micro-donations. The minimum donation accepted for the PM CARES Fund is ₹10 (14¢ US).

Solution: C

Green Companies (GreenCo) Rating System

• The Green Companies (GreenCo) Rating System has been developed by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).
• The system evaluates the companies on 10 broad green parameters, including GreenHouse Gases (GHG) reduction, renewable energy use etc.
• It is the “first of its kind in the world” holistic framework that evaluates companies on the environmental friendliness of their activities using a life cycle approach.
• The development of ‘Green Company Rating system’ (GreenCo rating) for companies was a step taken by CII to promote the greener ways of production in Indian companies
• The development of ‘Green Company Rating system’ (GreenCo rating) for companies was a step taken by CII to promote the greener ways of production in Indian companies
• GreenCo rating is applicable to both manufacturing facilities and service sector units
• Accordingly, ratings are provided which remain valid for three years.

Solution: B

Project Arunank

• Project Arunank is responsible for the construction and maintenance of approximately 1113 Kms of roads in Arunachal Pradesh and Assam.
• It is being implemented by the Border Roads Organisation, an important arm of the Ministry of Defence.
• It aims to link remote regions of the borders with well-developed strategic roads
• Project Arunank has reconstructed the Daporijo Bridge across Subansiri River in Arunachal Pradesh.

Solution: D

Applications of Geo-Positioning System are:

• GPS’s high accuracy makes it suitable for use in mapping soil sample locations, and the farmers can locate the areas that have soils suitable for farming.
• GPS is used in mapping and measuring various measures on the earth surface and underwater. It is used in determining land boundaries, mapping sea floors, and highlighting the changes in the shape of structures.
• Financial organizations such as banks use this app to schedule and determine local and international money transfers. They are also using it to provide audit trails of financial transactions.
• GPS can be used in any weather or environmental condition which is the reason why is preferred for use during disaster management. The emergency vehicles and supplies are tracked using GPS.
• GPS technology is used in projecting temperature levels both on the ground and that of the atmosphere.

Solution: D

Indian Ocean Commission (IOC):

India’s joining of the IOC as an observer has strategic importance as the Commission is an important regional institution in the Western/African Indian Ocean

Indian Ocean Commission (IOC) is an intergovernmental body created in 1984 to protect the interests of the Western Indian Ocean islands.

It consists of Madagascar, Comoros, La Réunion (French overseas territory), Mauritius and Seychelles.

The Commission has five observers — India, China, European Union (EU), Malta and International Organisation of La Francophonie (OIF).

IOC’s principal mission is to strengthen the ties of friendship between the countries and to be a platform of solidarity for the entire population of the African Indian Ocean region.

The Commission has a secretariat in Mauritius

Objectives:

• Political and diplomatic cooperation,
• Economic and commercial cooperation
• Sustainable development in a globalisation context, cooperation in the field of agriculture, maritime fishing, and the conservation of resources and ecosystems
• Strengthening of the regional cultural identity, cooperation in cultural, scientific, technical, educational and judicial fields.

Solution: B

Sir Creek is a 96 km long (60 mi) tidal estuary in the uninhabited marshlands of the Indus River Delta in Rann of Kutch marshlands.

The creek flows into the Arabian Sea and separates the Gujarat state of India from the Sindh province of Pakistan.

Apart from strategic location, Sir Creek’s core importance is fishing resources. Sir Creek is considered to be among the largest fishing grounds in Asia.

The Kori Creek is a tidal creek in the Kutch region of the Indian state of Gujarat. It lies just to the west of the Great Rann of Kutch area of India. This region belonging to India is a part of the Indus River Delta which lies across Gujarat state in India and Sindh in Pakistan.

Solution: B

Public Financial Management System (PFMS) is a web-based online software application developed and implemented by the Office of Controller General of Accounts (CGA), Ministry of Finance.

With an objective of tracking funds released under all Plan schemes of the Government of India, and real time reporting of expenditure at all levels of Programme implementation

At present, the ambit of PFMS coverage includes Central Sector and Centrally Sponsored Schemes as well as other expenditures including the Finance Commission Grants.

Solution: C

TRAFFIC – The Wildlife Trade Monitoring Network:

• Founded in 1976 as a strategic alliance of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN)
• Headquarters — Cambridge, UK
• Type — International non-governmental organization
• Wildlife Trade Monitoring Network
• Aim — ‘ensure that trade in wild plants and animals is not a threat to the conservation of nature
• It is governed by the board of trustees of TRAFFIC International
• TRAFFIC’s 2020 goal — help reduce the pressure of illegal and unsustainable wildlife trade on biodiversity, and enhance the benefits to wildlife conservation and human well-being that derive from trade at sustainable levels.

Solution: C

Additional Tier-1 bonds:

Context: The Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI) has written to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) to allow fund houses a temporary write down of additional tier 1 bonds of Yes Bank to avoid a huge hit on the net asset value of schemes that hold such bonds.

Background:

• Under the Based III framework, banks’ regulatory capital is divided into Tier 1 and Tier 2 capital.
• Tier 1 capital is subdivided into Common Equity (CET) and Additional Capital (AT1).

Key features:

• They are a type of unsecured, perpetual bonds that banks issue to shore up their core capital base to meet the Basel-III norms.
• These have higher rates than tier II bonds.
• These bonds have no maturity date.
• The attraction for investors is higher yield than secured bonds issued by the same entity.
• Individual investors too can hold these bonds, but mostly high net worth individuals (HNIs) opt for such higher risk, higher yield investments.
• Investors cannot return these bonds to the issuing bank and get the money, this means there is no put option available to its holders. However, the issuing banks have the option to recall AT-1 bonds issued by them (termed call options that allow banks to redeem them after 5 or 10 years).
• Given the higher risk, the rating for these bonds is one to four notches lower than the secured bond series of the same bank. For example, while SBI’s tier II bonds are rated AAA by Crisil, its tier I long-term bonds are rated AA+.
• The RBI is the regulator for these bonds.

Solution: B

Hydroxychloroquine is used to prevent and treat acute attacks of malaria. It is also used to treat discoid lupus erythematosus (DLE; a chronic inflammatory condition of the skin) or systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE; a chronic inflammatory condition of the body) and rheumatoid arthritis in patients whose symptoms have not improved with other treatments.

Hydroxychloroquine is in a class of drugs called antimalarials. It works by killing the organisms that cause malaria. Hydroxychloroquine may work to treat rheumatoid arthritis and systemic lupus erythematosus by decreasing the activity of the immune system.

A study suggests that both hydroxy-chloroquine and chloroquine have in vitro activity against SARS-CoV, SARS-CoV-2, and other coronaviruses, with hydroxy-chloroquine having higher potency against SARS-CoV-2.

India is one of the largest producer of this drug.

Solution: D

Daspalla Hills

• Daspalla Hills is an important neighborhood situated on the coastal part of Visakhapatnam City, India.
• Daspalla Hills is one of the more affluent residential areas of the city.
• Recently workers were frantically trying to clear the rubble on the eastern side of the Circuit House (Governor’s Bungalow) in Daspalla Hills when they stumbled upon some concrete structures. They were baffled by the unusually thick walls that did not give away easily to repeated blows from their hammers. The massive assembly was part of some sort of Second World War fortification
• The discovery brings back memories of Second World War and the sleepless nights that residents faced from 1941 to 1945.
• The structures on the Daspalla Hills are the latest to be discovered from the era of a global war.

According to retired Lt. Col. Matthew Thomas, what was found on the Daspalla Hills appears to be fortifications of an anti-aircraft battery or an anti-ship battery.