Daily Current Affairs Quiz Prelims Practice 2027
- CERT-In is established under Section 70B of the Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008, and functions under the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY).
- CSIRT-Fin serves as India's national nodal cybersecurity agency covering the entire economy, including the financial sector.
- The Digital Threat Report 2025–26 was jointly released by MeitY, CERT-In, CSIRT-Fin, and cybersecurity firm SISA.
- The concept of "AI Asymmetry," as introduced in the report, refers to the structural imbalance where AI tools enable offensive actors to operate at machine speed while defensive institutions remain bound by human-paced procedural cycles.
Statements 1, 3 and 4 are correct. CERT-In is established under Section 70B of the IT (Amendment) Act, 2008, operating under MeitY as India's national nodal cybersecurity agency with an economy-wide mandate. The Digital Threat Report 2025–26 was jointly released by MeitY, CERT-In, CSIRT-Fin, and SISA. "AI Asymmetry" is the report's defining risk concept — offensive actors operate at machine speed and minimal cost while regulatory, procurement, and audit processes remain anchored to human-paced timelines. Statement 2 is incorrect — it is CERT-In, not CSIRT-Fin, that is the economy-wide nodal agency; CSIRT-Fin is a sectoral CSIRT confined to the financial ecosystem.
- The CRS operates under the Registration of Births and Deaths Act, 1969, and all registrations have been mandated to be conducted digitally through the CRS portal since the 2023 amendment.
- The completeness of vital registration under the CRS is benchmarked against data from the Decennial Census of India.
- The 2024 CRS Report records 99.1% birth registration and 99.4% death registration — with death registration surpassing birth registration for the first time.
- Under the RBD Act, all births, deaths, and stillbirths must be registered within 21 days of occurrence; a stillbirth is defined as the death of a foetus after 28 weeks of pregnancy before or during delivery.
Statements 1 and 4 are correct. The RBD Act, 1969, as amended in 2023, mandates fully digital registration through the CRS portal from October 2023, hosted on the MeghRaj national cloud. The Act requires registration within 21 days, with a stillbirth defined as foetal death after 28 weeks gestation, before or during delivery. Statement 2 is incorrect — CRS completeness is benchmarked against the Sample Registration System (SRS), a continuous demographic survey, not the Decennial Census. Statement 3 is incorrect — while the 99.1% birth and 99.4% death registration figures are accurate, the claim that death registration surpassed birth registration "for the first time" is not established by the source; it merely reports the 2024 snapshot.
- 1. ENMOD Convention, 1976 — Prohibits the use of environmental modification techniques as a means of warfare
- 2. Geneva Conventions, Additional Protocol I, 1977 — Prohibits warfare methods expected to cause widespread, long-term, and severe damage to the natural environment
- 3. Kyoto Protocol, 1992 — Explicitly includes military greenhouse gas emissions within its emissions accounting framework
- 4. UNEA 2024 Decision — Mandated UNEP to support countries in gauging and mitigating environmental impacts of armed conflicts
Pairs 1, 2 and 4 are correctly matched. The ENMOD Convention (1976) prohibits weaponising environmental modification techniques. Geneva Additional Protocol I (1977), through Articles 35(3) and 55, prohibits warfare methods expected to cause widespread, long-term and severe environmental damage. The UNEA 2024 Decision mandated UNEP to help countries assess and mitigate the environmental impacts of armed conflicts. Pair 3 is incorrect — the Kyoto Protocol is dated 1997, not 1992 (1992 is the UNFCCC's year), and more critically, military GHG emissions are explicitly excluded from both the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement, the opposite of what's claimed.
- 1. Collision between the Indian tectonic plate and the Asian tectonic plate begins
- 2. Indian plate underthrusting in western Tibet — the period during which uplift of western and central Plateau diverged significantly
- 3. Fieldwork conducted at Gerze (central plateau) and Rutog (western plateau) for the Nature Geoscience study
- 4. Publication of 'West versus Central Tibet exhumation difference influenced by Indian slab underthrusting' in Nature Geoscience
The correct sequence is the Indian–Asian plate collision beginning roughly 50–55 million years ago → Indian plate underthrusting in western Tibet during the 45–20 million-year window, driving divergent uplift histories → fieldwork at Gerze and Rutog during the summers of 2017–2019 → publication of the findings in Nature Geoscience in 2026.
- India Semiconductor Mission 2.0 (Semicon 2.0) carries an outlay of ₹1.27 lakh crore — nearly double the ₹76,000 crore corpus of ISM 1.0 — and targets attracting approximately ₹4 lakh crore in semiconductor investments.
- Under Semicon 2.0, the first of the six programme pillars is focused on domestic chip manufacturing (fabrication), reflecting India's priority to become a global fab hub.
- The National Investment Policy for Urea 2026 (NIPU 2026) targets setting up nine new gas-based urea plants with a combined capacity of 10 million tonnes, which would close India's current annual urea import gap entirely.
- The two Varanasi highway projects approved under CCEA will be implemented by NHAI under the Hybrid Annuity Model (HAM), a public-private partnership structure in which the government pays a fixed annuity to the private developer.
Statements 1, 3 and 4 are correct. Semicon 2.0's ₹1.27 lakh crore outlay is nearly double ISM 1.0's ₹76,000 crore, targeting ₹4 lakh crore in investments. NIPU 2026's nine new gas-based urea plants with 10 MT combined capacity would close India's roughly 10 MT annual urea import gap (production ~30 MT versus demand ~40 MT). Both Varanasi highway projects (NH-31 and NH-19 corridors) will be implemented by NHAI under the Hybrid Annuity Model, with the government paying a fixed annuity to the private developer. Statement 2 is incorrect — Pillar 1 of Semicon 2.0 actually focuses on chip design, not manufacturing/fabrication, reflecting India's priority on building indigenous design capability given it currently has zero operational fabs.
