Current Affairs Quiz 16 September 2026

Statement 1 is correct — the PSS Act, 2007 makes the RBI the designated authority for payment systems, acting through the Board for Regulation and Supervision of Payment and Settlement Systems (BPSS). Statement 2 is incorrect, since NPCI is not a statutory body — it was set up in 2008 by the RBI and the Indian Banks' Association as a not-for-profit company, now a Section 8 company under the Companies Act, 2013, that is merely authorised under the PSS Act to operate retail payment systems. Statement 3 is correct, as zero MDR on UPI and RuPay debit cards took effect on 1 January 2020, backed by Section 10A of the PSS Act inserted in 2019. "Authorised under an Act" is not the same as "established by an Act," and NPCI, like many market infrastructure bodies, is a company rather than a statutory corporation, so an institution's statutory basis shouldn't be assumed just because a statute governs its operations.

Pair 1 is correctly matched — phosphorus is pentavalent and acts as a donor, producing n-type silicon with electrons as majority carriers. Pair 2 is correctly matched — boron is trivalent and acts as an acceptor, producing p-type silicon with holes as majority carriers. Pair 3 is incorrectly matched, since arsenic, like phosphorus, is a pentavalent (Group 15) donor that produces n-type, not p-type, silicon. Pair 4 is incorrectly matched, since gallium, like boron, is a trivalent (Group 13) acceptor that produces p-type, not n-type, silicon — leaving only two pairs correct. Counting valence electrons settles this quickly: Group 15 elements such as phosphorus and arsenic give an extra electron and yield n-type, while Group 13 elements such as boron and gallium leave a hole and yield p-type, so the periodic-table group decides the answer.

Statement 1 is correct — Article IV of the Outer Space Treaty bars placing nuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction in orbit, on celestial bodies, or stationed in outer space. Statement 2 is NOT correct, since the Treaty is silent on conventional weapons and on Earth-to-space (direct-ascent) anti-satellite weapons, which were not a practical prospect in the 1960s — this gap is why ASAT tests by the US, Russia, China and India (Mission Shakti, 2019) did not violate it. Statement 3 is correct, as India signed the Treaty in 1967 and ratified it in 1982. Since the question asks for the incorrect statement, the answer is 2 only. The Treaty's narrow ban on WMD in orbit is being stretched here to cover a related but excluded category, ground-based ASATs, so the OST's actual scope of banning nuclear/WMD in space, not all weapons, is worth keeping in mind.

The National AQI, launched in April 2015, uses eight pollutants — PM10, PM2.5, nitrogen dioxide, sulphur dioxide, carbon monoxide, ozone, ammonia, and lead — with the overall AQI set by the worst-performing pollutant and reported in six categories from Good (0–50) to Severe (401–500). Methane, though a potent greenhouse gas and an ozone precursor, is not an AQI parameter and is not among the pollutants covered by the National Ambient Air Quality Standards. Methane feels like it should be included since it's a well-known pollutant in climate discussions, but air-quality (health) pollutants need to be kept separate from greenhouse gases, with ammonia and lead being the two "unexpected" members of the AQI list that are often tested.

The Assertion is true — CAQM derives its status from the Commission for Air Quality Management in NCR and Adjoining Areas Act, 2021, which is why it is a statutory body. The Reason is also true, since CAQM replaced the Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority (EPCA), constituted in 1998 by the Union Environment Ministry under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 on the Supreme Court's direction. However, R does not explain A — CAQM's statutory character comes from being created by an Act of Parliament, not from the fact that it succeeded EPCA, so both are true but R is not the correct explanation. In Assertion-Reason questions, it's worth asking whether R actually answers why A is true: a body is statutory because a statute creates it, while succession from an earlier body is history, not explanation.

Statement 1 is correct — the HKH spans eight countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Myanmar, Nepal, and Pakistan, the regional member countries of ICIMOD, headquartered in Kathmandu. Statement 2 is incorrect, since peak water is the point at which river flows stop rising and begin to decline — as warming accelerates melt, runoff first increases, and once glaciers have shrunk enough, runoff peaks and then falls even if warming continues. A recent study by Systemiq, the Integrated Mountain Initiative, ICIMOD, and the G.B. Pant National Institute of Himalayan Environment projects the region approaching peak water by mid-century. The definition here is flipped from the turning point where flows start falling to the phase where they start rising, so it's worth remembering that "peak" marks a maximum, meaning anything described as a peak is the moment the rise ends.

Statement 1 is correct — Article 19(1)(b) guarantees the right to assemble peaceably and without arms, forming, together with Article 19(1)(a), the constitutional basis of the right to protest. Statement 2 is correct, as Article 19(3) permits reasonable restrictions in the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India or public order. Statement 3 is incorrect, since the power to issue orders in urgent cases of nuisance or apprehended danger, formerly Section 144 CrPC, is now Section 163 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023, the procedural code, not the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023, which replaced the Indian Penal Code. The correct section number has been paired with the wrong one of the three new criminal laws here, so it's worth remembering that BNS covers substantive offences (old IPC), BNSS covers procedure (old CrPC), and BSA covers evidence (old Evidence Act) — since prohibitory orders are procedural, they sit in the BNSS.

Statement 1 is correct — the first BRIC leaders' summit was held at Yekaterinburg, Russia, in June 2009, with South Africa joining in 2010. Statement 2 is correct, as the New Development Bank, agreed at the Fortaleza Summit (2014), is headquartered in Shanghai, with an Indian regional office at GIFT City. Statement 3 is correct — Indonesia joined as a full member in January 2025, after Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the UAE joined in January 2024. Statement 4 is incorrect, since BRICS has no charter and no permanent secretariat; it works by consensus under a rotating chair, with India having chaired the 18th Summit in New Delhi in 2026 and China taking the chair for 2027. A loose grouping is being credited here with the permanent machinery that formal organisations such as SAARC or the SCO possess, so it's worth remembering that BRICS, the G20, and the Quad have no permanent secretariat, with the host chair's sherpa system running the agenda instead.

Stunting (A-2) is low height-for-age, reflecting chronic, long-term undernutrition. Wasting (B-1) is low weight-for-height, reflecting acute undernutrition such as recent illness or food shortage. Underweight (C-3) is low weight-for-age, a composite measure that can reflect both stunting and wasting. As per NFHS-5 (2019–21), 35.5% of children under five were stunted, 19.3% wasted, and 32.1% underweight. All three indicators reuse the same two measurements, height and weight, against a reference of age or height, so the options simply shuffle the pairings — it helps to remember that stunting relates to stature (height-for-age), wasting describes wasting away in the present (weight-for-height), and underweight is the plain weight-for-age measure.

Statement 1 is correct — personal remittances are current transfers (secondary income) and are recorded in the current account, with India's large remittance inflows keeping its current account deficit much smaller than its merchandise trade deficit. Statement 2 is correct, as the Marshall–Lerner condition holds that depreciation improves the trade balance only when the absolute sum of export and import demand elasticities is greater than one. Statement 3 is incorrect — the J-curve describes the reverse sequence, where the trade balance first worsens after depreciation because import prices rise before quantities adjust, and improves only later. The two phases of the J-curve have been swapped here, so tracing the letter J itself is a useful check: it dips first, then rises, and so does the trade balance after depreciation.