The country’s first Government-owned Waste-to-Energy Plant was commissioned at the Mancheswar Carriage Repair Workshop in Odisha. The plant, a patented technology called Polycrack, is first-of-its-kind in the Indian Railways and fourth in the country. It converts multiple feedstocks into hydrocarbon liquid fuels, gas, carbon, and water.

The world’s first fully electric cargo ship was launched by China in 2017. It was manufactured by the Guangzhou Shipyard International Company Ltd. It uses a Lithium-ion type of battery. The cargo ship is powered by a 26-tonne lithium battery. It can travel up to 80km with 2000-tonnes cargo on a single charge. The top speed of the first fully electric cargo ship is 12.8 km per hour. The highlighted feature of this cargo ship is its zero-emission.

• Invoking Essential Commodities Act against hoarding traders and stockist reduces hoarding and increases supply in the market thus reducing prices. So, statement 1 is correct.
• Prices rise when production falls short of demand. Zero duty on exports would further reduce domestic supply. So, statement 2 is NOT correct.
• Futures and forward trading in times of price rise further destabilizes food prices by speculation. The government recently suspended such trading in view of rising pulse prices. So, statement 3 is NOT correct.

• Monazite is a reddish-brown phosphate mineral containing rare earth metals. It occurs usually in small isolated crystals. Lanthanum is the most common rare earth element in monazite. So, statement 1 is correct. Monazite is radioactive due to the presence of thorium and, less commonly, uranium. 
• Because of its radioactive nature, monazite is a useful for radiometric dating of geological events, such as crystallization, heating, or deformation of the rocks containing monazite. So, statement 2 is also correct. Thorium extracted from Monazite sands can be used for generation of nuclear power.

Dialysis works on the principle of the diffusion of solutes and ultra-filtration of fluid across a semi-permeable membrane. Diffusion is a property of substances in water; substances in water tend to move from an area of high concentration to an area of low concentration. Blood flows by one side of a semi-permeable membrane, and a dialysate, or special dialysis fluid, flows by the opposite side. 

Crop diversification and also the growing of a large number of crops are practiced in rainfed lands to reduce the risk factor of crop failures due to drought or fewer rains.

Fruits, medicinal herbs, flowers, vegetables, bio-diesel crops like jatropha and jojoba need much less irrigation than rice or sugarcane. So, statement 3 is correct.

There is a huge demand for cash crops abroad. For e.g. India exports 80% of the coffee it produces earning precious foreign exchange. So, statement 1 is correct.

Processing of crops like tobacco, cotton, jute, cashew, etc is generating large forward and backward linkages in the food processing industry. So, statement 2 is correct.

Dispersion divides light into 7 colors which is not the case here. So, option (B) is NOT correct. Air parcels don't actually move much, even if they do, the 'apparent' flickering is not due to this. It is because of the way light is refracted across warm and cold air packets.

The 123 Agreement was signed between the United States of America and the Republic of India. It is known as the U.S.–India Civil Nuclear Agreement or Indo-US nuclear deal. The framework for this agreement was a July 18, 2005, joint statement by then Indian Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh and then U.S. President George W. Bush, under which India agreed to separate its civil and military nuclear facilities and to place all its civil nuclear facilities under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards and, in exchange, the United States agreed to work toward full civil nuclear cooperation with India.

The Hyde Act: The Henry J. Hyde United States-India Peaceful Atomic Energy Cooperation Act of 2006. It is the U.S. domestic law that modifies the requirements of Section 123 of the U.S. Atomic Energy Act to permit nuclear cooperation with India and in particular to negotiate a 123 Agreement to operationalize the 2005 Joint Statement.

Sheet Mica is used for atomic force microscopy (a very high resolution of microscoping). So, statement 4 is not correct.

Manganese dioxide has been used since antiquity to oxidatively neutralize the greenish tinge in the glass caused by trace amounts of iron contamination. MnO₂ is also used in the manufacture of oxygen and chlorine, and in drying black paints. Manganese is mainly used in the manufacturing of steel and ferromanganese alloy. Nearly 10 kg of manganese is required to manufacture one tonne of steel. ​It is also used in preparing insecticides and bleaching powder.

The food web goes in this order, Rats > Mongoose > Humans.

Pesticides are either washed down into the soil or into the water bodies. From the soil, these are absorbed by the plants along with water and minerals, and from the water bodies, these are taken up by aquatic plants and animals. This is one of the ways in which they enter the food chain. As these chemicals are not degradable, these get accumulated progressively at each trophic level. As human beings occupy the top level in any food chain, the maximum concentration of these chemicals gets accumulated in our bodies. This phenomenon is known as biological magnification.