UPSC Current Affairs Quiz, 9 November 2026

Explanation

Statement 1 is correct. The Asian elephant (Elephas maximus) is listed under Schedule I of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. Schedule I confers the highest protection — hunting is absolutely prohibited except in narrowly defined circumstances such as unavoidable self-defence or defence of others. This is a foundational fact of Indian wildlife law. Statement 2 is incorrect. Elephant Reserves are not declared through the same statutory mechanism as Tiger Reserves. Tiger Reserves have an explicit statutory basis under Section 38V of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 (inserted by the 2006 amendment), and their notification requires the approval of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) as well as the National Board for Wildlife. Elephant Reserves, by contrast, were created under Project Elephant (launched 1992) primarily through administrative/executive orders by state governments in consultation with the Centre — they do not have a dedicated standalone provision in the WPA parallel to the Tiger Reserve framework. The procedures are conceptually distinct. Statement 3 is correct. 'Elephant corridor' is not a statutory category defined in the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. Corridors are identified through ecological surveys and protected via a combination of administrative measures (such as the District Collector's orders directing removal of fences and encroachments, as seen in Kerala), Revenue/Forest Department land-use controls, and Supreme Court and High Court directions. There is no specific Section in the WPA that legally notifies or defines an elephant corridor the way Section 26A defines a National Park or Section 38V defines a Tiger Reserve.

Explanation

Statement 1 is correct. The Paris Agreement benchmarks warming against the 1850–1900 average, which is the internationally accepted proxy for pre-industrial global surface temperature, and the WMO State of the Climate Report explicitly uses this baseline when reporting current warming levels. Statement 2 is incorrect. Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) are an instrument of the Paris Agreement (2015), not the Kyoto Protocol (1997). The Kyoto Protocol required only Annex I countries (developed nations and economies in transition) to meet legally binding emission targets; developing countries such as India and China had no binding mitigation obligations under Kyoto. The NDC architecture — a bottom-up system in which all Parties submit their own climate plans — was introduced by the Paris Agreement, replacing the top-down Kyoto structure. India submitted its first NDC in 2016 and an updated NDC in 2022. Statement 3 is correct. CO₂ is present in the atmosphere at the scale of hundreds of parts per million (currently around 426 ppm) while methane, far less abundant, is tracked in parts per billion (currently around 1,948 ppb). This difference in unit reflects the actual difference in concentration and is standard practice in atmospheric science and IPCC/WMO reporting.

Explanation

All three pairs are correctly matched. First, El Niño is officially declared when the sea surface temperature (SST) anomaly in the central-eastern tropical Pacific Ocean exceeds +0.5°C above the long-term average — this is the standard WMO/NOAA threshold. Second, the core mechanism of El Niño involves the release of heat that has accumulated in the upper layers of the Pacific Ocean into the overlying atmosphere; because ocean heat content is vast, this process significantly warms global average surface temperatures. Third, El Niño is well-documented to act as a 'risk multiplier' through teleconnections — large-scale atmospheric circulation changes driven by the SST anomaly — that intensify heatwaves, tropical cyclones, and extreme precipitation events across multiple continents beyond what historical baselines would predict. All three pairs therefore correctly capture the declaration threshold, the physical mechanism, and the downstream weather effects of El Niño.

Explanation

All three pairs are correctly matched. First, a high CIC-to-GDP ratio indicates that people and businesses rely heavily on physical cash rather than banking or digital channels; this high cash dependence tends to weaken monetary policy transmission because a large portion of economic activity occurs outside the formal banking system where policy rate changes propagate. Second, the RBI defines 'currency with the public' as total currency in circulation (notes and coins issued by the central bank) minus the cash held by banks — this is the standard monetary aggregate used to gauge cash in the hands of the non-banking public. Third, a lower CIC-to-GDP ratio, achieved through greater digitalisation and reduced cash dependence, generally enables smoother monetary policy transmission and better inflation control because more transactions flow through the formal banking system, making interest-rate signals more effective. All three characterisations reflect standard monetary-economics principles around cash intensity and policy transmission.

Explanation

India's official AQI, launched in 2014, converts measurements of up to eight major air pollutants into a single number. These eight pollutants are: PM2.5, PM10, nitrogen dioxide, sulphur dioxide, ozone, carbon monoxide, ammonia, and lead. Ammonia is indeed a gaseous pollutant included in this framework — Pair 1 is correctly matched. PM2.5 refers to fine particulate matter with a diameter of 2.5 micrometres or less; these particles are well-established as capable of penetrating deep into the lungs and entering the bloodstream, making Pair 2 correctly matched. Lead, however, is a heavy-metal particulate pollutant — not a gaseous pollutant. It is measured as airborne particulate lead, not in its gaseous form. Classifying lead as a 'gaseous pollutant' is a conceptual error — Pair 3 is incorrectly matched. Hence only Pairs 1 and 2 are correctly matched.