Why are the Pamirs called the Roof of the World ?

It is called the roof of the world because they are at high altitude. The Pamir Mountains are a mountain range in Central Asia formed by the junction of the Himalayas with Tian Shan, Karakoram, Kunlun, and Hindu Kush ranges.
Pamirs Mountainous region in central Asia, lying mostly in Tajikistan and partly in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and China. The region forms a geological structural knot from which the Tian Shan, Karakoram, Kunlun, and Hindu Kush mountain ranges radiate.

Who is bugs bunny?

Bugs Bunny is an animated cartoon character; created in 1940 by Leon Schlesinger Productions (later Warner Bros. Cartoons) and voiced originally by Mel Blanc. Bugs is best known for his starring roles in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of animated short films, produced by Warner Bros. during the golden age of American animation. His popularity during this era led to his becoming an American cultural icon, as well as the official mascot of Warner Bros. Entertainment.

Old n new names of cities n changed year

Jubbulpore-Jabalpur-Madhya Pradesh- 1947

Cawnpore- Kanpur-Uttar Pradesh-1948

Simla-Shimla-Himachal Pradesh-1948

Tanjore-Thanjavur-Tamil Nadu-1948

Calicut-Kozhikode-Kerala-1949

Benares-Varanasi-Uttar Pradesh-1956

Allepey-Alappuzha-Kerala-1957

Panjim-Panaji-Goa-1961

Trichinapoly-Tiruchirapalli-Tamil Nadu- 1971

Baroda-Vadodara-Gujarat-1974

Poona-Pune-Maharashtra-1978

Gauhati-Guwahati-Assam-1983

Waltair-Vishakhapatnam-Andhra Pradesh
-1987

Trivandrum-Thiruvananthapuram-Kerala
-1991

Bombay-Mumbai-Maharashtra-1996

Madras-Chennai-Tamil Nadu-1996

Cochin-Kochi-Kerala-1996

Calcutta-Kolkata-West Bengal-2001

Pondicherry-Puducherry-Union Territory
-2006

Bangalore-Bengaluru-Karnataka-2006

Belgaum-Belagavi-Karnataka-2014

Mysore-Mysuru-Karnataka-2014

Mangalore-Mangaluru-Karnataka-2014

Trichur-Thrissur-Kerala-2014

Tumkur-Tumakaru-Karnataka-2014

Hubali-Hubbali-Karnataka-2014

Bellary-Ballari-Karnataka-2014

Gulbarga-Kalaburagi-Karnataka-2014

Bijapur-Vijapura-Karnataka-2014

Gurgaon-Gurugram-Haryana-2016

Mewat-Nuh-Haryana-2016

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“Clearer policies and investment in the right systems are needed to meet sanitation goals in India.” Discuss

(The government always gives special attention to Swachh Bharat Mission. This attention makes it more important for UPSC. Also, the mission deals with an important issue related to both rural and urban population of India.)

Level of implementation of the Swachh Bharat Mission

It has subsidy-based mass toilet-building programme A government-commissioned survey estimates that the coverage now extends to 62.45% of households, up from 39% in 2014
With the substantial funding available from the Centre, State governments cannot have a convincing reason for a poor record Issues with the implementation

Among the benefited households, nearly 92% of people who have access actually use the toilet
There is data from undivided Andhra Pradesh which shows that household latrines built before the Swachh programme couldn’t be used Why: because many rural households did not have a water source The newer ones may meet the same fate without access to water
Also, Dalit houses tend to have lower coverage which hints at structural difficulties in accessing the scheme positive outcomes of the Mission

The most important outcome is reduced stress for women, who suffer silently in the absence of toilets
There are well-known gains to public health as well performance by different states

According to Centre’s assessment, Bihar, Jammu and Kashmir, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and Telangana have particularly failed to upgrade rural sanitation.
While Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Uttarakhand, Haryana and Gujarat have exceeded the goals
Effort by the government: Union Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation has introduced a new district-level ranking It may help the more backward States to bring about infrastructure
The way forward many Indians do not see the waste they generate as their problem, and consider it to be someone else’s responsibility.This attitude of Indians should be changed.

What is a Cess?

Cess is a tax on tax, temporary levied by the govt. to achieve a specific objective. Generally, it is expected to be levied till the time the govt. gets enough money for that purpose.

For instance, the education cess, that is levied currently, is meant to finance basic education in the country.

What is the quantum of revenue generated through Cess?

The education and higher education cesses are budgeted to bring approx. Rs 30,000 crore this year.
The road cess on petroleum is budgeted to net just under Rs 50,000 crore.
There is also a cess on exports, clean energy, etc.
The total amount from cesses is Rs 1.16 lakh crore.

What is the criticism against Cesses?

The problem with cesses is that it becomes permanent in nature.
These levies are back door entry instead of levying taxes.
How Cess is different from Surcharge?

Surcharge is also a tax on tax, which is imposed on incomes above a certain level with a view to reduce the inequalities further.

There is a surcharge of 12% on individuals whose taxable income exceeds Rs. 1 crore.
Similarly, there is also a surcharge of 10% on the domestic companies whose taxable income exceeds Rs.10 crore, and also a surcharge of 5% on the foreign companies whose taxable income exceeds Rs.10 crore.

What is Swachh Bharat Cess?

The resources generated from the cess will be utilised for financing and promoting initiatives towards Swachh Bharat. It is a step towards involving each and every citizen in making contribution to Swachh Bharat.

Govt. has introduced a cess of 0.5% on all services and 2% on air services.
The revenue department is preparing a list of services which will attract the additional 2% cess provided for in the Budget 2015-16, over and above the proposed 14%.
Where does the proceeds of the Swachh Bharat Cess go?

The proceeds of the Swachh Bharat cess would be first credited to the Consolidated Fund of India. The govt. would be able to utilise it after due appropriation is made by Parliament by law. This will later go to Swachh Bharat Kosh.

The Government expects to collect around Rs 10,000 crore from Swachh Bharat cess for full year

Why does it goes against the principle of fiscal federalism?

The central divisible pool excludes levies classified as surcharges and cess for specific purpose.
The entire proceeds would remain with the Centre and need not be compulsorily shared with the states.
Swachh Bharat cess, to some extent, is a vague pretext for a cess, unlike the ones for national highways or high-speed rail corridors, which can be more effectively implemented at the Central level.

What will be the impact of GST on the cess?

There is no input credit available on this cess, which goes against the very principle of the GST and thereby weakens the Centre’s case for pushing through GST.

The cesses and surcharges would be subsumed once the GST is rolled out. So both for tax payers and states, this is for the time being.

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IB ACIO Recruitment 2017 Online Application Link Activated

What is floodplain?

A floodplain or flood plain is an area of land adjacent to a stream or river that stretches from the banks of its channel to the base of the enclosing valley walls and experiences flooding during periods of high discharge. The soils usually consist of levees, silts, and sands deposited during floods. Levees are the heaviest materials (usually pebble-size) and they fall in first; silts and sands are finer materials.

What is the Congenital Adrenal Hyperplasia (CAH)?

(1). CAH is an inherited disorder that affects the adrenal glands where the glands cannot produce cortisol and aldosterone, and instead produce an unwanted excess amount of androgens.

(2). A child with CAH lacks enzymes the adrenal glands use to produce hormones that help regulate metabolism, the immune system, blood pressure, and other essential functions.

(3). Parents with children suffering from it often have great difficulty in the upbringing of the child, including treatment, getting school admission and other support issues.

How sea turtles travel in open sea?

The Earth's magnetic field provides a pervasive source of directional information used by phylogenetically diverse marine animals. For these animals, the Earth's field also serves as a source of positional information. For young loggerhead turtles, regional magnetic fields function as navigational markers and elicit changes in swimming direction at crucial geographic boundaries. Older turtles, apparently acquire a “magnetic map” that enables them to use magnetic topography to determine their position relative to specific goals.

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The second volume of the Economic Survey 2016-17 unveiled on Friday
Highlights of the Economic Survey 20116-17:
Achieving the upper end of projections for economic growth at 6.75-7.5 per cent for FY18 may be difficult.
It noted, sizeable slack in the economy; for instance, the average capacity utilisation was just 72.7% in the third quarter of last fiscal year.
Survey iterated the need for “considerable” monetary easing in order to deleverage corporate balance sheets. 
Authors of the survey are critical of the Reserve Bank of India for keeping the policy rates at levels that felt higher than warranted they also rebutted the government’s claims of tax buoyancy and identified new short-term risks to Centre’s fiscal outlook.
Key points in the survey
Investment spending of the general government — which improved on the back of CPSEs last fiscal — is likely to decline relative to GDP this year.
Why?
Farm loan waivers shrank states’ fiscal space and the Centre struck a balance between counter-cyclical policy and the need to maintain fiscal credibility.
More downside risk to fiscal outlook than envisaged in the Budget due to
Reduced tax revenue from slower nominal GDP growth
Reduced GST collections owing to lower-than-earlier tax rates/transitional challenges
Lower spectrum receipts due to the structural jolt to the viability of telcos.
Declining profitability in power and telecom, which threatens to add to the twin balance sheet problem.
Farm-sector stress and real exchange rate appreciation have all posed risks to growth
Structural shift in underlying inflation dynamics, along with the fact that the current inflation is running below the 4% target.
Apart from short-term impacts from demonetisation and the GST, the economy suffer from
Deficient investment and export demand, appreciating rupee,
Macro implications from farm loan waivers
Sectoral problems in the power and telecommunication sectors.
These are expected to weigh down India’s growth pulse in the short-run. But we should reach closer to our potential growth exceeding 7.5% in FY19.

What happens when thunder hits a house ?

Power Surges: When lightning strikes a house, the electricity often surges through a home's wiring or plumbing system, searching for the quickest possible route to the ground. The most common place for a fire to ignite is in the attic, when a lighting bolt comes through the roof or top of the house.

Towards a clean-up: on meeting sanitation goals
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important:
The government always gives special attention to Swachh Bharat Mission. This attention makes it more important for UPSC. Also, the mission deals with an important issue related to both rural and urban population of the country.

In the article, writer talks about the implementation level, targets achieved, issues related to the Swachh Bharat Mission
Level of implementation of the Swachh Bharat Mission

🔘 It has subsidy-based mass toilet-building programme

🔘 A government-commissioned survey estimates that the coverage now extends to 62.45% of households, up from 39% in 2014
With the substantial funding available from the Centre, State governments cannot have a convincing reason for a poor record
Issues with the implementation

🔘 Among the benefited households, nearly 92% of people who have access actually use the toilet

There is data from undivided Andhra Pradesh which shows that household latrines built before the Swachh programme couldn’t be used

🔘 Why:

 because many rural households did not have a water source

🔘 The newer ones may meet the same fate without access to water

🔘 Also, Dalit houses tend to have lower coverage which hints at structural difficulties in accessing the scheme

🔴 Positive outcomes of the Mission

🔘 The most important outcome is reduced stress for women, who suffer silently in the absence of toilets

🔘 There are well-known gains to public health as well Performance by different states

🔘 According to Centre’s assessment, Bihar, Jammu and Kashmir, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and Telangana have particularly failed to upgrade rural sanitation
While Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Uttarakhand, Haryana and Gujarat have exceeded the goals

🔴 Effort by the government: 

Union Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation has introduced a new district-level ranking

🔘 It may help the more backward States to bring about infrastructure

🔴 The way forward

Many people do not see the waste they generate as their problem, and consider it to be someone else’s responsibility

This attitude of people should change.

Everything you need to know about encephalitis

🔴 What is encephalitis?

Encephalitis is a potentially life-threatening but rare disease causing “acute inflammation” of the brain. According to the Medical News Today website, the term “acute”, in medicine, is used when a disease appears abruptly and grows at a fast pace.

What are the causes of encephalitis?

The disease can occur in people of all ages, but children and the elderly are more at risk of being afflicted with the disease.

🔘 The usual cause of the rare disease is either a viral inflection. Sometimes it is caused when the brain’s own immune system mistakenly attacks brain tissue. 

🔘 According to a New York Times report, in rare cases, encephalitis is caused due to bacterial infection, parasites, or may be prompted from other infectious diseases. It is a non-communicable disease.
What is Japanese encephalitis?

One of the most common form of viral encephalitis in Asia is the Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV), caused by mosquito-borne flavivirus. The disease belong to the same genus as dengue, yellow and West Nile viruses.

🔘 JEV primarily affects children as most adults tend to attain natural immunity from the disease, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).

🔘 The disease usually shows mild symptoms such as fever and headache. In about 1 out of 250 cases, the disease takes a bad turn accompanied by sudden high fever, headache, stiffness, disorientation, coma and seizures. The fatality rate for patients showing symptoms is approximately 30 per cent.
What are the treatments available?

Almost every type of encephalitis shows similar systems, although it is difficult for doctors to determine through clinical features the cause of the onset of disease. When diagnosing the disease, the doctors aim to determine whether it is caused due to viral infections or any other factor.

🔘 According to an NYT report, the viral forms of encephalitis are not treatable and doctors usually try to cure the symptoms being caused by the disease via medications. Reducing the fever down and ease the pressure caused by the swelling of the brain are highly important when treating a patient suffering from the disease. NHS UK says doctors often prescribe steroid injections, antibiotics or painkillers based on the cause.

How can the disease be prevented?

There are several vaccinations that are effective in preventing the disease, including vaccines for measles, mumps, rubella.

In areas known to have mosquitoes carrying encephalitis-causing viruses, one must carry mosquito repellent ointments and apply it especially while going out. People should also use proper clothing to prevent being bitten by mosquitoes in mosquito-infested areas.

First case in India

Japanese Encephalitis is recognised as the leading cause of the disease in India. According to a report by Indian Council of Medical Research, JEV was first recognised in 1955 in the country, when cases of encephalitis were reported in North Arcat district of Tamil Nadu.

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Scientific Explanations Of Common Phenomena
➖➖➖➖➖➖➖➖➖➖➖➖
★It is dangerous to sleep in an unventilated room with fire burning inside because the fire produces carbon monoxide and carbondioxide gases. Carbon monoxide is poisonous and can cause death.

★The filament of an electric bulb is made of tungston because it has a high melting point and can be heated to a high temperature to emit light.

★Water kept in an earthen pitcher becomes cold because the pitcher has minute pores on its surface which absorb water. Water in the pores evaporates when it comes in contact with air, and produces a cooling effect.

★A sliced apple, when exposed to air, turns brown after some time as it contains iron which gets oxidised and gives the fruit a brownish colour.

★The freezing compartment inside a refrigerator is at the top because the air in contact with it becomes cold and heavy and sinks downwards, cooling the rest of the compartment.

★A copper vessel left in the air for a long time turns green. This is due to the formation of copper carbonate when copper reacts with carbon dioxide and moisture present in the air.

★A wick in a stove keeps burning continuously as kerosene rises in the wick due to capillary action.

★The Earth rotates on its axis from west to east. This rotation makes the Sun and the stars appear to be moving across the sky from east to west.

★The sky appears blue because the light of the Sun is spread or scattered by the dust particles in the air. In space the sky would appear black as there are no dust or air particles to scatter the light.

★Food is cooked quickly in a pressure cooker because the boiling point of water increases at high pressure. Food cooks faster at high temperature.

★In mountainous regions, the atmospheric pressure is less than it is at sea level. Water, therefore, boils at a lower temperature (less than 100° C) and food takes more time to cook.

★When ice floating in a glass of water melts, the level of water remains unchanged because as a solid, ice displaces an equal volume of water.

★A man weighs more at the poles than at the equator because the polar radius of the Earth is less than the equatorial radius. Hence the gravitational pull is more at the poles than at the equator.

★Standing in double-decker buses, particularly on the upper floor, is not allowed because on tilting, the centre of gravity of the bus gets changed and it is likely to overturn.

★The boiling point of seawater will be more than the boiling point of pure water because the former contains salt and other impurities.

★An ordinary clock loses time in summer because the length of its pendulum increases, and therefore, its time period also increases. The pendulum takes more time to complete each oscillation and thus loses time.

★Whenever there is water loss from the body, secretion of saliva is reduced resulting in dryness of the mouth and stimulating the sensation of thirst. Intake of fluid then helps in restoring the loss of the water.

★A swimmer just out of the river feels cold particularly if it is windy, because of the evaporation of water from his body surface. The evaporation is more on a windy day.

★Alcohol is sometimes rubbed on the body of a person suffering from fever. As soon as it is applied on the body, it evaporates taking away some heat from the body. Since evaporation has a cooling effect, the body temperature can be reduced by rubbing alcohol.

★Soft iron is used as an electromagnet because it remains a magnet only while the current passes through the coil around it and loses its magnetism when the current is switched off.

★The person jumping out of a moving train is carried forward in the direction of the train because the person himself is in motion sharing the velocity of the train and will continue in its state of uniform motion unless it exercises some force to prevent it
(Newton’s first law of motion).

★A lightning conductor is fixed to tall buildings to protect them from the destructive effects of the lightning.

Government launches nationwide campaign Gaj Yatra to protect elephants
================
The Union Ministry of Environment and Forest has launched a nationwide campaign Gaj Yatra to protect elephants. It was launched on the occasion of World Elephant Day observed on August 12.
The ministry also released the All India Census 2017 Report on elephants and Agreed Points of Action on Trans-Boundary Conservation of Elephants by India and Bangladesh.

Gaj Yatra Campaign
—------------------
The campaign is planned to cover 12 elephant range states across the country. It is 15 months campaign the will be led by the Wildlife Trust of India (WTI). The ‘Gaju’ mascot, which was released by the Ministry in 2012, will be helm of the campaign.
The campaign aims create awareness about elephant corridors to encourage free movement in their habitat. During the period of the campaign, artists and craftsmen will create life-size works on the theme of elephants in places along the route of the roadshow using local art and craft. Specially fabricated vehicles will be also deployed to display these on pre-determined routes with campaigners.

World Elephant Day
—-------------------
The World Elephant Day is observed every year on August 12 to support various stakeholders involved in supporting various conservation policies to protect elephants. It also seeks to support stakeholders involved in improving enforcement policies to prevent illegal poaching and trade in ivory, conserving elephant habitats, providing better treatment for captive elephants and reintroducing captive elephants into sanctuaries.
The World Elephant Day was conceived in 2011 by Canadian filmmakers Patricia Sims and Michael Clark of Canazwest Pictures and Sivaporn Dardarananda, Secretary-General of Elephant Reintroduction Foundation of Thailand. Now it is supported by over 65 wildlife organisations.
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Why does your hair stand on end when you get cold?

Tiny muscles connected to each hair follicle contract, causing the skin to bulge and our hairs to stand on end. Back when we were covered in more hair this allowed us to trap as much air as possible which worked as an insulator to battle the cold.