Current Affairs Questions

Explanation :

• The Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow-on (GRACE-FO) mission is a partnership between NASA and the German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ).
• Launched on 22 May 2018, GRACE-FO is a successor to the original GRACE mission, which began orbiting Earth on March 17, 2002
• The primary objective of the GRACE-FO Mission is to obtain precise global and high-resolution models for both the static and the time variable components of the Earth's gravity field.
• The GRACE missions measure variations in gravity over Earth's surface, producing a new map of the gravity field every 30 days.
• Thus, GRACE shows how the planet's gravity differs not only from one location to another, but also from one period of time to another.

Significance

• It will continue the work of tracking Earth's water movement to monitor changes in underground water storage, the amount of water in large lakes and rivers, soil moisture, ice sheets and glaciers, and sea level caused by the addition of water to the ocean.
• These discoveries provide a unique view of Earth's climate and have far-reaching benefits to society and the world's population.

Explanation :

• Community reserves in India are terms denoting protected areas of India which typically act as buffer zones to or connectors and migration corridors between established national parks, wildlife sanctuaries and reserved and protected forests of India.
• Such areas are designated as conservation areas if they are uninhabited and completely owned by the Government of India but used for subsistence by communities and community areas if part of the lands is privately owned.
• These protected area categories were first introduced in the Wildlife (Protection) Amendment Act of 2002 − the amendment to the Wildlife Protection Act of 1972.
• These categories were added because of reduced protection in and around existing or proposed protected areas due to private ownership of land, and land use.
• These categories roughly correspond to IUCN Category V (conservation reserves) and VI (community reserves) protected areas.
• Keshopur Chamb, Gurdaspur (Punjab) is India's first community reserve.

Explanation :

• Amidst the global coronavirus crisis, India, on 2^nd April, 2020, launched an 18-hour operation called 'Operation Sanjeevani' to deliver 6.2 tonnes of essential medicines and hospital consumables to Maldives.
• The Indian Air Force lifted medicines from airports in New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Madurai and delivered to the Maldives.
• Medicines including influenza vaccines, anti-viral drugs such as Lopinavir and Ritonavir (these two medicines are being used in other countries to treat COVID-19 ) have gone to the Maldives.
• Consumables including catheters, nebulisers, urine bags and infant feeding tubes and other medications for cardiac conditions, kidney ailments, hypertension, high blood pressure, diabetes, arthritis, allergies and cancer treatment, anticonvulsants have been delivered too.

Explanation :

• The Malabar large-spotted civet (Viverra civettina), also known as the Malabar civet, is a viverrid endemic to the Western Ghats of India.
• It has a dark mark on the cheek, large transverse dark marks on the back and sides, and two obliquely transverse dark lines on the neck.
• These dark marks are more pronounced than in the large Indian civet.

Distribution

• In the 19th century, the Malabar civet occurred throughout the Malabar coast from the latitude of Honnavar to Kanyakumari.
• It inhabited the forests and richly wooded lowland, and was occasionally found on elevated forest tracts.
• It was considered abundant in Travancore.

Threats

• Until a few decades ago, local merchants in Kerala reared Malabar civets to obtain civetone, an extract from the scent gland, which was used in medicine, and as an aromatic.

Conservation Status

• IUCN Red List: Critically Endangered.
• Wildlife (Protection) Act,1972: Schedule I
• CITES: Appendix III

Explanation :

• On 1^st April, 2020, the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA) has set up price monitoring and resource unit (PMRU) in the UT of Jammu and Kashmir.
• The unit shall help the NPPA and the State Drug Controller in ensuring availability and accessibility of medicines at affordable prices.
• With this J&K has become the 12th State/UT where the PMRU has been set up.
• PMRUs have already been set up by the drug price regulator NPPA in 11 states such as Kerala, Odisha, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Punjab, Haryana, Nagaland, Tripura, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Mizoram.
• It is to be noted that the Kerala has become the first State to set up a price monitoring and research unit (PMRU) in February, 2019.

Price Monitoring & Resource Unit

• It is a registered society, which function under the direct control and supervision of State Drug Controller of respective states.
• The unit is being funded by NPPA for its recurring and non-recurring expenses.

Functions

• Help NPPA and State Drug Controller in ensuring availability and accessibility of medicines at affordable prices.
• Organise seminars, training programs and other information, education and communication (IEC) activities in the areas of availability and affordability of medicines for all.
• Collect samples of medicines, collect and analyse data and make reports with respect to availability and over-pricing of medicines for taking action under the provisions of Drug Price Control Order (DPCO).

National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority (NPPA)

• Formed in August 1997, it is a government regulatory agency that controls the prices of pharmaceutical drugs in India.
• NPPA fixes ceiling price of essential medicines that are listed in Schedule I of DPCO, 2013.

Explanation :

• The countercyclical capital buffer is intended to protect the banking sector against losses that could be caused by cyclical systemic risks increasing in the economy.
• It aims to ensure that banking sector capital requirements take account of the macro-financial environment in which banks operate.
• It require banks to hold capital at times when credit is growing rapidly so that the buffer can be reduced if the financial cycle turns down or the economic and financial environment becomes substantially worse.
• Banks can use the capital buffers they have built up during the growth phase of the financial cycle to cover losses that may arise during periods of stress and to continue supplying credit to the real economy.
• The rule was first introduced in Basel III as an extension of another buffer (called the capital conservation buffer).

Explanation :

• Sodium hypochlorite is a chemical compound with the formula NaOCl or NaClO, comprising a sodium cation (Na+) and a hypochlorite anion (OCl−or ClO−).
• It may also be viewed as the sodium salt of hypochlorous acid.
• The anhydrous compound is unstable and may decompose explosively.
• Sodium Hypochlorite is a chlorine compound often used as a disinfectant or a bleaching agent.
• Household bleach is, in general, a solution containing 3–8% sodium hypochlorite, by weight, and 0.01–0.05% sodium hydroxide; the sodium hydroxide is used to slow the decomposition of sodium hypochlorite into sodium chloride and sodium chlorate.

Explanation :

• The Reserve Bank of India gives temporary loan facilities to the centre and state governments as a banker to government. This temporary loan facility is called Ways and Means Advances (WMA).
• The scheme for the Central Government was introduced on April 1, 1997, after putting an end to the four-decade old system of adhoc (temporary) Treasury Bills to finance the Central Government deficit.
• The WMA scheme is designed to meet temporary 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.
• If the WMA exceeds 90 days, it would be treated as an overdraft.
• The interest rate on overdrafts would be 2 percent more than the repo rate.
• Further, the RBI provides an overdraft facility when the WMA limit is breached. The overdraft is not allowed beyond 10 consecutive working days.

Types of WMA

There are two types of Ways and Means Advances — normal and special.

• Special WMA or Special Drawing Facility is provided against the collateral of the government securities held by the state. After the state has exhausted the limit of SDF, it gets normal WMA. The interest rate for SDF is one percentage point less than the repo rate.
• The number of loans under normal WMA is based on a three-year average of actual revenue and capital expenditure of the state.

Explanation :

• The Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction , usually referred to as the Biological Weapons Convention is the first multilateral disarmament treaty banning the development, production and stockpiling of an entire category of weapons of mass destruction, was opened for signature on 10 April 1972.
• It entered into force on 26 March 1975.
• Members: It currently has 183 states-parties, including Palestine, and four signatories (Egypt, Haiti, Somalia, Syria, and Tanzania). Ten states have neither signed nor ratified the BWC (Chad, Comoros, Djibouti, Eritrea, Israel, Kiribati, Micronesia, Namibia, South Sudan and Tuvalu).

Terms of the Treaty

The BWC:

• forbids States Parties from developing, producing, stockpiling, or otherwise acquiring biological agents or toxins that have no justification for peaceful or defensive purposes;
• forbids States Parties from developing, producing, stockpiling, or otherwise acquiring equipment to deliver biological agents or toxins for hostile purposes;
• obligates States Parties to destroy or divert to peaceful purposes their existing stocks of prohibited items;
• forbids States Parties from transferring prohibited items to anyone or otherwise helping in the manufacture or acquisition of biological weapons;
• protects the rights of States Parties to exchange equipment, materials, and scientific and technological information for peaceful purposes in order to avoid hampering their economic and technological development;
• commits States Parties to cooperate in solving any problems through consultation and in carrying out any investigation initiated by the UN Security Council; and
• commits States Parties to provide assistance to others that have been attacked using biological weapons.

However, it does not ban the use of biological and toxin weapons but reaffirms the 1925 Geneva Protocol, which prohibits such use. It also does not ban biodefense programs.

It also allows states-parties to lodge a complaint with the UN Security Council if they believe other member states are violating the convention.

Explanation :

• On 27^th March, 2020, the government has notified anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine under Schedule-H1, restricting its sale based on prescription and making it mandatory for chemists to maintain records for such sale.
• The sale of the drug from now on should be in accordance with the conditions for sale of drugs as specified in Schedule H1 to the Drugs and Cosmetics Rules, 1945.
• This would mean that any preparation containing the said drug will have a warning label of ‘only prescription sale’ and against self-medication.
• The move is aimed at stopping misuse of the drug which has now been allowed by the government for prophylactuse in high risk contacts of Covid-19 patients and healthcare workers treating such patients.

Schedule H1 Drugs

• The Drugs and Cosmetics Rules, 1945, are the set of rules under The Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940, which has provisions for classification of drugs into different schedules and also guidelines for storage, sale, display.
• Schedule H1 has been introduced through Gazette notification GSR 588 (E) dated 30-08-2013 to check the indiscriminate use of antibiotics, anti-TB and some other drugs in the country.
• The schedule contains certain 3rd and 4th generation antibiotics, certain habit forming drugs and anti-TB drugs.