February 2026

The Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India has formally communicated to state governments the operational framework for India’s first-ever digital Population Census 2027, with real-time monitoring of field operations through a dedicated web-based portal called the Census Management and Monitoring System. The houselisting operations phase is scheduled to commence on April 1, 2026, across all states and union territories, while the population enumeration phase — which will collect demographic, socio-economic, cultural, and critically, caste data — is scheduled for February 2027.

The Census 2027 has been delayed since the 2021 exercise was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, representing a gap of over six years in India’s foundational data collection exercise. This delay has had significant downstream consequences for planning, welfare delivery, delimitation, and resource allocation. The integration of digital technology — including satellite imagery for habitation mapping, a dedicated monitoring portal, and the deployment of approximately 32 lakh field functionaries — makes this the most technologically ambitious census in India’s history.

For UPSC aspirants, the Census 2027 is significant for multiple reasons: it will generate the baseline data for the next delimitation exercise, it is expected to include caste enumeration beyond Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes for the first time since 1931, and it raises profound questions about data privacy, administrative capacity, and the constitutional basis for affirmative action.

Background and Historical Context of Census in India

Five Important Key Points

• India’s census has been conducted every ten years since 1872, with the first post-independence census conducted in 1951 under the Census Act, 1948, which provides the legal framework for the current exercise including provisions on confidentiality of individual data and penalties for non-compliance.
• The Census 2021 was indefinitely postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, creating a data vacuum that has affected everything from delimitation planning to the design of welfare schemes, as schemes based on 2011 census population figures have become increasingly inaccurate in reflecting current demographic realities.
• For the first time in census operations, working maps will be generated using the latest available satellite imagery to enable clear identification of habitations and settlements, replacing the manual map preparation that had been a source of enumerator error and geographical inaccuracy in previous exercises.
• The population enumeration phase in February 2027 will collect caste data beyond Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, potentially providing for the first time since 1931 a comprehensive national database of Other Backward Class and other caste group populations, which has enormous implications for reservation policy and political representation.
• The Census Management and Monitoring System portal will allow senior officials to oversee field operations in real time, identify gaps and delays, and ensure timely completion — a governance innovation that represents a significant departure from the largely paper-based monitoring of previous census exercises.

Legal Framework: Census Act, 1948, and Constitutional Provisions

The Census Act, 1948, is the primary legislative instrument governing India’s population count. Section 8 of the Act mandates every household head to furnish accurate information to the census enumerator, while Section 15 makes it a criminal offence to provide false information or obstruct census operations. Critically, Section 15 also protects the confidentiality of individual census data, preventing it from being used for any administrative, legal, or fiscal purpose — a provision designed to encourage honest disclosure.

The constitutional basis for the census lies in Entry 69 of the Union List (Seventh Schedule), which reads “census, including census of non-Indian domiciled in India” — placing the census firmly within Parliament’s exclusive legislative domain. However, several dimensions of census data have constitutional implications across different entries: housing data relates to urban development (concurrent list), caste data relates to social justice provisions under Articles 15, 16, and 340, and population data will inform the delimitation of parliamentary and assembly constituencies once the freeze on delimitation is lifted after 2026.

The Caste Census Dimension: Constitutional and Political Implications

The inclusion of caste data beyond SC and ST categories in Census 2027 is perhaps the most politically significant aspect of the exercise. No national caste census has been conducted since 1931, and the absence of reliable national-level data on the population distribution of Other Backward Classes has been a persistent limitation on the scientific basis of reservation policy.

The Mandal Commission’s recommendations in 1980, which formed the basis for 27 percent OBC reservation in central government employment, were based on the 1931 census and extrapolated projections — data that is nearly a century old. The Supreme Court’s judgment in Indra Sawhney vs Union of India (1992) upheld OBC reservation but imposed the 50 percent ceiling on total reservations, leaving open the question of whether this ceiling could be revisited with updated demographic data.

Recent judicial developments — including the Bihar government’s survey on caste population and the Supreme Court’s consideration of sub-classification within SC/ST categories in the E.V. Chinnaiah and Panjab case — have made a comprehensive national caste database more constitutionally urgent than ever before.

Digital Transformation: Technology, Privacy, and Inclusion

The digitisation of census operations raises important questions about data security, privacy, and the digital divide. The use of mobile applications by field enumerators, the satellite imagery-based mapping system, and the real-time monitoring portal all represent significant improvements in data quality and administrative accountability. However, they also create new vulnerabilities: data breaches, algorithmic errors in mapping, and the exclusion of populations in areas with poor digital connectivity.

The Personal Data Protection Act (now the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023) does not explicitly exempt census data from its provisions, although the Census Act’s confidentiality provisions create a separate legal shield. The intersection of these two frameworks needs explicit regulatory clarification to ensure that the mass of demographic and socio-economic data collected through Census 2027 is appropriately protected against misuse.

The digital divide also poses a risk to enumeration quality. Areas with high concentrations of marginalised populations — remote tribal areas, urban slums, coastal fishing communities — may be harder to enumerate accurately using digital tools if field functionaries lack adequate training or if connectivity is unreliable.

Delimitation and Electoral Implications

The census data collected in 2027 will form the statistical basis for the next delimitation of parliamentary and assembly constituencies — an exercise that has been constitutionally frozen since 1976 under Article 82. The 84th Constitutional Amendment of 2001 extended the freeze until the first census after 2026, which makes Census 2027 the trigger for the first delimitation since 1976.

Delimitation based on updated population data is expected to significantly increase the representation of populous northern states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan, at the potential expense of southern states like Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh, which have achieved lower fertility rates through better development outcomes. This demographic-political tension makes Census 2027 not merely a data exercise but a constitutional moment with far-reaching political consequences.

Way Forward

The government should establish a multi-stakeholder oversight committee, including representatives from civil society, statistical organisations, privacy experts, and state governments, to monitor the digital census operations and provide independent assessments of data quality. The methodology for caste enumeration beyond SC and ST categories must be transparently documented and made publicly available for academic scrutiny. Data collection protocols must include specific provisions for enumerating homeless populations, nomadic communities, and residents of informal settlements, who have historically been undercounted. The Digital Personal Data Protection Act regulations should be amended to explicitly address the handling, storage, and access restrictions applicable to census data.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is relevant for UPSC GS-II under governance, constitutionalism, and social justice, and for GS-I under Indian society, diversity, and demographic trends. It is also relevant for GS-III under economic development and data infrastructure. For SSC examinations, it covers polity, government schemes, census history, and constitutional provisions.

Key terms: Census Act 1948, Delimitation Commission, Article 82, OBC reservation, Indra Sawhney case, Digital Personal Data Protection Act 2023, Census Management and Monitoring System, Seventh Schedule Entry 69, Mandal Commission, SECC 2011.

The Supreme Court of India is set to hear final arguments in the review petitions challenging the landmark 2018 Sabarimala judgment, which had permitted women of all ages to enter the Sabarimala temple in Kerala. The 2018 decision, delivered by a five-judge bench with a 4:1 majority, had opened the doors of the temple to women between the ages of 10 and 50, who had previously been excluded on religious grounds. The review petitions, which challenge this judgment, are now before a nine-judge Constitutional Bench — a composition that signals the court’s recognition that the case raises fundamental questions about the architecture of India’s religious freedom jurisprudence.

This case is significant not merely for its immediate outcome on temple entry for women, but for the broader doctrinal question it poses: What standard should courts use when evaluating whether a religious practice that excludes individuals — on grounds of gender, caste, or other identity characteristics — is constitutionally permissible? The court’s answer will shape the landscape of religious freedom, equality, and anti-discrimination law in India for decades.

For UPSC aspirants, this topic directly engages GS-II themes of fundamental rights, judiciary, religious freedom, and gender justice, while also offering rich material for the Ethics paper and the Essay.

Background and the 2018 Judgment

Five Important Key Points

• The 2018 Supreme Court judgment in Indian Young Lawyers Association vs State of Kerala ruled 4:1 in favour of allowing women of all ages to enter Sabarimala, with the majority finding that the devotees of Lord Ayyappa did not constitute a separate religious denomination protected by Article 26.
• The lone dissent by Justice Indu Malhotra held that the exclusion of women of a certain age constituted an “essential religious practice” entitled to constitutional protection, and that the court should not impose a generic doctrine of equality over the collective rights of religious communities to practise their faith in accordance with their customs.
• Rule 3(b) of the Kerala Hindu Places of Public Worship (Authorisation of Entry) Rules, 1965, which formed the legal basis for the exclusion of women, was struck down by the majority as violating both the parent statute’s mandate of free access for all classes of Hindus and the Constitution’s fundamental rights provisions.
• Justice D.Y. Chandrachud, in his concurring opinion, proposed an “anti-exclusion test” as an alternative to the much-criticised “essential religious practices test”, arguing that religious autonomy must yield when its exercise systematically excludes individuals from spaces and benefits that are integral to their ability to lead a life of dignity.
• The nine-judge bench now hearing the review petitions has the potential to recalibrate the entire framework of religious freedom jurisprudence in India, with implications beyond Sabarimala for cases involving Dawoodi Bohra excommunication, Parsi women’s religious rights, and Scheduled Caste temple entry rights.

Historical Background of the Essential Religious Practices Test

The “essential religious practices” test has been the primary judicial instrument for adjudicating conflicts between religious freedom and other fundamental rights since the early decades of the Republic. The test holds that the Constitution protects only those religious practices that are essential or integral to the religion, and that practices which are not essential are not entitled to constitutional protection.

The test originated in the Commissioner, Hindu Religious Endowments, Madras vs Lakshmindra Thirtha Swamiar of Sri Shirur Mutt case of 1954, and was elaborated in subsequent decisions. In Sastri Yagnapurushadji vs Muldas Bhudardas Vaishya (1966), Chief Justice Gajendragadkar made factual determinations about what was essential to the Swaminarayan sect based on selective readings of Hindu texts — without examining what the actual conscience of the followers dictated, and without oral evidence or cross-examination of any theological experts.

This judicial tendency to determine theological questions from the bench — effectively sitting as a religious arbiter — has attracted sustained academic and judicial criticism. The court lacks the institutional competence to make theological determinations, and the test allows judges to substitute their own reading of religious texts for the lived practice of religious communities.

Constitutional Framework: Articles 25, 26, 14, and 15

The constitutional provisions at the heart of this case form a carefully balanced framework. Article 25 guarantees all persons the freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practise, and propagate religion, subject to public order, morality, and health, and to other provisions of Part III of the Constitution. Article 26 guarantees religious denominations the right to manage their own affairs in matters of religion, subject to the same restrictions.

Articles 14 and 15 guarantee equality before the law and non-discrimination on grounds of sex, religion, caste, race, or place of birth. The interplay between the freedom of religion (Articles 25 and 26) and the equality rights (Articles 14 and 15) lies at the core of the Sabarimala dispute — the majority held that the right to equality overrides a non-essential religious practice, while the dissent held that religious autonomy is itself a form of equality.

Additionally, Article 17 of the Constitution abolishes untouchability in any form, and the Supreme Court has read this provision together with Article 25(2)(b), which explicitly permits the state to enact laws providing for the throwing open of Hindu religious institutions of a public character to all classes and sections of Hindus. This provision directly authorises the kind of intervention the Kerala government’s 1965 rules were meant to effect.

The Anti-Exclusion Test: An Alternative Framework

Justice Chandrachud’s anti-exclusion test offers a potentially more principled alternative to the essential religious practices test. The test accepts, as a starting point, the autonomy of religious groups to define their own tenets and practices — thus respecting religious freedom. It intervenes only when the exercise of that autonomy systematically excludes individuals from places or benefits that are integral to their ability to lead a life of dignity.

The test’s key virtue is that it grounds constitutional inquiry in constitutional terms rather than theological ones. Instead of asking whether a practice is essential to a religion — which requires courts to make theological judgments — it asks whether the consequences of a practice are compatible with the Constitution’s guarantees of equal treatment and the right to dignity under Article 21.

The test does, however, have its own complications. Determining whether a practice impairs dignity or hampers access to basic goods requires courts to engage with the purpose and meaning of the practice — an inquiry that cannot be conducted entirely in a theological vacuum. But the critical difference is that the investigation remains anchored in constitutional concepts of dignity and equality rather than in theological categories of essentiality.

Social and Gender Justice Dimensions

The Sabarimala case is, at its core, a case about the constitutional status of women’s right to access religious spaces without being subject to discrimination based on biological characteristics. The exclusion of women of menstruating age from the temple is premised on notions of ritual purity and pollution that have historically been used to subordinate women across many religious and cultural traditions.

Menstrual taboos continue to restrict women’s participation in religious, social, and public life across India. Judicial validation of such exclusions, even under the rubric of religious freedom, sends a signal that the Constitution tolerates biological discrimination when it is cloaked in religious language. This has implications not just for temple entry but for women’s access to places of worship across religious traditions.

Way Forward

The nine-judge bench should use this opportunity to formally replace the essential religious practices test with the anti-exclusion test or a similarly constitutionally grounded standard. The court should also clarify that the right of religious communities to manage their own affairs under Article 26 does not extend to practices that violate the fundamental dignity of individuals as guaranteed by Article 21, read with Articles 14 and 15. Parliament should consider comprehensive anti-discrimination legislation — long recommended by the Law Commission — that addresses exclusion from public and quasi-public spaces on grounds of gender, caste, disability, and other protected characteristics.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is directly relevant for UPSC GS-II under constitutional provisions, functioning of the judiciary, fundamental rights, and women’s empowerment. It is also critical for the Ethics paper under themes of discrimination, dignity, and the interface of personal belief with public institutional obligations. For SSC examinations, it covers constitutional provisions and important Supreme Court judgments.

Key terms: Essential Religious Practices test, Anti-Exclusion test, Article 25, Article 26, Article 21, Sabarimala judgment 2018, Kesavananda Bharati, Indian Young Lawyers Association case, Kerala Hindu Places of Public Worship Rules 1965.

The United States Department of Commerce announced a preliminary countervailing duty (CVD) of 126 percent on solar cell imports from India on February 24, 2026, following a complaint filed by the Alliance for American Solar Manufacturing and Trade, a coalition of leading American solar manufacturers. The duties were simultaneously imposed on Indonesia and Laos. Indian firms specifically named in the preliminary determination include Adani Group entities — Mundra Solar Energy Pvt. Ltd. and Mundra Solar PV Ltd. — as well as Premier Energies, Waaree Energies, and Waaree Solar Americas.

The timing of this action is significant. It arrives in the aftermath of a US-India trade framework agreement that sought to reduce tariffs on Indian exports, and follows the US Supreme Court’s invalidation of the Trump administration’s broad use of emergency powers for tariff imposition. It also coincides with a growing global trade war in the clean energy sector, where American, European, Chinese, and Indian manufacturers are all competing aggressively for market share in solar panel and component production.

For UPSC aspirants, this topic offers a rich analytical intersection of international trade law (WTO agreements on subsidies), India’s renewable energy industrial policy, the geopolitics of clean energy transition, and the challenge of reconciling economic nationalism with global climate commitments.

Background and Context of India’s Solar Manufacturing Sector

Five Important Key Points

• India’s solar cell exports to the United States grew from 232 megawatts worth in 2022 to 2,297 megawatts in 2024, representing a nearly tenfold increase in volume over two years, which directly triggered the American industry’s complaint about import surges.
• In financial year 2023-24, India exported solar photovoltaic products worth approximately 1.94 billion US dollars to the United States, making it the single largest export destination for Indian solar components and therefore the most consequential market for Indian solar manufacturers.
• The preliminary CVD rate of 125.87 percent for Adani Group entities was calculated based on the US Department of Commerce’s assessment of subsidies received through various Indian government schemes, including production-linked incentive schemes, concessional power tariffs, and land allocation benefits.
• The final determination in the CVD investigation is scheduled for July 6, 2026, and a concurrent anti-dumping duty investigation is also underway, meaning the eventual duty burden on Indian solar exports could be significantly higher than the preliminary rates.
• Existing tariffs of up to 40 percent on solar cell exports to the United States were already in place before these new CVD measures, meaning that the combined duty burden would make most Indian solar exports to the US economically unviable.

WTO Framework and Subsidies Agreement

The countervailing duty action is grounded in the WTO Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures (ASCM), which permits member countries to impose countervailing duties to offset the trade-distorting effects of subsidies provided by exporting country governments. Under the ASCM, a subsidy is actionable if it is specific to an enterprise or industry and if it causes adverse effects to the interests of other WTO members.

India’s Production Linked Incentive Scheme for solar manufacturing, the Approved List of Models and Manufacturers mechanism, and various state-level incentives for renewable energy manufacturing have all been cited as potentially actionable subsidies under the ASCM. India has consistently argued at the WTO that its industrial policy measures are designed to promote renewable energy as part of its Paris Agreement commitments — a defence that has some legitimacy under the WTO’s provisions on developing country flexibilities but has not been universally accepted in dispute settlement proceedings.

India could challenge the preliminary CVD determination through the administrative review process before the US Department of Commerce, and ultimately through WTO dispute settlement. India has used WTO dispute resolution successfully in the past — the US Solar Panels case involving domestic content requirements was resolved in India’s favour in 2016 — establishing a precedent for trade litigation in this sector.

India’s Renewable Energy Industrial Policy and PLI Scheme

The Production Linked Incentive scheme for solar photovoltaic manufacturing, approved by the government with an outlay of approximately 24,000 crore rupees, was specifically designed to build domestic manufacturing capacity across the solar value chain — from polysilicon and wafers to cells, modules, and integrated supply chains. The scheme was motivated partly by India’s dependence on Chinese solar imports and the recognition that energy security in a renewable-powered future requires domestic manufacturing capability.

The PLI scheme has succeeded in attracting significant private investment — companies like Adani, Waaree, Premier Energies, and Reliance have announced multi-gigawatt manufacturing capacity expansions. However, this very success has now attracted trade action from the United States, creating a structural dilemma: the same industrial policy that was designed to reduce dependence on Chinese imports and build export competitiveness has now become the basis for American trade action.

Geopolitical Dimensions: Clean Energy Trade Wars

The solar sector CVD action must be understood within the broader context of clean energy trade tensions that have emerged globally as countries compete to dominate the industries of the energy transition. The United States Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 committed 369 billion dollars to clean energy incentives, explicitly designed to build American manufacturing capacity in solar, wind, batteries, and electric vehicles. This was followed by the European Union’s Net Zero Industry Act and various Asian countries’ own industrial policies.

The result is a situation where every major economy is simultaneously subsidising its own clean energy manufacturers and complaining about other countries subsidising theirs — a structural tension that the WTO’s subsidy rules were not designed to resolve, having been written primarily for a fossil-fuel era economy.

For India, the strategic implication is significant. The US market has been one of the most important outlets for the excess manufacturing capacity that PLI-funded expansions will create. If US CVD action effectively closes that market, Indian manufacturers will be forced to redirect exports toward Europe, Latin America, Africa, and South-East Asia — markets that are growing but may not absorb the same volumes at comparable margins.

Impact on India’s Climate Commitments and Domestic Energy Transition

India has committed at COP26 and subsequent climate conferences to achieving 500 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity by 2030, with solar power forming the backbone of this target. Meeting this target requires both domestic installation of solar projects and a viable export-oriented manufacturing sector that can achieve the scale economies necessary to drive down module costs.

CVD actions by the United States create a secondary risk: if Indian solar manufacturers face reduced export revenues, their financial capacity to invest in further capacity expansion may be constrained, potentially slowing the pace of India’s own domestic solar deployment. This creates a direct link between US trade policy and India’s ability to meet its nationally determined contributions under the Paris Agreement — a linkage that India can and should articulate forcefully in trade and climate diplomacy forums.

Way Forward

India should immediately file a formal response to the US Department of Commerce’s preliminary CVD determination, providing comprehensive documentation of the non-actionable nature of its renewable energy subsidies under ASCM provisions applicable to developing countries. Simultaneously, India should engage the US at the trade ministerial level to negotiate a negotiated settlement that avoids a protracted WTO dispute while protecting Indian manufacturers’ market access. India should also accelerate diversification of solar export markets through the India-ASEAN FTA framework, bilateral agreements with emerging African solar markets, and preferential trade arrangements with the Caribbean Community. The government should consider establishing a trade defence fund, specifically to support Indian manufacturers in navigating anti-dumping and CVD actions in major markets.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is relevant for UPSC GS-III under Indian economy, infrastructure, energy, environment, and growth; government budgeting; and India’s bilateral trade and trade policy. It is also relevant for GS-II under India’s foreign policy and bilateral relations. For SSC examinations, it covers economy, government schemes, international trade, and environment.

Key terms: Countervailing Duty, WTO Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures, Production Linked Incentive scheme, Paris Agreement, Nationally Determined Contributions, US Inflation Reduction Act, Approved List of Models and Manufacturers, COP26.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s address to the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, on February 26, 2026, marked only the second visit by an Indian Prime Minister to Israel — the first being his own visit in 2017. The address was notable for its unambiguous condemnation of the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023, as a “barbaric terrorist attack”, its expression of strong bilateral solidarity, and its support for the Gaza Peace Initiative endorsed by the UN Security Council. These positions collectively signal a significant crystallisation of India’s stance on the Israel-Palestine conflict — one that departs from the more carefully balanced posture India had historically maintained.

The visit acquires additional significance because it comes barely weeks after India aligned with over 100 countries at the United Nations in criticising Israel’s moves in the West Bank, including signing a joint statement on settlement expansion after initially abstaining. This apparent contradiction — voting to criticise Israel at the UN while the Prime Minister addresses the Knesset in terms of solidarity — reflects the complexity of India’s multi-vector foreign policy and its attempt to maintain simultaneously productive relationships with Israel, Gulf Arab states, Palestine, and the broader international community.

For UPSC aspirants, this topic provides an ideal case study in the evolution of India’s foreign policy from strategic autonomy to a more proactive but carefully calibrated engagement, particularly in conflict zones where major power interests and energy security converge.

Background and Historical Context of India-Israel Relations

Five Important Key Points

• India and Israel established full diplomatic relations only in 1992, decades after Israel’s establishment in 1948, largely because India’s Cold War era Non-Aligned Movement commitments and its large Muslim-majority population made open engagement with Israel politically sensitive.
• Bilateral trade peaked at over 10.7 billion US dollars in 2022-23, before declining to 3.6 billion dollars in 2024-25 due to war-related disruptions and difficulties in trade routes, demonstrating how geopolitical instability directly impacts economic relationships.
• India has emerged as one of the largest importers of Israeli arms, accounting for over 38 percent of Israel’s arms exports between 2014 and 2024 according to Stockholm International Peace Research Institute data, making defence cooperation the cornerstone of the bilateral strategic partnership.
• Diamonds occupy a unique position in bilateral trade, with India importing rough diamonds from Israel, processing them domestically, and re-exporting finished products, creating a symbiotic value chain that accounts for approximately one-third of India’s imports from Israel and about 22 percent of exports.
• As of October 2024, approximately 32,000 Indian workers were employed in Israel — many recruited after the Gaza conflict to replace Palestinian labour in the construction sector — creating a significant human mobility dimension to the bilateral relationship.

India’s Historical Position on the Israel-Palestine Conflict

India was among the first countries to recognise the Palestinian Liberation Organisation as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people in 1974, and it recognised the State of Palestine in 1988. For decades, India’s UN voting record consistently supported Palestinian statehood, condemnation of Israeli settlements in the West Bank, and the principle of a two-state solution based on pre-1967 borders with East Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine.

The transformation began with the establishment of full diplomatic relations with Israel in 1992, during the tenure of Prime Minister Narasimha Rao, a decision that was politically facilitated by the Oslo Accords between Israel and the PLO. Subsequently, India pursued what foreign policy scholars described as a “de-hyphenation” strategy — engaging Israel bilaterally on defence, agriculture, and technology while maintaining rhetorical support for Palestinian rights at multilateral forums. This approach allowed India to benefit from Israeli defence technology, intelligence cooperation, and agricultural expertise without fundamentally altering its declared position on Palestinian statehood.

Modi’s 2017 visit to Israel — the first by any Indian Prime Minister — broke the long-standing practice of Indian Prime Ministers visiting Palestine in the same trip as Israel, effectively validating the de-hyphenation approach at the highest level of diplomatic signalling.

Geopolitical Dimensions: India’s Multi-Vector West Asia Strategy

India’s West Asia policy must be understood through multiple simultaneous interests that occasionally conflict with each other. Gulf Cooperation Council countries — Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, and Bahrain — host approximately 9 million Indian diaspora workers who remit over 40 billion dollars annually to India. India imports approximately 60 percent of its crude oil requirements from the Gulf region. Any significant deterioration of India’s relationship with Arab states would have immediate and severe economic consequences.

Simultaneously, Israel offers India access to defence technologies, cyber security capabilities, agricultural irrigation technology, and intelligence cooperation that few other bilateral relationships can match. The Abraham Accords of 2020, which normalised relations between Israel and several Arab states including the UAE and Bahrain, paradoxically made it somewhat easier for India to deepen its Israel relationship without it being perceived as anti-Arab.

Modi’s Knesset address explicitly referenced the Abraham Accords as showing “courage and vision”, and expressed regret that the momentum had been disrupted by the post-October 2023 situation. This positioning aligns India with the bloc of countries that see Arab-Israeli normalisation as a pathway to regional stability — a significant foreign policy alignment that has implications for India’s relationships with Iran, Turkey, and the broader Muslim world.

Defence and Technology Cooperation: Strategic Significance

India-Israel defence cooperation spans decades of joint development, co-production, and licensed manufacture of military equipment. Key systems include the Barak air defence missile system used by the Indian Navy, the Heron and Searcher unmanned aerial vehicle series used by the Indian Army, the Spyder quick-reaction surface-to-air missile system, and various small arms and ammunition systems.

Beyond hardware, Israel’s Unit 8200 — the equivalent of the NSA or GCHQ — has been India’s partner in cyber security and signals intelligence capacity building. In the context of India’s security concerns relating to cross-border terrorism and hybrid warfare from Pakistan-based groups, this intelligence relationship has operational value that transcends formal diplomatic frameworks.

The visit’s emphasis on “cross-border financial linkages using Digital Public Infrastructure” and an “ambitious Free Trade Agreement” suggests that the next phase of bilateral relations will seek to institutionalise economic interdependence at the same level that defence cooperation has achieved over the past three decades.

India’s UN Voting and the Tension with Bilateral Warmth

The apparent contradiction between India’s UN vote criticising Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank and the Prime Minister’s solidarity address to the Knesset reflects a structural tension in Indian foreign policy. India uses multilateral forums to maintain its historical credentials as a champion of international law, the rights of post-colonial states, and the Palestinian cause — constituencies that matter to India’s relationships with the Arab world, Africa, and the broader Global South.

Simultaneously, bilateral engagement with Israel is driven by strategic and economic interests that operate on a different logic. This dual-track approach is not unique to India — several European countries and the United States itself maintain this tension — but managing it requires sophisticated diplomacy and clear communication of India’s core principles to all parties.

Way Forward

India should pursue the finalisation of the India-Israel Free Trade Agreement as a priority, leveraging the current diplomatic momentum. Simultaneously, India must sustain its engagement with the Palestinian Authority and ensure that its support for the Gaza Peace Initiative is backed by concrete humanitarian contributions, including medical supplies, reconstruction assistance, and diplomatic support for Palestinian civil governance structures. India should use its G20 presidency legacy and its current UNSC engagement credentials to advocate for a ceasefire framework that addresses both Israel’s legitimate security concerns and Palestinian rights under international law.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is directly relevant for UPSC GS-II under India’s foreign policy, bilateral relations, international organisations, and important international institutions. It is also relevant for GS-III under defence and security, and for the Essay paper under themes of India’s strategic autonomy and multi-vector foreign policy. For SSC examinations, it covers India’s diplomatic history, international relations, and defence cooperation.

Key terms: De-hyphenation policy, Abraham Accords, SIPRI arms data, UN Security Council, Gaza Peace Initiative, two-state solution, India-Israel FTA, Strategic Partnership, Digital Public Infrastructure.

The Supreme Court of India took extraordinary suo motu cognisance on February 26, 2026, of a section in a Class 8 Social Science textbook published by the National Council of Educational Research and Training that referenced “corruption” in the judiciary as a challenge facing the judicial system. Chief Justice of India Surya Kant, visibly agitated in open court, characterised the textual reference as “a tentatively calculated, deep-rooted attempt” to denigrate the judicial institution, while senior advocates Kapil Sibal and Abhishek Manu Singhvi highlighted that the selective mention of the judiciary, without equivalent reference to corruption in the executive or legislative branches, appeared deliberate.

The NCERT subsequently issued an apology acknowledging an “error in judgement” and stated that distribution of the textbook had been placed on hold. However, the Supreme Court proceeded to register the suo motu case under the title “In Re: Social Science Textbook for Grade-8 (Part 2) published by NCERT and ancillary issues”, scheduling a hearing the following morning before a three-judge bench.

This episode raises questions that go to the very heart of constitutional governance in India: What are the appropriate limits of academic freedom in school curriculum? Can a textbook’s factual acknowledgment of institutional challenges — including those within the judiciary — constitute contempt or defamation of the institution? And does the judiciary’s intervention in curriculum content raise concerns about the separation of powers and the chilling of legitimate academic and pedagogical discourse?

Background and Institutional Context

Five Important Key Points

• The NCERT is a statutory body established under the Societies Registration Act, mandated to develop curriculum frameworks, publish textbooks, and conduct educational research to improve school education quality across India.
• The disputed section in the Class 8 Social Science textbook mentioned corruption, a massive backlog of cases, and a lack of adequate judges as challenges facing the judicial system — a characterisation consistent with findings of multiple parliamentary committees, Law Commission reports, and the Supreme Court itself in various judicial administration cases.
• The Supreme Court registered the suo motu case even after NCERT had already announced withdrawal of the disputed section, indicating that the court considered the institutional issue to transcend the immediate textbook controversy.
• Justice Bagchi of the Supreme Court bench indicated that the mention affected constitutional integrity and impacted the principle of separation of powers, a component of the Basic Structure Doctrine as established in the Kesavananda Bharati case of 1973.
• NCERT’s statement expressed that the council “holds the judiciary in highest esteem” and characterised the error as “purely unintentional”, while committing to rewrite the section in consultation with appropriate authorities.

Historical Background of Judicial Primacy in Constitutional Discourse

India’s constitutional architecture places the judiciary at the apex of the rights-protection framework. The doctrine of judicial independence, while not explicitly enumerated as a fundamental right, has been treated by the Supreme Court as a fundamental feature of the Constitution under the Basic Structure Doctrine since Kesavananda Bharati vs State of Kerala (1973). The independence of the judiciary has been further elaborated in the Second Judges Case (Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association vs Union of India, 1993), where a nine-judge bench held that judicial independence is the most important pillar of constitutional governance.

Simultaneously, however, Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution guarantees freedom of speech and expression, which encompasses academic freedom and the freedom of educators and curriculum designers to critically examine public institutions. The tension between protecting judicial dignity and preserving the space for legitimate institutional critique is not new — it has played out in contempt proceedings, restrictions on press reporting, and now, in school curriculum design.

Constitutional Provisions and Legal Framework

Several constitutional provisions and legal instruments are directly relevant to this controversy. Article 129 of the Constitution grants the Supreme Court the power to punish for contempt of itself, while Article 215 confers the same power on High Courts. The Contempt of Courts Act, 1971, distinguishes between civil contempt (wilful disobedience of court orders) and criminal contempt (publication of material that scandalises or tends to scandalise the authority of the court).

The critical question is whether a school textbook’s factual description of institutional challenges — framed within a civic education context — can constitute criminal contempt. The Supreme Court in Brahma Prakash Sharma vs State of Uttar Pradesh (1953) held that for material to constitute contempt, it must be calculated to interfere with the due course of justice or create an apprehension in the minds of people regarding the court’s ability to act impartially. A pedagogical description of systemic challenges, backed by documented evidence, arguably does not meet this threshold.

The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, and the National Education Policy 2020 both emphasise critical thinking, constitutional literacy, and institutional awareness as core pedagogical goals. There is a tension between these mandates and the apparent requirement that textbooks maintain unconditional reverence for state institutions.

The Separation of Powers Dimension

Justice Bagchi’s observation that the textbook content affected the principle of separation of powers deserves careful examination. The separation of powers doctrine, as part of the Basic Structure, protects each branch of government from encroachment by the others. If the legislature were to pass a law removing the judiciary’s power of judicial review, that would violate separation of powers. However, whether a curriculum text’s discussion of judicial challenges similarly violates this principle is a far more complex argument.

If the court’s position is that no educational material may describe institutional weaknesses of the judiciary without judicial approval, this creates a scenario where one branch of government — the judiciary — effectively controls the curriculum narrative about itself, which paradoxically might itself constitute an encroachment on the executive’s domain over educational policy. This is the kind of structural irony that the UPSC examiner will appreciate a candidate engaging with analytically.

Governance Concerns: NCERT Autonomy and Curriculum Design

NCERT, as an autonomous body under the Ministry of Education, is expected to develop curriculum content based on pedagogical research, expert committee deliberations, and National Curriculum Framework guidelines. The politicisation of NCERT content has been a recurring concern — various state governments and political parties have, over decades, sought to influence what is taught in schools.

The Yashpal Committee and the National Curriculum Framework of 2005 had explicitly cautioned against making school education an exercise in uncritical acceptance of established authority, advocating instead for a curriculum that develops democratic temperament and critical citizenship. The current controversy suggests that these pedagogical values remain contested in practice.

Comparative Analysis: Judicial Dignity vs. Academic Freedom

Democracies worldwide grapple with this balance. In the United Kingdom, academic textbooks regularly describe institutional failures, including those of courts and the legal system, as part of civic education. In the United States, the First Amendment jurisprudence broadly protects academic freedom, including the right to critically examine government institutions in educational settings. India’s contempt jurisprudence has historically been more restrictive, though the Supreme Court itself, in Indirect Tax Practitioners’ Association vs R.K. Jain (2010), cautioned that contempt powers should not be used to shield courts from fair and legitimate criticism.

Way Forward

The Supreme Court should use this case as an opportunity to articulate a clear and calibrated standard distinguishing legitimate institutional critique from material that genuinely scandalises the judiciary. The court may also consider directing the establishment of an independent curriculum review committee, comprising educationists, constitutional scholars, and civil society representatives, to periodically review educational content on public institutions for accuracy and pedagogical soundness — without subjecting that content to institutional veto power. NCERT should develop transparent, publicly accessible protocols for curriculum review and revision, ensuring that changes to textbook content are driven by pedagogical evidence rather than institutional pressure.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is relevant for UPSC GS-II under Polity and Governance, specifically the functioning of the judiciary, constitutional bodies, separation of powers, and fundamental rights. It is relevant for the Essay paper under themes of institutional integrity, academic freedom, and democracy. For SSC examinations, it covers constitutional provisions, important Supreme Court cases, and functioning of the NCERT.

Key terms: Suo motu cognisance, Basic Structure Doctrine, Article 129, Contempt of Courts Act 1971, Kesavananda Bharati case, National Curriculum Framework, Right to Education Act 2009, separation of powers, NCERT autonomy.

India has announced the nationwide rollout of a Human Papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination programme targeting girls aged 14, marking one of the most significant expansions of the Universal Immunisation Programme in recent years. The decision arrives at a particularly charged global moment — the United States is witnessing a measles epidemic across 26 states largely attributed to anti-vaccination sentiment, and globally, vaccine hesitancy has emerged as a critical public health threat identified by the World Health Organization.

The announcement carries immense significance for India because cervical cancer remains the second most common cancer among Indian women, with the country accounting for over 65 percent of the disease burden in the entire South-East Asia region as classified by the WHO. In 2022 alone, India recorded an estimated 127,526 new cervical cancer cases and 79,906 deaths — numbers that place this not merely as a health statistic but as a governance failure requiring urgent policy intervention.

For UPSC aspirants, this development sits at the intersection of public health policy, constitutional obligations under Article 21 (right to health as part of right to life), gender equity, federalism in healthcare delivery, and India’s commitment to Sustainable Development Goal 3 on good health and well-being. The programme also invites scrutiny of India’s troubled past with clinical trials for this very vaccine, demanding that any policy discussion be grounded in both scientific evidence and institutional accountability.

Background and Context of HPV and Cervical Cancer in India

Five Important Key Points

• HPV types 16 and 18 together account for more than 80 percent of all cervical cancer cases in India, and adequate evidence confirms that these cancers are largely preventable through timely vaccination and regular screening.
• India’s national screening coverage for cervical cancer remains alarmingly low at 1.9 percent among women aged 30 to 49, which means the overwhelming majority of cases are detected at late, less treatable stages.
• The WHO recommends a single-dose HPV vaccination schedule, which India has adopted, making the programme administratively simpler and more cost-effective to implement at scale.
• In 2009 to 2010, an HPV vaccine trial in Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat resulted in the deaths of seven girls, and while the ICMR investigation concluded that the deaths were most probably unrelated to the vaccine, it flagged inadequate monitoring of adverse events as a serious systemic concern.
• Over 90 countries globally have already implemented single-dose HPV vaccination schedules, with several demonstrating substantial reductions in HPV infection rates, precancerous lesions, and cervical cancer incidence.

Historical and Legislative Background of Immunisation Policy in India

India’s immunisation programme traces its origins to the Expanded Programme on Immunisation launched in 1978 under the influence of the WHO’s global initiative. Over decades, the programme evolved into the Universal Immunisation Programme in 1985, and subsequently expanded under the National Health Mission. However, the inclusion of new vaccines has historically been contested terrain, involving debates between scientific merit, cost considerations, global pharmaceutical interests, and domestic manufacturing capacities.

The HPV vaccine was first approved globally in 2006 and had been recommended for inclusion in India’s national programme multiple times, but was deferred each time due to the controversy surrounding the 2009 to 2010 trials and subsequent parliamentary scrutiny. The Parliamentary Standing Committee had, in 2012, sharply criticised the manner in which the trials were conducted, noting violations of ethical guidelines and informed consent norms, raising fundamental questions about the regulatory framework governing clinical trials in India.

The current announcement, therefore, is not merely a health decision but a political and institutional one — signalling that the scientific consensus, bolstered by two decades of global data and WHO endorsement, has finally overcome the bureaucratic and political hesitancy that had kept India behind the curve.

Constitutional and Legal Framework: Right to Health and State Obligations

The Constitution of India does not explicitly mention the right to health as a fundamental right, but the Supreme Court of India has consistently read it as an essential component of the right to life guaranteed under Article 21. In Consumer Education and Research Centre vs Union of India (1995), the Court held that the right to health is integral to the right to meaningful life with dignity. The Directive Principles of State Policy, particularly Articles 39(e), 41, 42, and 47, place the obligation on the state to raise the level of nutrition and standard of living and to improve public health.

Specifically, Article 47 mandates the state to regard the raising of the level of nutrition and the standard of living of its people and improvement of public health as among its primary duties. The HPV vaccination programme, therefore, is not merely a policy choice but a constitutional obligation. Its rollout at government health facilities with trained medical officers and skilled healthcare teams reflects the state’s attempt to operationalise this constitutional duty.

The Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940, and the New Drugs and Clinical Trials Rules, 2019, provide the regulatory framework governing vaccine approvals and post-market surveillance. Given India’s past experience with the HPV trials, rigorous adherence to these rules, particularly the monitoring of adverse events following immunisation (AEFI), is not optional — it is a non-negotiable institutional responsibility.

Epidemiological and Economic Dimensions

Cervical cancer is one of the most economically preventable diseases. The cost of treating late-stage cervical cancer is dramatically higher than the cost of prevention through vaccination and screening. Studies have shown that countries which achieved high HPV vaccination coverage witnessed a reduction in healthcare expenditure on gynaecological oncology within a decade, making this not merely a health investment but a fiscal one.

India’s disease burden is particularly acute given the demographic structure of the target population. A large cohort of adolescent girls currently passes through the age of 14 every year, and given the country’s pyramidal population structure, the near-term immunisation dividend — in terms of reduced cervical cancer incidence over the next two to three decades — could be substantial.

The programme’s limitation to government health facilities helps contain costs while ensuring quality control. However, this also means that the programme’s reach will depend entirely on the performance of the public health infrastructure, which remains uneven across states. Northern states with weaker health systems may see lower uptake than southern states with stronger institutional capacity.

Institutional Concerns: Learning from the 2009 Trial Controversy

The ghost of the 2009 to 2010 trials continues to be relevant. The deaths of seven girls, even if ultimately attributed to causes unrelated to the vaccine, revealed systemic failures: inadequate informed consent procedures, absence of robust AEFI monitoring, and insufficient institutional oversight by state health departments and ethics committees. The Parliamentary Standing Committee’s report was damning in its criticism of both the Department of Biotechnology and PATH, the international NGO involved in the trials.

For the current programme, the government’s decision to restrict administration to designated government health facilities, in the presence of trained medical officers, with skilled teams equipped for post-vaccination observation, directly addresses the AEFI gap identified in the trials. This structural safeguard is a meaningful institutional learning. However, independent oversight mechanisms, transparent reporting of any adverse events, and public disclosure of AEFI data remain essential to sustaining public trust.

Social and Gender Equity Dimensions

HPV vaccination is inherently a gender-targeted intervention, designed to protect girls and women from a cancer caused by a sexually transmitted infection. This raises complex questions in a society where adolescent girls’ health is frequently deprioritised, where menstruation remains stigmatised, and where parents may resist vaccination programmes linked to sexual health.

The programme’s success will depend significantly on community sensitisation — engaging parents, teachers, school health workers, and local health functionaries. States that have successfully implemented the Kishori Shakti Yojana, the Scheme for Adolescent Girls, or the POSHAN Abhiyaan at the community level possess institutional channels through which vaccine awareness can be effectively communicated.

India must also address the disparity in cervical cancer outcomes between urban and rural women. Rural women face compounded risks: lower likelihood of vaccination, minimal access to screening, and delayed diagnosis due to poor healthcare access. The programme’s design must account for this structural inequality.

Global Benchmarks and Comparative Analysis

Australia became one of the first countries to implement universal HPV vaccination and has dramatically reduced cervical cancer incidence to the point where it is expected to become the first country to eliminate cervical cancer as a public health problem by 2035. Rwanda, one of the first developing countries to implement national HPV vaccination, achieved over 93 percent coverage within three years. Both examples demonstrate that scale and sustainability of impact depend on robust health delivery systems, community engagement, and consistent political will.

For India, the lesson is that the vaccine is only the first step. Without expanding cervical cancer screening infrastructure, improving diagnostic capacity in district hospitals, and creating referral pathways for treatment, the vaccination programme alone cannot eliminate the disease.

Way Forward

The government must establish a real-time, publicly accessible AEFI reporting and monitoring dashboard, managed by the Indian Council of Medical Research in collaboration with state health departments, to ensure that any adverse events are immediately investigated and transparently communicated. Vaccination must be accompanied by a parallel campaign to expand cervical cancer screening through community health workers and Ayushman Bharat Health and Wellness Centres. The curriculum of medical and nursing colleges must include updated modules on HPV vaccination administration and AEFI management. Parliament should consider amending the Clinical Establishments Act to mandate AEFI reporting by all registered health facilities as a compliance criterion.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is relevant for UPSC GS-II under the subheading of Health, Education, Human Resources; Government Policies and Interventions; Issues Relating to Development and Management of Social Sector. It is also relevant for the Essay paper under themes of gender equity, public health governance, and the interface of science and policy. For SSC examinations, it falls under general awareness topics covering government health schemes, constitutional provisions, and science and technology developments.

Key terms aspirants must remember: Universal Immunisation Programme, Human Papillomavirus, AEFI, single-dose vaccine schedule, Article 47 of the Constitution, New Drugs and Clinical Trials Rules 2019, Cervical Cancer Elimination Initiative, WHO SEARO burden.

The Supreme Court’s decision to refer to a Constitution Bench the petitions challenging the amendment to the Right to Information (RTI) Act through Section 44(3) of the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act, 2023, marks a critical moment in India’s evolving jurisprudence on the balance between privacy and transparency. Section 44(3) of the DPDP Act amends Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act to provide blanket exemption to personal information without the earlier public interest override that permitted disclosure if it served a larger public purpose. Critics argue that this amendment fundamentally weakens the RTI Act, shields public officials from scrutiny, and undermines anti-corruption efforts.

Five Important Key Points

• Section 44(3) of the DPDP Act, 2023, amends Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act, 2005, by removing the public interest exception that previously allowed disclosure of personal information when it served larger public interest.
• The Supreme Court in Puttaswamy (2017) recognised the right to privacy as a fundamental right under Article 21, which the DPDP Act seeks to protect, while the RTI Act protects the fundamental right to information derived from Articles 19 and 21.
• The Constitution Bench referral reflects the Supreme Court’s recognition of the constitutional sensitivity of the balance between privacy and transparency.
• Previously, personal assets and liabilities of public servants declared to the government could be disclosed under RTI if it served public interest in anti-corruption investigations; the amendment now bars such disclosure.
• The amendment enables rejection of requests concerning procurement records, audit reports, or public spending if framed as personal information, severely restricting accountability mechanisms.

Background: The RTI Act and Its Role in Governance

The Right to Information Act, 2005, is one of India’s most transformative governance reforms. It operationalised the fundamental right to information derived from the Supreme Court’s interpretation of Article 19(1)(a) and Article 21. By empowering citizens to seek information from public authorities, the RTI Act has been instrumental in exposing corruption, improving administrative efficiency, and strengthening public accountability.

Section 8(1)(j) of the RTI Act had a carefully crafted exemption for personal information whose disclosure would constitute unwarranted invasion of privacy. However, this exemption was qualified by the important proviso that information must be disclosed if the appropriate authority was satisfied that larger public interest justified disclosure. This balance between privacy and transparency was the cornerstone of the RTI Act’s effectiveness as an anti-corruption tool.

The DPDP Act: An Overview

The Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023, was enacted to create a comprehensive legal framework for the protection of personal data in the digital age. It follows the Supreme Court’s directive in the Puttaswamy judgment (Justice K.S. Puttaswamy vs Union of India, 2017) to establish a data protection regime. The Act creates obligations for data fiduciaries (entities processing data), establishes rights for data principals (individuals whose data is processed), and creates a Data Protection Board for adjudication.

The DPDP Act is broadly modelled on global data protection frameworks such as the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), though with significant differences in its scope and enforcement mechanisms. While the objective of protecting citizen data is laudable, the manner in which Section 44(3) amends the RTI Act has generated serious concerns about collateral damage to accountability and transparency.

Constitutional Tensions: Privacy vs. Transparency

The constitutional question before the Constitution Bench is fundamentally one of balancing two facets of fundamental rights. The right to privacy under Article 21, as elaborated in Puttaswamy (2017), is not absolute. It is subject to the proportionality test, which requires that any restriction on privacy must be legally justified, serve a legitimate aim, be necessary and proportionate to achieve that aim, and include procedural safeguards.

The right to information, derived from Article 19(1)(a) (freedom of speech and expression) and Article 21, is equally fundamental. The Supreme Court has in multiple cases including Dinesh Trivedi vs Union of India (1997) and PUCL vs Union of India (2003) recognised that access to government information is integral to democratic functioning.

The blanket exemption created by Section 44(3) fails the proportionality test because it does not distinguish between genuinely private personal information and information about the discharge of public duties by public officials. A blanket bar on disclosing any personal information, including the assets and liabilities of public servants, is disproportionate to the legitimate aim of protecting privacy.

Anti-Corruption Implications

The practical impact of Section 44(3) on anti-corruption efforts is significant and direct. Under the earlier framework, RTI requests asking for details of a government official’s declared assets, procurement decisions, tender evaluations, or audit reports could be granted if the Public Information Officer determined that larger public interest was served. This enabled civil society organisations, journalists, and opposition parties to investigate corruption, misuse of public funds, and irregularities in government contracting.

Under the amended provision, any information that can be characterised as personal information may be withheld without the public interest override. This creates a perverse situation where the DPDP Act, ostensibly enacted to protect citizen data, actually ends up protecting the data of public officials from citizens’ scrutiny.

The Way Forward

The Constitution Bench’s deliberations should result in guidelines clearly distinguishing between private personal information (which deserves strong protection) and information about the discharge of public functions by public officials (which must remain accessible in the public interest). The amendment of Section 8(1)(j) through the DPDP Act should ideally be repealed and replaced with a nuanced provision that retains the public interest override for information related to the exercise of public functions. Parliament should be persuaded to revisit the DPDP Act’s impact on the RTI Act through a consultative process involving civil society, information commissioners, and legal experts.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is highly relevant for UPSC Mains GS-II (Polity and Governance) covering RTI Act, fundamental rights, privacy, and transparency. The Puttaswamy judgment, DPDP Act, and the RTI Act are all standard examination topics. Questions on the balance between privacy and transparency, the role of information in democratic governance, and constitutional provisions relating to fundamental rights are regularly asked. For SSC examinations, questions on the RTI Act, its sections, and key provisions frequently appear. Aspirants should understand the constitutional basis of both the right to privacy and the right to information, and the judicial interpretation that has shaped both.

The successive failures of the Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) have prompted the constitution of a high-level committee including former Principal Scientific Adviser K. Vijay Raghavan and former ISRO Chairman S. Somanath to investigate systemic organisational and process issues underlying the back-to-back mishaps. The PSLV-C61 failed on May 18, 2025, due to a third-stage ignition failure, destroying the EOS-09 strategic satellite. The PSLV-C62 repeated the same failure on January 12, 2026. This is the first time that an external committee has been constituted to investigate organisational and not merely technical failures at ISRO, marking a significant moment in India’s space governance.

Five Important Key Points

• Both PSLV-C61 (May 2025) and PSLV-C62 (January 2026) failed due to third-stage ignition failures, raising concerns about quality control in component manufacture, procurement, and assembly.
• The new high-level committee consists of experts external to ISRO and is expected to submit its findings to ISRO Chairman V. Narayanan before April 2026.
• National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, also a member of India’s Space Commission, visited the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre in connection with the PSLV-C62 failure, indicating strategic significance.
• The Failure Analysis Committee report on PSLV-C61 was sent to the Prime Minister’s Office but has not been made public, raising transparency concerns.
• India’s space ecosystem now involves multiple private companies, making accountability frameworks more complex than in ISRO’s earlier purely public sector era.

Background: The PSLV’s Role and Significance

The PSLV is ISRO’s most reliable workhorse launch vehicle, having successfully completed over 55 missions including the historic launch of 104 satellites in a single flight in 2017. It has been the backbone of India’s commercial launch business, placing satellites for foreign customers and enabling India’s own remote sensing, navigation, and strategic satellite programmes. The EOS-09 satellite destroyed in the PSLV-C61 failure was intended to serve the government’s strategic remote sensing needs, making its loss operationally significant beyond the financial cost.

The consecutive failures are unprecedented in PSLV’s history and represent a serious setback for India’s ambitions in the global commercial launch market, a market being actively contested by SpaceX’s Falcon 9, Arianespace, and now China’s commercial launch providers.

The Nature of the Probe: Organisational Not Just Technical

What makes this probe qualitatively different from previous Failure Analysis Committees is its organisational scope. Previous committees have focused on technical root cause analysis, identifying which component failed and why. The new committee has been tasked with examining whether organisational problems, including issues in manufacturing processes, procurement systems, quality assurance mechanisms, and accountability frameworks, contributed to the failures.

This shift in approach reflects a mature understanding that technological failures in complex systems are rarely purely technical in origin. They often reflect deeper organisational pathologies, including communication failures between departments, inadequate quality control checks, procurement shortcuts, and diffused accountability in multi-agency or multi-company supply chains.

With India’s space ecosystem now involving private companies under the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe) framework established in 2020, the probe will also need to examine how accountability is maintained when private suppliers are involved in critical component manufacture or assembly.

Constitutional and Governance Dimensions

Space activities in India are governed under the Space Activities Bill, which has been pending parliamentary approval for several years. The absence of a comprehensive legal framework for space activities creates gaps in accountability, liability, and oversight that become particularly visible when failures occur. The probe committee’s findings may provide important inputs for finalising and enacting a comprehensive Space Activities Act.

The Department of Space, which oversees ISRO, functions under the Prime Minister’s Office, reflecting the strategic importance of space programmes for national security, economic development, and scientific advancement. The constitution of a committee at the initiative of the NSA and the Space Commission signals that the failures are being viewed not just as technical setbacks but as potential vulnerabilities in India’s strategic capabilities.

Economic and Strategic Implications

India’s commercial space launch market aspirations depend heavily on PSLV’s demonstrated reliability. Two consecutive failures significantly damage India’s credibility with foreign satellite customers, who can choose from multiple reliable international launch providers. ISRO’s commercial arm, NewSpace India Limited (NSIL), has contracts with international customers that may be affected.

More critically, the destruction of EOS-09, intended for strategic remote sensing, creates a capability gap in India’s surveillance and earth observation infrastructure that has security implications. Filling this gap requires a successful PSLV mission or an accelerated timeline for ISRO’s next-generation launch vehicles.

The investment in India’s Small Satellite Launch Vehicle (SSLV) and the Gaganyaan human spaceflight programme may also be affected if fundamental quality control issues are found to be systemic across ISRO’s launch vehicle programmes.

Transparency and Public Accountability

A major governance concern highlighted by this episode is the lack of public disclosure of Failure Analysis Committee reports. In contrast to NASA’s Challenger and Columbia disaster investigation reports, which were published in full and became important documents for aerospace safety globally, ISRO’s failure reports are kept confidential. The PSLV-C61 Failure Analysis Committee report was sent to the Prime Minister’s Office but not publicly released before the PSLV-C62 launch, raising questions about whether findings were adequately acted upon.

Greater transparency in failure investigation processes would not only improve public accountability but also contribute to the global aerospace knowledge base, enhancing India’s standing in the international space community.

Way Forward

The committee’s findings should be acted upon promptly and its recommendations implemented before the next PSLV launch. ISRO should establish a permanent, standing quality assurance board with external independent members to conduct ongoing reviews of manufacturing, procurement, and assembly processes. A comprehensive Space Activities Act should be enacted to establish clear accountability frameworks. ISRO should also consider publishing summary findings of failure analysis reports to improve institutional credibility and public trust.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is directly relevant for UPSC Prelims under Science and Technology and for Mains GS-III covering Space Technology, ISRO missions, and Science and Technology governance. Questions on PSLV, ISRO’s launch vehicle portfolio, IN-SPACe, NewSpace India Limited, and India’s space policy frequently appear in both Prelims and Mains examinations. For the Essay paper, themes of institutional accountability and transparency in public sector organisations are relevant. SSC aspirants should note ISRO’s organisational structure, key missions, and India’s space programme milestones.

India’s global trade strategy has undergone a fundamental transformation in 2025 and early 2026. The signing of the India-EU Free Trade Agreement on January 27, 2026, described as historic by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, and the interim India-U.S. trade framework signed in February 2026, have positioned India as a proactive player in global trade architecture. Simultaneously, U.S. President Donald Trump’s Agreements on Reciprocal Trade (ARTs) with multiple countries, including Bangladesh, El Salvador, Argentina, Malaysia, and Cambodia, have created a new and legally controversial category of trade agreement that is not anchored in the WTO framework, raising serious questions about trade multilateralism and India’s negotiating position.

Five Important Key Points

• The India-EU FTA, signed after nearly two decades of negotiations, creates a free trade zone covering approximately two billion people, reducing or eliminating tariffs on over 90% of traded goods.
• Trump’s ARTs are distinct from WTO-compatible FTAs because they are not notified to the WTO under Article XXIV of GATT, making them legally suspicious under international trade law.
• India’s FTA network is projected to cover nearly 71% of its total export basket by 2026, up dramatically from approximately 22% in 2019.
• The India-U.S. interim framework prioritises strategic collaboration in rare earths and semiconductors alongside progressive tariff reduction.
• ARTs contain one-sided provisions, including clauses requiring partner countries to adopt complementary trade restrictions if the U.S. adopts protectionist measures, effectively tying partners’ trade policy to U.S. decisions.

Background: India’s Evolving Trade Policy

India’s trade policy for many years was characterised by caution, protectionism, and a preference for engaging primarily with economies at similar levels of development. India opted out of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) in 2019, citing concerns about Chinese import surges, intellectual property provisions, and insufficient market access for Indian services exports. This decision was controversial but reflected India’s determination to protect domestic manufacturing and agriculture.

Since then, India has pivoted dramatically toward a more proactive trade strategy. The India-UAE Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) was signed in 2022, followed by a FTA with Australia in 2022. Negotiations with the UK, which have been ongoing for years, are expected to conclude soon. The 2023 update of India’s Foreign Trade Policy set an ambitious target of reaching $2 trillion in total exports (merchandise plus services) by 2030. In FY 2024-25, India’s total exports reached $825.25 billion, reflecting a 6.05% annual increase.

The India-EU FTA: A Transformative Agreement

The India-EU FTA is arguably the most significant trade agreement in India’s history. The EU is India’s largest trading partner collectively, and the agreement opens the doors to preferential access to a market of approximately 450 million high-income consumers. The reduction or elimination of tariffs on Indian textiles, leather, pharmaceuticals, chemicals, and marine products will significantly enhance India’s export competitiveness against Bangladesh and Vietnam, which already enjoy preferential access to European markets under the Generalised System of Preferences.

For the pharmaceutical sector, the removal of tariffs and strengthened regulatory cooperation is particularly important. Indian pharmaceutical companies, which are already major suppliers to European generic markets, stand to gain substantially from reduced entry barriers.

The FTA is also expected to boost digital trade, attract European investment into Indian manufacturing under the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme framework, and accelerate India’s integration into global value chains in high-technology sectors.

U.S. ARTs: A Legally Controversial Innovation

Trump’s ARTs represent a fundamentally different approach to trade agreements compared to WTO-compatible FTAs. Traditional FTAs, notified to the WTO under Article XXIV of GATT, are subject to specific disciplines. They must cover substantially all trade between the parties, they cannot raise barriers to trade with non-members, and they are subject to scrutiny by the WTO Committee on Regional Trade Agreements. This transparency and conditionality serves as a check against discriminatory trade arrangements that could undermine multilateralism.

ARTs, by contrast, are not notified to the WTO. They are essentially bilateral arrangements where the U.S. leverages its market size and, in several cases, the threat of tariffs to extract concessions from partner countries. The clause in the U.S.-Bangladesh ART requiring Bangladesh to adopt complementary trade restrictions when the U.S. acts on economic or national security grounds effectively turns Bangladesh into an instrument of U.S. trade policy. Similarly, the prohibition on customs duties on electronic transactions in the U.S.-El Salvador ART restricts El Salvador’s data sovereignty.

These provisions reveal the imperial character of ARTs, which are designed not to promote mutual liberalisation but to entrench U.S. strategic and economic interests through trade law.

India’s Position and Implications

The interim India-U.S. trade framework announced in February 2026 has elements of both traditional FTA negotiations and ART-style reciprocity demands. It includes progressive tariff reductions and strategic collaboration on semiconductors and rare earths. The collaboration on critical minerals and semiconductors aligns with India’s efforts to build domestic semiconductor manufacturing capacity through the India Semiconductor Mission.

India must carefully evaluate whether the interim framework’s provisions protect India’s policy space for agricultural support, domestic manufacturing incentives under PLI schemes, and data localisation requirements. A full bilateral trade agreement with the U.S. that includes ART-style provisions restricting India’s policy autonomy would be detrimental to India’s economic sovereignty.

Economic Implications for India

India’s FTA strategy, if implemented effectively, has the potential to transform its export trajectory. The EU FTA alone is expected to generate significant gains in labour-intensive sectors, helping integrate micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) into global value chains. For services exports, where India has a strong comparative advantage, the agreements provide new opportunities in professional services, IT, and financial services.

However, the risk of tariff liberalisation leading to import surges in sensitive sectors, particularly agriculture and dairy, must be carefully managed through appropriate safeguard mechanisms. India’s experience with RCEP negotiations revealed the political economy constraints on comprehensive FTAs, and these lessons must inform the approach to agreements with the U.S. and the EU.

Way Forward

India should champion the reform of WTO dispute settlement mechanisms, which have been weakened by U.S. blocking of Appellate Body appointments. India should build coalitions with other developing countries to resist ARTs that undermine multilateralism. At the same time, India should leverage its new FTAs to develop competitive supply chains in textiles, pharmaceuticals, electronics, and food processing.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is critical for UPSC Mains GS-III (Economy) covering international trade, WTO, FTAs, and India’s trade policy. GS-II questions on India-EU relations and India-U.S. bilateral ties are also directly relevant. For SSC examinations, questions on India’s export policy, WTO, GATT, and bilateral trade agreements frequently appear. Aspirants should understand Article XXIV of GATT, the difference between FTAs and customs unions, and India’s export targets under the Foreign Trade Policy 2023.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s two-day standalone visit to Israel on February 25 and 26, 2026, is India’s most significant diplomatic engagement with West Asia in recent years. This is Mr. Modi’s second visit to Israel, coming against the backdrop of a fragile ceasefire in Gaza, growing U.S.-Iran tensions, India’s recently concluded trade agreements with the EU and the U.S., and Israel Prime Minister Netanyahu’s announcement of a proposed hexagonal alliance involving India, Greece, Cyprus, and Arab, African, and Asian nations. The visit has profound implications for India’s defence procurement, technology cooperation, trade relations, the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC), and India’s traditionally balanced foreign policy in West Asia.

Five Important Key Points

• The visit is standalone, with no engagement with Palestinian Authority leadership, reflecting India’s successful de-hyphenation of its Israel engagement from its Palestinian policy.
• Key agenda items include defence cooperation (including Iron Beam laser defence system), AI and technology, labour mobility, and the IMEC project.
• Netanyahu proposed a hexagonal alliance of nations against radical Shia and Sunni axes, which creates diplomatic challenges for India given its deep ties with Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar.
• India’s visit follows the Gaza ceasefire that held since October 2025, but coincides with Israel’s plans to extend control over Palestinian territories in the West Bank, drawing international condemnation.
• India-Israel bilateral trade stood at $3.75 billion in FY2024-25, and negotiations are underway for a Free Trade Agreement, the Terms of Reference for which were signed during Commerce Minister Goyal’s November 2025 visit to Israel.

Background: India-Israel Relations

India recognised Israel in 1950 but maintained a largely distant relationship for decades, driven by solidarity with the Palestinian cause, dependence on Arab oil, and the large Indian Muslim population’s sensitivities. The establishment of full diplomatic relations in 1992 marked the beginning of a transformation. Since then, and particularly after Prime Minister Modi’s historic first visit to Israel in July 2017 (the first ever by an Indian Prime Minister), the relationship has deepened substantially into a strategic partnership.

Israel has been India’s largest defence supplier in terms of arms exports, accounting for approximately 34% of Israel’s total arms exports between 2020 and 2024 according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). Joint development projects such as the Barak-8 air and missile defence system exemplify the depth of defence cooperation.

Convergence on Defence and Security

India’s experience during Operation Sindoor in May 2025 underlined the strategic necessity of a robust, multi-layered air defence system. The Iron Beam, a 100 kW-class high-energy laser system capable of intercepting drones, rockets, and mortars at low per-shot costs, has emerged as a priority for India’s Mission Sudarshan Chakra, aimed at creating an impregnable air defence shield. The Modi visit is expected to advance procurement and co-production discussions on the Iron Beam.

The logic of India-Israel defence convergence is compelling. Both nations face asymmetric threats from non-state actors, both have invested heavily in drone technology and counter-drone capabilities, and both share intelligence on terrorist networks. The November 2025 agreement on deepening cooperation in defence industry and technology, including sharing of advanced systems, provides the framework for further integration during this visit.

The Hexagonal Alliance Proposal and India’s Dilemma

Netanyahu’s announcement of a hexagonal alliance against what he called the radical Shia axis and the emerging radical Sunni axis places India in an uncomfortable diplomatic position. India’s foreign policy is built on strategic autonomy, non-alignment with military blocs, and maintaining balanced relationships with all major powers.

Iran is a critical partner for India in multiple dimensions. The Chabahar port in Iran provides India’s most strategic connectivity corridor to Afghanistan and Central Asia, bypassing Pakistan. India has historically imported Iranian oil, and Iran’s geographic position makes it indispensable for India’s energy security and connectivity goals. India is also expected to host the BRICS summit later in 2026, where Iranian President Pezeshkian will be invited.

Joining any alliance framed explicitly against Iran would fundamentally compromise India’s Chabahar strategy, its energy diversification goals, and its role as a neutral facilitator in the region. The Ministry of External Affairs is likely to clearly signal that India endorses stronger bilateral ties with Israel without endorsing any multilateral alliance framework targeting specific nations.

The IMEC and Economic Dimensions

The India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, announced at the G-20 Summit in New Delhi in September 2023, is a transformative infrastructure project linking India to Europe through the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Israel. The Gaza conflict temporarily stalled the initiative, but with the ceasefire holding, there is renewed momentum to advance it.

India’s recently concluded FTA with the EU (signed January 27, 2026) and the interim trade framework with the U.S. (February 2026) create powerful incentives for operationalising IMEC, which would provide a shorter, safer alternative to the Suez Canal route for Indian exports to Europe. The signing of the Terms of Reference for a bilateral India-Israel FTA indicates that trade is becoming a more prominent pillar of the relationship alongside defence.

Gaza Peace Process and India’s Role

India’s participation as an observer at the U.S.-led Board of Peace summit on February 19, 2026, signals a cautious engagement with the Gaza reconstruction process without committing troops or taking sides. India’s historic recognition of Palestine on November 18, 1988, and its consistent support for a two-state solution place it in a morally complex position during a visit that makes no provision for meeting Palestinian Authority leadership.

India’s delayed signing of the UN statement signed by 100 countries criticising Israel’s violations of international law over West Bank expansion plans has raised questions about the consistency of Indian foreign policy. The government’s explanation that the statement was not jointly negotiated has not fully satisfied observers.

Way Forward

India’s West Asia policy must evolve to reflect the region’s increasing complexity. A clear, publicly articulated framework distinguishing bilateral partnerships from multilateral alliance commitments would help India maintain its credibility as a neutral actor. Deepening defence, technology, and trade ties with Israel while maintaining transparent engagement with Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the Palestinian Authority is achievable but requires careful diplomatic management.

Relevance for UPSC and SSC Examinations

This topic is ideal for UPSC Mains GS-II (International Relations), covering India’s foreign policy, India-Israel relations, West Asian diplomacy, and strategic autonomy. Questions on IMEC, India’s de-hyphenation policy, and India’s relationship with Israel and Palestine are examination-ready. For UPSC Essay, themes of India’s strategic autonomy in a multipolar world are directly relevant. SSC aspirants should note India’s recognition of Israel, SIPRI data on arms exports, and the IMEC project.