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Subject: Governance

Important aspects of Society

  • CPGRAMS Report for States/UTs (June 2026)

    Why in News?

    The Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) released the 47th monthly report on the Centralized Public Grievance Redress and Monitoring System (CPGRAMS) for States/UTs for June 2026.

    Key Highlights

    • Public Grievances Received: 96,190
    • Grievances Redressed: 93,170
    • Pending Cases (30 June 2026): 2,16,032
    • 23 States/UTs have over 1,000 pending grievances.
    • Uttar Pradesh recorded the highest disposals (31,460), followed by Maharashtra (7,619).

    CPGRAMS

    • CPGRAMS is an online grievance redress platform of the Government of India.
    • Developed and monitored by DARPG.
    • Enables citizens to submit and track grievances against government departments.
    • Integrated with over 5 lakh Common Service Centres (CSCs) through 2.5 lakh Village Level Entrepreneurs (VLEs).

    Sevottam Scheme

    • Capacity-building initiative to improve public service delivery and grievance redress.
    • FY 2022-23 to FY 2026-27 (till June): 1,196 training programmes conducted. Around 39,509 officers trained.

    Other Highlights

    • 83,544 new users registered on CPGRAMS in June 2026.
    • Feedback Call Centre collected 75,318 feedbacks, including 33,092 from States/UTs.
    • 6,262 grievances were registered through CSCs.
    • A dedicated Review Module for senior-level monitoring has been operational since 6 June 2025.

    Prelims Facts

    • DARPG: Department under the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions.
    • CPGRAMS: National online portal for public grievance redressal.
    • Sevottam Scheme: Focuses on improving service delivery and grievance redress mechanisms in government.

    [2021] With reference to the Union Government, consider the following statements:
    1. N. Gopalaswamy Iyengar Committee suggested that a minister and a secretary be designated solely for pursuing the subject of administrative reform and promoting it.
    2. In 1970, the Department of Personnel was constituted on the recommendation of the Administrative Reforms Commission, 1966, and this was placed under the Prime Minister’s charge.
    Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

    [A] 1 only

    [B] 2 only

    [C] Both 1 and 2

    [D] Neither 1 nor 2

  • NCRB data shows chronic pendency under the National Honour Act, even as government moves to add Vande Mataram

    Why in the News?

    National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data spanning 2014 to 2024 on the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971 shows pendency above 90% and a conviction rate below 16%. The government is simultaneously pushing an amendment to criminalise insult to Vande Mataram on par with the national anthem, despite the existing law’s poor enforcement record.

    What is the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971?

    1. The Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971 is an Indian law that bans the burning, mutilation, destruction, or disrespect of the national flag, the Constitution, and the national anthem.

    Key Rules and Penalties

    1. National Flag and Constitution: Section 2 prohibits burning, damaging, defacing, or showing disrespect to the flag or Constitution in any public place.
    2. National Anthem: Section 3 penalizes anyone who stops people from singing the national anthem or creates a disturbance during it.
    3. Punishment: Violations are punishable by up to three years in prison, a fine, or both. Repeat offenders face a minimum prison term of one year.
    4. Exceptions: Peaceful or lawful criticism aimed at changing or amending the Constitution or flag does not count as a crime

    Why does the enforcement record complicate the case for expanding the law?

    1. Pendency scale: Over 90% of cases registered under the Act between 2014 and 2024 remain pending, indicating a chronic backlog rather than an occasional delay.
    2. Low conviction: A conviction rate below 16% suggests weak evidentiary standards, prosecutorial capacity constraints, or both, in cases actually brought to trial.
    3. Expansion without fixing enforcement: Adding Vande Mataram to the Act’s protected symbols expands what the law covers without addressing why the existing provisions on the national anthem and flag are so poorly enforced.
    4. Symbolic versus functional legislation: A law with a sub-16% conviction rate functions more as a symbolic statement of state intent than as an operative deterrent.

    Conclusion

    The government’s push to expand the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971 proceeds without addressing why the existing law convicts fewer than one in six prosecuted cases. Enforcement capacity, not statutory scope, is the constraint the amendment leaves unaddressed.

      Back2Basics

      The Prevention of Insults to National Honour (Amendment) Bill, 2026:

      1. It is a legislative proposal introduced in the Rajya Sabha on July 24, 2026. It amends the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971, to extend statutory protection to India’s national song, Vande Mataram.

      Key Provisions

      1. Inclusion of the National Song: Amends Section 3 of the 1971 Act to place Vande Mataram under the same legal umbrella as the national anthem, Jana Gana Mana.
      2. Offenses Covered: Criminalizes intentionally preventing the singing of the national song or causing a disturbance at an assembly engaged in its rendition.
      3. Penalties: Proposes imprisonment for up to three years, a monetary fine, or both for first-time offenders, and a mandatory minimum of one year in prison for subsequent convictions

    1. CBSE On Screen Marking crisis exposes gaps in evaluation transparency

      Why in the News

      The Central Board of Secondary Education’s On Screen Marking system left roughly 18 lakh Class XII students unable to access their evaluated answer scripts, with only about 4 lakh managing to view them. The Supreme Court has flagged this as a source of frustration of young minds, exposing a gap between the Board’s digital evaluation push and its duty to let students verify their own results.

      What is On Screen Marking (OSM)?

      1. Definition: On Screen Marking is a digital evaluation method where scanned answer scripts are marked by examiners on a screen instead of on paper.
      2. Objective: The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) adopted it to standardise evaluation and speed up result processing.
      3. Access problem: Students are meant to view their own scanned, marked scripts after results, but the current system does not guarantee this access at scale.
      4. CIC role: The Central Information Commission (CIC) had already advised CBSE to frame a standard operating procedure (SOP) for script access before this crisis became public.

      Why has script access broken down for most students?

      1. Capacity gap: The Board built a system that could evaluate scripts digitally but did not build matching capacity to let all students retrieve their own scripts afterward.
      2. Verification denied: Without script access, students cannot check whether their marks were recorded and totalled correctly.
      3. Court intervention: The Supreme Court’s intervention signals that the current process fails a basic due process test for an examination body.
      4. Trust deficit: The gap between the promise of a transparent digital system and the reality of restricted access has deepened student distrust in board evaluation.

      What are the challenges to CBSE’s On Screen Marking system?

      1. Server capacity: Providing 18 lakh students simultaneous access to scanned scripts requires infrastructure the Board has not demonstrated it has built.
      2. Re-evaluation load: A universal access policy will likely increase re-evaluation requests, straining CBSE’s examination machinery further.
      3. Accountability gap: No fixed timeline currently binds CBSE to release scripts or resolve discrepancies once a student flags one.
      4. Precedent for other boards: State boards using similar digital evaluation systems face the same access question, but have no shared standard to follow.
      5. Data security: Wider script access at scale raises the risk of manipulation or leakage of evaluation data if access controls are weak.

      What are the Core Safeguards Used Globally?

      1. Item-Level Marking: Slicing whole papers into isolated questions, sending each question to a different subject specialist to minimize bias or fatigue.
      2. Seed Scripts: Silently injecting pre-marked test scripts into an evaluator’s queue; failing to match the benchmark locks the user out for recalibration.
      3. Centralized Tracking: Real-time dashboards tracking marker progress, turnaround times, and statistical consistency across distributed pools.

      Conclusion

      The central issue is not the shift to digital evaluation itself but the absence of a guaranteed, time bound right for students to view their own scripts. A proposed seven day transparency framework standard operating procedure would fix the access gap, but only if CBSE is bound to a deadline rather than treating disclosure as discretionary.

      PYQ Relevance

      [UPSC 2020] National Education Policy 2020 is in conformity with the Sustainable Development Goal-4 (2030). It intends to restructure and reorient education system in India. Critically examine the statement.

      Linkage: The PYQ evaluates reforms aimed at improving quality, equity and governance in education. The OSM controversy underscores that digital reforms in education must be accompanied by transparency, accountability and robust grievance redressal to achieve quality education.

    2. Examination reform: Nilekani task force and Radhakrishnan committee implementation under Supreme Court watch

      The Supreme Court will consult the Nandan Nilekani-led task force at its next hearing on 3 August 2026 regarding the proposed transition of NEET-UG from a pen-and-paper examination to Computer-Based Testing (CBT). The Court is also examining the government’s progress in implementing the K. Radhakrishnan Committee’s recommendations on examination reforms.

      Key Highlights

      • Implementation review: The Centre has submitted an affidavit on the implementation status of the 101 recommendations of the K. Radhakrishnan Committee.
      • Committee recommendations:
        • 60 short-term and 35 medium/long-term reforms.
        • Restructuring of the National Testing Agency (NTA).
        • Introduction of Computer-assisted Secure Pen-and-Paper Testing (CPPT).
        • Adoption of DIGI-EXAM for secure candidate authentication.
      • Infrastructure plan: Establishment of 1,000 Secure Testing Centres across the country.
      • Related development: Concerns over examination integrity have also emerged in the Jharkhand Combined Civil Services Examination, highlighting the need for broader examination reforms.

      About the National Testing Agency (NTA)

      • Established in 2017 as an autonomous organisation under the Ministry of Education.
      • Conducts major national entrance examinations such as NEET-UG, JEE Main, CUET and UGC-NET.
      • Objective is to ensure fair, transparent, efficient and technology-driven examinations.

      What is Computer-Based Testing (CBT)?

      • Candidates answer questions on a computer terminal instead of paper.
      • Responses are digitally recorded and securely transmitted.
      • Reduces risks associated with paper leaks, manual handling and evaluation delays.

      What is Computer-assisted Secure Pen-and-Paper Testing (CPPT)?

      • Question papers are generated digitally and printed securely at authorised centres shortly before the examination.
      • Minimises transportation and storage of printed question papers.
      • Reduces the possibility of paper leaks while retaining a pen-and-paper examination format.

    3. The Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Amendment Bill, 2026 passed by both houses

      Why in News

      The Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Amendment Bill, 2026 has been passed by both Houses of Parliament, having first been cleared by the Lok Sabha on July 29, 2026, followed by approval from the Rajya Sabha on July 30, 2026.

      Key Highlights

      • Stricter punishment: Maximum imprisonment for offences involving unfair means increased to 10 years, from the earlier 3 to 5 years.
      • Higher penalty: Maximum fine for individual offences enhanced to ₹50 lakh.
      • Organised examination fraud: Punishable with a minimum imprisonment of 7 years and a fine up to ₹10 crore.
      • Procedural reforms: Provides for fast-track courts and mandates completion of investigations within two months.
      • Companion legislation: The Prevention of Insults to National Honour (Amendment) Bill, 2026 was also introduced during the same session.

      Background

      • The amendment strengthens the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024.
      • The Act aims to prevent paper leaks, impersonation, organised cheating and other examination-related malpractices in public examinations conducted by designated authorities.

      Objectives

      • Ensure fairness, transparency and credibility in recruitment and entrance examinations.
      • Deter organised examination fraud through stringent penalties.
      • Protect the interests of genuine candidates.
      • Improve the speed of investigation and prosecution.

      Significance

      • Enhances the integrity of public recruitment and competitive examinations.
      • Acts as a deterrent against paper leak mafias and organised crime networks.
      • Strengthens public confidence in examination systems.
      • Supports merit-based selection and good governance.

      [2026] Mr. X, a senior officer, was overseeing a critical vaccination programme during a pandemic. He found that a private service provider responsible for vaccine distribution was compromising on quality to make profits. Despite immense pressure to manage the issue due to vested interests, he raised his voice based on the principles of public administration which he learnt during various training programmes attended across his career. He reported the issue to the appropriate vigilance authority and halted the contract to ensure citizen welfare.
      Which one among the following principles of public administration was most strongly demonstrated by Mr. X’s actions?

      [A] Esprit de corps

      [B] Equity

      [C] Accountability

      [D] Delegation

    4. Why India must modernise the way the government publishes laws and regulations 

      Why in the News?

      India’s legal publishing system still runs on PDF-based gazettes, a format created in the early 1990s, forcing citizens, lawyers and even courts to search scattered notifications to determine which provisions of law are actually in force. In one documented case, sections of a 2005 amendment to the Code of Criminal Procedure remained unnotified and legally void for more than two decades without public knowledge. This exposes a gap between the constitutional promise that laws be knowable in advance and the administrative reality of an opaque, print-oriented publishing format.

      Why must a law be knowable before it can be enforced?

      1. Historical precedent: Mahatma Gandhi’s first act against the 1906 Transvaal “Black Act” was to translate and publish the ordinance in full in Indian Opinion, so that Indians could read exactly what was being done to them.
      2. Underlying principle: A community cannot defend its rights against a law it cannot read.
      3. Constitutional expectation: Bills before Parliament or a State Assembly are meant to be made known to the people in advance of enactment.
      4. Practical breach: Bills are often not placed in the public domain before they are introduced.
      5. Judicial dimension: The judiciary is expected to know the state of the law it adjudicates, which presupposes that the state of the law is discoverable.

      Where does India’s legal publishing system actually fail?

      1. Fragmentation: Laws governing citizens include Acts and their amendments, rules, regulations, BIS standards, road standards, circulars and municipal bylaws.
      2. No single source: There is no single place to find out what the law actually is; it lies scattered across multiple websites.
      3. Discovery problem: Citizens struggle to find the law currently in force.
      4. Historical-state problem: Even after locating a copy, determining what the law was on a given date is a separate and difficult exercise.
      5. Primary publishing channel: Government uses gazettes as its primary means of publishing laws and bringing them into force.

      Can a provision bind citizens if its own government cannot confirm it is in force?

      1. Case origin: A legal publisher was incorporating changes made by the Code of Criminal Procedure (Amendment) Act, 2005 into the principal Act.
      2. Search failure: The amendment left it to the government to decide when its various sections would come into force, and no gazette notifying Sections 16, 25, 28(a), 28(b), 38, 42(a), 42(b), 42(f)(iii) and (iv), and 44(a) could be found.
      3. RTI confirmation: An RTI application to the Ministry of Home Affairs confirmed that these sections have never been notified.
      4. Legal consequence: More than two decades later, these sections are still not valid law.
      5. Systemic implication: If a central ministry itself cannot demonstrate whether a provision is in force, publication by gazette has failed at its most basic function.

      What technical flaw locks Indian law into this opacity?

      1. Format origin: Gazettes are published as PDFs, a format created in the early 1990s to ensure a digital document looks identical on every device by embedding fonts and images.
      2. Print-fidelity trade-off: This makes PDFs easy to share and print but very hard to extract the structure and meaning of a legal document from.
      3. Lost hierarchy: A law is inherently hierarchical, with chapters, parts, sections and subsections, but a PDF exposes none of that hierarchy.
      4. Language barrier: Many gazettes published in regional languages use proprietary fonts that display correctly on a PDF viewer but cannot be searched in that regional language or read on most websites.
      5. Amendment tracking: A format that cannot expose structure also cannot show precisely what changed across successive amendments to an Act.

      What do global legal-publishing models demonstrate is possible?

      1. Akoma Ntoso, Africa: Many African countries have adopted the Akoma Ntoso standard, a markup language designed specifically for legal documents; Akoma Ntoso is an open markup format that encodes a law’s structure, semantics and language rather than only its printed appearance.
      2. Indigo platform, Africa: These countries use Indigo, an open-source legal publishing platform that lets users add or edit laws and see precisely what changed across an Act’s successive amendments, with subordinate rules tagged to their principal Act.
      3. USLM, United States: The United States publishes every law and amendment in USLM (United States Legislative Markup), a variant of Akoma Ntoso, generating PDF and HTML versions automatically from it using a stylesheet.
      4. Federal Register, United States: All past issues of the Federal Register have been converted into this format and made available for bulk download, allowing commercial legal vendors, nonprofits and think tanks to build citizen-facing tools on top of it.
      5. CLML, United Kingdom: The United Kingdom publishes its legislation at legislation.gov.uk, run by The National Archives, using Crown Legislation Markup Language (CLML), another modified version of Akoma Ntoso.
      6. Convergence toward one standard: The National Archives has stated it aims to move towards Akoma Ntoso itself, since Akoma Ntoso is emerging as the international standard, is less complex, and is supported by a wider pool of experts and suppliers.

      What is at stake for Indian democracy if this publishing model is not upgraded?

      1. Structural lag: While the rest of the world has moved away from PDF publishing, India remains dependent on a standard built more than three decades back.
      2. Persistent barrier: Until the government upgrades its legal publishing software stack, access to the law will remain unnecessarily difficult for citizens, lawyers, judges and other stakeholders in a democracy.
      3. Precedent from the internet: The internet itself was built on open standards, which every stakeholder came together to adopt.
      4. Ambedkar’s distinction: Dr B.R. Ambedkar reminded that a democracy needs more than a government “for the people”; it needs a government “by the people.”
      5. Contractor-capture risk: Laws are the raw material of democracy, and leaving their publication to a handful of contractors will only deepen the obscurity around them.
      6. Reform payoff: If the government instead consults citizens and standardises legal publishing, it could transform how the state communicates with the people and make them active participants in democracy.

      Conclusion

      The central failure identified is not the absence of law but the absence of a reliable way to know the law: India’s PDF-and-gazette-based publishing system leaves entire provisions practically undiscoverable even as they legally bind citizens. Other democracies have already shown that open, structured legal markup standards (Akoma Ntoso, USLM, CLML) can make a law’s text, hierarchy and amendment history transparent and machine-readable. Until India upgrades this publishing infrastructure, the rule of law will remain formally intact but practically inaccessible, with its administration effectively outsourced to a narrow set of contractors rather than opened to citizens.

      PYQ Linkage

      [UPSC 2018] E-Governance is not only about utilization of the power of new technology, but also much about critical importance of the ‘use value’ of information. Explain.

      Linkage: The PYQ argues that e-governance’s value lies in making information usable, not merely digitised. The article’s central claim mirrors this exactly, PDF gazettes are digitised but not structurally usable, while open markup standards make the “use value” of legal information real.

    5. Nilekani to lead task force on exams: Modi

      Why in News?

      Prime Minister Modi constituted a six member high powered task force headed by Nandan Nilekani to recommend steps to secure India’s examination system, as the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Amendment Bill, 2026 is set to be introduced in Parliament.

      Key Highlights

      • The task force is headed by Nandan Nilekani and includes S. Somanath, Tapan Deka, V. Kamakoti, Anita Karwal, and Amrit Lal Meena.
      • It has been tasked with recommending measures to make the public examination system leak proof, transparent, secure, and technology driven.
      • The Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Amendment Bill, 2026 is scheduled to be introduced during the Monsoon Session of Parliament.
      • The proposed reforms seek to strengthen exam security, digital monitoring, accountability, and integrity in recruitment and entrance examinations.
      • Pralhad Joshi has assumed additional charge as Union Education Minister following the resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan.

      Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024

      • Enacted to prevent unfair practices such as paper leaks, impersonation, and organised cheating in public examinations.
      • Covers examinations conducted by bodies such as: UPSC, SSC, RRBs, NTA, IBPS, and Other notified central recruitment agencies
      • Prescribes:
        • Imprisonment of 3 to 5 years and a fine up to ₹10 lakh for individuals involved in unfair means.
        • Imprisonment of 5 to 10 years and a fine of at least ₹1 crore for organised paper leak syndicates.
      • Offences are cognizable, non-bailable, and non-compoundable.

      [2024, GS2, 15 marks] What are the aims and objects of the recently passed and enforced, The Public Examination (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024? Whether University/State Education Board examinations, too, are covered under the Act?”

      [2018] Consider the following statements:

      1. As per the right to education (RTE) Act, to be eligible for appointment as a teacher in a state, a person would be required to possess the minimum qualification laid down by the concerned State council of Teacher education.
      2. As per the RTE Act, for teaching primary classes, a candidate is required to pass a Teacher Eligibility Test conducted in accordance with the National Council of Teacher Education guidelines
      3. In India, more than 90 % of teacher education institutions are directly under the State Governments.

      Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

      [A] 1 and 2

      [B] 2 only

      [C] 1 and 3

      [D] 3 only

    6. On guard: on India and the Qdenga dengue vaccine

      Why in the News?

      India’s drug regulator, the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO), has approved Qdenga, the country’s first dengue vaccine, after its licensing in over 40 countries and World Health Organisation (WHO) prequalification, arriving amid some of India’s worst dengue outbreaks.

      Why was developing any dengue vaccine so difficult in the first place?

      1. Four serotypes must be defeated at once: The four antigenically distinct dengue serotypes (DENV-1, DENV-2, DENV-3, DENV-4) require a vaccine to generate strong immunity against all four simultaneously.
      2. The antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE) risk: A second infection with a different serotype can cause more severe disease through antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE), the mechanism that undermined the first licensed dengue vaccine, Dengvaxia, and led to the 2017 Philippines controversy.
      3. Qdenga’s design choice: Developed by Japan-based Takeda, Qdenga differs from Dengvaxia and does not require prior screening for previous dengue infection before vaccination.

      What specific gaps in Qdenga’s protection could undermine its rollout this monsoon?

      1. Uneven serotype coverage: Protection is highest against DENV-2, followed by DENV-1, while uncertainty remains regarding DENV-3 and DENV-4 in seronegative individuals.
      2. A rising mismatch: Although DENV-2 currently predominates in India, DENV-3 is increasing. If DENV-3 becomes dominant during the 2026 monsoon, the vaccine’s real-world effectiveness could decline, especially among those with no prior dengue exposure.
      3. A dangerous timing gap: Qdenga requires two doses administered three months apart. The first dose provides uneven protection, leaving seronegative individuals vulnerable if exposed to DENV-3 before completing the vaccination schedule.
      4. A specific trial finding on vulnerable children: The Tetravalent Immunization against Dengue Efficacy Study (TIDES) trial raised concerns about negative efficacy against hospitalisation related to DENV-3 among seronegative children who do not complete both doses.

      Why is the vaccine’s price, not just its science, presented as the real barrier to protection?

      1. The mobile workforce problem: Ensuring that migrant workers receive the second dose on schedule will be difficult, increasing the risk highlighted in the TIDES trial.
      2. Tiered pricing risks excluding vulnerable groups: Under Takeda’s global tiered pricing strategy, Qdenga may remain unaffordable for residents of dense urban slums with poor drainage, who face the highest exposure to Aedes mosquitoes.
      3. The Aedes mosquito’s changing range compounds the problem: Aedes mosquitoes are spreading into semi-urban and rural areas, making vector control more difficult and expanding the population requiring affordable vaccination.

      Conclusion

      The approval of Qdenga is a significant milestone in India’s fight against dengue, but its public health impact depends on addressing serotype-specific protection gaps, ensuring completion of the two-dose schedule, and making the vaccine affordable for high-risk populations. The editorial argues that price negotiations are essential for the vaccine to achieve meaningful public health outcomes.

      Back2Basics

      About Dengue:

      1. Dengue (break-bone fever) is a viral infection that is spread from mosquitoes to people. It is more common in tropical and subtropical than in temperate climates.
      2. Transmission: The dengue virus is transmitted to humans through the bites of infected female mosquitoes, primarily the Aedes aegypti mosquito. Other species within the Aedes genus can also act as vectors, but their contribution is normally secondary to Aedes aegypti.
      3. Human-to-mosquito transmission: Mosquitoes can become infected by people who are viremic with DENV. This can be someone who has a symptomatic dengue infection, someone who is yet to have a symptomatic infection (those who are pre-symptomatic), and also someone who shows no signs of illness (those who are asymptomatic).

      Dengue Serotype

      1. Four Types: The virus exists as four closely related strains: DENV-1, DENV-2, DENV-3, and DENV-4.
      2. Immunity: Catching one serotype gives you lifelong immunity to that specific type, but only short protection against the other three.
      3. Severe Risk: Getting infected a second time by a different serotype can raise your chance of getting severe dengue.

      Important Keywords:

      1. Antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE): A phenomenon in which antibodies generated from a previous infection with one dengue serotype enhance, rather than prevent, severe disease during infection with a different serotype, making dengue vaccine development particularly challenging.
      2. WHO prequalification: A World Health Organization (WHO) assessment that certifies a vaccine meets international standards of quality, safety, and efficacy, enabling procurement by governments and international agencies.

      PYQ Relevance

      [UPSC 2022] What is the basic principle behind vaccine development? How do vaccines work? What approaches were adopted by the Indian vaccine manufacturers to produce COVID-19 vaccines?

      Linkage: The PYQ examines the science behind vaccine development and immunization, a core GS-3 Science & Technology theme. The article applies these principles to dengue, highlighting challenges of multi-serotype vaccines, ADE, efficacy, and rollout.

    7. Delhi High Court declines interim injunction against OpenAI in ANI copyright suit

      Why in News?

      The Delhi High Court refused to grant interim relief to ANI in its copyright infringement case against OpenAI, holding that AI training on copyrighted content is covered by the fair dealing exception under the Copyright Act.

      Key Highlights

      • Justice Amit Bansal held that using ANI’s content to train Large Language Models (LLMs) falls under Section 52(1)(a) of the Copyright Act, 1957.
      • The Court found that ANI failed to prove any loss to its news syndication business.
      • ANI had earlier offered OpenAI a content licence for $7.5 million, indicating any potential damages are quantifiable.
      • The Court rejected ANI’s request to delete training data, noting OpenAI’s legal obligations under US law.
      • It observed that requiring licences from every copyright holder would make AI development economically unviable and highlighted AI’s public benefits in sectors such as education, healthcare, agriculture, and finance.
      • The Federation of Indian Publishers, Digital News Publishers Association, and Indian Music Industry joined the suit.

      Fair Dealing (Section 52, Copyright Act, 1957)

      • A statutory exception permitting limited use of copyrighted works without the owner’s permission.
      • Applies to purposes such as:
        • Private or personal use (including research)
        • Criticism or review
        • Reporting current events

      Copyright vs Patent

      • Copyright: Protects original literary, artistic, musical, dramatic works, films, and software.
      • Patent: Protects new inventions, granting exclusive rights generally for 20 years.

      Copyright Act, 1957

      • Governs protection of literary, artistic, musical, dramatic works, films, sound recordings, and software.
      • Grants creators exclusive rights over reproduction, adaptation, distribution, and communication of their works.
      • Section 52 provides exceptions under the doctrine of fair dealing.

      PYQ (2014, GS3, 12.5 Marks) In a globalised world, intellectual property rights assume significance and are a source of litigation. Broadly distinguish between the terms copyrights, patents and trade secrets.

      [2026] Which of the following statements with regard to Large Language Models (LLMs) used in machine learning is/are correct?
      1. LLMs assign probabilities to the next possible words and then pick the one with the highest probability.
      2. LLMs process data through mathematical optimization to minimise prediction errors.
      3. LLMs produce unbiased outputs.
      Select the answer using the code given below :

      [A] 1 only

      [B] 1 and 2 only

      [C] 2 and 3 only

      [D] 1, 2 and 3

    8. Telecom infra data can’t be shared outside India, says Govt

      Why in News?

      The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has mandated that telecom infrastructure providers store and process telecom network data only within India.

      Key Highlights

      • DoT barred telecom infrastructure providers from sharing telecom network data outside India.
      • Covers cloud-based telecom networks, mobile tower operators, and satellite gateway providers.
      • Mandates that all telecom network systems, data, logs, and related information be stored within India.
      • No copies of such data can be routed, shared, or made available outside the country.
      • Issued under the authorisation framework of the Telecommunications Act, 2023, replacing the earlier licensing regime.

      Data Localisation

      • Refers to storing and processing data within the country’s borders.
      • Benefits:
        • Strengthens national security and cyber resilience.
        • Improves regulatory oversight and law enforcement access.
        • Enhances protection of critical digital infrastructure.
      • Challenges:
        • Higher compliance costs for companies.
        • Concerns over cross-border data flows and global cloud operations.

      Telecommunications Act, 2023

      • Replaced the Indian Telegraph Act, 1885.
      • Introduces an authorisation-based regime instead of licensing.
      • Aims to strengthen telecom security, spectrum management, user protection, and digital infrastructure governance.

      PYQ (2018, GS3, 15 Marks) Data security has assumed significant importance in the digitized world due to rising cyber crimes. The Justice B. N. Srikrishna Committee Report addresses issues related to data security. What, in your view, are the strengths and weaknesses of the Report relating to protection of personal data in cyberspace?