AFCAT 2 2018 Questions and Answer 18th August

1. Indian hockey captain in 1928 – Jaipal Singh Munda
2. What is biome? – a large naturally occurring community of flora and fauna occupying a major habitat, e.g. forest or tundra.
3. Mike Powell long jump record in meters? – Mike Powell 8.95 m (29 ft 4 1⁄4 in) (1991)
4. First ever women PM in the world? – Sirimavo Bandaranaike became the first women PM in the world. She became the PM of Sri Lanka(then Ceylon).
5. What is the Radcliffe Line? – The Radcliffe Line was the boundary demarcation line between the Indian and Pakistani portions of the Punjab and Bengal provinces of British India. It was named after its architect, Sir Cyril Radcliffe, who, as the joint chairman of the two boundary commissions for the two provinces, received the responsibility to equitably divide 175,000 square miles (450,000 km2) of territory with 88 million people.
6. Who was the first posthumous recipient of Bharat Ratna ? – Lal Bahadur Shastri 
7. In which year Goa is taken by India? – The Annexation of Goa was the process in which the Republic of India annexed the former Portuguese Indian territories of Goa, Daman, and Diu, starting with the “armed action” carried out by the Indian Armed Forces in December 1961.
8. Baltic cup related to? – The Baltic Cup is an international football competition contested by the national teams of the Baltic states – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Also Finland has participated as a guest twice.
9. Hook pass is related to which game?- Basketball
10. Hindu Sanskrit Book Natya Shastra is written by?- Bharata Muni was an ancient Indian theatrologist and musicologist who wrote the Natya Shastra, a theoretical treatise on ancient Indian dramaturgy and histrionics, especially Sanskrit theatre. Bharata is considered the father of Indian theatrical art forms.
11. How many timeouts can a team take in volleyball? – Maximum of 2 timeouts per game for a team is allowed. Time out lasts 30 seconds. In official international competitions, two 60 seconds technical time-out are used when the leading team reaches the 8 or 16 point mark.
12. What caused the Jallianwala Bagh Massacre? –  The Jallianwala Bagh massacre, also known as the Amritsar massacre, took place on 13 April 1919 when a crowd of nonviolent protesters, along with Baishakhi pilgrims, who had gathered in Jallianwala Bagh, Amritsar, Punjab, were fired upon by troops of the British Indian Army under the command of Colonel Reginald Dyer.
13. Daksh Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) – Daksh is an electrically powered Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) designed and developed by the Indian state-owned Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) at the Research and Development Establishment (Engineers), Pune, India.
14. What was the term used for measurement of land in the Delhi Sultanate period? – Masahat
15. Riga is the capital of which country? – Latvia, with Riga as its capital city, thus declared its independence on 18 November 1918. Between World War I and World War II (1918–1940), Riga and Latvia shifted their focus from Russia to the countries of Western Europe.
16. Who was the founder of Brahmo Samaj? – Raja Rammohan Roy founded Brahmo Samaj in Calcutta on 20 August 1828. It was more of a reformist movement of Hinduism which later got divided into adi Brahmo samaj and sadharan Brahmo samaj.
17. Where is Indira Point located? – Indira Point is a village in the Nicobar district at Great Nicobar Island of Andaman and Nicobar Islands, India. It is located in the Great Nicobar tehsil. It is the location of the southernmost point of India’s territory.
18. JAXA is an aerospace agency of which country? –  Japan 
19. India became a member of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) as a founding member in 1966. The Bank is engaged in promoting economic and social progress of its developing member countries (DMCs) in the Asia Pacific Region.
20. Vitamin which is responsible for blood clotting? – vitamin K affects the clotting mechanism by being essential for the production of four distinct clotting factors: prothrombin, factors VII, IX and X.
21. Oldest Veda? – The Rigveda is the oldest work, which Witzel states are probably from the period of 1900 to 1100 BCE. Witzel, also notes that it is the Vedic period itself, where incipient lists divide the Vedic texts into three (trayī) or four branches: Rig, Yajur, Sama and Atharva.
22. Which act is known as the Black Act? – The Anarchical and Revolutionary Crimes Act of 1919, popularly known as the Rowlatt Act and also known as the Black Act, was a legislative act passed by the Imperial Legislative Council in Delhi on March 18, 1919, indefinitely extending the emergency measures of preventive indefinite detention, incarceration without trial and judicial review enacted in the Defence of India Act 1915 during the First World War. It was enacted in light of a perceived threat from revolutionary nationalist organisations of re-engaging in similar conspiracies as during the war which the Government felt the lapse of the DIRA regulations would enable.
23. Jallianwala bagh massacre happened due to which act? – Rowlatt Act
24. Taseometer used to measure? – taseometer is an instrument to measure strains.
25. Characteristics of coal – Coal is a black, inhomogeneous, organic fuel, formed largely from partially decomposed and metamorphosed plant materials. Formation has occurred over long time periods, often under high pressures of overburden and at elevated temperatures.
26. Mont Blanc is situated in? – Mont Blanc, Italian Monte Bianco, mountain massif and highest peak (15,771 feet [4,807 metres]) in Europe. Located in the Alps, the massif lies along the French-Italian border and reaches into Switzerland.
27. Ten cities will have hosted the Olympic Games more than once: Athens (1896 and 2004 Summer Olympics), Paris (1900, 1924 and 2024 Summer Olympics), London (1908, 1948 and 2012 Summer Olympics), St. Moritz (1928 and 1948 WinterOlympics), Lake Placid (1932 and 1980 Winter Olympics), Los Angeles (1932, 1984 and 2028).
28. Island between Russia and Japan ? – The Kuril Islands dispute, also known as the Northern Territories dispute, is a disagreement between Japan and Russia and also some individuals of the Ainu people over sovereignty of the South Kuril Islands.
29. “Double fault” is related to which sport? – The term double-fault can be an adjective referring to: double fault (computing), a fault that occurs during processing of another. double fault (tennis), two consecutive faults during service.
30. ‘Lona’ is the term associated with which sports? – Kabaddi
31. Which place is the Key to the Mediterranean Sea? – Gibraltar is the key to the Mediterranean Sea. It is 3 miles (5 km) long and 3/4 mile wide and is connected to Spain by a low, sandy isthmus which is 1 mile long.
32. Capital of Estonia? – Tallinn became the capital of an independent Estonia. After World War II started, Estonia acceded to the Soviet Union (USSR) in 1940, and later occupied by Nazi Germany from 1941 to 1944.
33. War fought between Sshershah and Humayun in the year 1540AD? – Battle of Kannauj (1540 A.D.) – Sher Shah Suri defeated Humayun.
34. Jude Felix is a famous Indian player in which of the fields? – Jude Felix was captain of the Indian Hockey team from 1993 to 1995.
35. What are the five colors on the Olympic flag? – The rings are five interlocking rings, colored blue, yellow, black, green and red on a white field, known as the “Olympic rings”. 
36. 1st Asian games held at? – The Asian Games, also known as Asiad, is a continental multi-sport event held every four years among athletes from all over Asia. The Games were regulated by the Asian Games Federation (AGF) from the first Games in New Delhi, India, until the 1978 Games.
37. Satyajit Ray received Bharat Ratna in which year? – Satyajit Ray received an Academy Honorary Award in 1992 followed by the Bharat Ratna the same year.
38. The light year is unit of ? – The light-year is a unit of length used to express astronomical distances and measures about 9.5 trillion kilometers or 5.9 trillion miles. As defined by the International Astronomical Union (IAU), a light-year is the distance that light travels in vacuum in one Julian year (365.25 days).
39. Women who won first medal in olympic in india? – The first Indian woman to ever win an Olympic medal was Karnam Malleswari who won a bronze medal at the Sydney Olympics in the Women’s 69 kg category in Weightlifting.
40. Degree of tropic of cancer? – The Tropic of Cancer is the circle marking the latitude 23.5 degrees north, where the sun is directly overhead at noon on June 21, the beginning of summer in the northern hemisphere.
41. In the Rigveda, the Maruts are known as storm gods.
42. Who is known as the Little corporal?- Little Corporal, Napoleon Bonaparte. So called after the battle of Lodi, in 1796, from his low stature, youthful age, and amazing courage.
43. Member of lok sabha during first election? 
44. No. Of constituencies in india during the first indian parliament election? – The first general elections, which were conducted for 489 seats in 401 constituencies, represented 25 Indian states. At that time, there were 314 constituencies with one seat, 86 with two seats and one with three seats. The multi-seat constituencies were abolished in the 1960s. There were also 2 nominated Anglo-Indian members.
45. Author of the underground railroad? – Colson Whitehead
46. In which country Baikonur cosmodrome is located? –The Cosmodrome is the world’s first and largest operational space launch facility. The spaceport is located in the desert steppe of Baikonur, about 200 kilometres (124 mi) east of the Aral Sea and north of the river Syr Darya. It is near the Tyuratam railway station and is about 90 meters (300 ft) above sea level. Baikonur Cosmodrome and the city of Baikonur celebrated the 63rd anniversary of the foundation on June 2, 201

1. First indigenously built fighter aircraft by India? – The HAL HF-24 Marut (“Spirit of the Tempest”) is an Indian fighter-bomber aircraft of the 1960s. Developed by Hindustan Aircraft Limited (HAL), with Kurt Tank as lead designer. It is the first Indian-developed jet aircraft, and the first Asian jet fighter to go beyond the test phase and into successful production and active service. On 17 June 1961, the type conducted its maiden flight; on 1 April 1967, the first production Marut was officially delivered to the IAF.

SOURCE VISION IAS
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UNESCO World Heritage Site

• A UNESCO World Heritage Site is a place that is listed by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as of special cultural or physical significance.
• The list is maintained by the international World Heritage Programme administered by the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, composed of 21 UNESCO member states which are elected by the General Assembly.
• Each World Heritage Site remains part of the legal territory of the state wherein the site is located and UNESCO considers it in the interest of the international community to preserve each site.
• The List of recorded sites on the World Heritage include both cultural and natural wonders.
• Italy is home to the greatest number of World Heritage Sites with 50 sites.
• India now has 37 world heritage sites, including 29 cultural heritage sites, 7 natural sites and 1 mixed site.
• It makes India seventh ranked country in the list of world heritage properties. 

List of World Heritage Sites of India:

1. Agra Fort
2. Ajanta Caves
3. Ellora Caves
4. Taj Mahal
5. Group of Monuments at Mahabalipuram
6. Sun Temple, Konârak
7. Kaziranga National Park
8. Keoladeo National Park
9. Manas Wildlife Sanctuary
10. Churches and Convents of Goa
11. Fatehpur Sikri
12. Group of Monuments at Hampi
13. Khajuraho Group of Monuments
14. Elephanta Caves
15. Great Living Chola Temples 12
16. Group of Monuments at Pattadakal
17. Sundarbans National Park
18. Nanda Devi and Valley of Flowers National Parks
19. Buddhist Monuments at Sanchi
20. Humayun’s Tomb, Delhi
21. Qutb Minar and its Monuments, Delhi
22. Mountain Railways of India
23. Mahabodhi Temple Complex at Bodh Gaya
24. Rock Shelters of Bhimbetka
25. Champaner-Pavagadh Archaeological Park
26. Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (formerly Victoria Terminus)
27. Red Fort Complex
28. The Jantar Mantar, Jaipur
29. Western Ghats
30. Hill Forts of Rajasthan
31. Great Himalayan National Park Conservation Area
32. Rani-ki-Vav (the Queen’s Stepwell) at Patan, Gujarat
33. Archaeological Site of Nalanda Mahavihara (Nalanda University) at Nalanda, Bihar
34. Khangchendzonga National Park
35. The Architectural Work of Le Corbusier, an Outstanding Contribution to the Modern Movement *
36. Historic City of Ahmadabad
37.  Victorian Gothic and Art Deco architectural styles in Mumbai

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Niti Aayog

 Niti Aayog 

• The National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog), was formed via a resolution of the Union Cabinet on January 1, 2015.

  • It has emerged as the premier policy ‘Think Tank’ of the Government of India fostering the spirit of cooperative federalism.

The key functions which refer to ‘Cooperative Federalism’ are: 

  To evolve a shared vision of national development priorities, sectors and strategies with the active involvement of States in the light of national objectives.

  To foster cooperative federalism through structured support initiatives and mechanisms with the States on a continuous basis, recognising that strong States make a strong nation.

• Its other objectives include:
 o To develop mechanisms to formulate credible plans at the village level and aggregate these progressively at higher levels of government.
o To pay special attention to the sections of our society that may be at risk of not benefitting adequately from economic progress.

To design strategic and long-term policy frameworks and monitor their progress and their efficacy.

To create a knowledge, innovation and entrepreneurial support system through a collaborative community of national and international experts, practitioners and other partners.

Significance of Niti Aayog

 • Cooperative federalism: State governments have been given prominence in the functioning of NITI Aayog and it has also expedited the resolution of issues between the central ministries and state and UTs.

 • Competitive federalism: States are competing to perform better in indices developed by NITI Ayog which measures incremental annual outcomes in critical social sectors such as Digital Transformation Index, innovation index, health index. 

 • Focus on inclusive development: It started a special initiative focusing on transformation of 115 aspirational districts. It is also the nodal body for monitoring implementation of Sustainable Development Goals 

• Evidence based policy making: It focuses on policy formulation based on adequate data such as it brought out three-year action agenda, development of composite water management index, promotion of GIS based planning etc.

 • Economic Reforms: It brought out policy paper on reforms in APMC Act, rejuvenating fertilizer sector, doubling farmer's income, Model Act on Agricultural Land Leasing etc. 

• Knowledge and Innovation hub: It acts as a Repository of information as it engages in Compiling, transmitting and emulating best practices across states. It also launched Atal Innovation Mission and hosted Global Entrepreneurship Summit, 2017.

 • Balanced regional development: such as focus on areas such as North East. For eg: NITI Forum for North East which aims to identify various constraints in the way of accelerated, inclusive and sustainable economic growth of the North Eastern Region (NER) is co-chaired by the Vice-Chairman of NITI Aayog. 

Challenges for NITI Aayog 

• Overlapping functions: In discharging the assigned tasks, the Aayog overlaps with the Inter-State Council, which is a constitutional body, and the office of the cabinet secretary that at present strives to achieve inter-departmental coordination.

 • Favor advance states: Its promotion of competitive federalism may work in favour of already advanced states to the detriment of others.

 • Lack of statutory nature: It is established by executive resolution, thus, the chances of government interference is more.  

• Lack of active actionable targets: It needs to take active measures to solve some of the challenges that India faces today such as job creations, increasing economic growth, etc. Even its three-year action agenda has too wide approach for imminent challenges.

 • Limited focus on implementation: It doesn’t focus adequately on the practical aspects of its recommendations such as fixing accountability of bureaucrats, government-citizen interaction etc. which is core to several good ideas remaining on paper. 

Conclusion 

Moving beyond cooperative federalism it is now ‘competitive cooperative federalism’ that defines the relation between Centre and states as NITI Aayog puts onus on states to drive transformation in India. India is facing many challenges in its path to SDGs 2030. The central government has initiated many mission mode programs viz Smart City, Skill India, Swach Bharat, Housing and Electricity for All etc. Success of all these 

 depends on active cooperation and healthy competition among states and centre. NITI Ayog is poised to play the role of catalysts achieving this cooperation. 

Difference with Planning Commission: 

• It has a structure similar to the Planning Commission, but its functions will be limited to only acting as a policy think tank  relieving  it  of  the  two  more functions  viz. formation of  five  year plans and  the  allocation of funds to the States. 

• The  major  difference  in  approach  to planning,  between  NITI  Aayog  and Planning Commission, is that the former will  invite  greater  involvement  of  the states, while the latter took a top-down approach with a one-size-fits-all plan. 

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Cauvery Management Authority (CMA)

Acting on the Supreme Court’s direction, the Centre has constituted a Cauvery Management Authority (CMA) to address the dispute over sharing of river water among Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala and Puducherry. In a gazette notification, the Ministry of Water Resources said it has framed a scheme constituting the CMA and the Cauvery Water Regulation Committee to give effect to the decision of the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal as modified by the Supreme Court order.

Composition;

The Cauvery management authority would comprise a chairman, eight members besides a secretary. Out of eight members, two each will be full-time and part-time members, while the rest four would be part-time members from states.

Functions;

• Exercise power and discharge such duty for “sufficient and expedient for securing compliance and implementation” of the Supreme Court order in relation to “storage, apportionment, regulation and control of Cauvery waters”.
• Supervise operation of reservoirs and with the regulation of water releases therefrom with the assistance of the regulation committee

• The Cauvery Management authority will also look at the regulated release of water by Karnataka, at the inter-state contact point presently identified as Billigundulu gauge and discharge station, and located on the common border of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.
• The authority at the beginning of the water year (June 1 each year) would determine the total residual storage in the specified reservoirs.
• The Cauvery Management authority has also been tasked to advise the states to take suitable measures to improve water use efficiency, by way of promoting micro-irrigation (drip and sprinkler), change in cropping pattern, improved agronomic practices, system deficiency correction and command area development.
• It has to also prepare an annual report covering the activities of the authority for the preceding year.

Additional info:

1. The chairman of the Cauvery management authority should either be a “senior and eminent engineer” with an experience of water resource management and handling of inter-state water dispute or an IAS officer with an experience in water resources management and handling the inter-state dispute
2. The Cauvery Water Regulation Committee has to meet once in 10 days during the months of June and October when the south-west and north-east monsoon set in and again after the monsoon has set in.
3. The Centre will initially contribute a sum of Rs. 2 crore for the functioning of the authority.
4. The share of each state will be determined on the basis of the flows so assumed together with the available carry-over storage in the reservoirs.

The top court had modified the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal (CWDT) award of 2007. It had raised the 270 tmcft share of Cauvery water for Karnataka by 14.75 tmcft and reduced Tamil Nadu’s share, while compensating it by allowing extraction of 10 tmcft groundwater from the river basin, saying the issue of drinking water has to be placed on a “higher pedestal”

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UN report on Kashmir

Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has published the first-ever UN human rights report on Kashmir. 

The title of the report is “Report on the Situation of Human Rights in Kashmir:  Developments in the Indian State of Jammu and Kashmir from June 2016 to April 2018, and General Human Rights Concerns in Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan”. 

Details:

● It highlights the wide range of ongoing serious human rights violations and patterns of impunity in Indian-Administered Kashmir It also raises significant human rights concerns in Pakistan-Administered Kashmir.

  ● It criticise the Restrictions on access to Kashmir imposed by both the Governments of India and Pakistan which impede the work of civil society organizations, journalists and independent human rights experts including OHCHR.

 ● It criticise Abuses by armed groups, Sexual violence, Use of pellet-firing shotgun Lack of access to justice and impunity. Arbitrary arrests and detention, including of children Torture Etc.

  It recommends;

● Urgent repeal of the Armed Forces (Jammu and Kashmir) Special Powers Act, 1990
● Establish independent, impartial and credible investigations to probe all civilian killings, all cases of abuses committed by armed groups, all cases of sexual violence allegedly perpetrated by state and non-state actors. 
● End restrictions on the movement of journalists and arbitrary bans of the publication of newspapers in Jammu and Kashmir
● Fully respect the right of self-determination of the people of Kashmir as protected under international law etc. 

      Problems of the report:
● Incompetence The UN report at best lacklustre and is wholly superficial with little groundwork and insufficient knowledge of the situation.

Glaring biases in the report- It refers to LeT, JeM and Harkat-ul-Mujahideen as "armed groups" even though they are listed as terrorist organisations by the Security Council.

● It uses Pakistan's nomenclature by referring to Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK) as "Azad Jammu and Kashmir" several times in the document

 ● It dwells at length on the provisions of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act but ignores the fact that most countries protect their armed forces with similar laws.

 ● Factual errors -It says that India is a state party to the international conventions against torture and enforced disappearance. But the fact is that India has not ratified either.

● The high commissioner's office does not state why it selected Kashmir's human rights situation for the report. It does not cite any resolution of the General Assembly, the Human Rights Council or the Security Council as the mandate for it, only its founding resolution.         

 India’s stand;

● India reacted sharply to the report, calling it “fallacious, tendentious and motivated”, and lodged a strong protest with the United Nations. 
● The Opposition also came out in support of the government saying the report violates India’s sovereignty and integrity.
 ● India reiterated that it does not recognise the geographical territories as defined in the report.
● The MEA also said that the report failed to take into account the global consensus on terrorism

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ECONOMICS OPTIONAL Strategy by Abhijeet Sinha, Rank 19 UPSC CSE 2017

Hello everyone,

I am Abhijeet Sinha and I have secured 19th Rank in the Civil Service Examination 2017, with Economics as my optional.  I graduated in Electrical Engineering (2016), but due to the interest developed in reading the Economics section of newspaper, I chose Economics as my optional :).  Over the 2 attempts, I have gained quite substantial experience in the optional, both the good as well as the bad ones. I hope dear aspirants would find something helpful out of it

Last year (1st attempt – 2016) I had one of the lowest scores in Economics Optional, 89+129 = 218. And it became the single reason why I did not find my name in the final rank list. It may have been in part, because Economics as a subject was almost completely new to me. But, much more importantly, it was more down to my own structural fallacies. I had hardly written down a word before the exam, did not solve past years papers…… and had many more strategical flaws.

Based on this, I modified my strategy to focus on the following in my 2017 attempt ( 2nd attempt)

1. Solving past 5–10 years papers is the most important of all tasks, since questions are generally repeated. Since, standard answers to question are missing, one can take the help of solved Past years papers by my senior Tejasvi Rana, who is like an elder sister to me
2. Practising drawing the diagrams. While, it is easy to appreciate and understand the Income effect and Substitution effect in a Labour Supply curve, believe me, while actually drawing, one realises it isn’t as easy as it seems. The more you practise, the easier it will become
3. Focussing on every word of the syllabus ( for GS as well). For instance, Q 6a of this years Paper 2 simply asked to write on Poverty Schemes and their performance. The question was almost exactly like the phrase written in the syllabus. Had one prepared notes on it, he/she could have done this question very easily
4. Making OWN notes.Last time, I just used to read from the notes of Gaurav Sir. But, now I can say that making your own notes helps to understand better, revise better and helps in writing practise. But, yeah, take the notes of Gaurav sir, Tejasvi, my own etc as a guidance
5. For Paper 1, I tried to cover the main topics from Indian authors as well, especially key terms and definitions. For eg q 5a ( 2017) asking on Differential Tax Incidence has been elaborated in Bhatia’s book.
6. Revising  This is more needed for Eco Paper 2, where there is a need to memorise things. As an example, I was able to revise between 4–5 times between prelims and mains, each revision being of a shorter duration than the previous one.
7. For Answer Writing
   1. Putting a lot of data and names of Economists in my Eco Paper 2 answer
   2. Making my answers more concise and succinct, and not being verbose. See Tejasvi’s answers to appreciate this point.
   3. I tried to interlink Eco 1 and Eco 2. For eg, on the question on Gravity model of trade in Paper 1 , I quoted actual examples of India and UAE ( how UAE is small, but we have a trade of 60 billion $)
   4. Trivial changes like Using pencil and scale to draw 🙂
8. Taking help from my peers, seniors and the group econsiasprep@googlegroups.comwhenever required.

Other Points worth noting

• For UPSC purpose, it is not important to go into the Mathematical details, what . Rarely has a question been asked from it. Instead focus on the Diagrams very well
• Utilise the first 5-15 minutes to identifywhich questions to attempt. It is better to invest time in the beginning, than to regret later, when 1 realises that he/she is short of points
• Stay away from negativities. People might demotivate you that Economics is not an easy optional. Maintain the confidence and resilience during moments like those. Remember that every year, there are scores of people who come in the rank list with Economics as an optional, in spite of very few people choosing economics in the 1st place

Booklist

Paper 1

1. Micro –
   1. Primarily from Ahuja. As Tejasvi said last time, a thumb rule to find out what is important and what is not is to see past years papers. If a question is being asked from a chapter, then it is important
   2. Abhimanyu’s notes as a summary – https://reluctanteconomistblog.wordpress.com/
2. Macro and Money Banking
   1. Mainly Froyen
   2. Ahuja to find out any new definitons / terms
3. International
   1. Salvatore
4. Growth and Devleopment
   1. Thirlwall mainly
   2. Jhingan for new terms / definitions
5. Public Finance
   1. Musgrave mainly
   2. Bhatia for new terms / definitions

Paper 2

• Instead of going cover to cover, I went topic by topic,browsing every word / phrase of syllabus, and making my own notes from various sources such as
  • Gaurav Sir’s notes – Khelo India
  • Tejasvi’s notes
  • Riju Mam notes – Riju Bafna
  • Mishra and Puri
  • Uma Kapila
• Althoug, I’ve already done the hardwork and compiled the notes out of these into 1 single source :). They can be accessed here –

https://1drv.ms/u/s!Am-XDyZeJwRZjJkuXjXNDxvI6uss-A

All of these did help me to improve my score from 218 to 288 this time ( 140 + 148). Although, its not an excellent score, but it was good enough to give me a good rank. And I hope and wish, it helps you as well 

For more queries and sharing of materials especially related to Economics, you could follow my blog abhijeetsinhaupsc.wordpress.com

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NATIONAL POLICY ON BIO FULES 2018

• The Union Cabinet has approved National Policy on Biofuels – 2018 in order to promote biofuels in the country.
• Biofuels in India are of strategic importance as it augers well with ongoing initiatives of Government such as Make in India,  Skill Development and Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.
• It also offers great opportunity to integrate with ambitious targets of doubling of import reduction, farmers’ income, employment generation, waste to wealth Creation.

Salient features of Policy

• The policy categorises biofuels to enable extension of appropriate financial and fiscal incentives under each category
• • Basic Biofuels: First Generation (1G) bioethanol and biodiesel.
  • Advanced Biofuels: Second Generation (2G) ethanol, Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) to drop-in fuels, Third Generation (3G) biofuels, bio-CNG etc.

• Expansion scope of raw material for ethanol production: It allows use of sugarcane juice, sugar containing materials like sweet sorghum, sugar beet, starch containing materials like corn, cassava, damaged food grains like broken rice, wheat, rotten potatoes, unfit for human consumption for ethanol production.
• Use of surplus food grains: The policy allows use of surplus food grains for production of ethanol for blending with petrol with approval of National Biofuel Coordination Committee. This will ensure farmers get appropriate price for their produce during the surplus production phase.
• Incentives to advanced biofuel: Viability gap funding scheme indicated for 2G ethanol Bio refineries of Rs.5000 crore in 6 years for giving special emphasis to advanced biofuels. It also proposes additional tax incentives, higher purchase price as compared to 1G biofuels.
• Supply chain mechanisms: The policy encourages setting up of supply chain mechanisms for biodiesel production from non-edible oilseeds, used cooking oil, short gestation crops.
• Synergising efforts: It predefines roles and responsibilities of all the concerned Ministries and Government Departments with respect to biofuels to synergise efforts.

Expected Benefits

• Reduce Import Dependency: The ethanol supply will help to reduce import dependency on crude oil which will in turn result in savings of forex.
• Cleaner Environment: The use of ethanol will reduce CO2 emissions. It will also reduce Green House Gas emissions by reducing crop burning and conversion of agricultural residues and wastes into biofuels.
• Health benefits: Prolonged reuse of cooking oil for preparing food, particularly in deep-frying causes health hazard and can lead to many diseases. By using cooking oil as a potential feedstock for biodiesel will prevent diversion of used cooking oil in the food industry.
• Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) Management: Using advance technologies waste and plastic in MSW can be converted in use fuels. One ton of such waste has potential to provide around 20% of drop in fuels.
• Infrastructural Investment in Rural Areas: Addition of 2G bio refineries across country will spur infrastructural investment in the rural areas.
• Employment Generation: Setting up one 100klpd 2G bio refinery contributes to 1200 jobs in plant operations, village level entrepreneurs and supply chain management.
• Additional Income to Farmers: By adopting 2G technologies for producing biofuels, agricultural residues and waste which otherwise are burnt by farmers can be converted to ethanol. Through this process farmers can fetch price for these waste. Moreover, conversion of surplus grains and agricultural biomass can also help in price stabilization for farmers

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