UPSC Key: NFHS-6 shows rise in obesity, SC sets deadline for HCs, and Quad Foreign Ministers meeting

— What are the reasons for the delay in pronouncing judgements reserved by judges?

— What are reserved judgments?

— What is the status of India’s judiciary system?

— What are the reasons for the pendency of cases?

— What are the main areas that need immediate attention?

— Suggest steps that can be taken to reduce pendency of cases.

— What are the recent measures adopted by the judiciary to decrease the pendency of cases?

— Understand the integrated judiciary system of India and how it is different from that of America.

— What are the different types of bail?

— What are the issues concerning undertrials?

Key Takeaways:

— A bench comprising Chief Justice of India Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi said the directions were intended to strengthen the judicial administration and ensure timely delivery of judgments.

— Among the key directions, the Supreme Court said that bail applications should be heard and the order should preferably be pronounced and uploaded the same day. If it is reserved, it should be pronounced the next day and uploaded on the website.

— The Supreme Court also called for reasoned judgments pronounced in open courts to be uploaded on the High Court website within 24 hours.

— The directions came on a petition filed by four convicts serving life sentences whose criminal appeals had been reserved by the Jharkhand High Court in 2022 but the verdicts were pronounced three years later. While deciding their plea, the Supreme Court chose to address what it described as a wider institutional issue affecting courts across the country.

— The Court said that orders in cases seeking bail or suspension of sentence should be communicated to the jail authorities as soon as it is pronounced, and that the undertrial or convict must be released, preferably the same day or at most the next day.

— The bench also said that at the end of every month, an automated list of reserved judgments that remain pending must be generated and placed before the Chief Justice of the High Court, with a copy to the bench concerned.

— If a judgment is not delivered in three months of reserving the order, the Registrar General must place the matter before the Chief Justice, who is then required to bring the delay to the notice of the bench concerned within two weeks, the top court said.

— A similar string of directions, aimed at improving access to justice were issued in a 2001 case, Anil Rai v. State of Bihar, in which the Supreme Court noted that delivering judgments long after arguments had concluded could affect public confidence in the judicial process.

Do You Know:

— Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), Indian criminal statutory law, Section 2(1)(b), “bail” means release of a person accused of or suspected of commission of an offence from the custody of law upon certain conditions imposed by an officer or Court on execution by such person of a bond or a bail bond.

— According to the fourth edition of the India Justice Report (IJR) 2025, in judiciary there is a 20 per cent increase in pending cases, crossing the five-crore mark; shortages in court halls; vacancies in the high courts and district courts that stand at 33 per cent and 21 per cent respectively.

— There is also an increase in the average workload in district courts – 2,200 cases per judge, while case clearance rate is at 94 per cent. This leads to a slower pace of justice and erodes public confidence in the justice system.

— In prisons, overcrowding continues undeterred, with some running at over 400 per cent occupancy. The average overcrowding in prisons stands at 131 per cent. Prisoners awaiting trial stand at 76 per cent. Their guilt is yet to be proven, and the period of detention is constantly increasing, with one in every four undertrials spending between one to three years in prison pending trial.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍Knowledge Nugget: Why is the India Justice Report 2025 important for UPSC?

📍Knowledge Nugget | What are parole, furlough and anticipatory bail?

Previous year UPSC Prelims Question Covering similar theme:

(1) Which one of the following factors constitutes the best safeguard of liberty in a liberal democracy? (UPSC CSE 2021)

(a) A committed judiciary

(b) Centralization of powers

(c) Elected government

(d) Separation of powers

(2) In India, separation of judiciary from the executive is enjoined by (UPSC CSE 2020)

(a) the Preamble of the Constitution

(b) a Directive Principle of State Policy

(c) the Seventh Schedule

(d) the conventional practice

Previous year UPSC Mains Question Covering similar theme:

Discuss the desirability of greater representation to women in the higher judiciary to ensure diversity, equity and inclusiveness. (UPSC CSE 2021)

Infographics created using NotebookLM

Sharp rise in obesity, diabetes in five years since 2019, shows latest health survey

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance

Mains Examination: General Studies-II: Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources

What’s the ongoing story: Adult obesity in India is rising fast, with the proportion of men and women in the 15-49 age group who were overweight or obese up by 4.4 and 6.7 percentage points, respectively, in five years between 2019 and 2024, according to the National Family Health Survey-6 (NFHS-6), released by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare Friday.

— What is obesity?

— What are the major findings of the NFHS-6?

— What are the reasons for the increase in obesity in India?

— What are the reasons for adult obesity in urban areas?

— What are the impacts of rising obesity on India’s health system?

— What are the efforts taken by the government to nudge Indian youngsters towards healthy dietary practices?

— Suggest measures that an individual can take to counter it

Key Takeaways:

— The NFHS-6, conducted in 2023-24 by the Union Health Ministry with the International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS), Mumbai as the nodal agency, covered around 6.79 lakh households across 715 districts in all States and UTs, except Manipur. It provides “vital evidence” on population, health, nutrition and family welfare indicators.

— As per the survey, the percentage of women who were overweight or obese increased to 30.7 per cent in 2023-24 from 24 per cent in 2019-21. The obesity was higher in urban areas than rural areas. In urban areas, 42.8 per cent women were reported overweight or obese, while the figure was 25.5 per cent in rural areas.

— The percentage of men who were overweight or obese also increased to 27.3 in 2023-24 from 22.9 in 2019-21. In rural areas, 23 per cent men were reported obese, while in urban areas the figure was 36.3 per cent.

— Like the spike in adult obesity, the burden of high blood sugar is also climbing among those aged 15 years and above, the survey shows. The proportion of men reporting high or very high (>140mg/dl) blood sugar levels or taking medicine to control it increased to 20.9 per cent in 2023-24 from 15.6 per cent in 2019-21.

— The figure was higher in urban areas — 23.9 per cent of men reported battling high or very high blood sugar levels or being under medication to control while it was 19.7 per cent in rural areas.

— The proportion of women reporting high blood sugar levels was lower compared to men but it has increased sharply from 2019 to 2024. As per the survey, 17.8 per cent of women reported having high or very high blood sugar levels or taking medicine to control it, up from 13.5 per cent in 2019-21.

— The rate of caesarean-section deliveries has also been rising — particularly in private healthcare facilities. The proportion of births at a private health facility delivered by caesarean section increased to 54.1 per cent in 2023-24 from 47.4 per cent in 2019-21.

Do You Know:

— On World Obesity Day (4th March, 2026), the World Obesity Federation released the second edition of the World Obesity Atlas 2026. According to the Atlas, India now ranks second globally for children who are overweight and living with obesity after China, beating the US and other Western nations.

— According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), obesity is an abnormal or excessive accumulation of fat that poses health risks. School-aged children and adolescents — anyone between the ages of 5 and 19 years — are considered obese, if their BMI is two standard deviations more than the mean. BMI is a person’s weight in kilograms divided by the square of height in meters, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

— In January 2025, a Lancet commission had proposed changes to the definition of obesity to introduce two new categories: ‘clinical obesity’ and ‘pre-clinical obesity’. The new definition included physical parameters like height, weight, waist circumference, muscle mass, and the functioning of various organs.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍Knowledge Nugget: World Obesity Atlas 2026 – Why it matters for your UPSC exam

📍Knowledge Nugget: What must you read on ‘Obesity’ for UPSC exams?

Previous year UPSC Mains Question Covering similar theme:

“Besides being a moral imperative of Welfare State, primary health structure is a necessary pre-condition for sustainable development.” Analyze. (UPSC CSE 2021)

Decade’s driest monsoon looms: Met cuts estimate to 90% of 50-yr average

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance

Mains Examination: General Studies-III: Major crops-cropping patterns in various parts of the country, – different types of irrigation and irrigation systems storage, transport and marketing of agricultural produce and issues and related constraints

What’s the ongoing story: INDIA is staring at the driest monsoon season in a decade, with the Met office Friday making a downward revision of its earlier forecast and predicting only 90 per cent rain this season.

— What is the mechanism of the monsoon?

— How El-Nino and La-Nina impact the monsoon?

— What is long-period average (LPA) rainfall?

— Understand the relationship between strong El-Nino and monsoon in India.

— What is the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD)? How does positive and negative IOD impact the monsoon?

— How low rainfall can impact India’s agricultural sector?

Key Takeaways:

— In April, in its first forecast for this year’s monsoon, India Meteorological Department (IMD) had said the country was likely to get 92 per cent of the long-period average (LPA) rainfall during the four-month season.

— The LPA, revised every 10 years, is the average rainfall over the 50-year period 1971-2020, which is considered the baseline, or normal. Its current value is 89 cm for the rainy season — June to September — across the country as a whole.

— The latest forecast is the lowest by IMD in the last 20 years. If this holds, India could be in for the driest rainy season since 2015, when the overall seasonal rainfall happened to  be 86 per cent of the LPA.

— In the last two decades, there have been only two other occasions — 2009 and 2014, apart from 2015 — when seasonal monsoon rains have remained below 90 per cent of LPA. This year looks all set to join that group.

— El Nino, a largescale ocean-atmospheric interaction in the equatorial Pacific Ocean that influences weather patterns worldwide, is known to suppress rainfall over the Indian region.

— There are predictions that this year’s El Nino, which could persist well into the next year, could develop into one of the strongest ever.

— The possibility of the emergence of an El Nino has been known for the last few months, but forecasts made for this phenomenon during March and April usually suffer from a greater degree of uncertainty, something that is referred to as spring barrier.

— The information coming about El Nino now is considered more accurate and robust. Recent forecasts suggest the formation of a strong El Nino.

ENSO phases, explained.

— The Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) refers to the temperature differential of surface waters between Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea side. If the latter is warmer, that is considered a “positive IOD” and heralds a better monsoon that may offset, to some extent, the adverse impact of a strong El Nino. On Friday, the IMD said IOD was likely to remain neutral through the entire monsoon season.

— The monsoon rains account for nearly three-quarters of India’s annual rainfall, and are extremely critical for agriculture, electricity generation, drinking water purposes and industrial use. The rains during this season fill up the reservoirs which serve the water needs of the country through the rest of the year.

— While low rainfall is, no doubt, a reason for concern, it might not bring immediate pain. India’s foodgrain stocks are in a comfortable state, following a good harvest last year. The impact of El Nino is likely to be felt only in the second half of the monsoon season, by which time the kharif sowing season should be over. The threat of El Nino is much bigger for the winter rabi crop.

— The major reservoirs of the country have sufficient amounts of water right now because of ample rains last year.

— However, lack of adequate rains is expected to push temperatures up. IMD said the country was expected to receive less than 92 per cent rains in the month of June. It also said that temperatures in most parts of the country in this month are likely to be above normal.

Do You Know:

— El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO)—The El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is a periodic, natural fluctuation in tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures (SST) and atmospheric pressure occurring every 2–7 years. It alternates between three phases—El Niño (warm), La Niña (cold), and Neutral—significantly influencing global weather, agriculture, and ecosystems.

— El Niño and La Nina—El Niño is characterized by warming of the ocean surface in the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean. It’s one of three states scientists observe; La Niña, conversely, happens when sea surface temperatures are below average, and neutral conditions are defined when neither El Niño or La Niña are present and surface temperatures are about average.

— Negative correlation between the Eurasian snow cover and the rainfall— A negative correlation exists where high Eurasian snow cover in winter/spring leads to reduced subsequent Indian monsoon rainfall, as increased snow keeps the continent cold, weakening the required thermal contrast for a strong monsoon. Conversely, low snow cover, as observed in early 2026, predicts better rainfall, although this teleconnection has weakened since 1990.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍How El Niño development during May-June is likely to affect India

📍Knowledge Nugget | What are Western Disturbances?

Previous year UPSC Prelims Question Covering similar theme:

(3) With reference to ‘Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD)’ sometimes mentioned in the news while forecasting Indian monsoon, which of the following statements is/are correct? (UPSC CSE, 2018)

1. IOD phenomenon is characterised by a difference in sea surface temperature between tropical Western Indian Ocean and tropical Eastern Pacific Ocean.

2. An IOD phenomenon can influence an EI Nino’s impact on the monsoon.

Select the correct answer using the code given below:

(a) 1 only

(b) 2 only

(c) Both 1 and 2

(d) Neither 1 nor 2

(4) La Nina is suspected to have caused recent floods in Australia. How is La Nina different from EI Nino? (UPSC CSE, 2011)

1. La Nina is characterized by un¬usually cold ocean temperature in equatorial Indian ocean whereas EI Nino is characterized by unusually warm ocean temperature in the equatorial pacific ocean.

2. EI Nino has adverse effect on south¬west monsoon of India, but La Nina has no effect on monsoon climate.

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 Mains Question Covering similar theme:

What characteristics can be assigned to monsoon climate that succeeds in feeding more than 50 percent of the won population residing in Monsoon Asia? (UPSC CSE 2017)

 

EXPLAINED

Quad’s struggle to find momentum, as members pursue disparate objectives

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance.

Mains Examination: General Studies-II: Important International institutions, agencies and fora- their structure, mandate

What’s the ongoing story: The recent Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) held in New Delhi, among the foreign ministers of Australia, India, Japan and the USA, came as an assurance that the grouping remains relevant.

— The Indo-Pacific has emerged as the world’s strategic and geo-economic centre of gravity. Elaborate.

— What was the objective of the formation of QUAD?

— What are the challenges facing QUAD?

— What are the major steps taken by QUAD?

— What are China’s reservations against QUAD?

— How is QUAD significant for India?

Key Takeaways:

— The Indo-Pacific has emerged as the world’s strategic and geo-economic centre of gravity. It hosts critical sea lanes, carrying over 50 per cent of global trade and energy flow. China’s rise, its coercive maritime behaviour, and technological dominance have created shared concerns among the Quad partners.

— After the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004, India, Japan, Australia, and the US came together in an informal arrangement to coordinate disaster relief operations. In 2007, the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, commonly known as the Quad, kicked off. It never really picked up momentum, and while it was revived in 2017, the Quad at best has sputtered along since.

— The major reasons for this are that the four constituents don’t always have the same aims, and China strenuously opposes the grouping.

— Beijing says the Quad’s purpose is mainly to target China. After the recent meeting on May 26, China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said at a presser, “We do not support ⁠the formation of exclusive cliques or bloc confrontation. No cooperation should undermine mutual trust and cooperation among regional countries.”

The meeting was chaired by Indian Minister of External Affairs S Jaishankar (extreme right) and attended by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio (second from right), Australian Minister of Foreign Affairs Penny Wong (second from left) and Japanese Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi (extreme left). (Photo: X/@DrSJaishankar)

— For Australia, Beijing’s intimidating posturing means it has to expand strategic outreach and security partnerships, but it remains heavily dependent on China economically.

— India needs to balance China in view of the shared border and the security calculus. It is also strongly opposed to China’s design of carving out a unipolar Asia, but Delhi remains wary of compromising its strategic autonomy.

— Tokyo views Quad as an essential security imperative, given the tensions in the South-East China Seas due to Beijing’s apparently expansionist designs.

— For the US, the Quad is perceived as the pillar of its Indo-Pacific strategy and as the mechanism to balance out China without military confrontation.

— These different priorities explain why the Quad’s progress has been incremental rather than decisive. The security cooperation remains constrained, lacking a NATO-like collective defence mechanism, and there is no binding treaty obligation.

— The recent Quad Foreign Ministers meeting has attempted to break fresh ground. The meeting focussed on maritime security, resilient supply chains, critical minerals and energy security amid geopolitical uncertainties.

— Periodic discussions around ‘Quad Plus’ have surfaced from time to time, although its expansion remains unlikely in the near future. South Korea is among the strongest candidates, given its growing Indo-Pacific orientation. However, China’s sensitivities and Seoul’s focus on the Korean Peninsula remain a constraint.

— The Quad’s future lies in strategic clarity among all members. To ensure organisational depth, the Quad needs to move towards permanent institutional architecture, alongside enhanced military operability, synergised technology partnerships and strengthened maritime capacity building in the Indo-Pacific.

— The real test of Quad is not whether it becomes an Asian NATO, but whether the four democracies, with varying interests, can sustain strategic cooperation in the era of great power competition.

Do You Know:

— The Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or the Quad, comprises India, Japan, Australia, and the US. It was formed as an informal alliance after the Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004. It was formalised in 2007 by the efforts of the then-Prime Minister of Japan, Shinzo Abe.

— The Quad is not structured like a typical multilateral organisation, and lacks a secretariat and any permanent decision-making body (like the EU or UN). Additionally, unlike NATO, the Quad does not include provisions for collective defence, instead choosing to conduct joint military exercises as a show of unity and diplomatic cohesion.

— In 2020, the trilateral India-US-Japan Malabar naval exercises expanded to include Australia, marking the first official grouping of the Quad since its resurgence in 2017, and the first joint military exercises among the four countries in over a decade.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍The Quad question: Rejuvenate, neglect or abandon?

UPSC Prelims Practise Question Covering similar theme:

(5) Which of the following countries is/are part of the QUAD grouping?

1. India

2. Canada

3. Japan

4. United Kingdom

5. France

6. Australia

Select the correct answer using the codes given below:

(a) 2, 3, 4 and 6

(b) 1, 3, 5 and 6

(c) 1, 2, and 4 only

(d) 1, 3 and 6 only

Why inflation rate is not the same as affordability

Syllabus:

Preliminary Examination: Current events of national and international importance

Mains Examination: General Studies-III: Indian Economy and issues relating to planning, mobilisation, of resources, growth, development and employment

What’s the ongoing story: The United States and Israel’s war on Iran and the resultant spike in prices of crude oil and other products critical to the smooth functioning of the global economy have made inflation the main worry for policymakers across the world.

— What is inflation?

— How is inflation calculated in India?

— What is the base year? Why has the government changed the base year of the consumer price index (CPI)?

— What is the role and function of the Monetary Policy Committee(MPC)?

— How does MPC control inflation in the economy?

— How does inflation impact the spending capacity of a consumer?

— What is the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management (FRBM) Act?

Key Takeaways:

— Between June 3 and 5, the Monetary Policy Committee of India’s Reserve Bank of India (RBI) will deliberate on this matter. For its part, the Union government has as yet shielded average consumers in India from the full effect of the rise in international prices.

— But while policymakers are focused on containing the inflation rate, average consumers in India focus more on affordability. The notion is best captured in the worries of several consumers, who bemoan that “once prices go up, they never come down”.

— In other words, consumers are often more worried about the cumulative effect of past price increases on their household budgets and overall affordability than just the inflation rate in a particular month.

— This difference between the two ideas is also at the heart of the so-called “affordability crisis” in the US and the cost-of-living crisis in the UK. In both countries, affordability, more than just the inflation rate, is also leading voters to change their political choices.

— The inflation rate is the rate at which the general price level rises from one year to another.

— Every country has chosen a representative basket of goods and services that its consumers use, and it tracks how the prices for this basket move. The year-on-year increase in this general price level is called the “headline” inflation rate, the one commonly referred to in policy debates.

— One way to assess whether one is better- or worse-off since the start of April 2014 is to compare incomes. If their income has gone up by 75%, then one is exactly where one was 12 years ago in “real” terms. If their income has grown by a lesser degree, then one is worse-off in real terms, and if the income has grown by a higher percentage, then one is better-off to that extent.

— On the inflation front, too, the RBI can’t address the main reason for inflation: inadequate crude oil supply. Under the circumstances, all that the RBI can do is to constrain overall demand for goods and services among consumers by raising interest rates. Higher interest rates would slow down economic activity by making loans (be it for cars, homes or factories) costlier.

— In other words, if RBI wants to arrest inflation, it will have to drag down India’s economic growth; an action that mirrors what the government is doing by raising fuel prices and urging people to consume less.

Do You Know:

— Inflation refers to the rate at which the general price level for goods and services increases over a period of time, causing a decrease in purchasing power of money or real income. In other words, as inflation rises, each unit of currency can buy fewer goods and services than before. There are different methods for measuring inflation such as Consumer Price Index (CPI), Wholesale Price Index (WPI), GDP deflator, and more, with each focusing on a specific aspect of price changes.

— CPI inflation, which measures the change in consumer prices of hundreds of goods and services in a given month compared to the same month in the previous year, is the most important economic indicator in the country as it directly influences the level of interest rates set by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

— The central bank has a legal mandate to target a CPI inflation rate of 4% in the medium term within a tolerance band of 2-6%. As such, if inflation is seen above 4% on a sustained basis, the RBI increases its policy repo rate to weaken demand and bring down inflation.

Other Important Articles Covering the same topic:

📍Why CPI with new base year 2024 matters for UPSC exam

📍Knowledge nugget of the day: RBI’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC)

Previous year UPSC Prelims Question Covering similar theme:

(6) Consider the following statements: (UPSC CSE 2020)

1. The weightage of food in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) is higher than that in Wholesale Price Index (WPI).

2. The WPI does not capture changes in the prices of services, which CPI does.

3. The Reserve Bank of India has now adopted WPI as its key measure of inflation and to decide on changing the key policy rates.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

(a) 1 and 2 only

(b) 2 only

(c) 3 only

(d) 1, 2 and 3

Previous year UPSC Mains Question Covering similar theme:

What are the causes of persistent high food inflation in India? Comment on the effectiveness of the monetary policy of the RBI to control this type of inflation. (UPSC CSE 2024)

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PRELIMS ANSWER KEY

1. (d)  2. (b)  3. (d)   4. (d)  5. (d)  6. (a)

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