5 February 2024

• Budget: Interim Budget 2024-25 recorded the highest-ever Gender Budget allocation at 3 lakh crore rupees, or 6.5 per cent of total expenditure.
• Culture: Subika paintings, an ancient Meitei manuscript tradition from Manipur, face near-extinction with only six surviving manuscripts.
• Governance: The GHAR portal was launched by NCPCR to track cross-border repatriation of missing children.
• Environment: World Wetlands Day 2024 was observed on 2 February with the theme "Wetlands and Human Wellbeing."

GS area: Economy, Social Justice

The Interim Budget 2024-25 allocated 3 lakh crore rupees under the Gender Budget Statement. This represents a 38.6 per cent increase over the previous year and is equivalent to 6.5 per cent of total budget expenditure.

• What the Gender Budget is: A statement annexed to the Union Budget since 2005 that disaggregates budgetary allocations by their benefit to women. It does not represent a separate budget but tracks schemes that specifically target women.
• Leading ministries: Rural Development received the largest share (under PM Awas Yojana-Grameen, where 70 per cent of houses are allotted to women). Education and Health and Family Welfare followed.
• Gaps identified: Gender budgeting in India concentrates in a few sectors; most allocations are not subject to mandatory impact assessment on women. A Gender Budgeting Act with binding requirements has been recommended but not enacted.
• India since 2005: India was among the first countries to institutionalise gender budgeting at the national level.

Static linkage: Economy (Union Budget, gender policy), Social Justice (women's schemes, PMAY).

GS area: Art and Culture

Subika is an ancient manuscript painting tradition of the Meitei people of Manipur. Only six Subika manuscripts are known to survive, making the tradition critically endangered.

• Medium: Handmade paper prepared locally; painted using natural pigments.
• Content: Cultural, cosmological, and mythological motifs from Meitei traditions. They served as religious and ceremonial texts.
• Script: The manuscripts use the Meitei (Meitei Mayek) script, one of the scripts used to write the Meitei language, which is the official language of Manipur.
• Preservation effort: Manipur University faculty have been working on documentation and revival.
• Threat: Urbanisation, decline in artisan communities, and the dominance of mass-produced imagery have displaced traditional manuscript arts.

Static linkage: Art and Culture (Manipur, manuscript traditions, Northeast India heritage).

GS area: Governance, Social Justice

The National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) launched the GHAR portal, which stands for "GO Home and Re-Unite." The portal provides digital tracking of the repatriation of children across state and national borders.

• Function: Tracks missing children through their return journey to their families. Facilitates translator and interpreter requests for cross-border cases involving foreign nationals.
• Legal basis: The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act 2015, which is the primary legislation for child welfare in India.
• NCPCR: A statutory body under the Ministry of Women and Child Development. It was set up under the Commissions for Protection of Child Rights Act 2005.
• Article 21 angle: The Supreme Court has held that the right to live with dignity under Article 21 extends to children. The restoration of a trafficked or missing child to a safe family environment is part of this right.

Static linkage: Governance (child rights, NCPCR), Social Justice (child trafficking, juvenile justice).

GS area: Economy (Energy), Science and Technology

The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) launched pilot projects under the National Green Hydrogen Mission targeting the shipping and steel sectors.

• Shipping pilot: Aims to retrofit existing vessels to run on green hydrogen or its derivatives (ammonia, methanol). Plans also include developing bunkering (ship refuelling) facilities at major international ports.
• Steel pilot: Green hydrogen can replace coking coal as the reducing agent in direct reduced iron (DRI) steelmaking, eliminating carbon dioxide emissions from this typically high-emitting process.
• National Green Hydrogen Mission: Launched by Cabinet in January 2023. Target: produce 5 million metric tonnes of green hydrogen per year by 2030. Total outlay: 19,744 crore rupees.
• Green hydrogen definition: Hydrogen produced by splitting water using electrolysis powered by renewable electricity. The process is emission-free at the production stage.
• Grey vs Green: Most hydrogen today is grey hydrogen, produced from natural gas with significant CO2 emissions.

Static linkage: Economy (energy transition, green hydrogen), Environment (climate, clean energy).

GS area: Science and Technology (Space)

Japan's Hayabusa2 mission returned samples from asteroid Ryugu in 2020. Analysis of those samples revealed two organic compounds essential for life: uracil (a nucleobase found in RNA) and nicotinic acid (niacin, a B vitamin).

• Ryugu: A C-type (carbonaceous) asteroid. C-type asteroids are the most common and contain significant amounts of carbon and water-bearing minerals.
• Hayabusa2: JAXA's asteroid sample-return mission. It landed on Ryugu, collected material from the surface and subsurface, and returned to Earth.
• Significance: The discovery strengthens the panspermia hypothesis that organic building blocks of life were delivered to early Earth by asteroids and comets. It does not confirm the origin of life but shows that key precursors can form and survive in space.

Static linkage: Science and Technology (space missions, astrobiology, organic chemistry).

• Heritage tourism push: The Government of India's schemes for heritage tourism include Swadesh Darshan (launched 2015), PRASAD (Pilgrimage Rejuvenation and Spiritual Augmentation Drive), and Adopt a Heritage. India has 42 UNESCO World Heritage Sites: 34 cultural, 7 natural, and 1 mixed (Khangchendzonga National Park).
• Manatees gathering: Nearly 1,000 West Indian manatees gathered in springs in Florida during a cold snap. Manatees (IUCN: Vulnerable) are large, herbivorous marine mammals that seek warm waters when ocean temperatures drop. They consume over 60 species of aquatic plants. The gathering was notable for its scale.