10 November 2023

• International Relations: Bhutan's King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck visited Assam to advance new rail links and an SEZ at Bhutan's southern border.
• History: The bicentenary of Tamil indentured labourers' arrival in Sri Lanka (1823) recalled India's colonial labour diaspora.
• Astronomy: The Indian Astronomical Observatory at Hanle in Ladakh captured a rare red aurora; Hanle is India's designated Dark Sky Reserve.
• Energy: National Coal Index rose 3.83 points to 143.91 in September 2023, the first increase since April.
• Climate: A global report found governments plan to produce 110 per cent more fossil fuels by 2030 than the 1.5-degree Celsius pathway allows.

GS area: International Relations (India-Bhutan)

Bhutan's King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck visited Assam, marking the first visit by a Bhutanese monarch to the state. The visit produced new infrastructure commitments.

• New rail links proposed: Kokrajhar (Assam) to Gelephu (Bhutan) and Banarhat (West Bengal) to Samtse (Bhutan).
• Special Economic Zone: planned at Bhutan's southern border with Assam, at Gelephu. Bhutan is developing Gelephu as a "Mindfulness City," a planned urban development project.
• New airport: proposed at Gelephu to improve connectivity.
• Energy exchange: a hydropower sharing arrangement among Bhutan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. Bhutan generates surplus hydropower that India helps transmit and trade.
• Outstanding issues: border disputes between Bhutan and China (particularly the Doklam area, where India has a security interest), hydropower revenue concerns from the bilateral agreement, trade imbalance.
• India-Bhutan Treaty of Friendship (1949, revised 2007): provides for free trade and mutual cooperation. India is Bhutan's dominant trade partner.

Static linkage: India's neighbourhood (International Relations), Indian Geography (Northeast).

GS area: Modern Indian History (Colonial Period)

2023 marks the bicentenary of Tamil indentured labourers' arrival in Sri Lanka. In 1823, the British began recruiting Tamil workers from South India for tea and rubber plantations in Ceylon (Sri Lanka). The indenture system effectively replaced African slavery after its abolition in the British Empire.

• Working conditions: long hours, inadequate housing, meagre wages. Workers were bound by contracts that tied them to a specific plantation.
• Modern diaspora impact: Tamil communities in Sri Lanka, Trinidad, Tobago, Fiji, Mauritius and Malaysia trace their origin to this labour migration. They form important diaspora communities with economic and cultural ties to India.
• Indian diaspora globally: the Tamil and Bihari communities of the Caribbean, the Fiji-Indian community and the Indo-Mauritians all share indenture origins.

Static linkage: Modern Indian History (Colonial Period, Diaspora).

GS area: Science and Technology (Astronomy)

On 5 November, the Indian Astronomical Observatory at Hanle in Ladakh and its companion site at Merak captured a rare red aurora. The event is called a Stable Auroral Arc (SAA).

• Hanle observatory: designated India's first Dark Sky Reserve. Situated at about 4,500 metres above sea level in the Changthang plateau, it is one of the world's highest astronomical sites.
• Merak: proposed site for India's National Large Solar Telescope, on the banks of Pangong Tso.
• Aurora mechanism: charged particles from solar events travel along Earth's magnetic field lines to the upper atmosphere near the poles, exciting atmospheric gases and producing light. Red auroras occur at higher altitudes where oxygen atoms are less dense.
• Why it matters for UPSC: Hanle as a Dark Sky Reserve is a GS-3 science and geography intersection. Map questions on Ladakh frequently reference Pangong Tso, Hanle and Siachen.

Static linkage: Science and Technology (Astronomy), Indian Geography (Ladakh).

GS area: Economy (Energy, Natural Resources)

The National Coal Index rose by 3.83 points to 143.91 in September 2023, the first increase since April. The NCI tracks the price of coal in India using auction and trade data.

• Base year: Financial Year 2017-18.
• Five sub-indices: covering coking coal and four categories of non-coking coal based on grade.
• Use: the government uses the NCI for the commercial auction of coal mines. A higher index means higher revenue for the government from mine auctions but higher input costs for power and steel producers.
• India's coal dependence: India is the world's second largest coal producer and the second largest importer. Coal accounts for about 70 per cent of electricity generation.

Static linkage: Economy (Energy, Natural Resources).

GS area: Governance (Education)

The UGC Foreign Universities Regulation 2023 set conditions for foreign higher education institutions to establish campuses in India.

• Eligibility: must rank within the top 500 globally.
• Approval process: UGC approval required for each campus; separate application for new courses.
• Online education restriction: cannot offer purely online or distance learning programmes. Online components capped at 10 per cent of the programme.
• Foreign contribution: FHEIs can receive donations under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act 2010.
• Context: the National Education Policy 2020 opened the door to foreign universities. The first campus, that of Deakin University and Wollongong University from Australia, opened in GIFT City, Gujarat.

Static linkage: Governance (Education Policy), International Relations.

GS area: Economy (Energy Efficiency)

The Energy Conservation Building Code 2017, targeting 25 to 50 per cent energy savings in commercial buildings with connected load of 100 kW or more, was noted by the International Energy Agency as a "notable exception" among developing countries.

• Three efficiency tags: ECBC, ECBC Plus and Super ECBC, with increasing energy performance requirements.
• State adoption: 23 of 28 states have notified rules; only 15 have adopted the 2017 version. Older rules are less stringent.
• Significance: buildings account for about 33 per cent of India's electricity consumption. Commercial buildings are the fastest-growing segment.

Static linkage: Economy (Energy, Governance).

• INDUS-X: the inaugural INDUS-X Investors Meet brought together Indian and US defence startups. INDUS-X is an India-US defence innovation initiative under the initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies (iCET), launched in June 2023. The Gurukul educational series trains defence innovators.
• Production Gap Report 2023: governments plan to produce 110 per cent more fossil fuels by 2030 than the 1.5-degree Celsius pathway requires. Near-total coal phase-out by 2040 and 75 per cent oil and gas reduction by 2050 are needed.