IAS Prelims GS Questions and Answers - July 12, 2016

ANSWER: Juba

Explanation:

• There has been violence in South Sudan. There is civil unrest.
• Indian nationals will be evacuated from South Sudan. They have been asked to be registered with the Indian Embassy there.
• South Sudan officially the Republic of South Sudan, is a landlocked country in northeastern Africa that gained its independence from Sudan in 2011.
• Its current capital is Juba, which is also its largest city. It is planned that the capital city will be changed to the more centrally located Ramciel in the future.

ANSWER: Cancer treatment machine

Explanation:

• Bhabhatron, the indigenous telecobalt machine, is one of the successful products developed by Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, Mumbai for cancer treatment.
• The machine is cheaper than imported ones and has superior features.
• Cobalt-60 is used as source in the Bhabhatron.
• Recently the PM handed a Bhabhatron to Kenya.

ANSWER: All of the above

Explanation:

• India and Kenya have inked 7 agreements. The two countries entered into a revised double taxation avoidance agreement.
• An MoU on Defence Cooperation was also inked.
• An agreement on exemption of visa facilities for official and diplomatic passport holders, another MoU between Bureau of Indian standards and Bureau of Kenya standards and an MoU on national Housing policy development and management were also signed.
• India has extended two Lines of Credit to Kenya. The First is worth 15 million dollars for development of small and medium enterprises. The second is worth 29.95 million dollars for upgrading of Rift valley textiles factory.
• In the area of healthcare, India said it would build a cancer hospital in Kenya to provide quality and affordable health care.

ANSWER: Kenya

Explanation:

• M-Pesa (M for mobile, pesa is Swahili for money) is a mobile phone-based money transfer, financing and micro financing service, launched in 2007 by Vodafone for Safaricom and Vodacom, the largest mobile network operators in Kenya and Tanzania.
• It has since expanded to Afghanistan, South Africa, India and in 2014 to Romania and in 2015 to Albania.
• M-Pesa allows users to deposit, withdraw, transfer money and pay for goods and services easily with a mobile device.

ANSWER: Ministry of Steel

Explanation:

• MECON Limited, formerly known as Metallurgical & Engineering Consultants Limited is a Public Sector Undertaking under the Ministry of Steel of the Government of India.
• MECON is India’s frontline engineering, consultancy and contracting organization, offering full range of services required for setting up of Project from concept to commissioning including turnkey execution.
• Its key areas of activities include:
• Metals, Power, Oil & Gas and Infrastructure (Architecture and Town Planning, Urban Infrastructure and Smart Cities, Water Management, Desalination of sea water, Bulk Transportation through Slurry Pipelines, etc.)

ANSWER: Agricultural graduates

Explanation:

• Prime Minister had launched Rural Entrepreneurship Development Scheme in 2015 and it will be effective from 2016-17.
• It is a new programme to impart opportunities for attaining experience as well as entrepreneurship skills on part of agriculture graduates.
• Under this scheme, the agriculture graduation students will be granted scholarship at the rate of Rs. 3000 per month.
• It also aims to create belief and competency amongst undergraduate students so as to initiate their own enterprise.
• It will trigger helping the students for practicable knowledge as well as skill orientation which will be very much conducive to provide quality entrepreneurship for augmenting strength of agriculture graduates.

ANSWER: 2, 3

Explanation:
The 97th Constitutional Amendment Act of 2011 gave a constitutional status and protection to co-operative societies. In this context, it made the following three changes in the constitution:

• It made the right to form co-operative societies a fundamental right (Article 191).
• It included a new Directive Principle of State Policy on promotion of co-operative societies (Article 43-B).
• It added a new Part IX-B in the Constitution which is entitled “The Co-operative Societies” (Articles 243-ZH to 243-ZT).

ANSWER: 21

Explanation:

• The board shall consist of such number of directors as may be provided by the state legislature.
• But, the maximum number of directors of a co-operative society shall not exceed twenty-one.
• The state legislature shall provide for the reservation of one seat for the Scheduled Castes or the Scheduled Tribes and two seats for women on the board of every co-operative society having members from such a category of persons.
• The term of office of elected members of the board and its office bearers shall be five years from the date of election.