Weekly Current Affairs Quiz: 18/04/2022 to 23/04/2022

EXPLANATION: 

• The Ministry of Finance oversees the ‘Stand Up India Scheme’, which aims to promote entrepreneurship among women, Scheduled Castes (SC) & Scheduled Tribes (ST) categories, to help them in starting a Greenfield enterprise. OBC is not eligible for this scheme. Hence statement 1 is not correct and statement 3 is correct. 
• Women are eligible for this scheme. This scheme is launched to fulfill the dream of babaSaheb ambedkar. And Ambedkar ji was very much concerned towards women’s upliftment. The scheme has completed six years and loans worth more than ₹30,160 crore have been sanctioned in the last six years. Over 1.33 lakh new entrepreneurs have been facilitated and more than 1 lakh women promoters have benefitted from this Scheme during the last six years. Hence statement 2 is correct.

EXPLANATION: 

• Gangaur is colorful and one of the most important festivals of the people of Rajasthan but nowadays this festival is celebrated in some parts of Gujrat , Madhya Pradesh and Bengal. But it is mainly celebrated in rajasthan. Hence statement 1 is correct. 
•  It is the celebration of spring, harvest, marital fidelity, and childbearing gana is a synonym for lord Shiva and Gaur which stands for Gauri or Parvati who symbolizes Saubhagya (marital bliss). It is the celebration of Hindu New year (similar to). Every year it is celebrated at Tratiya of the Chaitra month. It is not celebrated with English dates. However it is celebrated for 18 days in Rajasthan. The offering of new crops to God has been an Indian tradition for a long time. This festival is also a welcome festival of the new season, new date and the offering of new crops to lord Shiva. Hence statement 2 is correct. But this festival commenced with the Hindi date (tratiya of the Chaitra). Hance statement 3 is not correct.

EXPLANATION: 

• Two Indian musicians--Ricky Kej and Falguni Shah--were among the winners at the 64th Annual Grammy Awards of 2022. It is the second Grammy win for Ricky and the first for Falguni.
• Two Indian musicians were among the winners at the 64th Annual Grammy Awards, given out to musicians on Sunday night in Las Vegas. Composer Ricky Kej won his second Grammy Award as she and Stewart Copeland won the award for Best New Age Album. Indian-American singer-songwriter Falu won her maiden trophy for Best Children's Music Album on the night.Falu, whose real name is Falguni Shah, won in the Best Children's Music Album category for her album A Colorful World. The New York-based musician has, in the past, collaborated with AR Rahman for Slumdog Millionaire. She received her early training in music in Mumbai, where she trained under the legendary sarangi and vocal master Ustad Sultan Khan. Hence option (c) is correct.

EXPLANATION: 

• Falguni Nayar is an Indian businesswoman and billionaire who is the founder and CEO of the beauty and lifestyle retail company Nykaa. Nayar is one of two self-made female Indian billionaires. Hence statements 1 and 2 are correct. 
• Falguni Shah is a New York-based, whose music blends ancient classical Indian melodies with contemporary western sounds. Hence statement 3 is not correct. 
• Falguni Nayar was awarded the 'Woman Ahead' award at the Economic Times Startup Awards 2017. And Recently among three Indian women Falguni Nayar of Nykaa, Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw of Biocon and Radha Vembu, she secured her name in the list of Hurun Richest Self-Made Women in the World 2022. Hence statement 4 is also not correct.

EXPLANATION: 

• Government is focused on its important objective of building the overall semiconductor ecosystem and ensuring that, in-turn catalyzes India’s rapidly expanding electronics manufacturing and innovation ecosystem. This vision of AtmaNirbharta in electronics & semiconductors was given further momentum by the Union Cabinet, chaired by the Hon’ble Prime Minister, approving the Semicon India programme with a total outlay of INR 76,000 crore for the development of semiconductor and display manufacturing ecosystem in our country. Hence statement 1 is correct. 
• India Semiconductor Mission is the initiative of the government of India, not the government of Andhra Pradesh. Hence statement 2 is not correct. 

• It is the initiative of the Ministry of information technology, not the ministry of science and technology. Hence statement 3 is also not correct. 
• Ashwini Vaishnaw will be the Chairperson of the committee related to semiconductor mission. NITI Aayog member V K Saraswat, Principal Scientific Advisor, and Secretaries from the Ministry of External affairs, Departments of expenditure, economic affairs, and promotion of industry and internal trade, will be members of the committee.

EXPLANATION: 

• Astronomers have discovered a planet that is nearly identical to Jupiter, circling a star 17,000 light-years away from the Earth. In terms of mass, the exoplanet, dubbed K2-2016-BLG-0005Lb, is nearly the same as Jupiter. While K2-2016-BLG-0005Lb has a mass of 1.1 times that of Jupiter, the star that it orbits has a mass of about 60 percent of the Sun.
• The near-identical twin is also around the same distance from its star as Jupiter is from the Sun. K2-2016-BLG-0005Lb is 420 million miles away from its star, while Jupiter is 462 million miles away.
• The planet and its star are located in the constellation Sagittarius. An international team of astrophysicists discovered the exoplanet using data from NASA's Kepler satellite telescope collected in 2016. In the Milky Way galaxy, the telescope has discovered over 2,700 verified planets so far, but this system is twice as far away as any ever discovered by Kepler. Hence option (a) is correct.

EXPLANATION:

• NITI Aayog’s Agricultural Markets and Farmer Friendly Reforms Index — AMFFRI, an index that evaluates Indian states on the extent to which each of them undertook required agri-reforms. It was found that states that undertook reforms, and were thus ranked low on AMFFRI, witnessed a relatively faster agri-GDP growth rate and states which did not undertake required reforms, and thus were ranked high on the AMFFRI, witnessed relatively lower agri-GDP growth rates.
• This indicator reveals ease of doing agribusiness as well as opportunities for farmers to benefit from modern trade and commerce and have wider options for sale of her/his produce. 
• The index carries a score with a minimum value “0” implying no reforms and maximum value “100” implying complete reforms in the selected areas. A low AMFFRI rank implies the state is undertaking desired reforms. Hence option (a) alone is true.

EXPLANATION:

At the Central level, the following taxes are being subsumed:

1. Central Excise Duty,
2. Additional Excise Duty,
3. Service Tax,
4. Additional Customs Duty commonly known as Countervailing Duty, and
5. Special Additional Duty of Customs.

At the State level, the following taxes are being subsumed:

1. Subsuming of State Value Added Tax/Sales Tax,
2. Entertainment Tax (other than the tax levied by the local bodies), Central Sales Tax (levied by the Center and collected by the States),
3. Octroi and Entry tax,
4. Purchase Tax,
5. Luxury tax, and
6. Taxes on lottery, betting and gambling.

Taxes not subsumed under GST include Basic Custom Duty, Central Excise on Petroleum Products, Anti-Dumping Duty, VAT on alcohol for human consumption, Stamp Duty, Property Tax (levied by local bodies), Professional Tax. Thus option (c) is correct.

EXPLANATION :

• Context – Ex RBI Governor Urjit Patel was appointed to the Board of Governors of Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank(AIIB).
• The bank currently has 105 members, including 16 prospective members from around the world. Canada is a member of AIIB while the USA is not.
• China is the largest shareholder with 26.61 % voting shares in the bank followed by India (7.6%), Russia (6.01%) and Germany (4.2 %). China also has the highest voting power.English is the official language. There is no mention of Arabic. 
• (The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) is a multilateral development bank with a mission to improve social and economic outcomes in Asia. It is established by the AIIB Articles of Agreement (entered into force Dec. 25, 2015) which is a multilateral treaty. The Parties (57 founding members) to agreement comprise the Membership of the Bank. It is headquartered in Beijing and began its operations in January 2016. Fourteen of the G-20 nations are AIIB members including France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom. By investing in sustainable infrastructure and other productive sectors in Asia and beyond, it will better connect people, services and markets that over time will impact the lives of billions and build a better future.) Thus, option (b) is correct.

EXPLANATION:

Law of Diminishing Marginal Utility:

• Marginal Utility: Marginal utility is the added satisfaction that a consumer gets from having one more unit of a good or service. Thus, statement 1 is correct.
• The concept of marginal utility is used by economists to determine how much of an item consumers are willing to purchase.
• Law of Diminishing Marginal Utility: The law of diminishing marginal utility directly relates to the concept of diminishing prices.
• As the utility of a product decreases as its consumption increases. Thus, statement 2 is incorrect.
• The law of diminishing marginal utility directly impacts a company’s pricing because the price charged for an item must correspond to the consumer’s marginal utility and willingness to consume or utilize the good.

EXPLANATION:

Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA):

• It is a Statutory Body set up under the Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority Act, 1985, under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry and it provides financial assistance, information, and guidelines for the development of scheduled products.
• It is responsible for the export of products such as fruits; vegetables; meat; poultry; dairy products; confectionery, biscuits, and bakery products; honey, jaggery, and sugar products; cocoa and chocolates of all kinds; alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages; cereals; groundnuts, peanuts and walnuts, pickles, papads, and chutneys; guar gum; floriculture and floriculture products; herbal and medicinal plants. Thus, option (d) is correct.

EXPLANATION:

Enforcement Directorate

• The Directorate General of Economic Enforcement is a law enforcement and economic intelligence agency responsible for enforcing economic laws and fighting economic crime in India.
• Whenever any offense is registered by a local police station, which has generated proceeds of crime over and above Rupees 1 crore, the investigating police officer forwards the details to the ED. Thus, statement 1 is not correct.
• It was formed with the purpose of handling Exchange Control Law violations under the Foreign Exchange Regulation Act,1947.
• Now, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) is administered by the Department of Revenue under the Ministry of Finance. Thus, statement 2 is correct.