208939
UPSC Notes
Under the Start-up India scheme, the government of offers _____.
A. Easy Registration
B. Tax Exemption
C.No Inspection
D. All of the above
Gas Molecules That Absorb Thermal Infrared Radiation and Are Present in Large Quantity to Alter the Climate System Is Known As
(a) Greenhouse gases
(b) Beta radiations
(c) Alpha radiations
(d) Ozone gases
01 MAY : International Labour Day or International Worker’s Day or May Day.
🔷 Labour Day is a day that unites workers together and the day aims to pay tribute to workers’ sacrifices in achieving economic and social rights all over the world.
🔷 India's first Labour day was celebrated in 1923 in Chennai.
🔷 May 1 is also Maharashtra Day & Gujarat Day
#River_India
PENISULAR RIVER SYSTEM
▪️ The Penisular rivers are much older than Himalayan Rivers.
▪️ Penisular Rivers are Non - Perennial Rivers.
▪️ Rivers have reached their Mature stage and have almost reached the Base level.
▪️ Characterised by Broad and shallow valleys.
▪️ Water divide in Penisular rivers forms by Western ghats.
▪️ Velocity and load carrying capacity is low due to Low gradient.
▪️ East flowing rivers make deltas at their mouth while West flowing rivers make Estuaries.
📣 EPFO EO/AO & APFC
Exam on 02nd July, 2023
▪️EO/AO - 9.30 to 11.30 AM
▪️APFC - 2 PM to 4 PM
📣 SSC 2023 Exam Dates
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First Ever Census on Water Bodies in India
•The Ministry of Jal Shakti has conducted the first-ever census of water bodies across the nation.
•The census provides a comprehensive inventory of India's water resources, including natural and man-made water bodies like ponds, tanks, lakes, and more, and to collect data on the encroachment of water bodies.
•The Census also highlighted disparities between rural and urban areas and varying levels of encroachment and revealed crucial insights into the country's water resources.
•The census was launched under the centrally sponsored scheme, “Irrigation Census” in convergence with the 6th Minor Irrigation Census in order to have a comprehensive national database of all water bodies.
•The information on all important aspects of the water bodies including their type, condition, status of encroachments, use, storage capacity, status of filling up of storage, etc was collected.
•It covered all the water bodies located in rural as well as urban areas that are in-use or not in-use.
•The census also took into account all type of uses of water bodies like irrigation, industry, pisciculture, domestic/ drinking, recreation, religious, ground water recharge etc.
🌀World Bank
▫️Founded at the Bretton Woods conference in 1944, the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development—soon called the World Bank—has expanded to a closely associated group of five development institutions.
▫️International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) provides loans, credits, and grants.
▫️International Development Association (IDA) provides low- or no-interest loans to low-income countries.
▫️The International Finance Corporation (IFC) provides investment, advice, and asset management services to companies and governments.
▫️The Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) insures lenders and investors against political risk such as war.
▫️The International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) settles investment-disputes between investors and countries.
India is not a member of ICSID.
▫️Recently, the World Bank has released new Purchasing Power Parities (PPPs) for reference year 2017, under International Comparison Program (ICP) that adjusts for differences in the cost of living across economies of the world.
▫️It has also developed the Logistics Performance Index.
◾️Reports Published by World Bank:
•Human Capital Index Report
•Global Economic Prospects
•Ease of Doing Business
•South Asia Economic Focus Report
•Poverty and Shared Prosperity Report
•World Development Report
◾️Projects Supported by the World Bank:
•National Hydrology Project
•Strengthening Teaching-Learning and Results for States (STARS) Project
•National Nutrition Mission
•National Mission for Clean Ganga
•National Biopharma Mission
•Atal Bhujal Yojana.
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🌀Fiscal Deficit
▪️Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has pegged the fiscal deficit for 2021-22 at 6.8% of GDP
▪️Aims to bring it back below the 4.5% mark by 2025-26.
◾️The deficit has shot up to a high of 9.5% of the GDP due to:
▫️Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
▫️Low revenue flows due to the lockdown.
▫️Negative economic growth clubbed with high government spending to provide relief to vulnerable sections of society.
◾️What next?
Finance minister has also proposed to introduce amendments to the FRBM Act to make necessary change in the fiscal consolidation roadmap.
◾️What is fiscal deficit?
▫️Difference between the Revenue Receipts plus Non-debt Capital Receipts (NDCR) and the total expenditure.
▫️In other words, fiscal deficit is “reflective of the total borrowing requirements of Government”.
◾️Impact of high fiscal deficit:
▫️In the economy, there is a limited pool of investible savings. These savings are used by financial institutions like banks to lend to private businesses (both big and small) and the governments (Centre and state).
▫️If the fiscal deficit ratio is too high, it implies that there is a lesser amount of money left in the market for private entrepreneurs and businesses to borrow.
▫️Lesser amount of this money, in turn, leads to higher rates of interest charged on such lending.
▫️A high fiscal deficit and higher interest rates would also mean that the efforts of the Reserve Bank of India to reduce interest rates are undone.
◾️What is the acceptable level of fiscal deficit for a developing economy?
▫️For a developing economy, where private enterprises may be weak and governments may be in a better state to invest, fiscal deficit could be higher than in a developed economy.
▫️In India, the FRBM Act suggests bringing the fiscal deficit down to about 3 percent of the GDP
◾️What is the the FRBM Act?
▫️The Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act (FRBM Act), 2003, establishes financial discipline to reduce fiscal deficit.
◾️What are the objectives of the FRBM Act?
▫️To introduce transparency in India’s fiscal management systems.
▫️Long-term objective is for India to achieve fiscal stability and to give the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) flexibility to deal with inflation in India.
▫️The Act was enacted to introduce more equitable distribution of India’s debt over the years.
◾️Key features of the FRBM Act:
▫️The FRBM Act made it mandatory for the government to place the following along with the Union Budget documents in Parliament annually:
•Medium Term Fiscal Policy Statement.
•Macroeconomic Framework Statement.
•Fiscal Policy Strategy Statement.
Source - PIB
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All India Finance Institutions (AIFIs)
▫️They Provide medium to long term finance to different sectors through refinance and direct lending.
▫️There are 4 AIFIs- Exim Bank, NABARD, NHB and SIDBI.
▫️All AIFIs are under regulations and supervision of RBI.
▫️Prudential norms relating to asset classification are applicable on AIFIs also.
▫️ AIFIs are also subjected to onsite inspection and offsite surveillance by RBI.
@economics_optional_notes
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Circular Economy
🌳A circular economy entails markets that give incentives to reusing products, rather than scrapping them and then extracting new resources.
🌳In such an economy, all forms of waste, such as clothes, scrap metal and obsolete electronics, are returned to the economy or used more efficiently.
🌳This can provide a way to not only protect the environment, but use natural resources more wisely, develop new sectors, create jobs and develop new capabilities.
@economics_optional_notes
Biomethanation is a process by which organic material is microbiologically converted under anaerobic conditions to biogas.
◾️ Three main physiological groups of microorganisms are involved: fermenting bacteria, organic acid oxidizing bacteria, and methanogenic archaea.
◾️ Biomethanation has strong potential for the production of energy from organic residues and wastes.
◾️ It will help to reduce the use of fossil fuels and thus reduce CO(2) emission.
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Katkari
◾️ Katkari is one of the 75 Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups.
◾️Katkaris were historically forest dwellers. They are located
primarily in Raigad and in parts of Palghar, Ratnagiri and Thane districts as well and in some places of Gujarat.
◾️ The British administration had classified them under the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871.
◾️ The name Katkari is derived from a forest-based activity – the
making and barter or sale of Katechu (kath) from the Khair tree (Acacia Katechu).
◾️ It is produced by boiling wood from the Khair tree and evaporating the resulting brew.
Biofertilzier is a substance containing living microorganisms.
It can be applied to seed, plant surfaces, or soil.
Biofertilizer improves the supply of primary nutrients like nitrogen, Phosphorous etc. to the host plant, and thereby promotes its growth.
🛑 Briefly Explained
🟡 What is a Glacial lake
✅ A glacial lake is a body of water with origins from glacier activity.
✅ They are formed when a glacier erodes the land, and then melts, filling the depression created by the glacier.
🟡 Formation
✅ Near the end of the last glacial period, roughly 10,000 years ago, glaciers began to retreat.
✅ A retreating glacier often left behind large deposits of ice in hollows between drumlins or hills.
✅ As the ice age ended, these melted to create lakes.
✅ These lakes are often surrounded by drumlins, along with other evidence of the glacier such as moraines, eskers and erosional features such as striations and chatter marks.
✅ The moraine creates topographic depression in which the melt water is generally accumulated leading to formation of glacial lake.
✅ When this lake is watertight, melt waters will accumulate in the basin until seepage or overflow limits the lake level.
✅ Such moraine-dammed lakes appear to be the most common type of glacial lakes.
✅ The impoundment of the melt may sometimes be unstable, leading to sudden release of large quantities of stored water.
✅ Failure of these ice or moraine dams leading to disastrous destruction events has been documented throughout the world.
✅ Flash floods caused by the outburst of glacial lakes, called as Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF), are well known in Himalaya where such lakes had often been formed by landslides.
✅ The formation and characteristics of glacial lakes vary between location and can be classified into
◼️ glacial erosion lake,
◼️ ice-blocked lake,
◼️moraine-dammed lake,
◼️other glacial lake,
◼️supraglacial lake, and
◼️subglacial lake.
To whom did Mahatma Gandhi give the title ‘Deen Bandhu’?
(A) Abdul Ghaffar Khan
(B) Rabindra Nath Tagore
(C) CF Andrews
(D) Rajendra Prasad
In which of the following cases , the supreme court has issued specific guidelines regarding arrest ?
(A) Vishakha v state of Rajasthan
(B) A.R Antulsy's Case
(C) D.K Basu's case
(D) Nandini Satpathy 's case
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Caribbean Community
📣 Recruitment Notification:
Himachal Pradesh Judicial Services Exam
▪️Total Posts - 17
▪️Apply by - 12th May
▪️Eligibility - LLB
▪️Pay Scale - Level J-1
(Basic - 77,840)
✅ Exam Dates
▪️Prelims - 9th July
▪️Mains - 19th August
📣 UPSC Assistant Commandant 2023 Notification
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📣 BPSC Vacancy Notification : Assistant Divisional Fire Officer
✅ Total Post: 21
UPSC CAPF(AC) 2023
Total no. of seats 322
Last date to apply: 16th may
What is a Technical Recession?
● It is a term used to describe two consecutive quarters of decline in output. In the case of a nation’s economy, the term usually refers to back-to-back contractions in real GDP.
● Difference between Technical Recession and Recession: The technical recession is mainly used to capture the trend in GDP but the Recession encompasses an appreciably more broad-based decline in economic activity that covers several economic variables including employment, household and corporate incomes and sales at businesses.
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🌀SAKSHAM Campaign
● Launched by: It is a people-centric fuel conservation mega campaign launched by Petroleum Conservation Research Association (PCRA).
● Aim: To highlight the adverse health and environmental impacts of increasing carbon footprints.The idea is to convince consumers to switch to cleaner fuels and bring in behavioral change to use fossil fuel intelligently.
🌀ShramShakti Portal:
● Launched by: Ministry of Tribal Affairs
● Purpose: It is a National Migration Support Portal that aims to collect data related to tribal migrant workers and link them with the existing welfare schemes.
● The various data that will be recorded via the portal include demographic profile, livelihood options, skill mapping and migration pattern.
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🌀Digital Payments Index(DPI)
● Released by: Reserve Bank of India(RBI)
● Purpose: To capture the extent of digitisation of payments across the country.
● Parameters: The index comprises five broad parameters with varying weights to measure the penetration of digital payments:
▫️Payment enablers (25%),
▫️Payment infrastructure—demand-side factors (10%), Payment infrastructure—supply-side factors (15%),
▫️Payment performance (45%)
▫️Consumer centricity (5%).
● When will it be published? The index shall be published on RBI’s website on a semi-annual basis from March 2021 onwards with a lag of 4 months.
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Creeping inflation (1-4%)
🌳When the rate of inflation slowly increases over time.
🌳 For example, the inflation rate rises from 2% to 3%, to 4% a year. Creeping inflation may not be immediately noticeable, but if the creeping rate of inflation continues, it can become an increasing problem
@economics_optional_notes
Pulicat Lagoon is the second largest brackish water lagoon in India, after Chilika Lake.
The lake encompasses the Pulicat Lake Bird Sanctuary.
Flamingo festival is an annual festival held in the Pulicat Lake.
✅India’s green cover has touched nearly one-fourth of its geographical area with "forests" and "trees outside recorded forest areas" put together recording an increase of 2,261 sq km (0.3%) in 2021 compared to the previous assessment in 2019, shows the latest India State of Forest Report (ISFR 2021).
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List of countries by length of coastline
1) Canada's coastline is world's longest, measuring 202,080 km (includes the mainland coast and the coasts of offshore islands)
2) Indonesia (99,083 km)
3) Norway (58,133 km)
4) Greenland* (44,087 km)
5) Russia (37,653 km)
6) Philippines (36,289 km)
7) Japan (29,751 km)
8) Australia (25,760 km)
9) United States (19,924 km)
10) Antarctica* (17,968 km)
11) New Zealand (15, 134 km)
12) China (14,500 km)
13) Greece (13,676 km)
14) United Kingdom (12,429 km)
15) Mexico (9330 km)
16) Italy (7782 km)
17) India (7516km)
✅*Gandhian imprint in the farmer’s protest*
Synopsis: The protesting farmers are going through physical and mental suffering in Delhi’s severe winter. But the Government and the urban middle classes do not seem to feel a sense of discomfort.
Background
Gandhiji always backed non-violent methods of protest. Gandhiji also believed rural economy based mass movement follow non-violent methods. This is evident in the incident when he cancelled the Non-Cooperation Movement after Chauri Chura incident.
Today also, India is facing a rural economy based mass movement, following the principle of non-violence (Farmers protest). But the government and supporters of the farm laws are not respecting the non-violence.
Scholars, columnists and advisers supporting the laws are of the view that farmers who are protesting are being misled and do not represent the farming community as a whole.
What steps should the government take to end the farmers protest amicably?
First, Persuasion approach- Persuading farmers about the benefits and other important efforts towards farmer’s welfare can end the protest.
Second, Dialogue between equals- The Government should reach the farmers for negotiation as an equal partner.
Third, Removal of stereotypical perception- The urban educated class has certain stereotypes about farmers. These stereotypes have to be removed during negotiations. According to urban educated class:
Farmers do not know their own benefits due to the general ignorance and lack of education.
The farming community is simple-minded and therefore can be easily misled.
How the farmer’s protest and the Gandhian principles are relatable?
First, the idea of a peaceful protest is a legacy of Gandhi.
Second, the faith in non-violence by the protesting farmers must be respected by the other side (the government).
Thus, according to Gandhiji’s view the protester’s willingness to undergo physical or mental sufferings is a means of awakening opposite party’s human instincts.
✅Way Forward
The government and the urban middle classes need to change their stereotypical perception regarding farmers.
The government should also consider the suffering [physical as well as mental] of the farmers.