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UPSC Current Affairs Pointers brings you essential current affairs of the past week, every Monday, to aid you in your Prelims and Mains preparation of UPSC, State PCS, and other competitive examinations.
If you missed the UPSC Current Affairs Pointers of the past week | December 30, 2024, to January 5, 2025, from the Indian Express, read it here.
(FYI: The data provided in these reports can be used to substantiate your Mains answer and create a broad understanding of the topic.)
— According to the Future of Jobs Report 2025, published by the World Economic Forum (WEF), about 170 million new jobs will be created by 2030, while 92 million are projected to be displaced. This results in 78 million net new jobs.
— Farm workers and drivers will figure among the fastest growing jobs over the next five years. However, the roles of cashiers and ticket clerks will see the largest decline.
— Technological advancements, demographic shifts, geoeconomic tensions, and economic pressures are the key drivers of these changes, reshaping industries and professions worldwide.
— Technology skills in AI, big data, and cybersecurity are expected to see rapid growth in demand, but human skills, such as creative thinking, resilience, flexibility, and agility, will remain critical.
— Frontline roles, including farm workers, delivery drivers, and construction workers, are poised to see the largest job growth in absolute terms by 2030.
— The fastest-growing skills by 2030 will include AI and big data, networks and cybersecurity, technological literacy, and creative thinking.
— The report was produced by an international team of researchers from universities in Australia, Saudi Arabia, China, Germany, and elsewhere.
— The water cycle involves water evaporating from the ground and sea, and eventually returning to the Earth as rain snow. Climate change has intensified this cycle as air temperatures soar, more water evaporates into the air.
— Warmer air can hold more water vapour — for every 1 degree Celsius rise in average temperature, the atmosphere can hold about 7% more moisture. This makes storms more dangerous as it leads to an increase in precipitation intensity, duration and/or frequency, which ultimately causes severe flooding across the world.
— As the rise in temperatures causes more evaporation, soils are drying out. And when the rain does arrive, most of the water runs off the hard ground into rivers and streams, and the soil remains dry.
— According to the report, in 2024, water-related disasters caused more than 8,700 fatalities, displaced 40 million people, and resulted in economic losses exceeding $550 billion globally.
— There were 38% more record-dry months in 2024 than for the baseline period (1995-2005).
— Rainfall records are being broken with increasing regularity. For instance, record highs for monthly rainfall were set 27% more often in 2024 than in the year 2000, and daily rainfall records were set 52% more frequently.
— Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Grameen Bharat Mahotsav 2025 on 4th January at Bharat Mandapam, New Delhi.
— The Mahotsav was organised from 4th to 9th January, celebrating rural India’s entrepreneurial spirit and cultural heritage. The theme of this year’s event was ‘Building a Resilient Rural India for a Viksit Bharat 2047,’ with the motto “गांव बढ़े, तो देश बढ़े.”
(Source: PIB)
— The Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) is observed once every two years on January 9th. The 18th PBD 2025 was organised in collaboration with the State Government of Odisha from 08-10 January 2025 in Bhubaneswar, Orissa.
— It was celebrated under the theme, “The Diaspora’s Contribution to a Viksit Bharat,” with a considerable number of members of the Indian diaspora from over 50 different countries having registered to participate in the PBD Convention.
— The Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) Convention was created in 2003 by then-Prime Minister Late Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee as a platform for recognising and engaging with the Indian population residing abroad.
— January 9 was chosen as the day to commemorate this milestone since it was on this date in 1915 that Mahatma Gandhi, the greatest Pravasi, returned to India from South Africa, led India’s liberation war, and permanently transformed the lives of Indians.
— An award called the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman Award is given out as part of the programme. The award is to commemorate the contribution of the Indian diaspora to create a better understanding of India abroad, support India’s causes and work for the welfare of the local Indian community. Read more…
— Union Home Minister Amit Shah inaugurated the ‘Bharatpol’ portal, emphasizing the need for Indian investigative agencies to adopt modern technology and methods to apprehend fugitives.
— The portal will facilitate the exchange and retrieval of case-related information between Indian investigative agencies and Interpol’s 195 member countries.
— The ‘Bharatpol’ initiative has been established under the CBI and the National Central Bureau of India, which oversee Interpol-related matters.
— The genome sequencing data of 10,000 Indians, sequenced from 99 distinct populations, will now be available for researchers to develop medicines tailored to the local population.
— The Genome India project was approved by the government in 2020 with the aim of creating a comprehensive catalogue of genetic variations found in the Indian population.
— Researchers from 20 different scientific institutions have come together to sequence the first 10,000 genomes under the project.
— A map of genetic diversity is essential for understanding the history of our evolution, discovering the genetic basis for various diseases, and creating therapies for the future.
— The Centre has made it mandatory for new applicants to obtain a farmer ID for enrolment into the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-Kisan) to get benefits under the scheme.
— Kisan Pehchaan Patra or farmer ID is an Aadhaar-like unique digital identity linked dynamically to the state’s land records with information like demographics, crops sown, and ownership details.
— The database created through the farmer ID will be known as Farmer’s Registry — one of the three registries under the Agri-Stack component of the Centre’s Digital Agriculture Mission for the creation of digital public infrastructure in the farm sector, which was approved by the Union Cabinet last year.
— Under the PM-Kisan scheme, eligible farmer families receive Rs 6,000 per annum in three equated instalments (Rs 2,000 in each instalment) through Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) every four months.
— The scheme was launched on February 24, 2019, just before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. With 100 per cent funding from the Centre, the money is directly transferred to the bank accounts of the beneficiaries.
— In a historic step, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands administration has enrolled and distributed voter ID cards to 19 members of the Jarawa community.
— The Jarawas are one of the indigenous tribes of the Andaman Islands, known for their semi-nomadic lifestyle, reliance on forest resources, and deep connection to their natural environment.
— They inhabit the western coasts of South and Middle Andaman Islands, a region rich in biodiversity that supports their traditional way of life.
— Green crabs are an invasive species native to Europe. Sea otters are devouring thousands of green crabs at the Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve in California, helping save the ecosystem of the West Coast of the United States.
— Green crabs first arrived in North America in the 1800s, likely via the ballast water — fresh or saltwater held in the ballast tanks and cargo holds of ships — of merchant ships from Europe.
— Around the late 1980s, green crabs came to be seen as a threat to coastal ecosystems in the region.
— The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) defines invasive alien species (IAS) as “species whose introduction and/or spread outside their natural past or present distribution threatens biological diversity”. These include animals, plants, fungi, and even microorganisms, and can influence all kinds of ecosystems.
— Sea otters are devouring thousands of green crabs — an invasive species native to Europe — at the Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve in California, helping save the ecosystem of the West Coast of the United States, according to a new study.
— Once thought to be extinct, sea otters have rebounded along the coast, and have eaten so many crabs that they have locally solved a problem that has plagued the West Coast for years.
— Sea otters are a “super voracious predator” as unlike most marine mammals, they rely on a very rapid metabolism to stay warm in chilly oceans.
— Sea otters not only hunt green crabs but also sea urchins — small, spiky animals that can destroy entire forests of kelp, leaving behind deserts called urchin barrens.
— Sea otters are classified as endangered on the IUCN Red List due to habitat loss and pollution.
— At least five people have died in the United States after a winter storm hit a large swathe of the country over the weekend. The extreme weather has been caused by the expansion of the polar vortex southwards.
— The polar vortex is a large area of low-pressure and cold air that swirls like a wheel around both of the Earth’s polar regions. There are two types of polar vortex: tropospheric and stratospheric.
— The tropospheric polar vortex occurs at the lowest layer of the atmosphere — it extends from the surface up to about 10 km to 15 km — where most weather phenomena occur.
— The stratospheric polar vortex occurs at around 15 km to 50 km high. Unlike the tropospheric polar vortex, the stratospheric polar vortex disappears during the summer and is the strongest during the autumn.
— The US, parts of Europe, and Asia experience chilly winds when the polar vortex at the North Pole weakens travel from its usual position.
— “As this system weakens, some of the cold, arctic air can break off and migrate south, bringing plenty of cold air with it. Areas as far south as Florida may experience arctic weather as a result,” according to a report in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) SciJinks.
— Multiple wildfires have destroyed homes and businesses, and covered cities and highways in smoke in Southern California, the United States. Experts have suggested two reasons for this wildfire – the “Santa Ana” winds and climate change.
— Santa Ana winds blow when high pressure builds over the Great Basin — the area between the Rocky Mountains and Sierra Nevada (a mountain range in the Western United States) — and the pressure is low over California’s coast.
— The difference in pressure triggers the movement of powerful winds from the Basin’s inland deserts, east, and north of Southern California, over the mountains toward the Pacific Ocean.
— As the wind comes down the mountains, it compresses and heats up. The wind’s humidity also drops, sometimes to less than 20% or even less than 10%. The extremely low moisture turns vegetation dry, making it ready to burn. This process helped fuel the three wildfires in Southern California.
— Santa Ana-driven wildfires are a natural part of California’s landscape. However, experts say the wildfire season in California has lengthened in recent years. This has happened primarily because of climate change. Rise in global temperatures over the years has led to warmer springs and summers, and early spring snow melts.
— La Niña conditions have finally surfaced in the Pacific Ocean, the US-based National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) declared on Thursday (January 9).
— La Niña is a phase of what is known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO), a climate phenomenon characterised by changes in sea temperatures along the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean, accompanied with fluctuations in the atmosphere overhead.
— ENSO has three phases – warm (El Niño), cool (La Niña), and neutral — which occur in irregular cycles of two to seven years. La Niña last occurred in 2020-2023, and El Niño in 2023-24.
— In a step towards operationalising the Indo-US nuclear deal Washington is finalizing steps to remove long-standing regulations including removing Indian government entities from the US entity list.
— The US Entity List is a list of foreign individuals, businesses, and organizations that are subject to export restrictions and licensing requirements for certain goods and technologies.
— The list — compiled by the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) of the U.S. Department of Commerce — is ostensibly used to prevent unauthorized trade in items that could be diverted to terrorism, weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs, or other activities that are perceived by the US as going its foreign policy or national security interests.
— The current trip of US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan aims to strengthen the innovation alliance under the US-India initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET).
— The iCET was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Joe Biden in May 2022 to forge greater collaboration between India and the US in areas of critical technologies.
— Indonesia has become a full member of BRICS. The group, which brings together major emerging economies, now consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, and Indonesia.
— Brazil, which holds the presidency of BRICS in 2025, said member states had unanimously approved Indonesia’s membership during the 2023 BRICS summit in Johannesburg.
— However, Indonesia chose to finalise its membership after its presidential election in 2024, which saw President Prabowo Subianto take office in October.
— The bodies of three more men were recovered from the flooded rathole mine in Assam’s Dima Hasao district on Saturday, five days after they got trapped.
— Rat-hole mining is a method of extracting coal from narrow, horizontal seams, prevalent in Meghalaya. The term “rat hole” refers to the narrow pits dug into the ground, typically just large enough for one person to descend and extract coal.
— Once the pits are dug, miners descend using ropes or bamboo ladders to reach the coal seams. The coal is then manually extracted using primitive tools such as pickaxes, shovels, and baskets.
— The National Green Tribunal (NGT) banned the practice in 2014, and retained the ban in 2015. Read more
(Just FYI: UPSC has consistently included questions on health and diseases in its examinations over the years. For instance, in 2014, a question about the Ebola virus appeared in the Prelims, and in 2017, a question about the Zika virus was featured. Therefore, it is crucial to stay updated on diseases that are currently in the news.)
— Hepatocellular carcinoma or HCC is a type of cancer where malignant cells grow in the liver’s main cells, called hepatocytes.
— It accounts for the vast majority of liver cancer cases and is one of the leading causes of cancer deaths globally.
— According to available data, the incidence rate of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) in India for men “ranges from 0.7 to 7.5 and for women 0.2 to 2.2 per 100,000 population per year,” said Dr Sheetal Mahajani, senior hepatologist and one of the pioneers of the liver transplant programme in Pune.
— Hepatocellular carcinoma is treated by transarterial chemo-embolization (TACE). This is a minimally invasive procedure that involves injecting chemotherapy drugs and particles that block blood supply to the tumour through a catheter.
— Once the particles block blood to the tumour, starving it of oxygen and nutrients, chemotherapy drugs reach it in higher concentrations for a longer period of time, which can kill more cancer cells.
(Just FYI: Noting historical personalities’ anniversaries aids UPSC prep. UPSC often includes such personalities in questions, so revisiting their lives refreshes your static syllabus.)
— The Central Government has appointed Dr V Narayanan, currently the director of Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre (LPSC), Thiruvananthapuram, as the new chairperson of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), and also as the secretary of the Department of Space.
— Dr Narayanan started his career at the space agency in 1984 and has worked towards developing key technologies used in the launch vehicles of today, including the workhorse PSLV and the country’s heaviest LVM3.
— LPSC, the center that Dr Narayanan was heading, is working towards developing the Next Generation Launch Vehicle (NGLV) — a heavier launch vehicle that would be needed for India’s ambition of setting up its own space station and sending a man to the moon.
— General Joseph Aoun, a 60-year-old career soldier, has been elected president of Lebanon, filling a position that had been vacant for over two years. He is the fifth army commander in Lebanon’s history to become president, and succeeds former President Michel Aoun, who is not related to him.
— During a year-long conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, Aoun kept the Lebanese military neutral. Despite the deaths of over 40 Lebanese soldiers in Israeli strikes, the army avoided direct engagement in the conflict.
(Just FYI: The location of the place is important, considering that UPSC has asked several questions about places that were in the news, such as Aleppo and Kirkuk, in the 2018 UPSC Prelims. The best way to remember them is to plot them on a world map.)
— An earthquake measuring around 7 on the Richter scale hit Tibet on Tuesday (January 7), killing around 100 people and damaging about 1,000 houses.
— The entirety of Earth’s outermost surface (the crust and the upper mantle) is composed of 15 major and minor plates. Earthquakes are a result of movement along faults, which are breaks in the tectonic plates.
— The western Himalayas are one of the most dangerous seismic zones in the world. Scientists have long said that the larger region spanning 2,500 km from the Hindu Kush to Arunachal Pradesh is due for a big quake, of magnitude over 8.
— Donald Trump has expressed his intention to gain control of Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark. During his first term, Trump looked into the idea of buying the island territory.
— Greenland is geographically part of the North American continent. It became a formal territory of Denmark in 1953 and is subject to the Danish constitution, meaning any change to its legal status would require a constitutional amendment.
—Ram Katha Museum has been proposed at sangrahalaya (archives) building, 4 kilometres from the temple site on the occassion of the first anniversary of Ram mandir in Ayodhya.
— The museum, which will also showcase the findings from archaeological excavations to offer “concrete evidence of the temple’s ancient roots”, will span over 40,000 square feet and become the second-largest attraction in Ayodhya once completed.
— The project is in the concept and design stage, after which a detailed project report (DPR), including architecture drawings, will be finalised.
(Just FYI: With the unpredictability of the UPSC examinations and questions like the ICC World Test Championship question 2021, you can’t be sure of anything. It is wise to know what it is and not go into too much detail.)
— Uttarakhand is set to host the 38th National Games from January 28 to February 14, 2025.
— The mascot, named “Mauli,” is inspired by the Monal, the state bird of Uttarakhand, symbolizing the region’s uniqueness and encouraging young athletes to aim high.
— The logo, also inspired by the Monal, highlights the natural beauty and diversity of Uttarakhand.
— The tagline for the Games is “Sankalp Se Shikhar Tak” (From Resolve to Zenith).
— The winners of the 82nd Golden Globe Awards are:
| Best Film (Drama) | The Brutalist |
| Best Film (Musical or Comedy) | Emilia Pérez |
| Best Male Actor in a Film (Musical or Comedy) | Sebastian Stan, A Different Man |
| Best Male Actor in a Film (Drama) | Adrien Brody, The Brutalist |
| Best Female Actor In a Film (Drama) | Fernanda Torres, I’m Still Here |
| Best Television Series (Drama) | Shogun |
| Best Television Series (Musical or Comedy) | Hacks |
| Best Film (Animated) | Flow |
— Artesian Aquifer: According to the United States Geological Survey’s website, an artesian aquifer refers to water stored under pressure, between layers of sediments and soil below the earth’s surface. It is also described as “confined” water because of hardy materials above and below it.
— Soapstone: Soapstone is a metamorphic rock made of talc, a naturally occurring mineral, and is used in construction and design for countertops, sinks, hearths, and sculptures. Talc is used in cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and other industries. According to the Indian Bureau of Mines, the states of Rajasthan (57%) and Uttarakhand (25%) boast substantial reserves of soapstone in India.
(Note: The best way to remember facts for UPSC and other competitive exams is to recall them through MCQs. Try to solve the following questions on your own.)
A. What is the purpose of the ‘Bharatpol’ portal?
(a) Real-time action against transnational crimes
(b) Registration of new voters in the electoral roll
(c) Public distribution system for the farmers
(d) Monitoring of internet connectivity in rural areas
B. Consider the following statements about Hepatocellular carcinoma or HCC:
1. It is a type of cancer where malignant cells grow in the liver’s main cells, called hepatocytes.
2. It is treated by transarterial chemo-embolization (TACE).
Which of the following statements is/are correct?
(a) 1 only
(b) 2 only
(c) Both 1 and 2
(d) Neither 1 nor 2
C. The Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology (iCET) has been signed between which of the following nations?
(a) India-China
(b) India-Japan
(c) India-USA
(d) India-Germany
Previous Articles
UPSC Current Affairs Pointers of the past week | December 30, 2024 to January 5, 2025
UPSC Current Affairs Pointers of the past week | December 23 to December 29, 2024
UPSC Current Affairs Pointers of the past week | December 16 to December 22, 2024
UPSC Current Affairs Pointers of the past week | December 9 to December 15, 2024
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