Daily Current Affairs Quiz: July 16, 2022

ANSWER: D

• The National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) to rank India’s top colleges and universities has been released.
• IIT Madras remains the best institute in the country, IISc Bengaluru has topped the university category while University of Delhi’s Miranda House has been ranked first in the college category.
• NIRF India Ranking 2022 has been announced for 11 categories. This includes overall, university, management, college, pharmacy, medical, engineering, architecture, ARIIA (Atal Ranking of Institutions on Innovation Achievements), law and research institutions.
• The ranking framework judges institutions under five broad generic groups of parameters of Teaching, Learning and Resources (TLR), Research and Professional Practice (RP), Graduation Outcomes (GO), Outreach and Inclusivity (OI) and Perception (PR). Ranks are assigned based on the total sum of marks assigned for each of these five broad groups of parameters.

• The best medical college in India — like in the previous years’ — is All India Institute of Medical Science in Delhi, followed by Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research in Chandigarh.
• In 2021 too, IIT-Madras retained its number one position in the overall educational institutes and engineering categories. The institute also bagged the second position in the ‘research’ category that was newly introduced last year.

ANSWER: D

• According to a Government survey, the proportion of unmarried persons within the age bracket of 15-29 years has increased to 23 per cent in 2019 from 17.2 per cent in 2011.
• As per the National Youth Policy 2014, those aged 15 to 29 years are classified as youth.
• The latest report of the National Statistical Office stated that the percentage share of the youth population (15-29 years) who are never married has shown an increasing trend in the male population from 20.8 per cent in 2011 to 26.1 per cent in 2019 and a similar trend has been observed in case of the female population.
• The proportion of unmarried females rose from 13.5 per cent in 2011 to 19.9 per cent.
• In 2019, the highest percentage share of youth population who are never married have been observed in the States/UTs of Jammu & Kashmir followed by Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and Punjab and the lowest have been observed in the States/UTs of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.
• However, the report did not attribute any reason for rising in the proportion of unmarried youth. It stated that early marriage in India has been declining over time.

ANSWER: A

• Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe has sworn in as the interim President after Parliament Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena accepted the resignation of Gotabaya Rajapaksa.
• Wickremesinghe was sworn in as the Acting President before Chief Justice Jayantha Jayasuriya.
• Gotabaya Rajapaksa submitted his resignation letter after arriving in Singapore, officially vacating the post of President.
• According to Parliament Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena, President will be selected according to the provisions of the Special Provisions Act No. 2 of 1981 and Article 40 of the Constitution.

ANSWER: B

• Top financial officials from the Group of 20 leading rich and developing nations met on the Indonesian island of Bali seeking strategies to counter inflation, food insecurity and other troubles that have worsened due to the war in Ukraine.
• Indonesian Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati opened the two-day meeting by urging fellow finance ministers, central bank chiefs and other leaders to find ways to “build bridges, not walls.” The consequences of failure, especially for less wealthy nations, would be “catastrophic. “Millions and millions if not billions of people are depending on us.”
• The financial leaders are searching for ways to coordinate how they shepherd their economies through inflation that is running at 40-year highs, unsnarling supply chains and bottlenecks due to the coronavirus pandemic and fortifying financial systems against future risks.
• US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen called for the G-20 to take action to fight food insecurity as millions go hungry due to soaring costs for food and other necessities. It is crucial, to avoid stockpiling and export bans, to provide financial help to the needy and to ensure all organizations, such as development banks and food agencies, do their part to alleviate hunger.

ANSWER: D

• Speaking on the history of Bihar Vidhan Sabha, PM said, “The Bihar Vidhan Sabha has a history of its own and here in the Vidhan Sabha Bhawan, big and bold decisions have been taken. Before independence, Governor Satyendra Prasanna Sinha had appealed to this Assembly to encourage indigenous industries, to adopt Swadeshi Charkha.”
• PM Modi also laid the foundation stone for the museum showcasing 100 years of the House and also inaugurated the Centenary Memorial Garden with 100 varieties of medicinal plants. Apart from these, PM Modi also unveiled  “Shatabdi Stambh (centenary column)” marking 100 years of the House.
• After Bihar and Orissa provinces gained full statehood in 1920, the Legislative Assembly convened for the first time on February 7 at the freshly built building.
• The 17th Vidhan Sabha’s current session is in progress. Lord Satyendra Prasad Sinha, the governor, attended the first meeting on February 7, 1921.
• The Bihar-Orissa Legislative Council was the name of this structure during the British era.
• Bihar and Orissa were given full state status following the passage of the Government of India Act, 1919. The first governor of Bihar was Satyendra Prasad Sinha.
• President Ram Nath Kovind launched the celebrations for the Bihar Legislative Assembly building’s 100th anniversary on October 21, 2021. Prior to that, the President lay the foundation for the Assembly Complex’s Centenary Memorial Stambh.

ANSWER: B

• The auspicious occasion of Guru Purnima is observed on the Purnima tithi (15th day) in the Shukla Paksh (waxing phase of moon) of Ashadha month.

GURU PURNIMA: SIGNIFICANCE

• This day is commemorated to express our gratitude to our gurus for their dedication and selflessness in nurturing a child.
• On Guru Purnima, the special bond between students and teachers is celebrated .Teachers have the greatest influence on students’ lives.
• They not only transfer knowledge and teach co-curricular and extracurricular abilities, but they also help kids develop the morals and life skills that help them deal with the outside world.

ANSWER: A

• The boundary line shown on 29 topo-¬sheets by a high¬ powered committee in 1960 will be taken as the basis for the realignment of the Arunachal Pradesh¬ Assam boundary towards resolving decades of dispute. Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and his Arunachal Pradesh counterpart Pema Khandu signed the Namsai Declaration for minimising the interstate boundary dispute involving 123 villages.

List of villages

• A list of these villages had been placed before a local commission by Arunachal Pradesh on December 26, 2007. Namsai is the headquarters of Namsai district in southern Arunachal Pradesh.
• According to the Declration,the boundary line delineated and signed on 29 toposheets by the High-Powered Tripartite Committee as notified boundary in 1960 would be taken as the basis for the realignment of boundary by both the States.
• Present¬day Arunachal Pradesh, which attained Statehood in February 1987, used to be the North East Frontier Tract, administered by the Governor of Assam as an agent of the President of India.
• It was renamed North East Frontier Agency and brought under the Central government’s control in 1954.
• According to the declaration, all border issues between Assam and Arunachal Pradesh will be confined to those raised before the local commission in 2007.

12 committees

• Following the model for resolving the Assam¬ Meghalaya boundary dispute, both the States decided to constitute 12 regional committees each covering the districts on either side of the boundary for joint verification of the 123 villages.
• These committees will make recommendations to the respective State government keeping in view the historical perspective, administrative convenience, contiguity and people’s will, to delineate the interstate boundary.

ANSWER: A

• According to the IMF’s managing director, Kristalina Georgieva the global economic outlook has “darkened significantly” and could deteriorate further, citing Russia’s war in Ukraine and the rapid inflation it has caused, threatening widespread hunger and poverty.
• The warning comes just months after the IMF already cut its global growth forecast for 2022 and 2023.
• The Ukraine war hit as the world was struggling to recover from the ongoing impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, and has caused an acceleration of inflation that endangers the gains of the past two years.
• According to Kristalina Georgieva, the international crisis-lender is “projecting a further downgrade to global growth” in 2022 and 2023.
• The outlook remains extremely uncertain and the poorest is expected to suffer the most.
• The risk of social instability was also increasing due to food and energy prices rising.

ANSWER: C

• Larsen and Toubro (L&T) conducted the first survey to repair damaged temples in the Govind Sagar Lake in Bilaspur district.
• The state government has envisaged a project of Rs 1,400 crore for the repair of the temples submerged in the Govind Sagar Lake that were built in 1963 after the construction of the Bhakra Dam on the Sutlej.
• According to Pankaj Rai, DC, Bilaspur, a team of L&T visited various sites. He added that a detailed project report would be prepared before starting this ambitious project.
• According to DC, Chief Minister had announced that Bilaspur town would be restored to its former glory and a provision of Rs 1,400 crore had been made for the purpose. He added that besides L&T, some international companies would also be roped in for the effective execution of the project.
• According to Rai, the project would not only beautify the old town but also bring alive historical art, culture and tradition. This would also make Bilaspur a new tourist destination.

ANSWER: A

• The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Mandi, has been ranked No. 20 — with a score of 60.43 — among all the engineering institutes of the country in the India Rankings 2022 that were announced by Union Minister for Education, Dharmendra Pradhan.
• The institute climbed 39 positions to capture the 43rd rank in overall category of the rankings, which are conducted by the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF).
• In the research category, it was ranked No. 39.
• According to the Professor Laxmidhar Behera IIT-Mandi Director, “The significant improvements in the NIRF 2022 has been possible by the efforts of our faculty and students towards research, teaching, and other parameters.
• We will strive to keep our commitment to make IIT-Mandi relevant with our research for the local region, while also being of relevance to the country.
• The NIRF is an indigenous ranking framework for higher educational institutions which outlines a methodology to rank institutions across the country.