ANSWER: C

ANSWER: A

ANSWER: D

ANSWER: B

• PM recently greeted people on the occasion of Kharchi Puja.

ABOUT KHARCHI PUJA

• Kharchi Puja, also called the Festival of 14 Gods, is celebrated in Tripura.
  • The 14 Gods are worshipped by the Royal priest, ‘Chantai.
• It is performed during the months of July-August on the eighth day of the new moon.
• Kharchi is derived from two Tripuri words–‘khar’ or kharta meaning sin and ‘chi’ or si meaning cleaning.
• Festival is centred around worship of Chaturdasa Devata, ancestral deity of the Tripuri people.
• It lasts for seven days, and it takes place at old Agartala in the Fourteen Gods temple known as the ‘Chaturdasha Devata’ temple premises.
• The Kharchi Puja deities do not have a full body; they have only heads which are worshipped.
• On the day of the puja, the fourteen Gods are taken from the temple to the river Saidra by the Chantai members and given bathe with the holy river water, then carried back to the temple.

ANSWER: C

• Aarti Holla-Maini, a satellite industry expert of Indian origin, has been selected by United Nations Secretary-General as the Director of the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA).

ABOUT THE UNITED NATIONS OFFICE FOR OUTER SPACE AFFAIRS (UNOOSA)

• It is the UN office responsible for promoting international cooperation in the peaceful uses of outer space.
• It forms part of the United Nations Office at Vienna and serves as the Secretariat for the UN General Assembly’s only committee dealing exclusively with those issues: the Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space.
• UNOOSA implements the United Nations Programme on Space Applications (PSA).
• UNOOSA is also responsible for implementing the Secretary-General’s responsibilities under international space law and maintaining the United Nations Register of Objects Launched into Outer Space.
• It also prepares and distributes documents, reports, studies and publications on various aspects of space science and technology applications and international space law.
• It works to improve the use of space science and technology for the economic and social development of all countries, particularly developing countries.
• UNOOSA is also the current secretariat of the International Committee on Global Navigation Satellite Systems (ICG).

ANSWER: C

• North India’s first skin bank opens in Safdarjung Hospital in New Delhi.
• The country has 16 skin banks — a facility where the skin of deceased persons can be donated — with 7 in Maharashtra, 4 in Chennai, 3 in Karnataka, and 1 each in Madhya Pradesh and Odisha.

ABOUT SKIN BANK

• A skin bank is a place where cadaveric skin is processed and preserved under optimal conditions from where it can be used for the benefit of Burn victims.
• Anyone can donate Skin irrespective of sex & blood group; the minimum age of the donor should be 18 years.
  • There is no upper age limit.
• The skin of a deceased person can be donated within six hours of death.
• The donor’s skin is taken out only from the back of the thighs and legs and the thickness is only 3mm. It means a total of 1000-3000 sqm.
• The skin is then extracted, harvested, and processed, which takes five to six weeks.
• After this, it can be provided to patients.
• Unlike a kidney and liver, which cannot be stored and need to be transplanted within a few hours of donation, skin can be stored for three to five years by preserving in 85% glycerol solution.

ANSWER: D

• New study shows that few plants don’t follow a Fibonacci pattern.
• Researchers led by the University of Edinburgh have unearthed evidence of non-Fibonacci spirals in a fossilized plant that lived approximately 407 million years ago.

ABOUT FIBONACCI SPIRALS

• The characteristic of being arranged in spirals that adhere to a numerical sequence called the Fibonacci sequence.
• Spirals occur frequently in nature and can be seen in plant leaves, animal shells vortex of hurricane and even in the double helix of our DNA.
• In most cases, these spirals relate to the Fibonacci sequence – a set of numbers where each is the sum of the two numbers that precede it (1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21 and so on).
• They are extremely widespread in plants and can even be recognised with the naked eye.

ANSWER: A

• The term “organic intellectual” was coined by Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci.
• Gramsci defined Organic intellectuals are those specific intellectuals who could help build awareness among the masses.
• They are intellectuals who rose to the professional standing from a social class that usually does not produce intellectuals and yet remained associated with that class, unlike traditional intellectuals

ANSWER: D

• Priya A S has been honored with the prestigious Sahitya Akademi Bal Sahitya Puraskar 2023 in the Malayalam language for her novel “Perumazhayathe Kunjithalukal” (The Children Who Never Withered).
• The Sahitya Akademi Bal Sahitya Puraskar, awarded by the Sahitya Akademi, carries a cash prize of Rs 50,000 and an engraved copper plaque.

ANSWER: B

• Harry Markowitz, father of modern portfolio theory (MPT), passed away recently.
  • MPT is a practical method for selecting investments in order to maximize their overall returns within an acceptable level of risk.
  • Markowitz focused on combinations of assets, rather than individual securities.
  • He shared the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences (1990) with Merton H. Miller and William F. Sharpe for his ideas on finance.