National Affairs Questions and Answers

Answer: C

'Mann Ki Baat' is associated with Narendra Damodardas Modi.

Mann Ki Baat is the monthly radio programme in which Prime Minister Narendra Modi addresses the nation. It began on 3 October 2014 on All India Radio.

Nehru, Gandhi and Madan Mohan Malaviya lived long before the programme began.

Its episodes are broadcast on the last Sunday of each month and carried in many Indian languages.

Answer: D

The school is the Samvid Gurukulam Girls Sainik School.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh inaugurated the Samvid Gurukulam Girls Sainik School at Vrindavan, Mathura on 1 January 2024. It was set up under the scheme that opens new Sainik Schools in partnership with non-government organisations and private schools, and it is the first Sainik School exclusively for girls.

The other three names are not real schools; they combine plausible words such as 'Rani Jhansi', 'Veer Balika' and 'Bharatiya Raksha'.

Answer: B

The Anubhuti Inclusive Park is at Nagpur, Maharashtra. The question says Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari laid its foundation stone in February 2023. Nagpur is Mr Gadkari's home city and the park is built there as an inclusive, barrier-free space for persons with disabilities, described in the reports as the largest of its kind in the world. Pune, Nashik and Thane are other Maharashtra cities and are the options offered as distractors; none of them is the site named by the key. Since the answer is a news fact, the explanation rests on the key and on the description in the question.

Answer: C

The 28th Hunar Haat of March 2021 was held in Goa, as the official key states. Hunar Haats are the exhibitions of the Ministry of Minority Affairs that bring artisans and craftspeople to a city to sell their products. The edition in March 2021 was organised at Panaji, Goa. Haryana, Sikkim and Bihar are not the state of that edition. The exact serial number of the edition was not independently checked, and the answer rests on the key and on the Goa event.

Answer: C

Pegasus is a mobile spyware, made by the Israeli firm NSO Group, that can be installed on a phone to take its messages, calls and camera. In 2021 reports of its use to snoop on journalists, activists and politicians led to petitions in the Supreme Court, and the Centre said it was ready to set up a committee of experts, though the Court formed its own panel.

It is not an oral drug or a vaccine for the coronavirus, nor a search engine on the internet. The word is in the question in the sense of the software, so mobile spyware is the answer.

Answer: B

The Siyom bridge is in Arunachal Pradesh. It was built by the Border Roads Organisation and inaugurated by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh in January 2023, as part of road links in the Siang region of the state, where the Siyom is one of the rivers.

Assam, Ladakh and Sikkim also have BRO bridges, but the Siyom river and bridge are in Arunachal Pradesh. The second option is the answer.

Answer: C

The actress was Subhashree Ganguly.

At the inauguration of the 28th Kolkata International Film Festival in December 2022, one report says that the actress Subhashree Ganguly felicitated Shah Rukh Khan, who was a guest of honour. Other reports of the ceremony mention Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee honouring him, so the keyed name rests on that one report.

Ritabhari Chakraborty, Swastika Mukherjee and Koel Mallick are not reported as doing so.

This question rests on a single press report of the opening of the 28th Kolkata International Film Festival, held at Netaji Indoor Stadium, so it is hedged. The ceremony also featured Amitabh Bachchan, Rani Mukerji and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, so no other actress in the list is reported as presenting the honour.

Answer: C

The Infant Mortality Rate of India in 2020 was 28 per 1,000 live births, according to the Sample Registration System Statistical Report 2020. It had been 30 in 2019, so the 2020 figure was a fall of two points. The option 30 is therefore the previous year's figure, and 24 and 26 are lower than the reported level. In the same report the urban IMR was 19 and the rural IMR 31, and the rate was 28 for both male and female infants.

Answer: B

The Sachar Committee, set up in 2005 to study the social, economic and educational condition of Muslims, is the committee whose report was challenged in the Supreme Court in 2021. A petition filed in July 2021 questioned the March 2005 Prime Minister's Office notification that created it and asked the court to stop the government from acting on its report. The Shah, Mahajan and Khusro committees are not the body that examined this community's condition and were not the subject of that petition.

Answer: B

India ranked 39th in the Global Innovation Index 2024.

The Global Innovation Index is published each year by the World Intellectual Property Organization. In the 2024 edition India rose one place from 40th to 39th among 133 economies, and it remained first among the lower-middle-income economies.

India's rank had been 81st in 2015 and had climbed steadily since, but it was not 35th, 55th or 25th in 2024.