Headlines

The clear message in the Court’s ‘no’ to electoral bonds - Page No.8 , GS
2
Brave new world - Page No.8 , GS 2,3
Torpedoes, refueller aircraft in new deals cleared by DAC - Page No.12 ,
GS 2
Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) - Page No.12 , GS 2
Use Chabahar port, India tells Central Asian countries - Page No.12 , GS
2

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Recently the Union Finance Minister presented the Interim Union
Budget 2024-25. Which of the following are considered as Key Budget
documents?

1. Demands for Grants

2. Fiscal Policy Statements mandated under the FRBM Act, 2003
3. Fiscal Policy Strategy Statement
4. Macro-Economic Framework Statement
How many of the above options is/are correct?

a) Only two
b) Only three
c) Only four
d) None
• Solution: C)

Key Budget documents include:

• Annual Financial Statement (Article 112)

• Demands for Grants (Article 113)
• Finance Bill (Article 110)
• Fiscal Policy Statements mandated under the FRBM Act, 2003,
including
• The Macro-Economic Framework Statement and
• The Medium-Term Fiscal Policy cum Fiscal Policy Strategy
Statement.
Jordan is bordered by

1. Saudi Arabia
2. Iraq
3. Syria
How many of the above options is/are correct?

a) Only one
b) Only two
c) Only three
d) None
• Solution: C)

Jordan is a country in West Asia,

located at the crossroads of Asia,
Africa, and Europe in the Levant
region.

Bordered by Saudi Arabia, Iraq,

Syria, and the Palestinian West
Bank and Israel, Jordan has a
coastline on the Gulf of Aqaba’s
Red Sea.
Consider the following crops:

1. Torai
2. Masur
3. Barley
4. Safflower
5. Sunflower
6. urab
How many of the above crops fall under the purview of Minimum
Support Price(MSP)?

(a) Only two

(b) Only three
(c) Only five
(d) All six
Ans: (d)

Explanation:

What is MSP?
• The Minimum Support Price (MSP) is a minimum price for any crop
at which the government purchases it from farmers, and is based
on a calculation of at least one-and-a-half times the cost of
production incurred by the farmers.
By the time Gandhiji arrived in India

1. He had already forged the technique of Satyagraha in South Africa

2. The first Swadeshi movement was going on.
3. Indian National Congress (INC) was already established in India
How many of the above statements is/are correct?

(a) Only one

(b) Only two
(c) All three
(d) None
• Solution: b)

• It was in South Africa that Mahatma Gandhi first forged the

distinctive techniques of non-violent protest known as satyagraha.

• The India that Mahatma Gandhi came back to in 1915 was rather
different from the one that he had left in 1893. Although still a
colony of the British, it was far more active in a political sense.

• The Indian National Congress now had branches in most major

cities and towns. Through the Swadeshi movement of 1905-07 it
had greatly broadened its appeal among the middle classes.
 Pg no. 8 GS 2

The clear message in the Court’s ‘no’ to electoral

bonds - Page No.8 , GS 2
• The judgment of the Supreme Court of India, on February 15, 2024,
striking down the electoral bonds scheme, is a landmark moment.
Democracy requires transparency and the fact is that the electoral
bonds scheme was opaque.

• Voters in India have no idea who has been funding political parties
and the amounts given. In all leading democracies, transparency is
the basis of campaign funding. The Court has restored that
transparency.

• The first is the limit on funding by a corporate house or

organisation.

• Electoral bonds also removed the earlier limits on how much of its
profits a company could donate to political parties.
• There was an Amendment to the Finance Bill. In any country, the
central bank alone has the authority to issue currency such as
notes and bonds. Section 31 of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Act
says “only the RBI or the Central Government authorized by the RBI
Act shall draw, accept, make or issue any bill of exchange or
promissory note for payment of money to the bearers of the note or
bond”.

• The Government amended the RBI Act using a Finance Act, and
allowed under a new clause 31(3), the central government to
authorise any scheduled bank to issue electoral bonds. This
amendment to the Finance Act too has been struck down.
• All Amendments to the RPA Act, the Finance Act 2017, and the
Companies Act 2013 are violative of Articles 19 and 14 of the
Constitution.

• Article 19 refers to the right to information, and Article 14 to the

right to equality, where arbitrariness in law is not permissible.

• These Articles are part of the Fundamental Rights in the Indian

Constitution, and cannot be violated.
 Pg no. 8 GS 2,3

Brave new world - Page No.8 , GS 2,3

• Expectations are high that a free trade agreement involving India
and the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) is close to fruition.
However, a bone of contention relates to intellectual property rights,
and has persisted as an issue since 2008.

• Switzerland and Norway, which are prominent members of EFTA,

host several of the pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies
that are responsible for several of the drugs and therapeutics that
underpin health care globally.

• The nature of the pharma industry — it costs much to discover a

useful effective drug and relatively little to make generic copies of it
— with demand that is far disproportionate to affordability, means
that there is a constant tussle between the inventors and the
generic-drug companies.
• Patenting, or an exclusive monopoly for a fixed number of years to
originators and a reciprocal right by governments to issue directions
for ‘compulsory licensing,’ thereby selectively breaking such
monopolies in the interest of public health, has brokered the peace
and sustained the global pharma industry for decades.

• But new legal innovations such as data exclusivity continue to inveigle

themselves in free trade negotiations. Under this provision, all the
clinical-trial data that concerns the safety and efficacy of a drug
generated by the originator firm becomes proprietary and out of
bounds for a minimum period of six years.

• Permission to make a generic is possible if a country’s regulator can

rely on supplied clinical trial data to approve a drug. For this, generic
makers usually rely on the originator’s published data.
• The principle of data exclusivity is present among European countries as well
as in agreements involving many developing countries. Were it to take effect
in India, it could significantly hinder India’s drug industry which is also a
major exporter of affordable drugs.

• Indian officials have rejected data exclusivity as a point of negotiations in the

FTA, though leaked drafts of the agreement suggest that it is alive. However,
India’s rise up the drug manufacturing chain in the last few decades means
that it must invest in an ecosystem that can conduct ethical drug trials and
make new molecules and therapeutics from scratch.

• The paradigm that drug development will always be expensive and confined
to the West need not be permanent, as was seen in the development of
several novel technology approaches to developing vaccines in India during
the COVID-19 pandemic.

• But as preparation, India must invest substantially more in fundamental

research to incubate the local drug industry into the future.
 Pg no. 12 GS 2
Torpedoes, refueller aircraft in new deals cleared by
DAC - Page No.12 , GS 2
• The Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) on Friday accorded Acceptance of
Necessity (AoN), the first step in the procurement process, for proposals
worth ₹84,560 crore.

• The proposals include some long-pending deals — such as for heavy

weight torpedoes (HWT) for the Navy’s Scorpene-class submarines and
flight refueller aircraft (FRA) for the Indian Air Force (IAF) — beginning
afresh.

• Other major deals include medium range maritime reconnaissance and

multi-mission maritime aircraft for the Navy and the Coast Guard, new
generation anti-tank mines, air defence tactical control radar, and
software-defined radios.
What is the Defense Acquisition Council?

• The DAC is the highest decision-making body in the Defence

Ministry for deciding on new policies and capital acquisitions for
the three services (Army, Navy and Air Force) and the Indian
Coast Guard.

• The Minister of Defence is the Chairman of the Council.

• It was formed, after the Group of Ministers recommendations on

'Reforming the National Security System', in 2001, post Kargil
War (1999).
 Pg no. 12 GS 2
Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) - Page
No.12 , GS 2
• The Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA), an arm of the
Union Consumer Affairs Ministry, has released draft guidelines for
the “Prevention of misleading advertisement in coaching sector”,
which bring such offences under the radar of the Consumer
Protection Act.

• The CCPA has invited public comments on the three-page

guidelines. The CCPA had formed a sub-committee to draft the
guidelines earlier after discussions with several stakeholders. The
last date for submitting suggestions is March 16.

• Such guidelines were initiated after widespread complaints against

certain coaching centres for misusing the names and photos of
successful candidates in various competitive examinations,
including the civil services exam.
About CCPA:
• It is a regulatory body established in 2020 based on the
provisions of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019.
• Nodal Ministry: The Ministry of Consumer Affairs.

Composition
• It will have a Chief Commissioner as head, and only two other
commissioners as members one of whom will deal with matters
relating to goods while the other will look into cases relating to
services.
• The CCPA will have an Investigation Wing that will be headed by
a Director General.
• District Collectors too, will have the power to investigate
complaints of violations of consumer rights, unfair trade
practices, and false or misleading advertisements.
 Pg no. 12 GS 2

Use Chabahar port, India tells Central Asian countries

- Page No.12 , GS 2
• India has urged Central Asian countries to use the port of
Chabahar located on the southeast coast of Iran to enhance
connectivity and trade with India and other countries in the
world.

• During his interaction with delegates from Iran, Russia,

Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, Mr. Misri invited
“Central Asian neighbours to utilise the Chabahar port as well as
the Shahid Beheshti terminal at the port for maritime trade with
India and other countries of the world,” said a source privy to
the discussion that focused on terrorism, drug trafficking apart
from connectivity in the region.
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