Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991

• The Act prohibits conversion of any place of worship and to provide for the maintenance of the religious character of any place of worship as it existed on the 15th day of August, 1947, and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.
• No person shall convert any place of worship of any religious denomination into one of a different denomination or section.
• All suits, appeals or other proceedings regarding converting the character of a place of worship, that were pending on August 15, 1947, will stand abated when the Act commences and no fresh proceedings can be filed.
• However, legal proceedings can be initiated with respect to the conversion of the religious character of any place of worship after the commencement of the Act if the change of status took place after the cut-off date of August 15, 1947.
• Nothing contained in this Act shall apply to the place or place of worship commonly known as Ram Janma Bhumi-Babri Masjid situated in Ayodhya in the State of Uttar Pradesh.

Besides the Ayodhya dispute, the Act also exempted:

1. any place of worship that is an ancient and historical monument or an archaeological site, or is covered by the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958
2. a suit that has been finally settled or disposed of
3. any dispute that has been settled by the parties or conversion of any place that took place by acquiescence before the Act commenced

Superior Mirage

• It is an optical illusion, seen, at sea–shore in winter evening, due to which an image of a ship is seen formed in air in sea–sky. The actual ship is nowhere visible.
• Such illusions are reasonably common in the Arctic but can also happen in UK winters when the atmospheric conditions are right, though they are very rare.
• The illusion is caused by a meteorological phenomenon called a temperature inversion.
• Normally, the air temperature drops with increasing altitude, making mountaintops colder than the foothills.
• But in a temperature inversion, warm air sits on top of a band of colder air, playing havoc with our visual perception.
• Because cold air is denser than warm air, it has a higher refractive index.
• In the case of the “hovering ship”, this means light rays coming from the ship are bent downwards as it passes through the colder air, to observers on the shoreline.
• This makes the ship appear in a higher position than it really is – in this instance, above the sea surface.

Inferior Mirage

• It is an optical illusion, seen in deserts at summer noon, due to which an inverted image of a distant tree is seen formed in hot sand below it, as if formed in water. Actually there is no water anywhere.

Ken-Betwa Link Project

• Ken-Betwa Link Project is the first project under the National Perspective Plan for interlinking of rivers (Peninsular component).
• Under this project, water from the River Ken will be transferred to the River Betwa. Both these rivers are tributaries of river Yamuna. The project has two phases,

1. Phase-I - Daudhan dam complex and its appurtenances like Low and High Level Tunnel, Ken-Betwa link canal and Power houses
2. Phase-II - Lower Orr dam, Bina complex project, Kotha barrage

• Daudhan dam comes within the core habitat of Panna Tiger Reserve.

Pradan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Nidhi (PMSSN)

• It is a single non-lapsable reserve fund for share of Health from the proceeds of Health and Education Cess levied under Section 136-b of Finance Act, 2007.

Salient features of the PMSSN

• A non-lapsable reserve fund for Health in the Public Account.
• Proceeds of share of health in the Health and Education Cess will be credited into PMSSN.
• Accruals into the PMSSN will be utilized for the flagship schemes of the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare namely,

1. Ayushman Bharat - Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY)
2. Ayushman Bharat - Health and Wellness Centres (AB-HWCs)
3. National Health Mission
4. Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana (PMSSY)
5. Emergency & disaster preparedness and responses during health emergencies
6. Any future programme/scheme that targets to achieve progress towards SDGs and the targets set out in the National Health Policy (NHP) 2017.

• Administration and maintenance of the PMSSN is entrusted to Ministry of Health & Family Welfare.
• In any financial year, the expenditure on such schemes of the MoHFW would be initially incurred from the PMSSN and thereafter, from Gross Budgetary Support (GBS).

Candida Auris

• It is a fungus that, when it gets into the bloodstream, can cause dangerous infections that can be life-threatening.
• It is often resistant to major antifungal drugs that are typically used to treat such infections.
• Once the germ is present, it is hard to eradicate from a facility.
• Some hospitals have had to bring in special cleaning equipment and even rip out floor and ceiling tiles to get rid of it

Zero Coupon Bonds

• A coupon is a periodic interest received by a bondholder from the time of issuance of the bond till maturity.
• Zero coupon bonds, also known as discount bonds, do not pay any interest to the bondholders.
• Instead, they get a large discount on the face value of the bond.
• On maturity, the bondholder receives the face value of the investment.
• In simple words, the investor purchasing a zero coupon bond profits from the difference between the buying price and the face value, contrary to the usual interest income.
• It is not tradable and it is not transferable.

Stop TB Partnership

• It was established in the year 2000.
• It is a unique international body with the power to align actors all over the world in the fight against TB.
• The Secretariat is based at Geneva, Switzerland.
• It is mandated to eliminate Tuberculosis as a public health problem.
• The organization was conceived following the meeting of the First Session of the Ad Hoc Committee on the Tuberculosis Epidemic held in London in March 1998.
• In its inaugural year, the Stop TB Partnership through the Amsterdam Declaration gave a call for collaborative action from ministerial delegations from 20 countries that bear the highest burden of TB.

Registered Unrecognized Political Parties

• It constitutes the following:

1. The newly registered parties or those which have not secured enough percentage of votes in Assembly or General Elections to become a State party
2. The political parties which have never contested in elections since being registered
3. The Registered Unrecognized Parties do not enjoy all the benefits extended to the recognized parties.

• In India the number of these parties increased two-fold in the last 10 years.
• Out of total registered parties, approximately 97.5% of them are unrecognized.

Risk Based Internal Audit (RBIA) Framework

• It aims to bring uniformity in approach followed by the banks, as also to align the expectations on Internal Audit Function with the best practices.
• The Head of Internal Audit (HIA) shall be a senior executive of the bank, who shall be appointed for a reasonably long period, preferably for a minimum of three years.
• The HIA shall directly report to either the Audit Committee of the Board (ACB) / MD & CEO or Whole Time Director (WTD).
• The internal audit function shall not be outsourced.
• However, where required, experts, including former employees, could be hired on contractual basis subject to the ACB being assured that such expertise does not exist within the audit function of the bank.

Private Final Consumption Expenditure (PFCE)

• The Private final consumption expenditure (PFCE) is defined as the expenditure incurred by the resident households and non-profit institutions serving households (NPISH) on final consumption of goods and services, whether made within or outside the economic territory.
• It is a measure of national consumer spending, it constitutes over 56 per cent of the total GDP.
• It includes the value of goods and services produced for own use on current account i.e., the value of gross output reduced by the sum of the value of their commodity and non-commodity sales.