CDS GK Questions 2026

Section 51 of the Act prescribes this enhanced punishment, along with a fine, for offences against animals given the highest protection, and the amendment of 2022 raised the monetary penalties further.

Article 252 allows Parliament to legislate on a State subject for two or more States when the legislatures of those States pass resolutions asking it to do so, and the law then applies to those States and to any other State that adopts it later.

The peacock is the national bird of India and was placed in Schedule I, the group given the highest protection, so it could never be treated as vermin.

The amendment of 1991 inserted Chapter IVA into the Act and created the Central Zoo Authority, which lays down standards for housing and upkeep of animals, recognises or derecognises zoos and regulates the exchange of animals between them.

That amendment inserted Section 36A for conservation reserves, usually declared on government land next to a national park or sanctuary, and Section 36C for community reserves, declared on private or community land where people volunteer to protect wildlife.

The National Board for Wild Life was created by the amendment of 2002 under Section 5A of the Act as the apex advisory body on wildlife, and the Prime Minister chairs it.

Section 35 empowers the State Government to declare an area of adequate ecological or zoological importance as a national park, where no grazing is permitted and no rights of any person are allowed to continue.

In the restructured Act the plant schedule moved from the old Schedule VI to the new Schedule III, and it still protects a short list of species such as the blue vanda, the pitcher plant and other threatened orchids and cycads, whose uprooting and trade are controlled.

The amendment of 2022 rationalised the schedules of the parent Act: Schedule I now lists animals given the highest protection, Schedule II lists animals with a lesser degree of protection, Schedule III lists specified plants and Schedule IV lists specimens figuring in the appendices of the Convention on International Trade…

The Wild Life (Protection) Act received the assent of the President on 9 September 1972 and remains the principal wildlife law of the country, covering hunting, protected areas, trade in animal articles and the schedules of protected species.

A Constitution Bench struck down the electoral bond scheme in February 2024 in the petitions led by the Association for Democratic Reforms, holding that anonymous corporate funding of parties violates the voter's right to information under Article 19(1)(a) and that the amendments permitting unlimited company donations were arbitrary; the Court…

Section 34 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 fixes the security deposit for a Lok Sabha candidate at twenty-five thousand rupees, and a candidate belonging to a Scheduled Caste or a Scheduled Tribe pays half of it; the deposit is forfeited if the candidate does not poll more…

The Election Commission of India was constituted on 25 January 1950, a day before the Constitution came into force, and the day has been observed as National Voters' Day since 2011 to enrol young citizens who turn eighteen and to hand them the elector photo identity card.

The machine was used for the first time in 1982 at the Paravur assembly constituency in Kerala, in a by-election and only in a part of the polling stations; the experiment was challenged for want of a statutory basis, Parliament then amended the law in 1989 to permit the machine…

This committee reported in 1998 on state funding of elections and recommended that funding be partial, be given in kind rather than as cash, and be confined to recognised national and state parties, with the caution that the state of public finances allowed only a limited beginning.

In this judgment of 2013 the Supreme Court held that the right to reject every candidate is part of the freedom of expression and of the secrecy of the ballot, and it directed the Election Commission to provide a None of the Above button; the Commission used it from the…

The Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968 was issued by the Election Commission under Article 324 and the Conduct of Elections Rules, and it governs the recognition of national and state parties, the reservation of symbols for them, the list of free symbols for other candidates, and disputes between…

Section 29A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 is the provision under which an association or body of individual citizens applies to the Election Commission for registration as a political party, and the application must carry a specific undertaking of true faith and allegiance to the Constitution, to…

The Tenth Schedule was added by the Fifty-second Amendment in 1985 and it disqualifies a member of Parliament or of a state legislature who voluntarily gives up the membership of the party on whose ticket the seat was won, or who votes or abstains against the party direction; the Speaker…

The Constitution (Sixty-first Amendment) Act, 1988 amended Article 326 and lowered the qualifying age for a voter from twenty-one to eighteen years, and it took effect in March 1989, so the general election of 1989 was the first in which eighteen-year-olds voted.