13 March 2026

• Governance: Karnataka's Responsible AI Committee constituted, chaired by Kris Gopalakrishnan.
• Diplomacy: India co-sponsored a UNSC resolution on Iran, triggering debate on strategic autonomy.
• Polity: Supreme Court ruled parental income alone cannot determine OBC creamy layer exclusion.
• Innovation: India ranked 38th in the Global Innovation Index 2025, up from 81st in 2015, but R&D spending is only 0.65 per cent of GDP.
• Labour: Labour codes formalisation claims examined against on-ground reality.

GS area: Governance, Science and Technology

Karnataka constituted a Committee on Responsible Artificial Intelligence in March 2026:

• Chair: Kris Gopalakrishnan, co-founder of Infosys and a prominent voice in Indian technology policy.
• Co-chair: N. Manjula, Secretary of the Department of Electronics, IT, Biotechnology and Science and Technology.
• Mandate: Develop a responsible AI policy covering legality, fairness, non-discrimination, privacy, safety, transparency, accountability, and human oversight.
• National context: The IndiaAI Mission has ₹10,372 crore allocated. India ranks 38th in the Global Innovation Index 2025 (up from 81st in 2015), but AI regulatory readiness is low.
• Karnataka's AI economy: Bengaluru hosts the majority of India's AI-related startups and Global Capability Centres. The state sees AI governance as a competitive advantage.
• The global context: The EU's AI Act (2024) is the world's most comprehensive AI regulation. It categorises AI by risk level (unacceptable, high, limited, minimal) and prescribes different obligations for each.

Static linkage: AI governance, IndiaAI Mission (GS III).

GS area: International Relations

India co-sponsored a Gulf Cooperation Council-led UNSC resolution condemning Iranian attacks:

• The vote: Passed 13-0, with Russia and China abstaining. India was among 134 co-sponsors.
• What India condemned: Iranian retaliatory strikes on Gulf Arab states, Israel, and US bases.
• What India did not condemn: The initial US-Israeli assassination of Supreme Leader Khamenei and strikes that killed 1,255-plus people, including bombing of a school that killed 150 schoolgirls.
• The strategic concern: India's Chabahar Port access depends on Iranian goodwill. The India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) has been stalled since the October 2023 Gaza conflict. A lopsided condemnation damages both.
• Former Foreign Secretaries' critique: Several former Foreign Secretaries publicly argued that "tactical subservience equals strategic irrelevance." India's non-alignment and strategic autonomy doctrine, built over decades, appeared compromised.
• Chabahar Port: India has a 10-year operating contract (2024) for running the Shahid Beheshti port terminal. It is India's gateway to Afghanistan and Central Asia, bypassing Pakistan. This is the most concrete strategic asset at risk.

Static linkage: Strategic autonomy, IMEC, Chabahar (GS II, International Relations).

GS area: Polity (social justice)

The Supreme Court clarified that parental income alone cannot determine whether an OBC candidate falls in the creamy layer:

• The ruling: Justice P.S. Narasimha and Justice R. Mahadevan clarified that creamy layer exclusion is "status-based, not purely income-based."
• The background: Government PSU and public sector bank employees' children were being excluded from OBC reservation based solely on parental income crossing ₹8 lakh per year, even if the parent was in a technical or managerial position that the DoPT criteria do not classify as Group A or B service.
• DoPT criteria: The Department of Personnel and Training guidelines use parental governmental position and class of service (Group A/B officers) as a key criterion, alongside income, for creamy layer determination. A high-income PSU employee in a technical role may not fall in the creamy layer if they do not hold a Constitutional post or Group A central government position.
• Indra Sawhney (1992): Introduced the creamy layer concept. Its purpose was to exclude those OBC members who had already achieved the social advancement that reservation was designed to facilitate.
• Current threshold: ₹8 lakh annual family income. Unchanged for 11 years despite inflation.

Static linkage: OBC reservation, creamy layer, Indra Sawhney (GS II).

GS area: Economy, Science and Technology

India's innovation metrics in context:

• Global Innovation Index 2025 (WIPO): India ranked 38th of 139 countries. Up from 81st in 2015. Published annually by WIPO.
• R&D spending: 0.65 per cent of GDP. The lowest in BRICS except South Africa. China spends over 2.5 per cent. Israel spends about 5 per cent.
• PCT patent applications: India filed 4,547 Patent Cooperation Treaty applications in 2025. China filed over 70,000. The US filed about 54,000.
• Knowledge-intensive employment: India ranks 95th globally.
• Women in advanced STEM: India ranks 101st of 119 countries on this sub-index.
• Government initiatives: The RDI Fund allocated ₹1,00,000 crore. Budget 2026-27 provided ₹20,000 crore for deep-tech startups. Atal Tinkering Labs received 6 times their earlier allocation (₹500 crore to ₹3,200 crore).
• The structural gap: Lab-to-market commercialisation. India's research institutions generate publications but Technology Transfer Offices (TTOs) are weak. Private sector R&D in long-gestation areas is also low.

Static linkage: Innovation policy, intellectual property, R&D (GS III).

GS area: Economy (labour), Governance

The Economic Survey 2025-26 projected that the four labour codes would increase formalisation from 60.4 to 75.5 per cent, create 77 lakh jobs, and add 1.25 per cent to GDP by 2029-30. The on-ground picture is different:

• Factory definition threshold: Raised from 10 to 20 workers (with power). This removes 30 million small establishments from formal safety protections.
• Lay-off approval threshold: Raised from 100 to 300 workers. Employers with 101 to 299 workers can now retrench without government permission.
• Fixed-Term Employment (FTE): Formalised with no minimum tenure and no cap on renewals. A worker can be kept on rolling short contracts indefinitely without triggering permanency.
• Inspector-cum-Facilitator: The renamed enforcement officer. Critics say the name change signals a shift from enforcement to facilitation, weakening safety inspections.
• Gig workers: Defined in the Social Security Code but treated as self-employed. Platform companies are mandated to contribute 1 to 2 per cent of annual turnover to a welfare fund. Details are to be notified.

Static linkage: Labour reform, social security, informal economy (GS III).

GS area: Polity (digital rights, media freedom)

The Supreme Court heard a challenge to the DPDP Act's removal of the public interest exception:

• The challenge: Journalist Geeta Seshu and the Software Freedom Law Center petitioned that the DPDP Act's removal of the public interest clause prevents journalists from accessing data held by public officials, undermining the Right to Information Act.
• The RTI balance: Under RTI Section 8(1)(j), personal information is exempt but there is a public interest override for larger public accountability. The DPDP Act deleted this override entirely.
• K.S. Puttaswamy (2017): The nine-judge bench ruling that declared privacy a fundamental right under Article 21 also said that privacy must be balanced against other rights including transparency and accountability.
• CJI Surya Kant's observation: "Data has become true wealth; one right cannot compromise the other." Signalling that the Court may read a public interest exception into the DPDP framework even if Parliament did not explicitly provide one.

Static linkage: DPDP Act, RTI, right to privacy (GS II).

• SHANTI Act 2025: Opened nuclear energy patents to private sector participation. This is part of the broader opening of the nuclear sector to private investment, which began with the amendment of the Atomic Energy Act to allow private companies to build and operate nuclear reactors under DAE supervision.
• LPG crisis: fertilizer sector impact: Urea plants operating at 50 per cent capacity due to LNG shortage. Urea production requires natural gas as feedstock. India already imports 30 to 35 per cent of its urea requirement. A production cut creates a further gap ahead of the Kharif season.