List of top Current Affairs Questions on National Affairs

The National Education Policy, 2020, excluded the following disciplines from its ambit

Which among the following states admitted more foreign tourists in 2021 ?

In order to reduce plastic waste in India, the Indian government in July, 2022 banned _____ .

The agriculture sector has experienced buoyant growth in the past two years. The sector, which is the largest employer of workforce, accounted for a sizeable 18.8 per cent (2021- 22) in Gross Value Added (GVA) of the country registering a growth of 3.6 per cent in 2020-21 and 3.9 per cent in 2021-22. Growth in allied sectors including livestock, dairy and fisheries has been the major drivers of overall growth in the sector. When measured in total value of agricultural production, India is ranked fourth largest in the world. Post-independence, there was a need to import food grains due to low-productivity, stagnant food-crop sector and poor rural infrastructure making food self-sufficiency a major national goal. The introduction of the Green Revolution then yielded spectacular results and we became one of the largest producers of many agricultural commodities such as rice, wheat, pulses, fruits and vegetables. From being a net importer of foods in the 1960s, India is now a net exporter, thanks to Indian farmers and the Indian agriculture input industry.
[Extracted, with edits and revisions, from: “India’s changing agricultural landscape and its way to inclusive growth”, by NS Ramaswamy, The Economic Times]

Former Governor of a State and National Democratic Alliance (NDA) candidate Droupadi Murmu was elected the 15^th President of India, the first tribal woman to be elected to the position and the youngest as well. She was declared elected on Thursday after four rounds of counting, although she had crossed the half-way mark after the third round of counting itself, posting an unassailable lead over her rival and the Opposition’s candidate who conceded the election thereafter. Prime Minister Narendra Modi was the first to greet Ms. Murmu at her residence in New Delhi after the third round of counting showed that she had crossed the half-way mark.
Ms. Murmu hails from the Santhal tribe and was born in the district of Mayurbhanj, coming up the hard way in life, graduating and teaching in Odisha before entering electoral politics at the local body level and later being elected MLA and serving as a Minister in the Biju Janata Dal-BJP coalition government from 2000 to 2004. She remained an MLA till 2009, representing Rairangpur in Odisha, a town that burst into celebrations since her name was announced as a candidate for the post of President of India. She was known to intervene in stopping amendments to the Chota Nagpur Tenancy Act that was being brought in by the BJP government of Raghubar Das, which involved changing land use in tribal areas.
[Excerpt taken and edited from “Droupadi Murmu elected 15^th President of India”, The Hindu]

The National Commission for Backward Classes was accorded the constitutional status by

In which of the following States, the first Emergency Landing Facility on a National Highway was inaugurated ?

On December 26, 2021, for the first time since the present government came to power in 2014, the Union Home Ministry constituted a panel led by its officers to review the withdrawal of the Armed areas. The Act was amended in 1972 and the powers to declare an area as "disturbed" were conferred concurrently upon the Central Government along with the States. Currently, the MHA issues periodic "disturbed area" notification to extend AFSPA only for Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh, where it is applicable in the districts of Tirap, Changlang, Longding and areas falling under Namsai and Mahadevpur police stations bordering Assam. The notification for Manipur and Assam is issued by the State Governments. Tripura revoked the Act in 2015 and Meghalaya was under AFSPA for 27 years, until it was revoked by the MHA from April 1, 2018. The Act was implemented in a 20-km area along the border with Assam. Jammu and Kashmir has a separate J&K Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1990.

Maritime Strategy in 2007, titled "Freedom to use the Seas". They kept on upgrading their vision document on regular intervals with latest being declared in 2015. The Security And Growth for All in the Region (SAGAR) vision declared by the Government of India in May 2015 has been a massive game changer on multiple fronts. It integrates the geopolitical and geostrategic realities to domestic requirements. The security concerns and the blue economic opportunities are comprehensively addressed along with the diplomatic leverage and reviving the rich maritime heritage.
The SAGAR vision has been backed by aggressive push by the Government of India to drive mega projects with massive human resource requirements.

On 29 July, 2020, the Ministry of Human Resource Development (since renamed the Ministry of Education) unveiled the National Education Policy 2020 (NEP 2020), which recommends sweeping changes to the Education System in India. Which of the following is not a feature of the NEP 2020 ?

The Government of India recently signed a pact for a $500 million project to build safe and green national highway corridors in Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh, with which of these organisations ?

Which of the following cannot cast their votes remotely through the postal ballot system in India ?

India was elected a Member of U.N. Commission on Status of Women during September 2020 defeating

National Voters’ Day in India is observed on

According to Public Affairs Index, 2020, which are the two best governed States in India ?

UNESCO New Delhi, along with the National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) and other partners, organised a hybrid event with school children and teachers to celebrate ‘World Water Day 2021’. The event included felicitating the winners of a water conservation awareness programme, and screening of their winning animation short films, according to an official release. UNESCO launched this nation-wide programme for school children in India, in partnership with the National Mission for Clean Ganga, the United Schools Organization (USO), Water Digest and India based global animation major Toonz Media Group. Entitled ‘H2Ooooh!-Waterwise program for children of India’, this innovative initiative encouraged school students between the age of 6-14 years to submit story ideas for animated short films to raise awareness on water conservation and its sustainable use.

India has added Tso Kar Wetland Complex in Ladakh as its 42ndRamsar site, which is a second one in the Union Territory (UT) of Ladakh. Expressing happiness, Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Shri Prakash Javadekar shared this information in a tweet message. The Tso Kar Basin is a high-altitude wetland complex, consisting of two principal waterbodies, Startsapuk Tso, a freshwater lake of about 438 hectares to the south, and Tso Kar itself, a hypersaline lake of 1800 hectares to the north, situated in the Changthang region of Ladakh, India. It is called Tso Kar, meaning white lake, because of the white salt efflorescence found on the margins due to the evaporation of highly saline water. The Tso Kar Basin is an A1 Category Important Bird Area (IBA) as per Bird Life International and a key staging site in the Central Asian Flyway. The site is also one of the most important breeding areas of the Blacknecked Crane (Grus nigricollis) in India. This IBA is also the major breeding area for Great Crested Grebe (Podicepscristatus), Bar-headed Geese (Anserindicus), Ruddy Shelduck (Tadornaferruginea), Brown-headed Gull (Larusbrunnicephalus), Lesser Sand-Plover (Charadriusmongolus) and many other species.

Which State in India tops the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) India Index 2019?

The first batch of five Rafale jets flew out of France on July 25 and will arrive in India on Wednesday, July 29, when the fighter jets will officially be inducted and join the Indian Air Force fleet in Haryana's Ambala. The fighter jets, built by French aviation firm [1], took off from the Merignac airbase in southern France's Bordeaux today and landed safely at Al Dhafra airbase in the UAE after a sortie of more than seven hours. The five aircraft will be the first tranche of the 36 planes bought by India from France in a Rs. 59,000-crore inter governmental deal in 2016. "Delivery of ten aircraft has been completed on schedule. Five will stay back in France for training Mission. The delivery of all thirty six aircraft will be completed on schedule by the end of 2021," the Indian embassy in France said in a statement.
The Rafale fighter jets are capable of carrying a range of highly effective weapons, including the Meteor air-to-air missile and Scalp cruise missile. The Rafale jets will come with various India-specific modifications, including Israeli helmet-mounted displays, radar warning receivers, low-band jammers, 10-hour flight data recording, infra-red search and tracking systems among others. The Air Force has readied the required infrastructure to welcome the jets in its line-up.

The central bank doesn‘t disclose its foreign exchange management strategy, but it was evident in the last few years that the rupee was not allowed to appreciate despite healthy inflows, resulting in a rapid build-up of foreign exchange. From a low of $275 billion in September of 2013, when rupee came under severe pressure due to so-called 'taper tantrums‘ by the US Federal Reserve, India now has record foreign exchange reserves of [1] billion, as on 21 August — a 95 per cent rise over seven years. Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, the foreign exchange kitty swelled by $62 billion since March. In this seven-year period, rupee ended the year with an appreciation against the dollar only once — in 2017. This year, the rupee is so far down by 2.04 per cent against the dollar. The latest RBI statement suggested that it is not uncomfortable with the appreciation in rupee, confirming the speculation among currency analysts that a departure was made in the exchange management policy.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said that it will conduct liquidity operations worth Rs 20,000 crore in two tranches through sale and purchase of government securities (G-Secs). The two open market operations (OMOs) of Rs 10,000 crore each will be conducted on September 10 and 17, the central bank said in an official release. This is now the second such announcement in as many weeks. Last week, RBI had announced sale and purchase of G Secs worth Rs 20,000 crore, in two tranches, slated to be conducted on August 27 and September 3. In another move, RBI announced the infusion of Rs 1 lakh crore in mid September through long-term repo operations (LTROs) at floating rates, or the prevailing repo rate. Moreover, the central bank also gave an option to lenders who have earlier availed funds through LTROs, to reverse their transactions before maturity.

India‘s first Chairperson of Lokpal is:

How many States went to polls along with the 2019 Lok Sabha elections?

Which state's Kandhamal Haldi (turmeric) received Geographical Indications (GI) tag recently?

Recently, the Government of India relaxed the Angel Tax Norms for Start-ups and enhanced the investment limit to: