On May 12, 2026, the fifth meeting of the Informal Group of Ministers (IGoM), chaired by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh at Kartavya Bhavan, was convened to assess India’s economic resilience in the face of the escalating West Asia conflict. The government assured that India holds 60 days of crude oil reserves, 60 days of natural…
On May 12, 2026, the Union government officially notified that from July 1, 2026, all rules, notifications, schemes, orders, and guidelines made under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005 (MGNREGA) will stand repealed. In their place, the Viksit Bharat — Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin), or VB-G RAM G Act,…
Delhi and the National Capital Region are experiencing longer, more intense, and more dangerous heatwaves, with urban temperatures consistently exceeding natural seasonal averages due to the compounding effect of rapid urbanisation, concrete-heavy infrastructure, declining green cover, and increasing waste heat from air conditioning and vehicular traffic. The phenomenon, described by urban climate scientists as a…
The Union Labour Ministry’s announcement of free annual health check-ups for workers aged 40 years and above, to be implemented through the Employees’ State Insurance Corporation under provisions of the new Labour Codes, represents a significant if long-overdue step toward formal occupational health protection for India’s large organised sector workforce. The programme builds on an…
A landmark multi-centric study published in Nature Medicine on April 6, 2026, has fundamentally advanced scientific understanding of how psychedelic substances affect the brain. Researchers from Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States pooled 11 global datasets comprising 500 functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging scans, including 267 subjects under the influence of LSD, psilocybin, DMT,…
The announcement of the Korea-India Defence Accelerator, known as KIND-X, at the India-South Korea Summit on April 20, 2026, between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, represents a significant evolution in the bilateral defence relationship that has been building since formal diplomatic ties were established in 1973. KIND-X is designed…
India’s economic policy discourse in May 2026 has been marked by a striking contradiction. The Confederation of Indian Industry reported that private sector capital expenditure grew by 67 percent to Rs 7.7 lakh crore in September 2025 compared to the same period in 2024, signalling what CII’s director-general described as the most important indicator yet…
The swearing-in of C. Joseph Vijay as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu on May 10, 2026, following the Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam’s historic electoral debut, has reignited one of the most persistent constitutional controversies in Indian federalism: the role of the Governor in government formation after a hung assembly verdict. Governor Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar’s insistence on…
A major scientific survey published in 2026 has revealed an “alarming gap” in biodiversity across India’s Western Ghats, one of the world’s 36 biodiversity hotspots and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Researchers were able to document only approximately 65 percent of the dragonfly and damselfly (collectively: odonata) species historically recorded in the region, suggesting a…
The Delhi government has declared approximately 673.32 hectares of the Central Ridge area as a “reserved forest” under Section 20 of the Indian Forest Act of 1927 — a decision approved by Lieutenant-Governor Taranjit Singh Sandhu and Chief Minister Rekha Gupta. This declaration has been described as completing “an important process that had remained pending…