VidBodh
हिन्दी — Read in HindiLatest edition: September 2026. Covered from 1 June to 30 September 2026. Next edition, October 2026, publishes on 5 November 2026.
The monthly magazine
8 lead articles · 55 new articles · 11 updates
LeadPrelims and MainsExtreme weather, monsoon and forecasting
The southwest monsoon ended on 30 September 2026 at 87 per cent of the long period average, the driest season in 11 years, and Maharashtra declared drought in 265 of its 358 talukas on 26 September.
LeadPrelims and MainsCryosphere, oceans and sea level
Uttarakhand began installing its first glacial lake early warning system at Vasundhara Tal in Chamoli on 29 September 2026. It comes a month after the Nepal disaster of 26 August, which experts now say was not a lake outburst at all.
LeadPrelims and MainsAir pollution
On 28 September 2026 CAQM approved a revised GRAP schedule, and Delhi announced a winter plan with curbs fixed by date from 1 November 2026 to 31 January 2027.
LeadPrelims and MainsCryosphere, oceans and sea level
On 24 September 2026 the United Nations General Assembly adopted its first declaration on sea level rise, and agreed to hold another high level meeting by September 2030.
LeadPrelims and MainsAI governance, safety and ethics
Through September 2026 it emerged that AI agents under test had entered systems they were not meant to reach, including an Australian government health statistics portal, and OpenAI cancelled the release of its newest model on safety grounds.
LeadPrelims and MainsCritical minerals and rare earths
The Act, passed in August 2026, has drawn protests in the Odisha Assembly, with mineral rich States saying it undoes a Supreme Court ruling in their favour.
LeadPrelims and MainsStorage, batteries and electric mobility
On 30 September 2026 the Ministry of Power notified new CAFE norms for passenger vehicles, in force from 1 April 2027 to 31 March 2032.
LeadPrelims and MainsSpace policy, private sector and governance
On 14 September 2026 the United States Air Force Secretary said the country has "space control" weapons in Earth orbit, the first public admission of this kind by any country.
International Big Cat AllianceNewPrelims
The International Big Cat Alliance is a grouping launched by India for the conservation of seven big cats, and is headquartered in India.
The cheetahPrelims
21 Sep 2026A female born in India gave birth to four cubs at Kuno on 18 September, the first litter born to an India born cheetah. The population is 55, and 36 of them were born in India. The Indian Express, 21 Sep 2026: 'Rock Star' of Kuno is gone: Gaurav, an original Project Cheetah big cat, dies (opens in a new tab) · The Indian Express, 18 Sep 2026: A milestone at Kuno: Cheetah born to South African feline now has four cubs of its own (opens in a new tab)
Pygmy hogNewPrelims
The pygmy hog is the world's smallest wild pig, found in the wild only in Assam.
Rhesus macaqueNewPrelims and Mains
The rhesus macaque is the common monkey of north Indian towns, and since 2022 it is no longer protected under the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972.
National Coastal Mission 2.0NewPrelims
National Coastal Mission 2.0 is a Central Sector Scheme of the Environment Ministry for the coast, running to 2030 to 31.
The Western Ghats Ecologically Sensitive AreaPrelims and Mains
27 Sep 2026Karnataka's legislature unanimously rejected the Kasturirangan report on 22 September, in response to the seventh draft notification, which covers 56,825 sq km. The State wants only forest land included, and a joint physical survey in place of satellite data. Mains: since the States bear the local cost and the country gains, a State may reject the framework only if it offers an equally considered alternative. The Hindu, 27 Sep 2026: What is Karnataka’s objection to the ESA? | Explained (opens in a new tab) · The Hindu, 26 Sep 2026: Narrowed posture: On Karnataka and the Kasturirangan Report (opens in a new tab)
Biological Diversity Act, 2002NewPrelims and Mains
The Biological Diversity Act, 2002 is the law by which India gives effect to the Convention on Biological Diversity at home.
Access and benefit sharingNewPrelims and Mains
Access and benefit sharing is the promise of the Biological Diversity Act that anyone who profits from a biological resource pays something back to the place it came from.
International Whaling CommissionNewPrelims
The International Whaling Commission (IWC) is the global body for managing whaling and conserving whales.
OrangutansNewPrelims and Mains
Orangutans are the only great apes in Asia, and they live wild only on Borneo and Sumatra.
The 1.5°C goal and overshootNewPrelims and Mains
The 1.5°C goal is the limit on global warming above pre industrial levels that the Paris Agreement pursues, the line everything else is measured against.
Rising seas and statehood: the UN declarationLead
On 24 September 2026 the United Nations General Assembly adopted its first declaration on sea level rise, and agreed to hold another high level meeting by September 2030.
Himalayan glacier retreatNewPrelims and Mains
Himalayan glacier retreat is the loss of ice from the glaciers of the Hindu Kush Himalaya.
A dry monsoon under a strong El NiñoLead
The southwest monsoon ended on 30 September 2026 at 87 per cent of the long period average, the driest season in 11 years, and Maharashtra declared drought in 265 of its 358 talukas on 26 September.
Swell surgeNewPrelims
A swell surge is coastal flooding caused by ocean swell that was generated far away, by a distant storm or a long gale.
COP31, AntalyaNewPrelims and Mains
COP31 is the 2026 conference of the parties to the United Nations climate convention, to be held at Antalya, Türkiye, in November.
Loss and damageNewPrelims and Mains
Loss and damage is the third thing the climate regime has had to deal with, after mitigation and adaptation.
BRICS as a negotiating blocPrelims and Mains
12 Sep 2026India held the chairship in 2026 and hosted the leaders' summit in New Delhi. The New Delhi Declaration of 12 September lifted those positions into a heads of government text, calling carbon border measures unilateral, punitive and discriminatory. It accepts a continuing role for fossil fuels in developing economies, asking instead for just, orderly, equitable and inclusive transitions. It launches a BRICS Carbon Markets Partnership and backs Ethiopia's COP32 presidency. PIB, 12 Sep 2026: BRICS New Delhi Declaration: Building for Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability (opens in a new tab) · The Indian Express, 13 Sep 2026: Need 'orderly & inclusive' energy transition, fossil fuels will continue playing key role: BRICS declaration (opens in a new tab)
Green status for nuclear powerNewPrelims and Mains
Green status for nuclear power would class nuclear energy as green, so that nuclear projects could raise money through green instruments.
Carbon Border Adjustment MechanismPrelims and Mains
23 Sep 2026Importers into the European Union start paying from February 2027 for goods shipped in 2026, by buying certificates that track the Union's carbon price. The mechanism deducts a carbon price paid at home, but India's carbon market sets intensity targets, so a mill that meets its target pays nothing at home and gets no deduction. Mains: the charge moves production to Europe without cutting emissions and reverses the flow of climate finance, though the Union's worry about carbon leakage is real. The Indian Express, 23 Sep 2026: Experts Explain | How the European Union's carbon tax works, and why BRICS pushed back against it (opens in a new tab)
Adaptation below the State: panchayatsNewPrelims and Mains
Adaptation below the State is climate planning by panchayats, which a State may entrust with planning for economic development and social justice.
Steel: carbon lock in and the two routesNewPrelims and Mains
Carbon lock in is what follows when a steel plant is built or relined: the decision is taken once, and it commits the plant's emissions for the years it runs.
Delhi's winter air: the revised GRAP and a fixed calendar of curbsLead
On 28 September 2026 CAQM approved a revised GRAP schedule, and Delhi announced a winter plan with curbs fixed by date from 1 November 2026 to 31 January 2027.
National Clean Air ProgrammeNewPrelims and Mains
The National Clean Air Programme (NCAP), launched in 2019, sets 130 cities, most of them non-attainment cities, a target for one pollutant and pays them to meet it.
Stubble burning and crop residue managementPrelims and Mains
4 Sep 2026CAQM opened talks with Punjab and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) on how stubble burning is counted, doubting that fire counts capture it. Peak burning moved from about 1.30 pm in 2020 to about 5 pm in 2024, after the satellites have passed. Fire counts in Punjab and Haryana fell 93 and 91 per cent from 2021 to 2025, but burnt area fell far more slowly. The burnt area protocol is being re-tested as satellite and ground data diverge. The Hindu, 4 Sep 2026: Air quality panel holding talks with Punjab govt. and ISRO over tracking of stubble fires (opens in a new tab) · The Indian Express, 7 Sep 2026: Air quality management body to re-test burnt area protocol as satellite, ground data diverge (opens in a new tab)
Jal Sanchay Jan BhagidariNewPrelims and Mains
Jal Sanchay Jan Bhagidari (JSJB), launched in September 2024, builds low cost artificial recharge structures with the community as their owner.
Urban miningNewMains
Urban mining is recovering metals and critical minerals from electronics at the end of life.
World Circular Economy ForumNewPrelims and Mains
The World Circular Economy Forum is a meeting on the circular economy, organised by the Central Pollution Control Board with Sitra, the Finnish Innovation Fund.
Industrial residues in roadsNewPrelims and Mains
Steel slag is a residue a steelworks produces whether anyone wants it or not, and processed into the shape and strength of stone aggregate it can replace the quarried stone that road building consumes by the tonne.
Watershed developmentNewPrelims and Mains
A watershed project treats a whole catchment so that rain is held where it falls, which is what protective irrigation later draws on.
PRAMAAN: the Indian Forest and Wood Certification SchemeNewPrelims
PRAMAAN is India's own framework for certifying forests, wood and non timber forest produce, launched in December 2023.
Bamboo in forest lawNewPrelims and Mains
Bamboo is botanically a grass, not a tree, and almost everything the law does about it turns on that fact.
Gram sabha consent for forest clearancePrelims and Mains
6 Sep 2026The Ministry of Tribal Affairs said on 31 August that the Forest Rights Act carries no provision for gram sabha consent to Stage II clearance, and that the matter falls outside its purview. A parliamentary committee report called consent from every gram sabha the most critical bottleneck in forest clearance, which took 106 months on average for hydropower projects. It suggested a qualified super majority of 70 to 75 per cent, citing Teesta IV, where three of ten gram panchayats had not consented. The Hindu, 6 Sep 2026: No provision in Forest Rights Act to obtain gram sabha consent for projects, Tribal Affairs Ministry says (opens in a new tab) · The Hindu, 7 Sep 2026: Why is MoTA distancing itself from Gram Sabha consent for forest clearance? | Explained (opens in a new tab)
The Brahmaputra and ChinaNewPrelims and Mains
The Brahmaputra is the Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibet, so India and Bangladesh lie downstream of whatever China builds on it.
The Sone agreementNewPrelims and Mains
The Sone agreement divides the water of the Sone, a right bank tributary that rises near Amarkantak in Madhya Pradesh and joins the Ganga near Patna.
Himalayan hazards: lake outbursts and avalanche cascadesLead
Uttarakhand began installing its first glacial lake early warning system at Vasundhara Tal in Chamoli on 29 September 2026. It comes a month after the Nepal disaster of 26 August, which experts now say was not a lake outburst at all.
The Nepal flood of August 2026NewPrelims and Mains
The Nepal flood of August 2026 was a debris flow that began on 26 August, when glacier ice and bedrock broke away on Langtang Lirung near the Nepal Tibet border and ran down the Bhote Koshi.
Drought declarationNewPrelims and Mains
India has no single definition of drought, and it is the State government that declares one.
EOS-05NewPrelims and Mains
EOS-05, also called Geo Imaging Satellite 1A (GISAT-1A), is the first Indian Earth observation satellite to image from geosynchronous orbit.
Weapons in orbit and the gaps in space lawLead
On 14 September 2026 the United States Air Force Secretary said the country has "space control" weapons in Earth orbit, the first public admission of this kind by any country.
NewSpace India LimitedNewPrelims and Mains
NewSpace India Limited (NSIL), formed in 2019 as a public sector company under the Department of Space, is ISRO's commercial arm.
Indian Space Policy 2023Prelims and Mains
14 Sep 2026ISRO's staff associations asked whether the agency would stop building launch vehicles and routine satellites, citing vacant posts and departures. ISRO replied that the shift is ecosystem expansion, not privatisation, with about 80 per cent of its budget already going to industry. An explainer set out what the policy says: ISRO moves out of routine manufacturing to research and frontier missions, and industry builds the operational systems. The Indian Express, 14 Sep 2026: ISRO's 'privatisation' move: What India's space policy says (opens in a new tab) · The Indian Express, 6 Sep 2026: Letter sent after GSLV launch: ISRO staff question trajectory of space privatisation, want chief to clarify (opens in a new tab) · The Indian Express, 7 Sep 2026: Private sector push is 'ecosystem expansion, not privatisation': ISRO allays staff concerns (opens in a new tab)
Scrub typhusNewPrelims
Scrub typhus is a bacterial infection spread by the bite of infected mites, and not by mosquitoes.
Lumpy skin diseaseNewPrelims
Lumpy skin disease is a pox virus infection of cattle and buffaloes, spread by biting insects, that causes fever, hard skin nodules and a fall in milk.
Disease surveillance and biological disaster preparednessNewPrelims and Mains
Disease surveillance is how India watches for outbreaks, through three networks; biological disaster preparedness is how it responds to an epidemic, a pandemic or a deliberate release.
Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness InnovationsNewPrelims and Mains
The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), launched in 2017, funds vaccines against emerging epidemic threats so that candidates are ready before an outbreak.
Pneumococcal vaccinesNewPrelims and Mains
Pneumococcal vaccines protect against Streptococcus pneumoniae, the bacterium that causes pneumonia, meningitis and sepsis when immunity weakens.
Gram-negative bacteriaNewPrelims and Mains
Gram-negative bacteria are one of the two groups into which a nineteenth century staining test, the Gram stain, sorts bacteria, and the harder of the two to treat.
FluorosisNewPrelims and Mains
Fluorosis is the harm done to the teeth and the bone by years of drinking groundwater that carries fluoride.
Rare diseases and orphan drugsNewPrelims and Mains
An orphan drug is a medicine for a rare disease, long neglected by drug makers because the market for it is small.
Indian Pharmacopoeia CommissionPrelims
21 Sep 2026A Biovigilance Programme of India, led by the Commission, will track adverse events from products used in organ and tissue transplantation. It is the third safety track, after pharmacovigilance for medicines and materiovigilance for medical devices. PIB, 21 Sep 2026: Union MoS for Health and Family Welfare Smt. Anupriya Patel launches 7th National Formulary of India 2026, announces Biovigilance Programme to widen India’s patient-safety net (opens in a new tab)
Pradhan Mantri Matsya Sampada YojanaNewPrelims
The Pradhan Mantri Matsya Sampada Yojana (PMMSY), launched in 2020 on the base of the earlier Blue Revolution scheme, is the scheme that funds fish farming units, recirculating and biofloc alike.
Recirculatory aquaculture and bioflocNewPrelims
Recirculatory aquaculture and biofloc are two ways of farming fish intensively by cleaning the water rather than replacing it.
When AI agents cross the line: the incidents and the pacing debateLead
Through September 2026 it emerged that AI agents under test had entered systems they were not meant to reach, including an Australian government health statistics portal, and OpenAI cancelled the release of its newest model on safety grounds.
Global governance of artificial intelligenceNewPrelims and Mains
Governments argue less about which rules to write for artificial intelligence than about whether it needs rules written for it at all.
Copyright in a machine generated workPrelims and Mains
2 Sep 2026India's Copyright Office refused to name the AI system DABUS as an author, holding that an author must be a person. The Indian Express, 2 Sep 2026: AI can create a work, but can it be its author? Why the Copyright Office drew the line (opens in a new tab)
Semicon India ProgrammeNewPrelims and Mains
The Semicon India Programme, begun in 2021 under the India Semiconductor Mission, backs the fabrication and the assembly and testing of chips in India.
Digital India Land Records Modernisation ProgrammeNewPrelims and Mains
The Digital India Land Records Modernisation Programme (DILRMP) is a Central Sector Scheme to modernise land records, so that the record of who owns which piece of land can be read, mapped and registered.
Consumer Protection (E-Commerce) Rules, 2020Prelims and Mains
10 Sep 2026An amendment notified on 10 September 2026 requires a platform to certify its own interface from 1 January 2027. Before the amendment a platform answered for its interface only when somebody caught it. PIB, 10 Sep 2026: Government amends E-Commerce Rules to strengthen consumer protection and promote transparency (opens in a new tab)
PhotonicsNewPrelims and Mains
Photonics is the technology of the parts that carry a signal as light rather than as current, where India's chip policy meets its network hardware.
Vehicle-to-vehicle communicationNewPrelims and Mains
A vehicle fitted for vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication broadcasts what it is doing to the vehicles around it, and listens for the same from them.
Hydropower in the HimalayaNewPrelims and Mains
Hydropower in the Himalaya means dams and power projects built on the rivers of a young, steep and seismically active range.
Geothermal energy and Puga ValleyNewPrelims and Mains
Geothermal energy taps heat that is already in the ground, and India's first geothermal wells are at Puga Valley in Ladakh.
Coal gasificationNewPrelims and Mains
Coal gasification turns coal into gas with heat, pressure and a controlled shortage of oxygen; it is thermochemical and not biochemical, and no microbe is involved.
CAFE III: the new fuel economy norms for carsLead
On 30 September 2026 the Ministry of Power notified new CAFE norms for passenger vehicles, in force from 1 April 2027 to 31 March 2032.
Green Energy CorridorNewPrelims and Mains
The Green Energy Corridor, begun in 2015, is the programme that builds the lines and substations to evacuate renewable power, to carry electricity away from where it is generated.
Who taxes minerals: the 2026 mining amendmentLead
The Act, passed in August 2026, has drawn protests in the Odisha Assembly, with mineral rich States saying it undoes a Supreme Court ruling in their favour.
District Mineral FoundationsNewPrelims and Mains
A District Mineral Foundation (DMF) is a district level body that spends on the welfare of areas and people affected by mining.
Lithium blocks abroadNewPrelims and Mains
Lithium blocks abroad are lithium bearing ground in other countries that India buys into, through KABIL, Khanij Bidesh India Limited.
India's deep sea mining programmeNewPrelims and Mains
India's deep sea mining programme explores the seabed for minerals under three International Seabed Authority contracts.
Correct the Map resolutionNewPrelims and Mains
Correct the Map is a non binding resolution of the United Nations General Assembly that names the Equal Earth projection as more accurate than Mercator's.
Legal Metrology (Indian Standard Time) Rules, 2026NewPrelims and Mains
Made under the Legal Metrology Act, 2009, these rules put Indian Standard Time on a legal footing for the first time.
National Quantum MissionPrelims and Mains
30 Sep 2026The mission has shown quantum secure communication over 1,000 km in about three years, against a target of 2,000 km in eight. A link between Chennai and Bengaluru combined post quantum cryptography with quantum key distribution on existing optical fibre. PIB, 30 Sep 2026: India’s emerging quantum ecosystem strengthened by enabling policy of the Modi government: Dr Jitendra Singh (opens in a new tab)