Prelims in Focus, an IAS Abhiyan Initiative to quickly navigate through the important facts, current affairs, static portion to enrich aspirant’s knowledge base along with conceptual clarity. Our Prelims in Focus initiative will surely be an added advantage for UPSC Prelims Examinations. This initiative will help the aspirants to focus to the main points of a topic quickly at the same time. In this initiative, we will cover 10-15 important facts on a daily basis. Click here to Join our Telegram Channel to read these articles. We will continue our Monthly Pre-Bits Flash Liner along with this initiative.
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Prelims in Focus-Part-25
- The Sundarbans mangrove ecosystem in India is evaluated as ‘endangered’ by a global team of researchers using the IUCN’s Red List of Ecosystems framework.
- 🔹 West Bengal has the maximum number of IUCN Red List Mammal Species in India (211)
🔹 Tamilnadu has the maximum number of Reptile Species in India (158)
🔹Kerala has maximum number of Amphibian Species in India (103)
- Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) (Amendment) Order, 2017
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➖Party symbols are either “reserved” or “free”➖While eight national parties and 64 state parties across the country have “reserved” symbols
➖Election Commission also has a pool of nearly 200 “free” symbols that are allotted to the thousands of unrecognised regional parties that pop up before elections
- Cost Inflation Index (CII)
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➖Used for Computation of Long Term Capital Gain.➖Notified by Central Board of Direct Tax (CBDT) every year and till date CBDT has notified Cost Inflation Index for the Financial Year 1981-82 to Financial year 2020-21.
➖Used for computing indexed cost of acquisition.
- CPI Base Year for Industrial Workers
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➖The Labour and Employment Ministry revised the base year of the Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers (CPI-IW) from 2001 to 2016➖Reflect the changing consumption pattern, giving more weightage to spending on health, education, recreation and other miscellaneous expenses, while reducing the weight of food and beverages.
➖Apart from measuring inflation in retail prices, the CPI-IW was used to regulate the DA of government employees and industrial workers, as well as fixing and revising minimum wages in scheduled employments
📌 Note: CPI for agriculture workers, currently has the base year of 1986-87
- Activities under Eco-Sensitive Zone (ESZ)
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➖Mining and stone quarrying are prohibited➖Include construction of hotels and resorts, albeit not within 1 km of the boundary of the protected area or up to the extent of ESZ, whichever is nearer.
➖Agro-forestry, use of eco-friendly transport, cottage industries, and organic farming will also be promoted by the state government.
- Eco-Sensitive Zone (ESZ)
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➖Ecologically Fragile Areas➖Areas within 10 kms around Protected Areas, National Parks and Wildlife Sanctuaries.
➖Notified by MoEFCC, Government of India under Environment Protection Act 1986
➖Kind of a ‘Shock Absorber’ for the protected area
➖Act as a transition zone
➖Help in in-situ conservation, which deals with conservation of an endangered species
- Global Wealth Report 2020
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➖By Credit Suisse➖Wealth per adult in India rose from $17,300 at the end of the calendar year 2019 to $17,420 at the end-June 2020
➖Average wealth in India may rise 5–6 per cent in the full year 2020 and 9 per cent in 2021
➖Financial assets have grown over time, now forming 22 per cent of gross assets
➖73% of adults in India had a net worth less than $10,000 at the end of 2019, compared to only 19 per cent in China
➖2.3% of adults had a net worth over $0.1 million.
➖9.07 lakh adults in the top 1 per cent of global wealth holders, which is 1.8 per cent share
➖4,600 adults are estimated to have wealth of over $50 million.
- Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights Olivier De Schutter said at the United Nations (UN) that between 150 million and 175 million more people will fall into extreme poverty, due to the epic fallout from COVID-19.
- Union Commerce ministry is the nodal agency for administering Special Economic Zones (SEZs)
- The Baba Kalyani led committee
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➖Constituted by the commerce ministry to study the existing SEZ policy.➖Objectives to evaluate the SEZ policy and make it WTO compatible, suggest measures for maximising utilisation of vacant land in SEZs,
➖Suggest changes in the SEZ policy based on international experience and merge the SEZ policy with other government schemes like coastal economic zones, Delhi-Mumbai industrial corridor, national industrial manufacturing zones and food and textile parks.
- South Asian Flash Flood Guidance System (FFGS)
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➖Launched by the India Meteorological Department (IMD)➖Aimed at helping disaster management teams and governments make timely evacuation plans ahead of the actual event of flooding.
➖India is leading a delegation of nations, including Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal, in sharing hydrological and meteorological data towards preparing flash flood forecasts.
- Chail Wildlife Sanctuary is situated in the state of Himachal Pradesh
- In Kinnaur’s Sangla valley, an amoeba-like organism named Cyclopyxis leidy earlier known from France and Indonesia was reported for the first time in India.
➖Sangla also reported a new record of another single-celled organism, Assulina quadratum, earlier known from parts of Europe.
- The latest Time-Use Survey, carried out in all the states of India in 2019 by the National Statistical Office, comes after a gap of two decades.
