{GS2 – Governance } Five Years of e-Shram Portal *

• Context (PIB): Since its launch in August 2021, the e-Shram portal has evolved into a centralized platform that integrates welfare schemes, employment services, and social security coverage for India’s unorganized workforce.

About e-Shram Portal

• e-Shram Portal is India’s first Aadhaar-authenticated National Database of Unorganized Workers (NDUW) under the Ministry of Labour & Employment.
• Identifier: Provides every registered worker with a unique 12-digit Universal Account Number (UAN) for seamless nationwide portability of social security benefits.
• Objective: Centralize worker data to ensure nationwide convergence, portability, and the delivery of social security and crisis relief.
• Eligibility: Exclusively covers unorganized workers (gig, migrant, agricultural, etc.) aged 16 to 59 who are neither income-tax payers nor members of EPFO/ESIC.
• Integration: e-Shram One-Stop Solution, launched in 2024, integrates 15 social security and welfare schemes into a single digital platform.
• Insurance Linkage: Registrants can enroll in PMSBY (accident insurance), PMJJBY (life insurance), and PM-SYM (assured minimum pension).
• Total registrations: 31.89 crore; women account for 54.28%. Agriculture, Domestic and Household Workers, Construction, and Apparel have the highest registrations.

Read More> Unified National Employment Framework: Need & Challenges

{GS2 – IR} India’s Central Asia Strategy **

• Context (IE): PM Modi’s visit to Uzbekistan and participation in the SCO summit in Kyrgyzstan renewed debate on shifting India’s Central Asia policy from historical romance to strategic realism.

Key Pillars of India’s Strategy

• Multimodal Connectivity: Alternative access routes via Iran’s Chabahar Port and the multimodal International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) to reach the Central Asian Republics.
• Energy Security: Uranium supplies from Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan and regional hydrocarbon linkages through the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) Pipeline.
• Security Coordination: Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and National Security Advisor dialogues counter cross-border terrorism, religious radicalization, and drug trafficking linked to Afghanistan.
• Development Financing: A $1 billion Line of Credit announced in 2020 supports infrastructure and capacity-building projects across the region.
• Soft Power: ITEC training, scholarships, yoga, Bollywood, and historical Silk Road ties expand cultural diplomacy and people-to-people relations.

Why India Needs a More Realist Approach

• Transit Vulnerability: India lacks direct overland access because Pakistan does not permit transit, while Chabahar and INSTC remain exposed to geopolitical disruptions.
• Trade Asymmetry: India’s $1.5–2 billion bilateral trade volume trails China’s $100 billion commercial footprint driven by BRI infrastructure financing.
• Strategic Autonomy: Central Asian states use C5 and C5+1 diplomatic framework with major powers to pursue multi-vector diplomacy, limiting exclusive Indian influence.
• Shifting Fault Lines: Intra-regional focus shifting from Afghan security to water disputes along the Amu Darya reduces India’s leverage in mediation.
• Resource Security: India relies on Central Asian uranium, rare earths, and natural gas supplies for its clean energy transition and industrial self-reliance.

Pathways for Pragmatic Strategic Realism

• Deploy Digital Stacks: Export low-cost e-governance and UPI architectures to offer sovereign digital infrastructure instead of competing in capital-intensive railway projects.
• Target Technical Training: Expand ITEC-based technical training in skills, banking, and specialized healthcare, where it possesses established capabilities and regional goodwill.
• Pivot Mineral Partnerships: Reduce reliance on high-risk pipelines like TAPI and prioritize direct bilateral supply deals for uranium, lithium, and rare earths.
• Diversify Transit Coalitions: Explore transit cooperation with Türkiye, Azerbaijan, and Pakistan alongside the EU-backed Trans-Caspian Transport Corridor.
• Deepen Defense Cooperation: Reinforce defense sites like the Farkhor facility in Tajikistan and maintain joint exercises such as Exercise DUSTLIK with Uzbekistan.

Read More > India-Central Asia Relations

{GS2 – Polity} Hijab Not an Essential Religious Practice: Allahabad HC *

• Context (IE): Allahabad High Court rejected a schoolgirl’s plea to wear a hijab in school, holding that wearing a headscarf was not an essential religious practice (ERP) protected under Article 25.

• The HC relied on the Karnataka High Court’s 2022 which held that wearing hijab by Muslim women is not part of ERP and a uniform requirement did not violate students’ rights under Articles 14, 15, 19, or 21.

What is ERP?

• It is a judicial test used by Indian courts to determine whether a religious practice is fundamental and integral to a religion and, therefore, deserves constitutional protection under Article 25.
  • The Constitution does not define which religious practices are “essential”; this has been developed through judicial interpretation.
• Constitutional Basis: Articles 25 and 26 guarantee freedom of religion, but these rights are subject to public order, morality, and health.
• Origin of Doctrine: SC formulated the doctrine in 1954 to separate essential religious rituals from secular or administrative activities.
• Integral Test: Courts look at the fundamental tenets, foundational texts, and historical practices of a religion to decide if a custom is core to the faith.
• Example: SC ruled that instant triple talaq was not an essential Islamic practice and struck it down.

Why is the ERP Doctrine Required?

• Prevents Misuse of Article 25: Not every activity associated with religion can claim constitutional protection.
• Balances Fundamental Rights: Helps reconcile religious freedom with equality, dignity and other Fundamental Rights.
• Enables Social Reform: Allows the State to regulate secular activities associated with religious practices.
• Judicial Scrutiny: Provides a framework to distinguish genuinely religious practices from non-essential customs and practices.

Criticisms

• Judicial Overreach: Critics argue judges act like theologians when interpreting religious texts.
• Subjective Standards: There is no fixed standard, leading to inconsistent rulings across different courts.
• Lack of Theological Expertise to interpret complex religious doctrines and scriptures.
• Narrow Approach: It may deny protection to genuine religious practices simply because they are not considered “essential”.
• Individual Autonomy: The doctrine may overlook an individual sincerely held religious beliefs and freedom of conscience.

{GS3 – Envi} Why Indian Cities Flood and Overheat?

• Context (IE): Indian cities are increasingly witnessing two seemingly opposite extremes, severe flooding during intense rainfall and extreme heat during summers.

• However, these are not merely weather-related events. It becomes a disaster as it strikes a place where people, buildings, and public services are exposed and lack the capacity to withstand it.

Factors Behind Indian Cities Becoming More Vulnerable

• Loss of Natural Ecosystems: Lakes, wetlands, floodplains and natural drainage channels are often encroached upon or built over. As concrete replaces permeable soil, rainwater cannot infiltrate the ground, resulting in rapid runoff and urban flooding.
• Urban Heat Island Effect: Dense construction, asphalt surfaces, poor ventilation and declining tree cover cause urban areas to absorb and retain more heat.
  • E.g., Bengaluru’s built-up land rose from 8% (1973) to nearly 74% (2013), while vegetation fell from 68% to under 15%.
• Rapid Urban Expansion: India’s urban population is projected to reach 951 million by 2050, while a large share of the infrastructure required for the future is yet to be built.
• Planning & Institutional Deficits: Inadequate master plans, shortage of qualified urban planners and fragmented institutional responsibilities weaken risk-sensitive urban planning and disaster preparedness.

Socio-Economic Cost of Urban Disasters

• Loss of Livelihoods: Floods and heatwaves disrupt economic activity, particularly affecting informal workers and outdoor workers who may lose wages and working days.
• Damage to Infrastructure: Repeated disasters damage roads, buildings, transport networks and public infrastructure, imposing a significant financial burden on governments and citizens.
• Public Health Burden: Extreme heat and flooding increase the risk of illnesses and other health emergencies, placing additional pressure on healthcare systems.
• Impact on Vulnerable Groups: The poor, elderly, children, residents of poorly ventilated houses and people living in low-lying areas face disproportionately higher risks.
• Economic and Social Disruptions: Small businesses, education, mobility and essential services are disrupted, while the indirect costs of lost productivity and recovery often remain underreported.

Way Forward

• Risk-informed Urban Planning: Integrate flood maps and heat maps into master plans, zoning regulations and building approvals.
• Adopt Nature-Based Solutions: Conserve and restore wetlands, lakes, floodplains, drainage channels and green spaces.
• Strengthen Urban Institutions: Equip urban local bodies and disaster management authorities with qualified planners, technical experts, adequate funds and coordination powers.
• Shift from Relief to Resilience: Prioritise mitigation, prevention and climate-resilient infrastructure, rather than focusing mainly on post-disaster relief.
• Improve Early Warning and Preparedness: Link warnings to pre-decided actions such as changes in outdoor working hours, hospital preparedness, school closures and traffic management.

Read More> Urban Flooding in India

{Prelims – Envi} Datura

• Context (OM): Karnataka suspended the food licenses of three e-commerce companies for listing Datura fruits and seeds as edible products.

• Datura is a genus of highly poisonous, night-blooming plants in the nightshade family (Solanaceae), also known as jimsonweed, devil’s trumpet, or thornapple.
• All parts contain potent tropane alkaloids (primarily scopolamine, atropine, and hyoscyamine) that can cause severe delirium, toxicity, and death if ingested.
• Range: Thrives in warm tropical and temperate climates on well-drained, alkaline soil; abundant across most of India as a wild weed.
• Legal Status: Schedule E(1) of the Drugs and Cosmetics Rules, 1945 lists it as a poisonous substance for Ayurvedic, Siddha, and Unani systems; Rule 161(2) mandates a caution label and medical supervision.
• Application: Antispasmodic drugs, sedatives, motion-sickness patches, eye-dilating drops, and Ayurvedic-Unani respiratory and pain care.
• Known as “Shivapriya,” it is offered to Lord Shiva, symbolizing the destruction of ego and toxic traits.

{Prelims – Envi} Guggal Species

• Context (DTE): The two native Guggal species, named Khara Guggal (Commiphora wightii) and Mitha Guggal (Commiphora stocksiana) are being planted in the Gujrat under a Gaucharland (community grazing commons) restoration programme.

• Guggal is a spiny shrub or small tree with many branches, usually growing two or three meters high, that is native to India, Arabia and Pakistan.
• It is found in the arid, rocky tracts of Rajasthan, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka in India.

Primary Guggal Species

{Prelims – Geo} Waterspout

• Context (IT): A waterspout was documented over the Brahmaputra River in Assam’s Barpeta district.

• Waterspout is a funnel-shaped rotating column of air over water, usually connected to an overlying cumulus or cumulonimbus cloud. The visible funnel contains condensed atmospheric water droplets from low pressure, not sucked-up river water.
• Formation Mechanism: Warm surface water rapidly heats the air above it, causing the air to rise, form a low-pressure zone, and rotate due to wind shear.

• Favorable Conditions: High lower-level humidity, warm surface temperatures, and significant vertical temperature gradients.
• Types:
  1. Tornadic: Destructive extensions of severe thunderstorms.
  2. Fair-weather: Form under calm conditions from developing clouds.
• Global Hotspots: Tropical and subtropical areas like Florida Keys, Gulf of Mexico, and Mediterranean Sea.
  • In India, they occur occasionally over the Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal, and Brahmaputra River system.

{Prelims – IS} Central Bureau of Narcotics

• Context (PIB): Central Bureau of Narcotics (CBN) seized 18.64 kg of crude heroin near Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, in Operation Black Hawk.

• CBN is a subordinate regulatory and law enforcement agency under the Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance. It was formalized in 1950 and is headquartered in Gwalior (shifted from Shimla in 1960).
• Derives authority from the NDPS Act, 1985, and is headed by the Narcotics Commissioner of India.
• Functions: Holds exclusive rights to license farmers, supervise cultivation, and procure opium in the notified districts (MP, Rajasthan, UP); issues NOCs for precursor chemical imports and exports to prevent diversion into illicit drug manufacturing.
• It interacts with the Vienna-based International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) to fulfill India’s reporting obligations under three UN drug control conventions.

{Prelims – IR} UN Initiative to Protect Victims of Terrorism from Online Harm

• Context (UN): A new victim-led initiative to protect victims of terrorist attacks from online harm and re-traumatisation by the Victims of Terrorism Associations Network (VoTAN).

• It was launched on the International Day of Remembrance of and Tribute to the Victims of Terrorism.
• It aims to protect victims & survivors from online harm, prevent the misuse & manipulation of victims’ stories, address fake & misleading digital content & prevent re-traumatisation through online platforms.

{Prelims – Initiatives} Jago

• Context (PIB): Ministry of Tribal Affairs has launched “Jago”, its official AI-powered conversational assistant at the National Conclave on Tribal Languages held in Mysuru.

• Jago has been designed to make information related to tribal welfare schemes, programmes, initiatives and repositories easier to find, understand and access.
• By bringing trusted information from the Ministry onto a single intelligent interface, Jago aims to improve accessibility and make government services more user-friendly for tribal communities and other stakeholders.

{Prelims – IR} Exercise Pitch Black 2026 and Udara Shakti 2026

• Context (PIB): Indian Air Force participated in Pitch Black 2026 and Udara Shakti 2026.

• Pitch Black: Biennial multinational air combat exercise hosted by Royal Australian Air Force in Australia to promote interoperability, combat simulation & regional security. 21 countries joined the 2026 edition.
• Udara Shakti: Bilateral biennial air combat exercise between the IAF and the Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) at Subang, Malaysia. 2026 edition is the 3^rd since its 2022 launch.

{Prelims – Social Sector} Ribociclib

• Context (TH): Kerala High Court intervened in a petition addressing the prohibitive pricing of the drug Ribociclib to widen patient access.

• Ribociclib is a targeted anticancer drug developed to treat aggressive forms of early-stage and metastatic breast cancer. It acts as a CDK4/6 (cyclin-dependent kinase) inhibitor, blocking the proteins that cancer cells use to multiply and divide.
• Prescribed for patients with hormone receptor (HR)-positive, HER2-negative breast cancer and administered alongside standard hormone therapy, not as a standalone treatment.

{Prelims – MeitY} GENESIS EIR 3.0

• Context (PIB): Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) launched the third cohort of the GENESIS Entrepreneur-in-Residence (EIR) programme.

• GENESIS EIR 3.0, part of the Gen-Next Support for Innovative Startups (GENESIS) scheme, aims to accelerate startups, especially in Tier-II and Tier-III cities.
• Nodal Agency: MeitY Startup Hub (MSH), a unified national platform connecting startups, incubators, investors, and government stakeholders.
• Eligibility: Indian citizens with early-stage Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 1–4 innovations; incorporated startups must be under 2 years old with prior funding under ₹10 lakh.
• Support: Milestone-linked grants up to ₹10 lakh, incubation infrastructure, industry networks, mentorship, prototyping, and patent/IP guidance.
• Focus Sectors: Deep-tech domains including AI, IoT, semiconductors, cybersecurity, blockchain, quantum computing, and augmented reality.

{Prelims – Misc} One-Liners

• Sports – Badminton World Federation (BWF) World Championships (TH): India hosted the 30^th edition at the Indira Gandhi Indoor Stadium, New Delhi. France and South Korea won the most gold medals (2 each).
  • India Medal: Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand won a bronze medal in the women’s doubles.