SSC CHSL GK Questions 2026

The twenty-year Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation was signed in August 1971 by Foreign Minister Swaran Singh and his Soviet counterpart Andrei Gromyko, months before the war that created Bangladesh.

The Shimla Agreement was signed on 2 July 1972, after the war of 1971 and the creation of Bangladesh. It committed both countries to settle differences bilaterally and by peaceful means, and it turned the ceasefire line in Jammu and Kashmir into the Line of Control.

India, which had been an observer since 2005, was admitted as a full member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation at the Astana summit in Kazakhstan in 2017, along with Pakistan.

SAGAR was announced in 2015 and sets out India's role in the Indian Ocean: maritime security and surveillance, capacity building and training for neighbouring navies and coast guards, cooperation on the blue economy and sustainable use of ocean resources, and first response during cyclones, tsunamis and other disasters.

BIMSTEC, the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation, was created by the Bangkok Declaration of 6 June 1997, first as BIST-EC and then widened as more members joined; its seven members bridge South Asia and South East Asia, and its permanent secretariat is at Dhaka.

The Gujral Doctrine was set out by Inder Kumar Gujral in 1996, when he was Minister of External Affairs and later Prime Minister.

The Look East Policy was launched in 1991 under Prime Minister P. V. Narasimha Rao, when the collapse of the Soviet Union removed India's closest partner and economic liberalisation created a reason to seek markets in South East Asia.

The Tashkent Declaration was signed on 10 January 1966 by Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri and President Ayub Khan of Pakistan to settle the war of 1965, with Soviet Premier Alexei Kosygin as host and mediator at Tashkent, then in the Soviet Union.

Article 51, among the Directive Principles of State Policy in Part IV, asks the State to promote international peace and security, to maintain just and honourable relations between nations, to foster respect for international law and treaty obligations, and to encourage the settlement of international disputes by arbitration.

The first summit of the Non-Aligned Movement met at Belgrade, then the capital of Yugoslavia, in 1961, with Josip Broz Tito as host and Jawaharlal Nehru, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Sukarno and Kwame Nkrumah among the leading figures.

The five principles of Panchsheel appear in the preamble to the Agreement on Trade and Intercourse between the Tibet region of China and India, signed on 29 April 1954 by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai.

The London Convention of 1972, formally the Convention on the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping of Wastes and Other Matter, controls the deliberate disposal of waste at sea from ships, aircraft and platforms, prohibiting the most hazardous categories outright and allowing others only under permit; its later Protocol tightened…

A containment boom is a floating barrier with a skirt below the waterline and floats above it, towed or anchored around a slick to hold the oil in a smaller area so that it can be recovered and kept away from beaches, mangroves and water intakes.

Sustainable Development Goal 14, Life Below Water, commits countries to conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources, with targets on reducing marine pollution from land-based activities, protecting coastal ecosystems, addressing ocean acidification, ending overfishing and conserving coastal and marine areas.

Oilzapper is a consortium of oil-degrading bacteria developed by the institute and used as bioremediation: the bacteria break the hydrocarbons in crude oil and oily sludge into harmless products, which makes it a cheap, low-waste option for contaminated soil at refineries and spill sites.

The hydrogen ions released when carbonic acid dissociates combine with carbonate ions to form bicarbonate, so the pool of free carbonate shrinks.

Oil spill response in Indian waters runs under the National Oil Spill Disaster Contingency Plan, and the Coast Guard is its central coordinating agency, working with major ports, state governments, oil companies and the Navy on reporting, containment with booms, recovery with skimmers, use of dispersants and shoreline clean-up.

MARPOL is the International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships, adopted in 1973 and modified by the Protocol of 1978, and it is the main pollution instrument of the International Maritime Organization.

The tanker Exxon Valdez struck a reef in Prince William Sound in 1989, releasing crude oil that coated a long stretch of a cold, sheltered coastline where oil breaks down slowly, and killing large numbers of seabirds, sea otters and salmon.

Eutrophication begins with nitrogen and phosphorus from fertiliser, detergent and sewage. The nutrients feed an algal bloom; the bloom is short-lived, and when it dies the bacteria that decompose the mass consume large amounts of dissolved oxygen.