Daily Current Affairs Quiz 28 January 2023

a) Ukraine

Soledar is a settlement in the Bakhmut Raion of Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine. It is a highly important salt-mining location, with the Soledar Salt Mine providing 95% of Ukraine’s salt in 2021. The settlement was heavily damaged due to intense fighting during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, after which it came under Russian control on 11 January 2023. Since then, it has been occupied by Russia as part of the Donetsk People’s Republic.

Ukraine has pulled back its forces from the strategic town of Soledar after Russia took control of the salt-mining town earlier this month.

c) INS Vagir

Indian Navy’s fifth stealth Scorpene class Submarine INS Vagir was commissioned into the Indian Navy at the Naval Dockyard Mumbai.
Six Scorpene Class submarines are being built in India by the Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders Limited (MDL) Mumbai, under collaboration with M/s Naval Group, France under Project 75 (P75). Vagir has the distinction of having the lowest build time among all indigenously manufactured submarines.

d) iNNCOVACC

Dr. Mansukh Mandaviya, Union Health Minister, launched the world’s first intranasal COVID-19 vaccine, iNNCOVACC, in New Delhi on January 27, 2023. Bharat Biotech International Limited (BBIL) created it in conjunction with Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance (BIRAC). The vaccine was unveiled in the presence of Dr. Jitendra Singh, Union Minister of State (IC) for Science and Technology, and other authorities.

a) 1 only

The concept of mandatory minimum sentencing refers to “a sentence which must be imposed without leaving any discretion to the court. It means a quantum of punishment which cannot be reduced below the period fixed,” the Apex court held in its 2016 ruling in ‘Mohd Hashim vs State Of UP And Others’. No matter what the unique, individual circumstances of the offender or the offense might be, the court must mandatorily award this minimum period of sentencing for the offenses which prescribe it. Hence, statement 1 is correct.

A concept that comes primarily from the Canadian and American legal systems; in India, such sentences are prescribed for all sexual offenses under the Prevention of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act except the offense of sexual harassment. Hence, statement 2 is incorrect.

A CJI Chandrachud-led bench of the Supreme Court decided to examine a petition challenging the constitutional validity of Section 376 DB of the Indian Penal Code. This section describes the punishment for gangrape of a minor under 12 years of age, to the extent that it prescribes a ‘minimum mandatory sentence’ of life imprisonment for the remainder of the convict’s life and even death.

b) Indian Institute of Astrophysics

The Visible Line Emission Coronagraph (VELC) payload for the Aditya-L1 mission was handed over to ISRO by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA) on January 26, 2023, at the Centre for Research and Education in Science and Technology (CREST) Campus at Hosakote, near Bengaluru. The VELC payload was conceived and built on the CREST site. At URSC, the payload would be integrated with the satellite.