Current affairs — 21 October 2026

Prelims pointers

• Kerala’s paddy-field area fell from 8.82 lakh hectares in 1974-75 to 1.76 lakh hectares in 2024-25, an 80% decline.
• The Kerala Conservation of Paddy Land and Wetland Act was enacted in 2008 and mandates a verifiable databank of paddy fields.
• The Kerala Finance (No. 2) Act, 2015 inserted Section 3A to regularise unauthorised pre-2008 paddy-field conversions on payment of a nominal fee.
• A 2016 State notification removed Section 3A without referring to regularisation cases handled during the amendment period.
• Up to 2024, Kerala’s Revenue Department earned as much as ₹1,606 crore through paddy-field regularisation.

Prelims pointers

• Nearly 28 lakh women were omitted from India’s first electoral roll because they were identified through relationships to men rather than by their own names.
• By the 1957 elections, about 85% of the women affected by the first-roll omission had been registered under their own names.
• Bihar’s August 2025 draft electoral roll omitted around 65 lakh names; the Supreme Court directed publication of excluded voters and reasons.
• In Aland, Karnataka, the ECI rejected 5,994 of 6,018 online Form 7 deletion applications as incorrect and accepted 24 after verification.
• Maharashtra’s reported 2024 Assembly election turnout rose from 58.22% at 5 p.m. to a final figure of 66.05%.

Prelims pointers

• The India-U.K. CETA followed 14 rounds of negotiations, and the Great North delegation brought nearly 200 participants to India.
• Nearly 5,40,000 people of Indian origin live across the North of England, according to the article.
• A CII report cited over £1 billion of Indian investment in the Northwest, supporting more than 6,700 jobs.
• A Grant Thornton UK tracker put growth in Indian-owned U.K. companies at nearly 60% and combined revenue above £105 billion.
• India-U.K. bilateral trade reached £47.4 billion in 2025, up 11.7%, led by advanced manufacturing, clean energy and technology.

Prelims pointers

• HERC granted Eleven Power Private Limited a 25-year parallel distribution licence for Gurugram and Nuh under Section 14 of the Electricity Act, 2003.
• Over 8.3 lakh consumers in the licence area can choose between two electricity distribution companies.
• The State Power Minister said Haryana would challenge the regulator's decision before the Appellate Tribunal for Electricity.
• Eleven Power committed to supply on request under Section 43 and to build its network in phases over five years across five divisions.
• Projected annual electricity sales rise from about 12,220 million units in FY 2024-25 to about 18,224 million units by FY 2030-31.

Prelims pointers

• Mohsen Rezaei told visiting Pakistani army chief Asim Munir that enriched nuclear material would not leave Iran.
• President Masoud Pezeshkian said U.S. threats and sanctions must be removed before Iran would enter dialogue.
• Iran’s stated demands include a West Asia ceasefire, unfreezing overseas assets and lifting oil-sector sanctions.
• A June memorandum followed the war’s late-February outbreak but failed to provide a lasting resolution framework.
• Iran’s material was described as enriched to 60%, near the stated 90% atomic-bomb threshold, with possible dilution inside Iran.

Prelims pointers

• Donald Trump said on October 20, 2026 that India and the United States were close to making a trade deal.
• India and the U.S. announced a framework for the first phase of a bilateral trade agreement in February 2026.
• Changes in the U.S. tariff landscape led to further negotiations after the framework announcement.
• Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal met U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer in Milwaukee and Washington earlier in October.
• Marco Rubio's India discussions included trade, energy, technology, defence and people-to-people ties.

Prelims pointers

• The October 19, 2026 Alberta referendum was non-binding, with official results scheduled for October 29.
• With more than 90% of votes counted, 1,467,256 of 1,951,821 voters—over 75%—supported remaining in Canada.
• Alberta accounts for more than 80% of Canada's crude-oil production and has abundant oil sands.
• The separation question was the tenth question, added after nine questions on immigration, welfare and federal issues.
• The alternative to remaining in Canada was to begin the legal process for a binding provincial referendum on separation.

Prelims pointers

• India's statement was delivered to the UN General Assembly's Third Committee in New York on October 20, 2026.
• The agenda item concerned the Working Group on Enforced Disappearances.
• Barkha Tamrakar is a Deputy Secretary in India's Ministry of External Affairs.
• India said engagement with international human-rights mechanisms should follow dialogue, consultation, cooperation, non-selectivity and transparency.
• More than 20 UN human-rights experts had expressed concern about the police response to youth-led demonstrations in New Delhi.

Prelims pointers

• The India-New Zealand FTA entered into force on October 20, 2026 and became India’s seventh such agreement to take effect in five years.
• New Zealand granted Indian goods duty-free access to 100% of its tariff lines under the full trade agreement.
• New Zealand is to promote an increase of US$20 billion in investment by its investors into India within 15 years, subject to stated caveats.
• The two Temporary Employment Entry categories allow up to 5,000 visa holders at a time for three years without a pathway to residence.
• India excluded 29.97% of tariff lines, including dairy, several agricultural products, sugar, vegetable fats and oils, and arms and ammunition.

Prelims pointers

• The proposed minimum SME IPO application would fall from ₹2 lakh to ₹1 lakh, with at least four lots of no less than ₹25,000 each.
• SEBI proposed raising the minimum number of SME IPO allottees from 200 to 500 to widen the investor base.
• The proposed profit test is an average operating profit of ₹3 crore annually over three years, replacing ₹1 crore in two of three years.
• A firm failing the profit test could use book-building if qualified institutional buyers receive at least 75% of the net offer.
• Proposed post-issue market-cap bands are up to ₹1,000 crore for mandatory SME listing, ₹1,000-4,000 crore for either platform, and above ₹4,000 crore for the main board.

Prelims pointers

• The Jackdaw gas field is in the North Sea about 150 miles, or 240 kilometres, east of Aberdeen.
• Labour returned to power in 2024 after promising not to issue new oil and gas drilling licences.
• The U.K. government says it remains committed to reaching net zero by 2050.
• The Rosebank field lies west of the Shetland Islands and mainly contains oil, while Jackdaw is a gas field.
• Adura says Jackdaw and Rosebank could provide about 6% of U.K. North Sea gas production and support over 3,500 jobs.

Prelims pointers

• Wiikwemkoong Unceded Territory is located at the eastern end of Manitoulin Island in Lake Huron in rural Ontario.
• The community data centre stores Anishinaabe language videos, corporate documents, residents’ health data and security-camera footage.
• A 2022 flood that destroyed some scattered digital records added urgency to Wiikwemkoong’s data-sovereignty programme.
• The secure facility has four server racks and uses two fans rather than water for cooling.
• The Chiefs of Ontario represents 133 First Nations, while First Nations developed their own data-governance principles in 1998.

Prelims pointers

• Every cetacean in India is protected under Schedule I of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972.
• India accounts for about one in seven of roughly 470 recorded blue whale strandings worldwide.
• Gujarat has fifteen recorded blue whale strandings, fourteen of them from the twentieth century.
• The Maharashtra coast recorded 109 marine-mammal strandings during 2020 and 2021.
• Researchers believe only around one hundred Arabian Sea humpback whales remain.

Prelims pointers

• SBI’s preliminary analysis of about 3,75,000 dark-web records identified 3,897 customer records containing personally identifiable information.
• The exposed fields included mobile numbers, birth dates, names, gender, email and residential addresses, branch and CIF identifiers, and lead-related metadata.
• SBI engaged an independent cybersecurity agency empanelled by CERT-In to investigate the nature and extent of the alleged compromise.
• Section 8(6) of the DPDP Act, 2023 requires breach intimation to the Data Protection Board and each affected Data Principal.
• The report said Section 8(6) and Rule 7 of the DPDP Rules, 2025 take effect on May 13, 2027.

Prelims pointers

• The emergency meeting was told on October 21, 2026 that Nigeria had detected its first Ebola case.
• Nigeria’s first detected Ebola case was confirmed as the Bundibugyo strain.
• Olajumoke Babatunde directs Public Health Lab Service at the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.
• Babatunde said three levels of testing were performed and all of them were molecular tests.
• The patient was identified as a diplomat, had multi-organ failure, and carried the strain linked to the Democratic Republic of Congo outbreak.

Prelims pointers

• Parts of Great Nicobar Island sank by as much as 15 feet during the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake.
• The proposal includes a transshipment port, international airport, power plant and township, with investment estimated at up to ₹92 thousand crore.
• The Shompen and Nicobarese are the two indigenous communities whose rights are discussed in relation to the project.
• Great Nicobar supports endemic species including the Great Nicobar serpent eagle, Nicobar parakeet and Nicobar megapode.
• The island has a major leatherback-turtle nesting site, while scientists estimate that 3-10 million old-growth trees could be felled.

Prelims pointers

• The India-EU FTA was expected to enter into force in early 2027 after clearance by the European Parliament.
• Reported first-year duties on European luxury-car CBUs would fall from about 110% to 30-35%, then phase down to 10%, subject to initial annual quotas.
• Ferrari officials said Indian orders had risen by more than double in anticipation of the trade agreement.
• Ferrari generally maintains an 18-month waiting period between placement of an order and delivery of a car.
• Vahan data showed 35 Ferrari registrations in 2024, 45 in 2025 and 45 during the first nine months of 2026.

Prelims pointers

• UNEP’s Emissions Gap Report 2026 is titled The Point of Return and evaluates pathways for limiting a 1.5°C overshoot.
• The lowest-possible scenario peaks at 1.7-1.8°C around mid-century and returns to at most 1.5°C by 2100 with about 50% probability.
• Required emission cuts from 2025 levels are 18% by 2030, 45% by 2035 and 69% by 2040.
• UNEP projects about 2.8°C warming under current policies and 2.6°C if all NDCs are delivered with similar subsequent efforts.
• The 2015 Paris Agreement requires NDCs every five years, with each successive contribution representing progression.

Prelims pointers

• The rupee closed at ₹94.46 per U.S. dollar on October 21, 2026, after touching an intraday high of ₹94.43.
• Foreign inflows linked to the $3.2-billion Jio Platforms IPO supported the rupee during its eighth consecutive session of gains.
• Benchmark Brent crude climbed to $110 a barrel, limiting currency gains and intensifying concern about imported inflation.
• The benchmark 10-year government-security yield reached 7.44%, its highest level since 2023; bond prices and yields move inversely.
• India’s September retail inflation was reported at 5.54%, close to the Reserve Bank of India’s upper tolerance limit of 6%.

Prelims pointers

• The Programme Code cited by the advisory is prescribed under the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act and the Cable Television Networks Rules.
• Live coverage of anti-terrorist operations is prohibited; coverage must be limited to periodic briefings by an authorised officer until the operation ends.
• Telecasts, graphics and digital representations were advised to use only authentic maps of India published by the Survey of India.
• Channels must not reveal direct or indirect details capable of identifying victims of sexual offences, including family or locality information.
• The advisory said artificial intelligence should remain assistive and must not compromise the accuracy, authenticity or sensitivity of news content.

Prelims pointers

• January 1, 2027 is the qualifying date for Puducherry's Special Summary Revision of Photo Electoral Rolls.
• Advance applications may be filed by those attaining eligibility on April 1, July 1 or October 1, 2027.
• Form 6 is for inclusion in the roll, while overseas electors use Form 6A.
• Form 7 is for objections or deletion requests; Form 8 covers shifting, correction, EPIC replacement and PwD marking.
• The integrated draft electoral roll is scheduled for publication on November 13.

Prelims pointers

• Industry sources reported planned Indian SAF blending levels of 1% in 2027, 2% in 2028 and 5% in 2030 for international flights.
• ICAO adopted CORSIA in 2016, and its mandatory phase is scheduled from 2027 to 2035.
• CORSIA uses Sustainable Aviation Fuel or eligible carbon credits to keep international-flight emissions below 85% of 2019 levels.
• An ICAO feasibility study estimated India's SAF production potential at 14 million to 33 million tonnes.
• Indian Oil's Panipat Refinery was prepared for 30,000 tonnes of capacity for India's 1% blending target in 2027.

Prelims pointers

• Agrivoltaics combines farming with solar photovoltaic electricity generation on the same land.
• A TERI study identified about 47.5 million hectares, nearly 30% of India's arable agricultural land, as suitable for agrivoltaics.
• The government is considering an agrivoltaics component in the next phase of PM-KUSUM.
• Agrivoltaic installations were said to cost 25-30% more than conventional ground-mounted solar projects.
• Proposed safeguards include module-repair support, dispute resolution, equipment recycling and restoration of land to agricultural use.

Prelims pointers

• FSSAI notices to Nestle India concerned Lactogen Pro 1 Powder and Nan Excella Pro Stage 1.
• Nestle was asked to substantiate scientifically the claim that Lactogen Pro 1's whey protein is easy to digest.
• The Nan Excella claim referred to five human milk oligosaccharides supporting the normal immune system.
• Complan claims cited by FSSAI included “2X Faster Growth”, “Supports Concentration and Memory” and “Pro Immunity+ 34 Vital Nutrients”.
• FSSAI found the cited Complan claims to violate the Food Safety and Standards (Advertising and Claims) Regulations, 2018.

Prelims pointers

• President Droupadi Murmu presented the Lalit Kala Akademi awards in New Delhi on October 21, 2026.
• The awards were presented to artists selected for the 65th National Exhibition of Art.
• The President also felicitated Grand Prize winners and Honourable Mentions of the 3rd Print Biennale India, 2026.
• She called for traditional artists in remote areas to receive training in new technologies and contemporary art techniques.
• The Lalit Kala Akademi and the Ministry of Culture were described as working to encourage the sale of artworks.

Prelims pointers

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi shared the article on agrivoltaics on October 21, 2026.
• The article was written by Union Ministers Pralhad Joshi and Shivraj Singh Chouhan.
• Agrivoltaics is described as combining solar power generation with agriculture.
• The model is presented as capable of providing farmers with additional revenue and reducing energy costs.
• The article says agrivoltaics can support crop productivity and advance rural prosperity.

Prelims pointers

• The MPC is constituted under Section 45ZB of the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934.
• Section 45ZL requires RBI to publish MPC minutes on the fourteenth day after each meeting with the resolution, votes and member statements.
• All six members voted to raise the repo rate by 25 basis points to 5.50%, while the stance changed to calibrated tightening.
• After the decision, the SDF rate stood at 5.25% and the MSF rate and Bank Rate at 5.75%.
• RBI projected 2026-27 real GDP growth at 7.1% and CPI inflation at 5.2%.

Prelims pointers

• Pakistan, Turkiye, Qatar and Indonesia signed the Badr Memorandum of Understanding in Doha on October 21, 2026.
• The Badr pact covers defence manufacturing, technical defence training, and research and development.
• Qatar’s Defence Ministry said the pact aims to enhance the four countries’ defence capabilities.
• Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Turkiye had signed the Makkah Joint Defence Agreement in August 2026.
• The Makkah agreement treats an attack on one of its three parties as an attack on all of them.

Prelims pointers

• RBI acted under Section 35A(1), read with Section 56, of the Banking Regulation Act, 1949.
• The directions restrict new loans, investments, liabilities, fresh deposits, payments, compromises and asset disposals without prior written RBI approval.
• Withdrawals from a depositor's accounts are capped at ₹5,000, subject to the directions.
• Eligible depositors may receive DICGC insurance claims up to ₹5,00,000 under the DICGC Act, 1961 after willingness and verification.
• The directions run for six months from the close of business on October 21, 2026 and do not by themselves cancel the bank's licence.