Ans: B

Exp:

For the year 2024, 60 Parachute Field Hospital, Uttar Pradesh, in the Institutional category, has been selected for the Subhash Chandra Bose Aapda Prabandhan Puraskar-2024 for its excellent work in Disaster Management.

Pair 1 is correct: The ‘Operation Dost’ was the search and rescue operation initiated by the Government of India to aid Syria and Turkey, after the 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquake devastated both countries on 6 February 2023. Under Operation Dost, India has sent search and rescue teams, mainly three teams of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), a field hospital, materials, medicines, and equipment to Turkey and Syria.

Pair 2 is incorrect: Operation Samudra Maitri is the relief effort launched by India to assist the victims of the 2018 Sulawesi earthquake and tsunami in Indonesia (not Maldives). 

 Pair 3 is correct: Operation Maitri was a rescue and relief operation in Nepal by the government of India and Indian armed forces in the aftermath of the April 2015 Nepal earthquake.

Ans: C

Exp:

Statement 1 is correct: Ingenuity is the first aircraft in history to make a powered, controlled flight on another planet. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) regained contact with its Mars helicopter Ingenuity on Sunday (January 21), after it was unable to communicate with it towards the end of its 72nd flight on the red planet earlier on Thursday.

Statement 2 is incorrect: On July 30, 2020, NASA launched a spacecraft towards Mars, carrying the Perseverance rover, which had Ingenuity attached to its belly. While the rover’s mission was to study signs of ancient life, and collect samples that might be sent back to Earth during future missions, Ingenuity was sent to Mars as an experiment to test powered, controlled flight on another world for the first time.

Statement 3 is correct:  Ingenuity is an autonomous aircraft. It is piloted by onboard guidance, navigation, and control systems running algorithms developed by the team at JPL (Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA). Perseverance acts as a relay between the chopper and Earth.

Ans: D

Exp:

Baltic Sea is an arm of the North Atlantic Ocean which extends northward from the latitude of southern Denmark almost to the Arctic Circle and separating the Scandinavian Peninsula from the rest of continental Europe. Baltic Sea is the largest expanse of semienclosed and brackish water in the world. The large islands of Bornholm (Denmark) and Oland and Gotland (Sweden) lie in the western Baltic, while the Aland Islands rise from a narrows between Sweden and Finland and mark the entrance to the arm of the Baltic known as the Gulf of Bothnia. Countries  bordering the Baltic Sea are:

• Denmark

• Sweden

• Finland

• Russia

• Estonia
• Latvia
• Lithuania
• Poland
• Germany.

Ans: C

Exp:

Statement 1 is correct: Eksaran Naamdharma is a Neo-Vaishnavite movement propagated by Mahapurush Srimanta Sankardeva and was the outcome of his wide experiences that emanated from various sources. Sankardeva, along with his staunchest disciple Madhavdava propagated his faith among the masses, and within a short period of time, this new movement attained an all-pervasive nature.

Statement 2 is correct: Eksaran Naamdharma has three aspects, namely Eksaran, Satsanga and Naama. Eksaran means seeking solace from one God, Satsanga denotes an assembly of Bhaktas (followers) for obeisance, while Naama refers to chanting as a means of prayer. It forbids elaborate rituals and worship of idols while advocating an austere lifestyle for the Bhaktas (followers). Naama was considered to be sufficient for the common people because it could be performed by the high and the low.

Statement 3 is correct: The Eksaran Naamdharma propagated by Sankardeva has been able to unify people from all walks of life, from the aristocrats to the poor and downtrodden, into one spiritual fraternity and thereby achieved a cultural synthesis. In Sankardeva’s movement, the essence of democracy, as well as the spirit of socialism, can easily be traced. Every individual was considered equal in his movement, and neither caste nor class was taken into account while inducting anyone into the faith.

Ans: A

Exp:

After three decades of being stuck to the Antarctic ocean floor, ‘the iceberg- A23a’ is now heading north on what could be its final journey. It contains an estimated one trillion tonnes of fresh water that is likely to melt off into the ocean along way. 

• It is a tooth-shaped iceberg and is nearly 4,000 square kilometres across, making it more than twice the size of Greater London. 
• It is up to 400 metres thick in places and is currently drifting between Elephant Island and the South Orkney islands. 
• A23a first broke off the Antarctic coast back in 1986, making it the world’s oldest iceberg, as well as its largest. But it quickly became stuck to the ocean floor, where it languished for decades.