UPSC Key: Joint Parliamentary Committee, Moon Base Programme and Indus script

Colombia quake toll crosses 200, count of missing over 3,000

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Indian and World Geography-Physical, Social, Economic Geography of India and the World.

Mains Examination: General Studies I: Important Geophysical phenomena such as earthquakes, Tsunami, Volcanic activity, cyclone etc., geographical features and their location-changes in critical geographical features (including water-bodies and ice-caps) and in flora and fauna and the effects of such changes.

What’s the ongoing story: A powerful earthquake hit western Colombia on Monday morning, killing at least 132 people and leaving many more feared trapped under fallen buildings. Officials call it the country’s strongest quake in years. President Abelardo de la Espriella has declared a national disaster, just days after taking office.

Key Points to Ponder:

• Colombia earthquake 2026-What you know so far?

• What caused the earthquakes?

• Is Colombia vulnerable to earthquakes?

• Why were the earthquakes so destructive?

• What is known as the ring of fire?

• Map Work-Mark Circum-Pacific Belt, Andes mountains

• What is Earthquake?

• Do shallow earthquakes cause greater damage?

• What is focus or seismic focus of Earthquake?

• What is epicentre of Earthquake?

• The intensity of earthquake is highest in the epicentre and decreases as one moves away-True or False?

• Earthquakes take place in the lithosphere-True or False?

Key Takeaways:

• The quake measured magnitude 7.4. It struck at 7:34am local time, at a depth of 103km, according to Colombia’s geological service. Two smaller aftershocks followed, at magnitude 2.8 and 4.8.

• The shaking reached far beyond the epicenter. People felt it in Bogotá, about 150 miles away, where alarms went off and residents left buildings as a safety step. Tremors also reached Venezuela, Ecuador, and Panama.

• The epicenter was near San José del Palmar, a small town in Chocó province. Local mayor León Fabio Marín Moncada told the BBC that, despite damage to roads, no one in the town died or was hurt.

• The worst damage was further away, in the coffee-growing city of Pereira, about 55km from the epicenter. Local authorities say at least 40 people died there, and 65 buildings collapsed. Rescue teams believe people are still trapped inside 15 of them. Part of the city is under curfew until 5am Tuesday.

• In Cali, about 200km from the epicenter, 32 buildings came down. CNN reports the collapsed structures included the pediatric and newborn units of a hospital. Deaths were also reported in Manizales, Quibdó, Medellín, and across the wider Chocó and Valle del Cauca regions.

• Residents described chaotic scenes as the ground shook. Angélica Ávila, staying in a hotel in Manizales, told the BBC that people around her were screaming as walls cracked.

Do You Know:

• The epicenter of the quake, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, was about three miles east of San José del Palmar — a town of about 5,000 people in the Chocó region, one of the poorest parts of Colombia.
The temblor, which struck about 7:34 a.m. local time, rattled much of the country, though the impact was worst in cities and towns in the foothills of the Andes.

• Colombia sits along the seismically active Pacific Ring of Fire, a major horseshoe-shaped basin around the Pacific Ocean where tectonic plates collide and interact. This geologically volatile setting results from the subduction and movement of major plates, such as the Nazca Plate beneath the South American Plate.

• According to National Geographic Society,
—the Ring of Fire is a string of volcanoes and sites of seismic activity, or earthquakes, around the edges of the Pacific Ocean. Roughly 90 percent of all earthquakes occur along the Ring of Fire, and the ring is dotted with 75 percent of all active volcanoes on Earth.
—The Ring of Fire isn’t quite a circular ring. It is shaped more like a 40,000-kilometer (25,000-mile) horseshoe. A string of 452 volcanoes stretches from the southern tip of South America, up along the coast of North America, across the Bering Strait, down through Japan, and into New Zealand. Several active and dormant volcanoes in Antarctica, however, “close” the ring.

The map of the Pacific Ring of Fire. (Credit: USGS)

Volcanic arcs and oceanic trenches partly encircling the Pacific Basin form the so-called Ring of Fire. The trenches are shown in blue-green. The volcanic island arcs, although not labelled, are parallel to, and always landward of, the trenches. For example, the island arc associated with the Aleutian Trench is represented by the long chain of volcanoes that make up the Aleutian Islands. (Source: W. Jacquelyne and Robert I. Tilling via USGS)[/caption]
—The Ring of Fire is the result of plate tectonics. Tectonic plates are huge slabs of Earth’s crust, which fit together like pieces of a puzzle. The plates are not fixed but are constantly moving atop a layer of solid and molten rock called the mantle. Sometimes these plates collide, move apart, or slide next to each other. Most tectonic activity in the Ring of Fire occurs in these geologically active zones.
—The Andes Mountains of South America run parallel to the Peru-Chile Trench, created as the Nazca Plate subducts beneath the South American Plate. The Andes Mountains include the world’s highest active volcano, Nevados Ojos del Salado, which rises to 6,879 meters (over 22,500 feet) along the Chile-Argentina border. Many volcanoes in Antarctica are so geologically linked to the South American part of the Ring of Fire that some geologists refer to the region as the “Antarctandes.”

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍Explained: What is the Pacific ‘Ring of Fire’?

Previous year UPSC Prelims Question Covering similar theme:
1) Consider the following statements: (UPSC CSE, 2023)
1. In a seismograph, P waves are recorded earlier than S waves.
2. In P waves, the individual particles vibrate to and fro in the direction of wave propagation whereas in S waves, the particles vibrate up and down at right angles to the direction of wave propagation.
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

Previous year UPSC Main Question Covering similar theme:
📍Why are the world’s fold mountain systems located along the margins of continents? Bring out the association between the global distribution of fold mountains and the earthquakes and volcanoes. (2014)

Front Page

Amid pushback from Opp, Govt ready to refer FCRA Bill to JPC

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Main Examination: 

• General Studies II: Development processes and the development industry —the role of NGOs, SHGs, various groups and associations, donors, charities, institutional and other stakeholders.

• General Studies II: Parliament and State legislatures—structure, functioning, conduct of business, powers & privileges and issues arising out of these.

What’s the ongoing story: The government is ready to send the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2026, to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC), sources told The Indian Express Tuesday.

Key Points to Ponder:

• Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment (FCRA) Bill, 2026-what are the key highlights?

• Why Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment (FCRA) Bill, 2026 is termed as contentious?

• What are issues with Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment (FCRA) Bill, 2026?

• Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act (FCRA)-What and When it was enacted?

• Rationality behind the enactment of Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act (FCRA)?

• NGOs and FCRA-why most of the NGOs are brought under FCRA?

• The government is ready to send the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2026, to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) OR joint sitting of both the houses?

• What is Joint parliamentary committee?

• A Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) is a permanent body or an ad-hoc body?

• How many members are there in Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC)?

• Who decides the specifics of the Joint Parliamentary Committee’s composition and topics?

• What can a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) do?

• How many Joint Parliamentary Committees (JPCs) have been established so far?

• How successful have Joint Parliamentary Committees (JPCs) been?

• Are their suggestions (JPCs) binding on the government?

Key Takeaways:

• The Opposition has been demanding the withdrawal of the Bill and civil society and religious bodies, especially the Church, have expressed concern that asset-vesting rules in the Bill could be used to penalise past investments. Several Church bodies have voiced their fears in meetings with Union Home Minister Amit Shah over the last few days.

• A Union Minister said, “There is nothing in the Bill to oppose it. It is not against any community. However, we are ready to send the Bill to a JPC for further deliberation.”

• One of the key concerns relates to the proposed concept of “cessation” of an FCRA certificate. Under Section 14B, a certificate would be deemed to have ceased if an organisation does not apply for renewal, its renewal application is refused or it is not renewed before expiry. Section 16A provides that, in such cases, the organisation’s foreign contribution and assets created from it would provisionally vest in the Designated Authority.

• The authority could take possession of the assets and, if considered necessary in the public interest, manage the organisation’s activities. If the organisation subsequently obtains a fresh, renewed or restored certificate within the prescribed period, the assets are to be returned; failing that, the assets would permanently vest in the authority. The Bill also provides that assets permanently vested in the authority can be transferred to a government ministry, department, agency or local authority, or sold, with the sale proceeds and unutilised foreign contribution credited to the Consolidated Fund of India.

• Another concern is that the proposed law would cover an asset in its entirety even if it was created or acquired partly from foreign contribution and partly from other sources. The organisation can apply for the return of a “distinct or ascertainable” portion attributable to domestic funds, but the entire asset would initially vest with the Designated Authority. This has raised concerns among organisations that have built institutions such as schools, hospitals or other facilities through a combination of foreign and domestic donations.

• The Bill had also attracted particular criticism over Section 16B, which provided for retrospective application of the new framework. It stated that foreign contributions and assets that had already vested under the existing Section 15 before the amendment came into force would be deemed to have been provisionally vested under the new Chapter IIIA from the date the amendment takes effect. This would bring such assets under the new regime governing their management, return, transfer and eventual disposal.

• The retrospective provision had become especially contentious amid fears that, when read with the provisions on “cessation”, the new regime could have implications for organisations whose FCRA registrations had lapsed in the past.

• The government has maintained that the FCRA amendments are intended to plug gaps in the existing law relating to the management and disposal of foreign-funded assets when an organisation’s registration is cancelled, surrendered or ceases to exist.

Do You Know:

• A JPC and a Select Committee are both ad hoc committees constituted to examine a Bill in greater detail, but the key difference is in their composition. A JPC has members from both Houses of Parliament, with the composition decided through motions adopted by Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, while a Select Committee is constituted by one House and consists only of members of that House.

• In either case, the committee can examine the Bill clause by clause, hear the government and stakeholders, seek evidence and suggest amendments; its recommendations are not binding on the government, though they carry considerable parliamentary weight. A JPC is generally seen as a broader mechanism because it brings MPs from both Houses into the examination process. Some key Bills that were sent to the JPC included the Waqf (Amendment) Bill, Personal Data Protection Bill,’One Nation, One Election’ Bill.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍What is a joint committee of Parliament, to be set-up for ‘One Nation, One Election’ Bills?

Previous year UPSC Prelims Question Covering similar theme:
2) With reference to the Parliament of India, which of the following Parliamentary Committees scrutinizes and reports to the House whether the powers to make regulations, rules, sub-rules, by-laws, etc., conferred by the Constitution or delegated by the Parliament are being properly exercised by the Executive within the scope of such delegation? (UPSC CSE, 2018)
(a) Committee on Government Assurances
(b) Committee on Subordinate Legislation
(c) Rules Committee
(d) Business Advisory Committee

Previous year UPSC Main Question Covering similar theme:
📍Explain the structure of the Parliamentary Committee system. How far have the financial committees helped in the institutionalisation of Indian Parliament? (2023)

Deepening ties, NASA invites ISRO to join its Moon Base programme

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Mains Examination: General Studies III: Awareness in the fields of IT, Space, Computers, robotics, nano-technology, biotechnology and issues relating to intellectual property rights.

What’s the ongoing story: Moving to strengthen their partnership, US space agency NASA has invited ISRO to join its Moon Base programme, the recently-launched effort to get humans back to the Moon with the larger objective of setting up a permanent settlement there.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What is NASA’s Moon Base Programme?

• Moon-Know its position and appearance

• How the term ‘Sustained human presence on the Moon’ is different from ‘Landing humans on the Moon’?

• How Moon Base Programme is different from other lunar programmes?

• Why the Lunar South Pole is particularly attractive?

• What is Permanently shadowed regions?

• Why Water on the Moon Matters?

• Artemis Accords and Artemis Programme-how they different?

• Why India’s participation matters in Moon Base Programme?

• What is In-Situ Resource Utilisation?

• Know the significance of In-Situ Resource Utilisation for establishing a sustained human presence on the Moon.

Key Takeaways:

• The offer, disclosed Tuesday, was made at the ninth meeting of the India-US Civil Space Joint Working Group in Bengaluru on August 5 and 6 which US Ambassador to India Sergio Gor also addressed.

• In 2023, India had joined the Artemis Accords, a US-led space alliance, whose stated purpose is to evolve and commit to a common set of principles that govern the civil exploration of outer space including the Moon. India was the 27th country to sign on the Artemis Accords. Now, a total of 70 countries are part of the Accords.

• “NASA invited ISRO to join its Moon Base program, building on the two countries’ partnership under the Artemis Accords,” a read-out from the US Embassy in India stated.

• “The two sides also agreed to advance discussions for cooperation on open scientific data sharing under the Accords,” it stated.

• In the last few years, the space agencies of the two countries have come closer to each other than ever before. The same year that India joined the Artemis Accords, the two countries had also agreed to develop a “strategic framework for human spaceflight cooperation”.

• It was in the same vein that NASA had agreed to provide advanced training to Indian astronauts at its facilities with the objective of sending them to the International Space Station through privately-operated missions. The flight of Indian astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla to the ISS in 2025 was a result of this arrangement.

Do You Know:

• NASA has launched an Artemis programme to take humans back to the Moon. There have been two preliminary flights under this programme – the first one was uncrewed in November 2022, and a crewed one flew around the Moon this April without making a landing. The next flight of the programme, probably by 2028, is scheduled to make the first human landing on the Moon since the Apollo programme.
ISRO is also pursuing its own human spaceflight programme Gaganyaan. It has plans to make a human landing on the Moon by 2040.

• According to NASA’s website, the NASA Moon Base programme is an ambitious international and commercial effort to establish humanity’s first permanent outpost near the Moon’s South Pole. Part of the broader strategy to enable sustained lunar operations and serve as a stepping stone for crewed missions to Mars, the base will utilize local resources like water ice.
—The Moon Base is humanity’s first lunar outpost, a place where astronauts will live, work, and explore near the Moon’s South Pole. Through a series of crewed and uncrewed missions, NASA and its partners will build the infrastructure needed to support an enduring human presence on the lunar surface while advancing science, technology, and exploration for the benefit of all.
• The NASA Moon Base Phases layout spans across a structured timeline to manage risk and deploy infrastructure sustainably:
— Phase 1: Explore & Learn (2026 to 2029)-Gaining reliable surface access via heavy robotic reconnaissance. Testing early technologies, landing systems, and deploying autonomous “MoonFall” exploration drones.
— Phase 2: Build & Expand (2029–2032)-Deploying initial critical surface infrastructure. This includes early lunar power networks, logistics hardware, broad communications capabilities, and unpressurized lunar terrain vehicles (LTVs).
— Phase 3: Live & Work (2032+)-Assembling a permanently crewed, modular, and expandable outpost. Astronauts will live and conduct scientific research on the surface for months at a time.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍Moon Base Development

Previous year UPSC Mains Question Covering similar theme:
3) Consider the following statements: (UPSC CSE, 2016)
The Mangalyaan launched by ISRO
1. is also called the Mars Orbiter Mission
2. made India the second country to have a spacecraft orbit the Mars after USA
3. made India the only country to be successful in making its spacecraft orbit the Mars in its very first attempt
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) 1 only
(b) 2 and 3 only
(c) 1 and 3 only
(d) 1, 2 and 3

Previous year UPSC Mains Question Covering similar theme:
📍India has achieved remarkable successes in unmanned space missions including the Chandrayaan and Mars Orbiter Mission, but has not ventured into manned space mission. What are the main obstacles to launching a manned space mission, both in terms of technology and logistics? Examine critically. (2017)

Explained

Monsoon revived, but why there’s cloud over the farm

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Indian and World Geography

Mains Examination: General Studies I: Important Geophysical phenomena such as earthquakes, Tsunami, Volcanic activity, cyclone etc., geographical features and their location-changes in critical geographical features (including water-bodies and ice-caps) and in flora and fauna and the effects of such changes.

What’s the ongoing story: The Southwest monsoon’s revival in July, in the face of a strengthening El Niño, has helped considerably narrow the gap in area sown under kharif crops this season relative to last year’s coverage.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What is meant by the “onset of the monsoon”?

• What are these conditions, which determine the onset of monsoon?

• Monsoon mechanism in India-Know in detail

• How Arabian Sea branch and Bay of Bengal branch are associated with Indian monsoon?

• What is difference between Arabian Sea branch and Bay of Bengal branch?

• What is the difference between the Southwest Monsoon and the Northeast Monsoon?

• What is El Nino?

• How El Nino impacts monsoon in India?

• El Niño and La Niña-Compare and Contrast

• What do we mean by long period average (LPA) of rainfall?

• What is large excess, excess, normal, deficient, large deficient rainfall?

• What is below normal, normal and above normal rainfall for the country as a whole?

Key Takeaways:

• The Agriculture Ministry’s data shows that Indian farmers had planted only 350.85 lakh hectares (lh) area in the current kharif (monsoon) season till July 6, which was 20.8% below the 442.80 lh sown during the same period of 2025.

• These acreage gaps were even higher for oilseeds (39.3%), pulses (21.8%) and cotton (23%). A previous explained column had pointed out that the combined value of India’s imports of the three commodities was close to $25 billion in 2025-26 (April-March) and how El Niño could push this further to a new high in the current fiscal.

• The above lag in sowings was courtesy of a poor start to the monsoon season (June-September). Rainfall during June for the country as a whole was 38% below the normal long-period average (LPA) for the month.

• June usually witnesses around three low-pressure systems (LPS) that bring rain and are active over 11 days of the month. This June was an anomaly, with not a single LPS being formed. That made it the sixth driest June in India since 1901. The previous five years to have registered lower June rainfall were 2014, 2009, 1926, 1923 and 1905.

• Significantly, the deficient June rainfall was despite El Niño only emerging and being in a weak-to-moderate phase that month.

• In July, El Niño intensified into a moderate-to-strong event. Yet, this month recorded four LPSs, as against the normal three. And since these systems moved slowly with longer durations, the number of LPS-affected days were about 24 (normal is 14). As a result, all-India rainfall in July was 2.4% above the LPA. This was contrary to the India Meteorological Department’s (IMD) forecast of “most likely to be below normal (<94% of LPA)” rains for the month.

• The monsoon’s turnaround in July and the cumulative rainfall deficit for the season easing to 11.8% as on August 10, notwithstanding a strengthening El Niño, has spurred kharif sowings. The 967.92 lh area covered till August 7 was only 1.8% lower than the progressive acreage during the corresponding period of last year.

Do You Know:

• The El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) refers to the periodic warming or cooling of the eastern Pacific Ocean, off the coast of South America, that influences weather worldwide. In India, its most evident impact happens on the monsoon rainfall. A warmer-than-usual eastern Pacific Ocean, the El Nino phase, is usually correlated with suppressed rainfall over the Indian subcontinent.

• El Nino, as is commonly known, refers to an abnormal warming of surface waters in equatorial Pacific Ocean. It is known to suppress monsoon rainfall. The opposite phase, La Nina, which is the abnormal cooling of sea surface waters in the same region, is known to aid rainfall over India. There is a third, neutral phase, as well in which the sea surface temperatures remain roughly in line with long-term averages. Together, these three phases in the Pacific Ocean are referred to as El Nino Southern Oscillation, or ENSO.

• The southwest monsoon is India’s primary rainy season. It runs from June to September and brings 70% to 75% of the country’s total annual rainfall. Driven by intense summer heat over the land and cooler ocean temperatures, moisture-laden winds sweep from the sea toward the subcontinent.

• The South West Monsoon gets its name from the physical direction of the prevailing winds. During summer, intense heat over the Indian subcontinent creates a low-pressure area that pulls moisture-laden winds from the Indian Ocean, which cross the equator and blow into the region from a south-westerly direction.

• Arabian Sea Branch hits the Western Ghats first, dumping heavy rain on the west coast before moving inland and Bay of Bengal Branch flows over eastern India and the northeast hills, then moves along the Himalayan foothills.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍Below normal monsoon, but no cause for alarm

Previous year UPSC Prelims Question Covering similar theme:
4) The seasonal reversal of winds is the typical characteristic of (UPSC CSE, 2014)
(a) Equatorial climate
(b) Mediterranean climate
(c) Monsoon climate
(d) All of the above climates

Previous year UPSC Main Question Covering similar theme:
📍Why is the South-West Monsoon called ‘Purvaiya’ (easterly) in Bhojpur Region? How has this directional seasonal wind system influenced the cultured ethos of the region? (2023)

Economy

As AI threat loomed, UPI players flagged rising security costs

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Mains Examination: General Studies III: Awareness in the fields of IT, Space, Computers, robotics, nano-technology, bio-technology and issues relating to intellectual property rights.

What’s the ongoing story: Companies operating UPI platforms are understood to have told the government in private meetings that the cost of securing the payments network is rising sharply, with emerging artificial intelligence (AI) systems adding a new layer of risk to fraud prevention and cybersecurity.

Key Points to Ponder:

• What is Unified Payments Interface (UPI)?

• Who Operates UPI?

• Control NPCI and RBI over UPI-know in detail

• NPCI operates the UPI infrastructure, while RBI regulates and supervises the payment ecosystem within its statutory mandate-True or false?

• What is Claude Mythos?

• What can Mythos?

• Why are there concerns?

• What have cyber experts said about it?

• How AI is threatening Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI)?

• Should Government of the day be worried about it?

• AI can be both the threat and the solution for Digital Public Infrastructure like UPI-Analyse

Key Takeaways:

• Companies operating UPI platforms are understood to have told the government in private meetings that the cost of securing the payments network is rising sharply, with emerging artificial intelligence (AI) systems adding a new layer of risk to fraud prevention and cybersecurity.

• The firms are understood to have specifically flagged threats posed by Anthropic’s Mythos Preview, arguing that defending payment systems against increasingly capable AI tools will require greater investment, a concern they have cited as part of their broader pitch for allowing a merchant discount rate (MDR) on UPI transactions.

• Industry insiders estimate that the total spends on security-related inputs account for over 20% of the total costs of running a UPI platform annually, which could rise sharply in deploying cutting-edge security software to prevent risks posed by AI systems like Mythos.

• “Many of the UPI ecosystem participants have flagged to us that due to risks linked to systems like the Mythos Preview, which most Indian entities do not yet have access to, there is going to be an exceeding investment towards securing UPI platforms,” a senior government official said.

• Earlier this year, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman held a high-level meeting with stakeholders from the financial sector to assess the risks posed by Mythos over concerns that the system’s capabilities could pose significant risks to India’s banking sector.

• Anthropic’s Mythos Preview is a restricted-access frontier AI model with advanced cybersecurity capabilities, including the ability to discover previously unknown software vulnerabilities and chain them into complex attacks, raising concerns that similar systems could dramatically lower the cost and expertise needed to mount sophisticated cyberattacks.

• The Payments Council of India, a lobby group consisting of all major UPI providers, in a statement had earlier said, “As transaction volumes continue to grow, sustained investment in security, resilience, innovation, fraud prevention and infrastructure will remain essential to ensure that UPI continues to serve consumers and businesses reliably for years to come.”

Do You Know:

• In July, UPI registered its highest-ever transaction volume of 2,366 crore transactions. At a security cost of 15 paise per transaction, the UPI ecosystem would have spent more than Rs 350 crore in that month alone to keep platforms secure. This would also peg the annual security-related costs at well over Rs 4,000 crore, supposing the monthly volumes remain the same throughout the year, though these numbers typically increase progressively.

• Developed by RBI-regulated National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) and the Indian Banks’ Association (IBA), work on UPI started as long back as 2012-13, with the payment systems “vision document” for 2012-15 making several noteworthy points, including how despite attempts to move towards a less-cash society, nearly a third of e-commerce purchases were being paid via cash-on-delivery. Several of the ongoing, short-term, medium-term, and long-term action points in that vision document can be recognised in the UPI we use today.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍How UPI became India’s biggest digital payments system — and its next challenge

Previous year UPSC Prelims Question Covering similar theme:
5) Consider the following countries: (UPSC CSE, 2025)
I. United Arab Emirates
II. France
III. Germany
IV. Singapore
V. Bangladesh
How many countries amongst the above are there other than India where international merchant payments are accepted under UPI?
(a) Only two
(b) Only three
(c) Only four
(d) All the five

6) Which one of the following best describes the term “Merchant Discount Rate” sometimes seen in news? (UPSC CSE, 2018)
1. The incentive given by a bank to a merchant for accepting payments through debit cards pertaining to that bank.
2. The amount paid back by banks to their customers when they use debit cards for financial transactions for purchasing goods or services.
3. The charge to a merchant by a bank for accepting payments from his customers through the bank’s debit cards.
4. The incentive given by the Government to merchants for promoting digital payments by their customers through Point of Sale (PoS) machines and debit cards.

7) Consider the following statements: (UPSC CSE, 2017)
1. National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) helps in promoting the financial inclusion in the country
2. NPCI has launched RuPay, a card payment scheme.
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

Previous year UPSC main Question Covering similar theme:
📍How can the ‘Digital India’ programme help farmers to improve farm productivity and income? What steps has the Government taken in this regard? (2015)

The Big Picture

The Indus Code

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: History of India

Main Examination: General Studies I: Indian culture will cover the salient aspects of Art Forms, literature and Architecture from ancient to modern times.

What’s the ongoing story: AI experts, computer scientists, even a 17-year-old in Washington DC — a new generation of enthusiasts is in the race with veteran epigraphers to unlock a secret code: what does the Indus script tell us about one of the oldest civilisations and its people? The signs and symbols and the promise of a $1 million prize are fuelling the quest

Key Points to Ponder:

• Why Indus script is in news?

• The Indus script, associated with the Indus Valley Civilization, is characterized by what?

• What are the widely held hypothesis about the Indus script?

• Artifacts commonly associated with the Indus script-What are they?

• What are the primary challenge in deciphering the Indus script?

• Discuss the key challenges in deciphering the Harappan script.

• Significance of deciphering the Harappan script in reconstructing the socio-cultural and economic life of the Harappan people-Discuss

• Highlight the role of modern technologies such as AI and computational linguistics in decoding ancient scripts like the Harappan writing system.

Key Takeaways:

• Since the announcement of the discovery of the Indus Civilisation in 1924, the script has remained one of history’s greatest uncracked codes, inspiring generations of linguists, archaeologists, computer scientists and enthusiastic amateurs.

• Then in January 2025, when Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin announced the $1 million prize for decoding the script, the interest got renewed. The announcement followed a study by the state’s Archaeology Department that claimed similarities between signs on Indus artefacts and graffiti marks recently unearthed at archaeological sites in Tamil Nadu, bringing the century-old puzzle back into academic and political debates.

• Long before AI became the loaded buzzword that it is today, Rao had in the early 2000s turned to computational methods to understand the corpus of symbols that would throw light on “who we are as Indians, and who our ancestors were”.

• A school-time fascination with the Indus Civilization stayed with him even as he pursued his undergraduate study in engineering in the US and went on to do his doctorate in computer science from the University of Rochester.

Do You Know:

• The Indus Civilisation, which reached its zenith between 2600 and 1900 BCE, sprawled over more than 800,000 sq km in what is today Pakistan and parts of northwestern India. It was the world’s most sophisticated urban culture at the time, with an elaborate system of trade, taxation, and drainage.

• The plethora of inscriptions on seals and terracotta tablets found at Indus sites contain a variety of symbols – human and animal motifs, and what scholars have identified as parts of a forgotten script. However, there is no agreement on the number of symbols in the supposed script.

• Archaeologist S R Rao, who pioneered the deciphering effort, postulated in 1982 that the script contained 62 signs. This was refuted by the Finnish Indologist Asko Parpola, one of the most authoritative voices on the subject – he said there were 425 signs (Deciphering the Indus Script (1994)). Then, in 2016, archaeologist and epigrapher Bryan K Wells suggested the presence of 676 signs.

• From the early 2000s onward, questions have been raised on whether the so-called Indus “script” represented any language at all. This hypothesis was based mainly on the fact that all the Indus inscriptions are very short – with only about five characters on average – with the longest having only 26 characters.

• In a paper published in 2004, historian Steve Farmer, computer linguist Richard Sproat, and Indologist Michael Witzel claimed that the Indus “script” did not constitute a language-based writing system, but mainly comprised nonlinguistic symbols of political and religious significance.

• To decipher a script, the following subproblems have to be solved in order, Italian philologist Fabio Tamburini wrote in 2023 (Decipherment of Lost Ancient Scripts as Combinatorial Optimisation using Coupled Simulated Annealing).
– Deciding if a set of symbols actually represent a writing system;
– Devising appropriate procedures to isolate or segment the stream of symbols into a sequence of single signs;
–Reducing the set of signs to the minimal set for the writing system forming (its alphabet, syllabery, or inventory of signs) by identifying all allographs (the same sign written in a variant form, for example a printed ‘a’ and a cursive ‘a’);
–Assigning to each symbol their specified value, whether phonetic or otherwise;
–Trying to match these values to a specific language.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍The mystery of the Indus script: Dravidian, Sanskrit or not a language at all?

Previous year UPSC Prelims Question Covering similar theme:
8) Which of the following characterize/characterises the people of the Indus Civilization? (UPSC CSE, 2013)
1. They possessed great palaces and temples.
2. They worshiped both male and female deities.
3. They employed horse-drawn chariots in warfare.
Select the correct statements using the codes given below:
(a) 1 and 2 only
(b) 2 only
(c) 1, 2 and 3
(d) None of the above

Previous year UPSC Main Question Covering similar theme:
📍To what extent has the urban planning and culture of the Indus Valley Civilization provided inputs to the present day urbanization? Discuss. (2014)

 

PRELIMS ANSWER KEY

1.(c)  2.(b)  3.(c) 4.(c)  5.(b)  6.(c) 7.(c)  8.(b)

  

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