IAS Prelims GS Questions and Answers - Feb 16, 2016

ANSWER: Mysuru

Explanation:

• Mysuru in Karnataka remained the cleanest city in the country while Dhanbad in Jharkhand came at the bottom of 73 major cities surveyed for sanitation scenario.
• The top 10 cities in terms of sanitation and hygiene in order of rank are: Mysuru, Chandigarh, Tiruchirapalli (Tamil Nadu), New Delhi Municipal Council, Visakhapatnam (Andhra Pradesh), Surat, Rajkot, both in Gujarat, Gangtok (Sikkim), Pimpri Chindwad and Greater Mumbai, both from Maharashtra. Pune ranks 11th.
• The 73 cities surveyed this year were also ranked based on the marks they scored in 2014 for arriving at their ranks in 2014 for further comparison with the results of this year’s survey.

ANSWER: All of the above

Explanation:

• The annual collection of Non Tax Receipts is over Rs. 2 lakh crores.
• The biggest share flows from Dividends paid by Public Sector Undertakings, RBI etc.
• Non-Tax Revenue of Government of India comprise of a large bouquet of receipts, collected by individual departments/ministries. The other major items of Non Tax Receipts are interest receipts (received on loans given by the government to states, railways and others), spectrum charges, royalty, license fee, sale of forms, purchase of forms/magazines by students, RTI application fee, etc.

ANSWER: Bharatkosh.gov.in

Explanation:

• The portal provides a one-stop platform to citizens /corporates/other users for making online payment of Non-Tax Receipts to Government of India.
• While direct and indirect taxes are largely collected using the e-payment mode, Non-tax revenues (NTR) flow mainly through physical instruments such as bank draft/cheques/cash. The Non Tax Receipt Portal fills this vacuum and provides an end to end solution for complete value chain of non-tax receipts, including online user interface, payment at the Payment Gateway Aggregator and reconciliation and accounting of receipts by Government Departments / Ministries.

ANSWER: SBI

Explanation:

• At present, SBI e-Pay is the PGA for NTRP.
• This is an important initiative taken by Controller General of Accounts, Department of Expenditure, and Ministry of Finance under the Digital India campaign.
• The online electronic payment in a completely secured IT environment will help common users/citizens from the hassle of visiting bank premises for issue of drafts, and later to Government offices to deposit the instrument for availing services.
  
• It also helps avoidable delays and remittance of these instruments into Government account as well as eliminates undesirable practices in the delayed deposit of these instruments into bank accounts.
• A depositor can make online payment to the Government using either a Credit Card, a Debit Card or through Net Banking with the Payment Gateway Aggregator (PGA).

ANSWER: Only 1

Explanation:

• No opposition party/coalition received 10% membership of the House. The single largest opposition party currently is the Indian National Congress, with 45 seats.
• Due to this the current i.e. 16th Lok Sabha has no Leader of Opposition (LoP).
• Mallikarjun Kharge is the Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha but not the LoP.

ANSWER: G. V. Malvankar

Explanation:

• A six-decade old ruling by India's first Speaker GV Malvankar established this norm, which later became official as a Direction 121(1) of the Speaker's directions.
• There was consequently no LoP from 1952 till 1969, and from 1979-89.
• From 1984-89, a TDP leader was made LoP, although TDP had 3 seats less than 10%.
• Recently, the Supreme Court has dismissed a petition seeking Leader of Opposition status for largest opposition party in Lok Sabha.
• The decision of the Supreme Court assumes significance as the Leader of Opposition's post is equivalent to that of a cabinet minister. The leader of opposition is mandated to be a part of the selection panel of several constitutional posts, including the Lokpal, CVC and the NHRC.

ANSWER: Conservation Efforts

Explanation:

• ‘Nagaland is changing, But... ‘, a film on conservation efforts by villagers has won the Golden Beaver Best Film Award in the institutional category at this year’s 6th National Science Film Festival in Mumbai.
• The film focuses on the community conservation of areas of Nagaland at Sendenyu village in Kohima district and Sukhai village in Zunheboto district.

ANSWER: Mumbai

Explanation:

• 6th National Science Film Festival took place in Mumbai.
• National Science Film Festival and Competition (Rashtriya Vigyan Chalchitra Mela) is organised by Vigyan Prasar, the Indian Department of Science and Technology in collaboration with Jahangirabad Media Institute as a part of the Indian Science Congress 2011.
• The festival is an initiative of Vigyan Prasar and the Government of India to promote science films in India. Science filmmaking is not a developed field in India compared to many other developed countries. The festival is meant to bring attention towards the need of quality science film making in the country.
• The competition category is open to Indian entries only. International science films will be screened under non-competition category. In each category there are three awards. The best film in each category will receive Golden Beaver Award and cash prize of Rs.50,000. Second best film in each category will get a cash prize of Rs.30,000. The third prize is consist of Rs.20,000.