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1. Who of the following has the responsibility of the registration of voters a) Individual voters b) Government c) Election commission d) Corporations 2. Democracy exists in India, without peoples participation and co operation democracy will fail. This implies that a) Government should compel people to participate and cooperate with it b) People from the government c) People should participate and cooperate with the government d) India should opt for the presidential system 3. Which of the following are not the functions of the election commission 1) Conduct of election for the post of the speaker and the deputy speaker, Lok sabha and the deputy chairman, Rajya sabha 2) Conduct of elections to the state legislative assemblies 3) Deciding on all doubts and disputes arising out of elections a) 1 and 2 b) 1 and 3 c) 2 and 3 d) 2 4. Which of the following electoral systems have not been adopted for various elections in India 1) System of direct elections on the b...

Q. Which among the following is correct regarding Phalcon AWACS? 1. It is used by India for air superiority 2. It is made in U.S. A. 1 only B. 2 only C. Both D. None Q.Which of the following statements is/are true-? 1. The Centre has proposed amending law to empower States to pay wages by cheque or credit into bank accounts. 2. For that Union Labour ministry has proposed changes in the Section 6 of the Payment of Wages Act of 1936. a) Only 1 b) Only 2 c) Both 1 & 2 d) Neither 1 nor 2 Q. consider the following statements about gold monetization scheme 1. scheme will enable depositors to earn interest on their on their gold accounts. 2. The sovereign gold bond will enable investors to buy gold certificates from the government, which can later be encashed for money or physical gold. Which of the above statements is/are true A. only 1 B. only 2 C. Neither 1 nor 2 D. Both 1 & 2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  Answer 1-A,2-C,3-D...

Following Mediterranean diet can significantly reduce the risk of chronic kidney diseases. The diet includes higher amounts of fruits, vegetables, fish, legumes, and fats such as olive oil which are healthy for the heart. It is also low on red meats, processed foods, and sweets. A study published online in the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology on October 30 says that those who follow the diet have a 50 per cent lower risk of developing chronic kidney disease and a 42 per cent lower risk of rapid kidney function decline. Data for the study was collected between 1993 and 2008. For gauging kidney health, serum creatinine levels of 900 people were measured at a mean interval of 6.9 years. Fifty-nine per cent of the members of the test group were women and 65 per cent were Hispanics. The mean baseline age of the group was 64 years. The eating habits of the people were scored on a scale based on the resemblance of the diet with the Mediterranean diet. Results show...

Over 300 million people (4.3 per cent) of the global population were living with depression in 2015, a new World Health Organization (WHO) study says. This is an 18 per cent increase between 2005 and 2015. Depression is the single largest contributor to global disability (7.5 per cent of all years lived with disability in 2015) and is a major contributor to suicides, with numbers close to 800,000 per year. Suicide was the second leading cause of death among 15-29 year olds globally in 2015. Characterised by sadness, loss of interest, feelings of guilt, low self-worth, disturbed sleep or appetite, tiredness and poor concentration, depression can be long lasting and recurrent, WHO says. Women more at risk The alarming thing is that the number of people with common mental disorders is increasing, particularly in low-income countries. Nearly half of the population affected by depression lives in South East Asia and Western Pacific regions. Women (5.1 per cent) are more prone t...

A report overviewing the solar sector shows positive trends in the industry based on higher solar production than ever before. In 2016, 70 gigawatt (GW) of solar power capacity was added, breaking previous year’s record of 50 GW. The capacity added takes the global solar power generation to nearly 300 GW. The report says that solar costs are now so low that industrial-scale solar plants are providing cheaper power than new fossil and nuclear power. Electricity prices from new coal power stations could rise to Australian $160 per megawatt hour, while solar parks are around $110 per megawatt hour, the report claims. China has taken the lead in solar power addition with 34.2 GW capacity added in 2016. It was followed by United States that added 13 GW and Japan with 10.5 GW more solar capacity. The solar sector employs 2.8 million people globally, outnumbering coal jobs, as per the report. In the United States, solar now provides twice as many jobs as coal. Solar costs have fallen...

Most of us never bother to know where the garbage from our households and localities ends up. It is forgotten once packed in dustbin bags and left for the municipality to dispose of. But the fact is most of the refuse keeps accumulating in our neighbourhoods, decomposing, giving rise to unbearable stench and emitting harmful gases, such as methane, volatile organic compounds and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Data with the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) shows that India generated 0.14 million tonnes of municipal solid waste a day in 2016. Of this, 60-70 per cent was collected. Since most municipal landfills lack waste treatment facilities, only a small amount—23 per cent of the collected waste—was treated. Young entrepreneurs in the country are now tapping into this void through a range of innovative solutions, and are converting waste into valuable resources, that too in eco-friendly ways. Resource in garbage Green Nerds Solutions Pvt Ltd is one such bootstrap star...

Prolonged use of common drugs to treat heartburn can eventually lead to kidney failure, a study published in the journal, Kidney International, says. Heartburn is experienced as a burning sensation in the chest and is caused by acid reflux into the oesophagus. Researchers at the Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis and the Veterans Affairs St. Louis Health Care System investigated the effects of Proton Pump Inhibitors (PPI) and H2 blockers—two common drugs used to treat heartburn—on a group of people for over five years to understand acute, chronic and end-stage renal diseases. PPIs are sold in the market under the common brand names Prevacid, Prilosec, Nexium and Protonix. The study evaluated the use of PPIs on approximately 1,25,000 people. Researchers found that more than half of the people diagnosed with chronic kidney diseases did not experience signs of acute kidney problems, meaning people are not aware of a gradual decline in kidney function. “Our results...

The as-yet-unnamed giant could win a spot in the top ten global list, and improve weather forecasting Come June, India will likely unveil its most powerful supercomputer. If its processors operate at the full capacity of 10 petaflops (1 followed by 15 zeroes of floating point operations per second), a clock speed a million times faster than the fastest consumer laptops, it could earn a place among the world’s top 10 fastest supercomputers. Though India has built or hosted supercomputers since the 1990s, it held a ‘top 10’ spot only once, in 2007, thanks to the EKA built by the Computational Research Laboratories, which is part of the Tata group. This position was lost, though several ultra-fast machines exist in Indian academic institutions: they feature in the 100s or 200s in global rankings. The as-yet-unnamed machine will be jointly hosted at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune and the National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting at Noida in Uttar Pra...

Air quality continues to deteriorate, but there is no pressure on the government to take action A report from The Lancet, published on Sunday, estimated that two lives in India are lost every minute due to ambient air pollution. The first response from the Environment Minister, Anil Madhav Dave, was that the government would come out with its own study to understand the effects of air pollution on human health. “A proud country,” Mr. Dave said, “always trusts its own data and takes action on that.” It is difficult to discern which is worse: the fact that the authorities are not interested in taking any immediate measures to tackle the problem of the killer air, as described in the report, or that they have not even initiated a study to understand its impact. The Minister, as well as anyone who has visited Delhi in the last couple of months, would be able to vouch for the fact that the evidence of the impact of the smoggy air on the health of the city’s population has, to use a t...

India can do much more to increase solar power capacity and meet its renewables target The clearance from the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs for a plan to double the capacity of  solar power installed in dedicated solar parks to 40 gigawatts  by 2020, with partial government fiscal assistance, is in line with the goal of creating a base of 100 gigawatts by 2022. Expansion of  solar power capacity  is among the more efficient means to meet the commitment to keep carbon emissions in check under the  Paris Agreement on climate change , and it can provide the multiplier effect of creating additional employment, with overall economic dividends. As the International Renewable Energy Agency notes in its report titled  REthinking Energy 2017: Accelerating the global energy transformation , globally, jobs in solar energy have witnessed the fastest growth since 2011 among various renewable energy sectors. Asia has harnessed the potential the most, providi...