Current affairs — 14 October 2026

Prelims pointers

• Delhi's draft SIR roll contained 97.54 lakh electors; 33.12 lakh were flagged for notices, including 19.33 lakh for logical discrepancies.
• Muslims were estimated at 13.6% of draft-roll electors but accounted for 20.3% of electors flagged for logical discrepancies.
• The analysis found 318 logical-discrepancy flags per 1,000 Muslim electors, compared with 197 per 1,000 non-Muslim electors.
• Among 6.75 lakh electors flagged under five family-size-related reasons, Muslims constituted 30%; the centralised ERONET software selected those flagged.
• The ECI's May 14, 2026 Phase 3 direction first mentioned notices where linkage to the previous electoral roll showed a discrepancy.

Prelims pointers

• WRD and Exnora International are removing the invasive seemai karuvelam, or Prosopis juliflora, from dry tanks along the Palar River.
• About 20 irrigation tanks were identified, and work in six tanks including Thorapadi, Agaramcheri, Kolamangalam and Melmanavur was complete.
• The WRD maintains 101 irrigation tanks in Vellore district; each is described as six metres deep and spread over at least 50 hectares.
• Officials estimated about 15 tonnes of invasive plants per acre and a removal cost of around ₹6 lakh for each tank.
• Excavated plants were sent to paper-making and wood-brick units, while regrowth in the waterbodies was expected after two years.

Prelims pointers

• The October 13, 2026 coalition strikes hit targets in Sanaa and the western Yemeni provinces of Dhamar and Saada.
• The coalition warned civilians before striking a Yemen Petroleum Company facility on the outskirts of Sanaa.
• A strike on Riyadh's international airport on the preceding Saturday killed 13 people and suspended airport operations.
• The Saudi-led coalition has militarily supported Yemen's government against the Houthis since 2015.
• The World Health Organization said suspected cholera cases in Yemen had tripled in three weeks.

Prelims pointers

• Anna Seve enables Karnataka PDS beneficiaries to complete e-KYC without visiting fair price shops or government offices.
• The app was launched on October 1, 2026 and piloted in eight districts before statewide expansion from October 14.
• A total of 1,60,267 beneficiaries used the app for e-KYC in the pilot districts between October 1 and 12.
• Anna Seve was developed with the National Informatics Centre and Karnataka’s Department of e-Governance.
• Of 2,67,64,276 beneficiaries required to complete e-KYC, 2,06,76,278 had done so by October 12; the deadline is October 20.

Prelims pointers

• Kerala State Biodiversity Board launched India’s first State-level Red List Assessment of Ecosystems project.
• The one-year project will assess ecosystem-collapse risks across all 14 districts of Kerala.
• Core habitats will be evaluated against the five standardised criteria of the IUCN Red List of Ecosystems framework.
• Kerala’s tropical riparian evergreen forests have lost 83% of their extent over the past century.
• The project will produce a Risk Register, an Ecosystem Typology Atlas and ecorestoration priority maps.

Prelims pointers

• Majorana zero modes are emergent quasiparticles predicted in 2010 to occur at the ends of engineered superconducting wires.
• Majorana 2 replaced aluminium with lead, adopted a gallium-antimonide substrate and redesigned the semiconductor stack.
• Microsoft reported that the topological gap increased from about 30 to 70 microelectron-volts.
• The reported parity-switching time increased from a few milliseconds to around 20 seconds.
• Many physicists remain unconvinced that the qubits in Majorana 1 and Majorana 2 are functioning topological qubits.

Prelims pointers

• After the 2011 floods, Thailand expanded embankments and water gates to divert water from Bangkok, Ayutthaya and industrial zones.
• Some villages north of Bangkok have experienced flooding for six consecutive years.
• Floodwater that once spread across much of Ayutthaya is now concentrated in five to 10 percent of the province.
• Raising a house can cost between 100,000 and one million baht, depending on its size and height.
• The $780-million diversion canal is designed to carry 1,200 cubic metres per second and is expected by 2030.

Prelims pointers

• Wholesale price inflation rose to 11.4% in September 2026, a new-series high and a 49-month high under the old series.
• The new WPI series has base year 2022-23 and data beginning in April 2024; the older series has base year 2011-12.
• Food articles inflation rose to 8.1% in September from 5.7% in August 2026.
• Manufactured goods inflation reached a series-high 9.8%, compared with 8.4% in August 2026.
• Fuel and power inflation was 25.85%, while crude petroleum and natural gas inflation reached 57.3%.

Prelims pointers

• India-China two-way trade rose 25.4% to $144.45 billion between January and September 2026.
• India’s imports from China increased 23.3% to $125.19 billion during the first three quarters of 2026.
• India’s exports to China grew 40.7% to $19.26 billion, reaching the previous year’s total.
• The bilateral trade deficit stood at $105.93 billion, compared with a record $116.12 billion in 2025.
• Major Indian exports to China included seafood products, naphtha and printed circuit boards.

Prelims pointers

• Richard Henry Beddome described the Jeypore ground gecko in 1878; it was rediscovered in Koraput district in 2010.
• Only four individuals were documented in the past year: one in 2025 and three in 2026, including one in October.
• The gecko is restricted to high-elevation forests at 900–1,400 metres in the northern Eastern Ghats.
• The proposed opencast bauxite mine covers 147 hectares of forest in the Balda hills within Nageswari reserve forest.
• Coffee plantations, hydropower projects and mining are identified as threats to the gecko’s shrinking habitat.

Prelims pointers

• The National Electricity Data Sharing Framework is planned for rollout in October 2026.
• The Power Ministry floated the draft framework for stakeholder consultation in June.
• The voluntary framework promotes structured, secure and transparent sharing while protecting critical information infrastructure.
• A national data-governance committee will include government officials and industry representatives.
• The committee will be chaired by the Chairperson of the Central Electricity Authority.

Prelims pointers

• Pallikaranai marshland in Chennai is a Ramsar site, and the NGT imposed a construction ban within a one-kilometre radius of its boundaries.
• TNSWA proposed an interim Zone of Influence covering 36 survey numbers and 128.19 hectares.
• The High Court adjourned the cases to November 11, 2026 to study the TNSWA report and consider clarifications.
• TNSWA proposed site-specific regulation based on scientific and hydrological characteristics rather than a zone-wide construction ban.
• The final Zone of Influence is to follow scientific and cadastral exercises and ground truthing under the Wetlands Rules, 2017.

Prelims pointers

• The Cabinet approved ₹53,428 crore for NSAP's continuation from 2026-27 to 2030-31.
• NSAP will be renamed Pradhan Mantri Samajik Sahayata Yojana.
• The disability-pension benchmark threshold is reduced from 80% to 40%, and the minimum age criterion is removed.
• Monthly disability-pension assistance will be ₹375 up to age 79 and ₹625 for persons aged 80 and above.
• Launched on August 15, 1995, NSAP is linked to Article 41 of the Directive Principles and receives 100% central assistance.

Prelims pointers

• The UNESCO expert team will visit Hampi on October 24 and inspect the site and surrounding areas until October 27, 2026.
• The team is scheduled to arrive in Delhi on October 22 before travelling to Hampi.
• International heritage experts George Abungu and Ichita Shimoda are members of the visiting team.
• Additional Director-General for World Heritage Sites Janvi Sharma will also be part of the team.
• The assessment covers historic monuments, temples, ancient remains, monument management and World Heritage Site guidelines.

Prelims pointers

• Section 163 of the BNSS empowers an Executive Magistrate to issue written preventive orders against specified dangers and disturbances.
• The August 23 order covered the Parliament Street police subdivision until October 21 but excluded a demarcated Jantar Mantar Road area.
• The order prohibited assemblies of five or more persons, public meetings, processions, slogan-shouting and speeches.
• Section 163(5) allows a person aggrieved by a prohibitory order to seek its rescission or alteration.
• Section 144 of the former Code of Criminal Procedure was replaced by Section 163 of the BNSS in 2024.

Prelims pointers

• UNIFIL had about 7,500 personnel from nearly 50 countries at the time of the report.
• The UN peacekeeping mission has served as a buffer between Israel and Lebanon since 1978.
• The UN Security Council had voted to end UNIFIL’s mandate on December 31, 2026.
• In July, 86 Lebanese lawmakers asked the UN Security Council to retain UNIFIL with an expanded mandate.
• France and Italy said they wanted to establish a multinational coalition to succeed UNIFIL.

Prelims pointers

• IIT Kanpur launched the Greater Than Us fundraising campaign in New Delhi on October 14, 2026.
• The IIT ecosystem has supported over 6,000 start-ups, 56 unicorns and nearly 5,000 patents.
• IIT Kanpur hosts a DRDO-Industry-Academia Centre of Excellence and has proposed a School of Defence Technologies.
• Approval for a National Military Drone Technology Hub at IIT Kanpur with the Defence Ministry was nearing completion.
• The campaign aims to raise US$1 billion by March 2029, with Rs 4,155 crore already committed.

Prelims pointers

• The meeting was the third session of the India-Brunei Darussalam Joint Trade Committee.
• Amit Verma and Dr. May Fa'ezah Ahmad Ariffin co-chaired the Joint Trade Committee meeting.
• The two sides discussed facilitating Indian exports of agricultural and animal products to Brunei Darussalam.
• Pharmaceuticals, healthcare and energy were identified as key areas for further cooperation.
• The next India-Brunei Darussalam Joint Trade Committee meeting will be held in Brunei Darussalam.

Prelims pointers

• The WPI series has base year 2022-23, and all-commodities inflation was 11.39% year on year in September 2026.
• September 2026 inflation was 8.67% for Primary Articles, 25.85% for Fuel and Power and 9.76% for Manufactured Products.
• The WPI Food Index has a weight of 24.99% and recorded 8.66% inflation in September 2026, up from 7.05% in August.
• The final July 2026 WPI index remained 110.0 and its final year-on-year inflation rate remained 9.78%.
• For September 2026, provisional Output PPI for all commodities was 112.5 and trial manufacturing Input PPI was 106.1.

Prelims pointers

• Section 73(6) of the Multi-State Co-operative Societies (Amendment) Act, 2023 empowers the Central Government to prescribe auditing and accounting standards.
• MSCARO 2026 was formulated with inputs from the RBI, ICAI, CAG and Multi-State Cooperative Societies.
• The framework is modelled on the Companies (Auditor’s Report) Order and requires standardised Yes or No responses with remarks.
• Integration with the CRCS Portal could support automated scrutiny, dashboards, risk scoring and artificial-intelligence-based analytics.
• Initial implementation covers societies crossing ₹1,000 crore, while the long-term objective is to cover those crossing ₹50 crore.

Prelims pointers

• Prof. Ramesh Chand, a former Member of NITI Aayog, chairs the committee on sugarcane-farmer and sugar-sector issues.
• The committee followed a meeting involving sugarcane-farmer representatives from Karnataka and Maharashtra.
• Its remit includes remunerative cane returns and revision of sugar’s ex-mill Minimum Selling Price.
• The committee will examine sugar-recovery testing and reporting as well as calibration, inspection and verification of weighment.
• Members include the Agriculture Commissioner, Joint Secretary for Sugar and Joint Secretary for Legal Metrology.

Prelims pointers

• CTF 154 was established in May 2023 as CMF's multinational maritime training task force.
• India joined Combined Maritime Forces as an Associate Partner in 2022 and became a full member in 2023.
• The Indian Navy commanded CTF 154 from February 11 to October 14, 2026, its first leadership of a CMF task force.
• The tenure produced over 7,800 training hours through 20 staff engagements, two exercises and the inaugural SPAR exchange.
• Operation Southern Readiness 26-2 in Kochi involved 276 personnel from 27 countries and about 3,800 training hours.

Prelims pointers

• The BIS Silver Refinery Scheme covers licensed silver refineries and mints and is modelled on the Gold Refinery Scheme.
• IS 2112:2025 now includes fine silver bullion and coins of 999.9, 999.5 and 999.0 parts per thousand purity.
• Hallmarked silver bullion and coins will carry a BIS mark, purity grade, manufacturer ID and unique batch serial number.
• BIS announced seven new standards spanning clean mobility, robotics, healthcare, textiles and building products.
• The sustainable-agriculture standardisation roadmap spans 15 categories and three implementation timelines.

Prelims pointers

• DoT and ITU organised AI for Good Build-a-thon 5.0 at India Mobile Congress 2026 in Yashobhoomi, New Delhi.
• The theme was Creating innovative agents in 5G, with a focus on agentic AI solutions for telecommunications.
• Five online mentoring sessions covered the ITU-T Y.3172 machine-learning pipeline and ITU AI Readiness 2.0 report.
• More than 25 teams registered, and more than 10 mentoring hours produced 16 AI prototype submissions.
• Team Netaxis of RVCE Bangalore won first prize for context-aware orchestration of QoS and adaptive security in constrained 5G.

Prelims pointers

• DoT will award top-performing States/UTs, police districts and police stations for handset recoveries through Sanchar Saathi.
• Performance parameters include total handsets recovered, accuracy against traces generated and timeliness of recovery efforts.
• Sanchar Saathi uses the Central Equipment Identity Register facility to block and trace lost or stolen mobile handsets.
• When a reported handset is detected on a network, police receive traceability information and the citizen gets SMS and email alerts.
• Chakshu allows citizens to report suspected fraudulent calls, SMS or WhatsApp messages and spam.

Prelims pointers

• TEC is the National Standardization Body for telecommunications under the Department of Telecommunications, Ministry of Communications.
• TEC's regulatory functions are described under the Telecommunications framework rules notified in 2025.
• TEC formulates standards, recognises Conformity Assessment Bodies and issues certificates.
• TEC has released 596 standards, designated 82 Conformity Assessment Bodies and issued more than 5,400 certificates.
• TEC links national standards to consumer protection, network security, interoperability and quality of service.

Prelims pointers

• The national Mahila Kisan Diwas 2026 celebration is scheduled for 15 October 2026 at the Dr. B. R. Ambedkar International Centre in New Delhi.
• The International Day of Rural Women was established by the United Nations General Assembly in 2007.
• The United Nations declared 2026 the International Year of the Woman Farmer.
• The Periodic Labour Force Survey reported that women formed 59.8% of the agricultural workforce during January-December 2025.
• Celebrations across States and Union Territories, EEIs, SAMETIs and MANAGE are to involve 50-100 women farmers at each venue.

Prelims pointers

• The programme was continued for five years, from 2026-27 through 2030-31, with a total outlay of ₹53,428 crore.
• The National Social Assistance Programme was renamed Pradhan Mantri Samajik Sahayata Yojana.
• Disability-pension assistance is ₹375 for ages 0-79 and ₹625 for people aged 80 years and above.
• The benchmark-disability threshold was reduced from 80% to 40%, and the minimum-age criterion now begins at birth.
• The National Social Assistance Programme began on 15 August 1995 in relation to Article 41 of the Constitution and receives 100% central assistance.

Prelims pointers

• The proposed buyer is M/s 10955230 Canada Inc., whose parent entity is M/s Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd.
• The buyer will acquire 60.72% of IDBI Bank: 30.48% from the Government of India and 30.24% from LIC.
• After the transaction, the Government of India will retain 15% of IDBI Bank and LIC will retain 19%.
• Two valuation agencies used the Market Multiple Method and Asset Valuation Method, producing an average fair value of ₹75.99 per share.
• The winning best-offer bid was ₹81 per share, for a purchase consideration of ₹52,878.0806181 crore.

Prelims pointers

• The five Ladakh development projects are worth around ₹3,350 crore and were scheduled for inauguration or dedication on 15 October 2026.
• The ₹640-crore Leh airport terminal spans 23,800 square metres, can handle 35 lakh passengers annually and incorporates geothermal energy.
• The 298-km Nimmu-Padum-Darcha Road was built by the Border Roads Organisation and passes through Zanskar Valley and Shinkun La Pass.
• The energy works include the 9 MW Hanu Small Hydroelectric Project and the 66 kV Double-Circuit Dah-Hanu-Khaltsi Transmission Line.
• Project Him Sarovar developed 40 water bodies across 40 villages and is aligned with the objectives of Mission Amrit Sarovar.

Prelims pointers

• Ayutech Navonmesh 2026 will be held at ITRA Jamnagar on October 15 and 16, 2026, for the institute's Sixth Foundation Day.
• The symposium's central theme is the application of artificial intelligence in Ayurveda.
• ITRA was dedicated to the nation on October 15, 2020 and is India's first Institution of National Importance in Ayurveda.
• ITRA operates a 300-bed NABH-accredited hospital and houses six laboratories accredited by NABL.
• ITRA has MoUs with 27 institutions—18 national and nine international—and a library with over 30,000 books and 5,000 manuscripts.

Prelims pointers

• ESTIC-2026 is scheduled for October 27–29, 2026 at Bharat Mandapam, Pragati Maidan, New Delhi.
• ICAR is linked to Agri-Tech, Food Systems and Nutrition, one of ESTIC-2026's 12 major thematic sessions.
• The DARE Secretary and ICAR Director General is a member of the ESTIC-2026 Steering Committee.
• ICAR will showcase AI, robotics, digital agriculture, advanced crop improvement, gene editing and sustainable agricultural systems.
• CSIR organises ESTIC-2026 under the Principal Scientific Adviser's guidance, with NIIST as organising partner.

Prelims pointers

• CCRAS SPARK expands to Studentship Program for Ayurveda Research Ken and its 2026-27 cycle is the fifth edition.
• SPARK 5.0 offers 300 studentships, each carrying a studentship amount of ₹50,000.
• Eligible applicants are third, fourth or professional-year BAMS students in NCISM or Government of India-recognised institutions.
• SPARK registration opens on 15 October 2026 and applications close on 15 November 2026.
• CCRAS Ayurshodh has Prabodh 3MT, Prakash and Navonmesha categories, with finals scheduled for 11 December 2026.

Prelims pointers

• KAUMARACON 2026 will run from October 15 to 17 at AIIA's Sarita Vihar campus in New Delhi.
• Kaumarabhritya is an Ayurveda branch covering child growth, nutrition, immunity, mental health and childhood diseases.
• AIIA's Kaumarabhritya department offers NICU care, vaccination and a specialised outpatient service for paediatric cancer care.
• The KINDER Lab supports clinical assessment and research in neurology, dermatology, respiratory and related paediatric areas.
• The 2026 conference programme includes six scientific sessions, 12 parallel sessions and more than 175 scheduled papers.

Prelims pointers

• Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps navy said the cargo ship struck a naval mine in the Strait of Hormuz.
• Iranian state television reported that the ship was carrying 2,500 containers before it caught fire.
• The incident occurred on the morning of October 14, 2026, according to the Iranian account.
• The report said the U.S. military was guiding ships through the strait along a route off Oman.
• There was no immediate independent verification and no report from the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations monitor.

Prelims pointers

• Canadian Foreign Minister Anita Anand visited India with International Trade Minister Maninder Sidhu.
• Anand’s Indian interlocutors included Prime Minister Narendra Modi and External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar.
• Modi and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney agreed by telephone to conclude a trade agreement soon.
• The ministerial talks reviewed an early conclusion of negotiations on a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement.
• The bilateral agenda included security, defence, energy, education, science and technology, trade and multilateral cooperation.