20 FEBRUARY 2022 DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS | UPSC CDS CAPF AFCAT NDA SSB

1. KISAN DRONES

The Prime minister Narendra Modi flagged off 100 Kisan drones in different cities and towns of India to spray pesticides in farms across India.

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He virtually addressed to a group of farmers gathered at Manesar from where the "Drone Kisan Yatra" was flagged off.
Kisan Drones will be used to boost the agricultural sector in the country. The use of Kisan Drones will be promoted for crop assessment, digitization of land records and spraying of insecticides and nutrients.
This step was taken as the government aims to promote chemical-free national farming.
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said in her Budget 2022 speech that "Chemical-free Natural farming will be promoted throughout the country, with focus on farmers' lands in 5-kilometre-wide corridors along the river Ganga in the first stage".

Source : LiveMint

2. ACTIVE GALACTIC NUCLEI

Observations showing a roughly dough-nut-shaped cloud of cosmic dust and gas shrouding a huge black hole at the heart of a galaxy similar in size to our Milky Way are providing scientists with new clarity about the universe's most energetic objects.

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Scientists said that their observations involving the supermassive black hole at the centre of galaxy Messier 77 and its surrounding cloud lend support to predictions made three decades ago about what are called “active galactic nuclei.”
These are places at the centres of many large galaxies that have tremendous luminosity – sometimes outshining all of a galaxy's billions of stars combined – and produce the universe's most energetic outbursts seen since the Big Bang event 13.8 billion years ago.
The energy arises from gas violently falling into a supermassive black hole that is surrounded by a cloud of tiny particles of rock and soot along with mostly hydrogen gas.

Messier 77

Messier 77, also called NGC 1068 or the Squid Galaxy, is located 47 million light years – the distance light travels in a year, 9.5 trillion km – from the Earth in the constellation Cetus.
Its supermassive black hole has a mass roughly 10 million times greater than our sun.

Source : The Hindu

3. EAT RIGHT CAMPUS

In a first-of-its-kind initiative, four police stations in the national capital’s New Delhi district have been designated as ‘Eat Right Campus’ by the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) for providing nutritious and wholesome meals daily to police personnel at their canteens and mess.

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The four police stations, the first in the country which have met the benchmark for FSSAI’s five-star category certificate, are Barakhamba Road Police Station, Tilak Marg Police Station, Connaught Place Police Station and Mandir Marg Police Station.
The scheme is already in place since 2017 in several government institutions including colleges and hostels.

What is the initiative?

Eat Right India is a flagship mission of FSSAI, a statutory body under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW). The mission aims at ensuring that citizens of the country are provided nutritious meals which help in reducing the burden of various lifestyle-related diseases.
Delhi government’s Department of Food Safety, which is the implementing body of the initiative in the capital, has launched a programme called ‘Sehatmand Delhi’ under which places that can be designated as ‘Eat Right Campus’ are identified.

Source : The Hindu

4. MOTHS

Moths are vital to pollination in the Himalayan ecosystem of northeast India, reveals a recent study. The study establishes 91 species of moths as potential pollinators of 21 plant families in Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh in the northeastern Himalayas.

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The results assume significance as a majority of the pollination-related studies are based on diurnal pollinators (bees and butterflies) and the role of nocturnal pollinators have so far received less scientific attention.
The details of the study were recently published in Scientific Reports, a publication from the Nature group of journals.
In the present study about 65% moths (91 species) carried sufficient quantities of pollen grains to be considered as potential pollinators. Teliphasa sp. (Crambidae) and Cuculia sp. (Noctuidae) are found to carry the highest quantity of pollen.
Geometridae (geometer moths) and Erebidae (erebid moths, tiger moths, lichen moths, among others) turned out to be the most important moth families for pollen transportation in the Himalayan region.

Moths

Moths are a paraphyletic group of insects that includes all members of the order Lepidoptera that are not butterflies
butterflies vs moths: While the butterflies form a monophyletic group, the moths, comprising the rest of the Lepidoptera, do not.

Source : The Hindu

5. CENTRAL ADVISORY BOARD ON CULTURE (CABC)

The Ministry of Culture has appointed Sudha Ragunathan as a member of the Central Advisory Board on Culture (CABC).

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The members will provide policy advice to the Culture Ministry on developing programmes which would focus on creativity at different levels in various regions.
The members of the board aid in having a participative process of decision making and give an integrated view of the different ideas and interests from various domains of culture.
From advising the Ministry on policies to giving inputs on the development of new need-based cultural programmes, the members will provide guidance on the work of the Ministry’s national missions.
The Board would be meeting once a quarter and presided by the Minister for Culture.

Source : The Hindu

6. REAR SEATBELTS

The Union government recently proposed that all seats in a car, including rear-middle seat, must have a y-shaped seatbelt that is considered safer and typically provided for all window seats.

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While the use of rear seatbelts is integral to ensuring safety of all passengers in a vehicle and mandatory under law, lack of awareness and poor enforcement are big impediments.
In a draft notification issued earlier this month for stakeholder consultations, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has proposed that all front-facing seats in passenger vehicles with up to eight seats should be provided with three-point belts, also known as y-belts.
Earlier, manufacturers had the option to provide a three-point or two-point (waist strap) belt and most cars already have y-shaped belts for window seats.
The three-point seat belt have been proven to be safer than the lap belt because it evenly spreads out the energy of a moving body over the chest, shoulders and pelvis at the time of a collision, resulting in fewer injuries.

Important Info :

Rear seatbelts are mandatory. According to Rule 138 (3) of Central Motor Vehicle Rules (CMVR), persons “seated in the front seat or the persons occupying front-facing rear seats” must wear seatbelts while the vehicle is in motion. Failure to do so can result in a fine of ₹1,000.
According to the World Health Organisation, use of rear seat-belts can prevent death of a rear seat passenger by 25%, and it can also prevent excess injury or death for the front seat passenger.

Source : The Hindu

7. GUANTANAMO BAY DETENTION CAMP

The Biden administration has been quietly laying the groundwork to release prisoners from the Guantanamo Bay detention center and at least move closer to being able to shut it down.

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The Guantanamo Bay detention camp is a United States military prison located within Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, also referred to as Guantánamo, GTMO, and Gitmo, on the coast of Guantánamo Bay in Cuba.
Of the 780 people detained there since January 2002 when the military prison first opened after the September 11, 2001 attacks, 731 have been transferred elsewhere, 39 remain there, and 9 have died while in custody.
The camp was established by U.S. President George W. Bush's administration in 2002 during the War on Terror following the September 11, 2001 attacks.
Indefinite detention without trial and torture led the operations of this camp to be considered a major breach of human rights by Amnesty International.

Source : Indian Express

8. PUBLIC ELECTRIC VEHICLE CHARGING INFRASTRUCTURE

The Ministry of Power recently issued the revised consolidated Guidelines and Standards for EV charging infrastructure on January 14, 2022.

Salient Features of these guidelines are:

To provide an affordable tariff chargeable by public EV charging station operators and owners and Electric Vehicle (EV) owners.
Enable owners of electric vehicles to charge EVs at their residences or offices using their existing electricity connections.
A revenue sharing model has been suggested for land use to make a public charging station financially viable from an operational perspective.
Timelines have been prescribed for providing connectivity to the Public Charging Station (PCS) for faster rollout of EV public charging.
Technical requirements for public charging stations have been elaborated.

Source : PIB

9. 2023 INTERNATIONAL OLYMPIC COMMITTEE SESSION

Mumbai has been officially elected as the host for the 2023 International Olympic Committee (IOC) session, which could possibly see the election for the host country for the 2030 Winter Olympics and sports programme for LA 2028 Olympic Games.

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The session will be held in May or June next year. An IOC session is the annual meeting of the members of the IOC, comprising 101 voting members and 45 honorary members.
It discusses and decides on the key activities of the global Olympics movement including adoption or amendment of the Olympic Charter, the election of IOC members and office bearers and election of the host city of Olympics.
The decision confirms India will be hosting this prestigious IOC meeting for the first time since 1983.

Source : Indian Express

10. U. V. SWAMINATHA IYER

The Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi has paid tributes to ‘Tamil Thatha’ U. Ve. Swaminatha Iyer on his birth anniversary.

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Uttamadhanapuram Venkatasubbaiyer Swaminatha Iyer (1855 – 1942) was a Tamil scholar and researcher who was instrumental in bringing many long-forgotten works of classical Tamil literature to light.
His singular efforts over five decades brought to light major literary works in Tamil and contributed vastly to the enrichment of its literary heritage.
Iyer published over 90 books in his lifetime, on a variety of matters connected to classical Tamil literature, and collected over 3,000 paper manuscripts, palm-leaf manuscripts and notes of various kinds.
He is affectionately called Tamil Thatha (literally, "Tamil grandfather").

Source : PIB

20 FEBRUARY 2022 DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS | UPSC CDS CAPF AFCAT NDA SSB

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