ForumIAS announcing GS Foundation Program for UPSC CSE 2025-26 from 19 April. Click Here for more information.
ForumIAS Answer Writing Focus Group (AWFG) for Mains 2024 commencing from 24th June 2024. The Entrance Test for the program will be held on 28th April 2024 at 9 AM. To know more about the program visit: https://forumias.com/blog/awfg2024
GS 2
SC scraps NOTA option for RS polls
A three-judge Bench, led by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, held that the option is meant only for universal adult suffrage and direct elections and not elections held by the system of proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote as done in the Rajya Sabha.
The five-judge Constitution Bench, led by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, suggested it could direct the Election Commission to insist that parties get new members to declare in an affidavit their criminal antecedents and publish them so that the “entire country knows how many criminals there are in a party.”
Strengthening the federal link
There must be recognition of the potential of State Finance Commissions in building regional equity
India and Pakistan must build on diplomatic courtesy to restore equilibrium to ties
GS 3
Last month, India received the happy news that that one of the three newly designated geological ages of the Holocene Epoch was named after Meghalaya.
Centre rules out total ban on firecrackers
The Supreme Court was hearing a bunch of applications seeking a complete nationwide ban on the use, manufacture, licensing, sale, resale or distribution of firecrackers and sparklers of any kind in a bid to combat pollution on an emergency basis.
Kerala flood lesson for Assam: experts
The similarity is a network of dams in the “control of other States” surrounding both the States
State seeks cess on SGST, increased borrowing limit
The Kerala government is looking forward to imposition of a 10% cess on State GST and rise in its borrowing limit from the present 3% to 4.5% of the Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) to raise sufficient resources for the post-floods reconstruction challenges that Kerala faces.
High science with low development
Emphasising a space programme as an objective while failing to highlight the multiple failings of public policy in India makes a mockery of the democratic project, the principal object of which is the creation of enabling conditions for a valuable life.
Ending human interference in the pathways of elephants is a conservation imperative, more so because the animals are then not forced to seek alternative routes that bring them into conflict with people
ILO report flags wage inequality in India
Real average daily wages in India almost doubled in the first two decades after economic reforms, but low pay and wage inequality remains a serious challenge to inclusive growth, the International Labour Organization warned in its India Wage Report published on Monday.
The scheme is designed for State governments that are keen to promote air connectivity on international routes identified by them and for which they are willing to provide subsidy to airlines.
IITs to cast net for foreign faculty
The Human Resource Development Ministry will set the ball rolling on facilitating the recruitment of permanent foreign faculty in the Indian Institutes of Technology.
