Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

Union Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) launched Toilets 2.0 campaign at a national event organised at Bengaluru, Karnataka on the occasion of World Toilet Day 2022.

• The campaign aims to change the face of public and community toilets in urban India through collective action involving citizens and Urban Local Bodies.
• India is set to go beyond the Open Defecation Free (ODF) narrative. Clean and safe public restrooms and public spaces will improve the experience and quality of public life.

The campaign has five thematic areas — 

• ‘People for Toilets’ that will focus on cleaning and maintaining community and public toilets, 
• ‘Partners for Toilets’ aimed at the adoption of public toilets, 
• A design challenge under the ‘Design Toilets’ theme, 
• ‘Rate your Toilet’ for the promotion of user feedback to improve public toilets
• ‘My thoughts – Our Toilets’ that will seek to gather public opinion for toilets.
• The People for Toilets program is an inter-city competition envisaged for cleaning and maintaining community and public toilets in which top-performing cities will be recognised.
• The objective of the Partners for Toilets theme is to forge partnerships with potential organisations for the adoption of community and public toilets for interim cleaning, annual operations and maintenance, one-time financial aid, beautification activities, innovation and feedback among others.
• The Design Challenge is being organised in collaboration with the Council of Architecture through which entries will be invited from students of architecture and practising architects on designs for aspirational toilets in the two categories of Public toilets and Community toilets. The top designs will be turned into a compendium for cities’ consideration to adopt for their facilities.
• Rate your Toilet is for promoting user feedback to improve public and community toilets, while My thoughts – Our Toilets is a general public survey among citizens on public toilets across the country.
• A questionnaire on citizen aspiration for toilets will be available on MyGov platform for the public to answer. The results from the survey are expected to help States and cities to understand gaps and provide course corrective measures.

The campaign will energise and bring States, cities and citizens together to take forward a rich sanitation legacy under the Swachh Bharat Mission that will script the Toilets 2.0 journey of India.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 1

The Geographical Indications Registry at Guindy, Chennai, has received an application from the Tribal Development Council, Andaman & Nicobar Islands, seeking the Geographical Indication (GI) tag for the Nicobari hodi craft. This is the first application from the Union Territory seeking a tag for one its products.

About Hodi Craft

• The hodi is the Nicobari tribe’s traditional craft. 
• It is an outrigger canoe, very commonly operated in the Nicobar group of islands. 
• The technical skills for building a hodi are based on indigenous knowledge inherited by the Nicobarese from their forefathers. 
• The hodi is built using either locally available trees or from nearby islands.
• Its design varies slightly from island to island.
• The tuhet, a group of families under a headman, consider the hodi an asset. Hodi races are held between islands and villages

1,000th GI application in Chennai office

• The Geographical Indications Registry, established in Chennai in September 2003, has received over 1,000 applications. 
• An application seeking GI tag for the Banaras’ thandai (a beverage made with milk, dry fruits and spices) was the 1,000th application, which was filed two weeks ago.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 1

The death toll from a 5.6-magnitude earthquake in Indonesia has risen to 162 with hundreds injured and over 13,000 displaced.

About the disaster

• The US Geological Survey said the magnitude 5.6 quake was centered in the Cianjur region in West Java province at a depth of 10 kilometres (6.2 miles).
• Indonesia’s Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysical Agency recorded at least 25 aftershocks.
• Several landslides were reported around Cianjur.
• Indonesia, the country of more than 270 million people is frequently struck by earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and tsunamis because of its location on the “Ring of Fire,”
• It also caused panic in the greater Jakarta area, where high-rises swayed and some were evacuated. Earthquakes occur frequently across the sprawling archipelago nation, but it is uncommon for them to be felt in Jakarta.

Pacific Ring of Fire

• The Ring of Fire, also referred to as the Circum-Pacific Belt/Zone, is a path along the Pacific Ocean characterized by active volcanoes and frequent earthquakes. Its length is approximately 40,000 kilometers.Circum- Pacific Zone
• Seventy-five percent of Earth’s volcanoes—more than 450 volcanoes—are located along the Ring of Fire.
• Ninety percent of Earth’s earthquakes occur along its path, including the planet’s most violent and dramatic seismic events.

Location

• It traces boundaries between several tectonic plates—including the Pacific, Juan de Fuca, Cocos, Indian-Australian, Nazca, North American, and Philippine Plates.
• The chain runs up along the western coast of South and North America, crosses over the Aleutian Islands in Alaska, runs down the eastern coast of Asia past New Zealand and into the northern coast of Antarctica.

The Ring of Fire is a direct result of plate tectonics:

• Along much of the Ring of Fire, plates overlap at convergent boundaries called subduction zones. That is, the plate that is underneath is pushed down, or subducted, by the plate above. As rock is subducted, it melts and becomes magma. The abundance of magma so near to Earth’s surface gives rise to conditions ripe for volcanic activity.
• Transform boundary: The border between the Pacific and North American Plates is a transform boundary, where plates move sideways past one another and generates many earthquakes as tension in Earth’s crust builds up and is released.
• Consumption of oceanic lithosphere at these convergent plate boundaries has formed oceanic trenches, volcanic arcs, back-arc basins, and volcanic belts.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 3

Unveiling yet another mystery of avian migrations, a great knot from Russia, belonging to the endangered Calidris tenuirostris (Horsfield, 1821), has found its way to Kerala’s coast, flying over 9,000 km for a winter sojourn.

• The migratory bird that traversed the Central Asian Flyway (CAF) is only one of the two — the other has been sighted at Jamnagar in Gujarat — great knots to be re-sighted in India among the nearly thousand ones tagged with MOSKVA rings in the Kamchatka peninsula in eastern Russia.

Great Knot

• Great Knot (Calidris tenuirostris) is a small wader or shorebird. It is a medium-sized shorebird with a straight, slender bill of medium length and a heavily streaked head and neck.
• It is an international migratory wading bird that travels vast distances between the Northern Hemisphere breeding grounds and Southern Hemisphere summer feeding grounds.
• IUCN Status: Endangered
• Distribution: Great Knots occur around coastal areas in many parts of Australia during the southern summer. They breed in eastern Siberia, and when on migration they occur throughout coastal regions of eastern and Southeast Asia.
• Habitat: In Australia, Great Knots inhabit intertidal mudflats and sandflats in sheltered coasts, including bays harbours and estuaries. They forage on the moist mud, and they often roost on beaches or in nearby low vegetation, such as mangroves or dune vegetation.
• Threats: Loss of intertidal stopover habitats in the Yellow Sea region is thought to be a key driver in the population declines of shorebirds

• It is also potentially threatened by climate change.
• Recent evidence shows a very rapid population decline caused by the reclamation of non-breeding stopover grounds, and under the assumption that further proposed reclamation projects will cause additional declines in the future.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

The Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) has upheld the order of insurance regulator IRDAI directing Go Digit General Insurance to discontinue the product “Digit Group Total Protect Policy” as the product falls under the purview of life insurance which could not be offered by a general insurance company.

• Any person who wishes to carry on insurance business can do so provided that the person gets a registration of a particular class of insurance business under Section 3 of the Insurance Act read with Clause 4 of the Regulations of 2000.

Securities Appellate Tribunal(SAT)

• Securities Appellate Tribunal (SAT) is a statutory body established under the provisions of Section 15K of the Securities and Exchange Board of India Act,1992.
• It’s headquarters is at Mumbai.
• The mandate of SAT is to hear and dispose of appeals against the orders passed by the 

• Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) (b)
• Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA)
• Insurance Regulatory Development Authority of India (IRDAI).

• SAT consists of a Presiding Officer & two other members.
• The Presiding officer of SAT shall be appointed by the Central Government in consultation with the Chief Justice of India or his nominee. 

Powers and Functions

• It has the same powers as vested in a civil court. Further, if any person feels aggrieved by SAT’s decision or order can appeal to the Supreme Court.
• To hear and dispose of appeals against orders passed by the SEBI or by an adjudicating officer under the SEBI Act,1992.
• To hear and dispose of appeals against orders passed by the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA).
• To hear and dispose of appeals against orders passed by the Insurance Regulatory Development Authority of India (IRDAI).

The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) 

• It is an independent statutory body that was set up under the IRDA Act,1999. 
• It is under the jurisdiction of Ministry of Finance.
• It is tasked with regulating and licensing the insurance and re-insurance industries in India.
• To protect the interests of the insurance policyholders and to develop and regulates the insurance industry. It issues advisories regularly to insurance companies regarding the changes in rules and regulations.
• The agency’s headquarters are in Hyderabad, Telangana, where it moved from Delhi in 2001.
• IRDAI is a 10-member body including the chairman, five full-time and four part-time members appointed by the government of India.

Main Objectives

• To ensure fair treatment and protect the interests of the policyholder.
• To regulate the insurance companies and ensuring the industry’s financial soundness.
• To formulate standards and regulations so that there is no ambiguity

Functions

• Granting, renewing, cancelling or modifying the registration of insurance companies.
• Levying charges and fees as per the IRDA act.
• Conducting investigation, inspection, audit, etc. of insurance companies and other organizations in the insurance industry.
• Specifying the code of conduct and providing qualifications and training to intermediaries, insurance agents etc.
• Regulating and controlling the insurance premium rates, terms and conditions and other benefits offered by insurers.
• Provides a grievance redressal forum and protecting interests of the policyholder.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 1

Melocanna baccifera, a tropical bamboo species, has long intrigued researchers for its association with the occurrence of ‘bamboo death,’ ‘rat floods’ and famines in northeast India.

Finding

• Researchers detected a correlation between the sugar content in the fruit of Melocanna baccifera and the frenzied feeding and population boom in rats during ‘Mautam’, the cyclical, mass bamboo flowering that occurs once in 48 years.
• Melocanna baccifera is the largest fruit-producing bamboo and is native to the northeast India-Myanmar region. 
• During its gregarious flowering, the bamboo produces large fruits which draw animal visitors/predators. 
• Of these, black rats greatly relish the fleshy, berry-like fruit. 
• During this period, they also multiply rapidly, a phenomenon dubbed as ‘rat flood.’ 
• Once the fruits are gone, they start devouring standing crops, causing famines that have claimed thousands of human lives.

Melocanna baccifera

• It is one of two bamboo species belonging to the Melocanna genus.
• It is the largest fruit-producing bamboo. 
• It grows up to 10–25 m tall. 
• It is native to Bangladesh, Myanmar, India, and Thailand.
• It is an invasive species that can occupy large areas due to its long and vigorous rhizomes and, in flowering, for its fruits that are easy to germinate.
• One of the most useful bamboos within its native range, especially in Bangladesh, it provides edible shoots, medicine and culms that have a wide range of uses.
• The plant is also grown as an ornamental purposes.

Cultivation of Melocanna Baccifera:

• A plant of the moist tropics. It grows best in areas where the mean annual temperature falls within the range 20 – 33°c, though it can tolerate 15 – 38°c.
• It prefers a mean annual rainfall in the range 2,000 – 3,000mm, tolerating 600 – 4,400mm.
• Succeeds in moist soils, preferring a fertile medium to heavy soil.
• Bamboos in general are usually monocarpic, living for many years before flowering, then flowering and seeding profusely for a period of 1 – 3 years before usually dying.
• The plant flowers gregariously, with a flowering cycle of 30 – 45 years. In the season before flowering no new shoots are produced. Flowering may continue for about 10 years over a tract that is sometimes called a flowering wave.

Uses

• In its native area, especially in Bangladesh, M. baccifera is one of the most useful bamboos. 
• Its culms are widely used in house building, 
• To make woven wares (baskets, mats, handicrafts, wall plates, screens, hats) and domestic utensils, 
• And are an important source of superior paperpulp. 
• The young shoots are edible and during the rainy season constitute one of the important foods.
• The shoots are also sliced and dried in the sun for preservation.

Medicinal Uses

• Tabashir, which is a siliceous concretion found in the culms of the bamboo stem, can be collected from the culms.
• It is used as a tonic in treating respiratory diseases.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 1

November 18, 2022, is the 60th anniversary of the Battle of Rezang La, one of the few bright spots in the War of 1962 with China. On that day, 13 Kumaon’s C Company made their heroic last stand against the Chinese army in the high Himalayas of Ladakh, warding off a very significant threat and, in the process, writing a glorious chapter in India’s military history.

About Rezang La:

• It is also called Rechin La.
• The brightest of the bright spots in the pervasive darkness of 1962 was the Battle of Rezang La in the high Himalayas in Ladakh. 
• The place is a massive 16,000-foot-high feature in the narrow gap between the even higher mountains surrounding the strategic village of Chushul and the Spanggur Lake that stretches across both Indian and Chinese territories. 
• Rezang La is, therefore, vital for the defence of the crucially important Chushul. 
• Any invader reaching there would have had a free run to Leh.

About the war memorial:

• It is dedicated to those who laid down their lives in the Battle of Rezang La during the 1962 war.
• It will now include the names of Army personnel who lost their lives in the violent clash at Galwan last year.
• 18th November marks the 60th anniversary of the Battle of Rezang La in which Troops from the 13 Kumaon Regiment defeated several waves of the Chinese Army at a height of over 16,000 feet.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 1

During the G20 Summit, Prime Minister mentioned Baliyatra, literally ‘voyage to Bali’, on the banks of the Mahanadi in Cuttack, which celebrates the ancient trade relations between India and Indonesia.

• This year’s Baliyatra, which concluded on Thursday, also found a place in the Guinness World Records for achieving an impressive feat of origami, the creation of beautiful paper sculptures.

Historical significance

• Baliyatra, literally ‘voyage to Bali’, is one of the country’s largest open-air fairs, which is organised every year to commemorate the 2,000-year-old maritime and cultural links between ancient Kalinga (today’s Odisha) and Bali and other South and Southeast Asian regions like Java, Sumatra, Borneo, Burma (Myanmar) and Ceylon (Sri Lanka).
• The origins of the festival, which begins on Kartik Purnima (full moon night in the month of Kartik) can be traced back more than 1,000 years. 
• The Bay of Bengal region had several ports, and sadhavas (traders) traditionally began their voyage across the sea on this auspicious day, when the winds were favourable for the boats, known as boita, to sail.
• According to historians, popular items of trade between Kalinga and Southeast Asia included pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, silk, camphor, gold, and jewellery.
• Even today, thousands of people across Odisha sail decorative miniature boats made of banana stems, paper, or thermocol to celebrate boita bandana, or the worshipping of the boats.
• Bali formed a part of the four islands that were collectively called the Suvarnadvipa, today known as Indonesia as their major trade hub along with other islands in the region.
• The Kalingas constructed large boats called the ‘Boitas’and with the help of these, they traded with the Indonesian islands.
• These ships had copper hulls and could carry up to seven hundred men and animals aboard. Interestingly, the Bay of Bengal was once known as the Kalinga Sea as it was thronged by these ships.
• The dominance of the Kalingas over the sea routes can be understood from the fact that Kalidasa in his Raghuvamsa referred to the King of Kalinga as ‘The Lord of the Sea’.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

NATO, the Western defensive military alliance led by the United States,  that a Russian missile killed two of its citizens. 

• Polish Prime Minister had said that the country was considering whether it should launch NATO’s Article 4 procedure. 
• Any attack on Poland, a NATO member, could drag the 30-nation strong alliance into the Russia-Ukraine conflict, risking a full-fledged nuclear war.

What is NATO?

• The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation came into being after World War II as a counter to the Soviet Union’s possible expansion attempts in Europe. 
• Then-US President Harry S Truman signed the 12-member treaty on April 4, 1949. 
• After the collapse of USSR in 1991, several eastern European nations previously members of the Soviet Union joined NATO.
• As of now, NATO comprise 30 members — Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, the United States, Greece, Turkey, Germany, Spain, Czechia, Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Albania, Croatia, Montenegro, and North Macedonia.
• Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Finland and Sweden applied for NATO membership and were invited to join the collective by 28 of the 30 members, with Turkey and Hungary being notable exceptions. 
• Bosnia and Herzegovina and Georgia have expressed interest in joining the collective as well.

NATO’s Core Duties

• The NATO works on a collective defense principle and routinely undertakes exercises to strengthen their territorial, naval, and air forces. 
• NATO members also arm themselves to face evolving methods of attacks like cybercrimes, and have participated in military operations in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosova, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria, among others.
• Article 4 of the treaty mandates that the member nations consult each other when faced with threat. 
• Article 5 spells out the ‘one-for-all, all-for-one’ nature of the treaty. It reads
• In exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognised by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.”

Rivalry that goes way back

• NATO and Russia have always been at odds with each other, since the treaty was signed to keep Russian expansionism at bay.
• When NATO came into existence, Soviet Union had sought to counter this Western alliance with a defence collective of its own and signed the Warsaw Pact with Poland, Czechoslovakia, Albania, Bulgaria, East Germany, Hungary, and Romania during the Cold War. However, this pact was gradually dissolved after the war ended and its existing member nations eventually joined the NATO.
• The expansion of NATO from 12 to 30 members has been a source of tension between Russia and the West for years.
• In Europe, Russia shares a border with Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Belarus, Ukraine, and Georgia. Of this, apart from Belarus and Ukraine, the others have either joined NATO or are in queue for a membership.
• Russia sees the presence of Western military and nuclear bases in its neighbourhood as a threat.

Syllabus: General Studies Paper 2

India participated in the fourth meeting of the Moscow Format Consultations on Afghanistan held in Moscow on 16th November 2022. The meeting saw participation from special envoys and senior officials from Russia, China, Pakistan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

What is Moscow Format?

• Moscow format is one of the several dialogue platforms on Afghanistan which began before the Taliban takeover of Kabul.
• The format consists of Russia, China, Pakistan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and India.

The issues discussed at the 4th Moscow Format

The participants discussed issues related to Afghanistan. These include 

• The current humanitarian situation and the ongoing efforts of various stakeholders to provide assistance, 
• Intra-Afghan talks, 
• The formation of an inclusive and representative government and 
• Efforts to counter threats of terrorism and ensure regional security.

About Moscow Format Consultations on Afghanistan:

• The Moscow Format Consultations on Afghanistan, launched in 2017, is a regional platform on Afghanistan involving the special envoys of Russia, Afghanistan, India, Iran, China, and Pakistan.
• Its mandate is to facilitate political reconciliation between the then-internationally backed Kabul government and the Taliban, establish peace, and ensure regional security.
• Moscow assumed the lead in this process based on its national concerns and interests in Afghanistan, most notably on two key issues.
• The first issue was centred around the potential threats due to the spread of instability, violence, and extremism in Afghanistan and the rest of Central Asia.
• The second was related to the growing inflow of Afghan heroin to the Russian market. Geopolitical interests related to Moscow’s opposition to any US or Western security presence in Central Asia undergirds Russia’s motives to lead such processes.
• April 2017 saw the first round of consultations with Russia, Afghanistan, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan in attendance.