Current Affairs for IAS Exams - 24 February 2022

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The Delhi headquarters of the Security Printing and Minting Corporation of India Limited (SPMCIL), has been declared a ‘prohibited place’ under the British-era Official Secrets Act (OSA) by the Ministry of Home Affairs To prevent the entry of unauthorised persons’.

About:

The Security Printing & Minting Corporation of India Ltd. (SPMCIL) is a government printing and minting agency.
It is under the jurisdiction of Ministry of Finance, Government of India.
It was incorporated on 13 January 2006 with its registered office at New Delhi.
It is engaged in the manufacture/production of currency and banknotes, security paper, non-judicial stamp papers, postage stamps and stationery, travel document etc.
It contains nine units, four mints, four presses and a paper mill.
The nine production units of SPMCIL, where bank notes and other government papers are manufactured, are already prohibited places.
The nine production units are four India Government Mints, two Currency Note Presses, two Security Printing Presses and one Security Paper Mill located in Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Noida, Nashik, Dewas and Narmadapuram.

The Ministry of Education has approved the continuation of Central Sector National Means-cum-Merit Scholarship (NMMSS) from 2021-22 to 2025-26 with financial outlay of Rs. 1827.00 crore.
Also, minor modifications in eligibility criteria such as increasing income ceiling from Rs.1.5 lakh per annum to Rs.3.5 lakh per annum and revising the renewal criteria under the scheme.

About:

It has been launched in 2008-09, it is a Central Sector scheme.
The objective of the scheme is to award scholarships to meritorious students of economically weaker sections to arrest their drop-out at class VIII and encourage them to continue their education at secondary stage.
1 lakh fresh scholarships of Rs.12,000/- per annum (Rs.1000/- per month) per student are awarded to selected students of class IX every year and their continuation/renewal in classes X to XII for study in State Government, Government-aided and Local body schools under the scheme.
Students are selected for award of scholarships through an examination conducted by the State/ UT Governments.

According to data analysis of sea cucumber-related seizures and arrests reported in the media, 2019 and 2020 saw a sharp increase in cases, making the Gulf of Mannar/Palk Bay region between the two countries a global hotspot for sea cucumber smuggling.

Key highlights:

Sea cucumbers are being harvested in India and Sri Lanka owing to high demand from East Asia where they are considered a delicacy, eaten both fresh or dried, and are also used in traditional Chinese medicine.
Though India banned sea cucumber fishery in 2001, Sri Lanka tried to restrict the trade through a system of permits.This disparity has allowed Indian fishers to exploit Sri Lanka’s legalised sea cucumber trade.

Sea Cucumbers:

Sea cucumbers are part of animal group called echinoderms (marine invertebrates) that live on the seafloor.
Their body shape is similar to a cucumber, but they have small tentacle-like tube feet that are used for locomotion and feeding.
These are found in virtually all marine environments throughout the world- shallow to deep-sea environments.
Climate change and ocean acidification, habitat destruction, illegal fishing, and water pollution are the prominent threats to that species.
Sea cucumber in India is treated as an endangered species listed under schedule I of Wildlife Protection Act of 1972.

Germany has suspended the certification process of a major natural-gas pipeline from Russia named Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline.

About:

Nord Stream 2 is a 1,230-kilometer-long natural gas pipeline run fromUst-Luga in Russia to Greifswald in Germany through the BalticSea.
It will carry 55 billion cubic metres of gas per year.
It is designed to double Russia’s gas exports to Germany.
It runs parallel to an earlier Nord Stream pipeline which has been working since 2011 and would double its capacity, to 110 billion cubic meters of gas a year.
Russian state-owned gas company Gazprom owns half of NordStream 2.

ThelatestIndustrialOutlookSurveyshows,demand improved in terms of production, new orders,capacity utilization, and jobs. But firms are still wary of high costs and prices.

What the survey measure?

The 96th round of the Industrial Outlook Survey of the Manufacturing Sector for Q3 captures a qualitative assessment of the business climate and expectations for the ensuing quarter.
It encapsulates business sentiments relating to demand conditions, financial situation in terms of finance availability, employment conditions, and the prevailing price situation in the economy.
The survey conducted by the Reserve Bank of India helps capture corporate sentiments that drive current and short-term business decisions and provide key inputs for policy formulation.

Highlights of current survey:

It shows improved demand conditions for manufacturers in terms of production, order books,and employment.
Input cost for the business is likely to remain elevated.

The Ramanujan Prize for Young Mathematicians was awarded to Professor Neena Gupta, a mathematician of the Indian Statistical Institute in Kolkata, in a virtual ceremony on 22nd February 2022.

About:

She received the award for the year 2021 for her outstanding work in affine algebraic geometry and commutative algebra.
The prize is awarded annually to a researcher from a developing country funded by the Department of Science and Technology (DST) of the Government of India in association with ICTP (International Centre for Theoretical Physics) and the International Mathematical Union (IMU).
It is given to young mathematicians less than 45 years of age who have conducted outstanding research in a developing country.
Prize carries a $15,000 cash award to support the research of the recipient.
It is supported by DST in the memory of Srinivasa Ramanujan, a genius in pure mathematics who was essentially self-taught and made spectacular contributions to elliptic functions, continued fractions, infinite series, and analytical theory of numbers.

The Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi has expressed happiness over R Praggnanandhaa for winning against the noted champion Magnus Carlsen in online Chess tournament.

About:

Born on 10 August 2005,Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa is an Indian chess grandmaster.
A chess prodigy, he is the 5thyoungest person ever to achieve the title of Grandmaster.
On February 20, 2022, he became the third Indian player (behind Anand and Harikrishna) to win a game against World Champion Magnus Carlsen in any time format, in the online Airthings Masters rapid tournament of the Champions Chess Tour 2022.