Current Affairs — 31 May 2026

📖 Explanation

The Ministry of Corporate Affairs has notified that companies may spend up to 10 per cent of their annual CSR budget by subscribing to Zero Coupon Zero Principal (ZCZP) instruments issued by registered Not-for-Profit Organisations on the Social Stock Exchange (SSE). Section 135 of the Companies Act, 2013 requires eligible companies (net worth above Rs 500 crore, turnover above Rs 1,000 crore, or net profit above Rs 5 crore) to spend at least 2 per cent of their three-year average net profit on CSR. The SSE, regulated by SEBI, was announced in the 2019-20 Union Budget and rolled out in 2022.

📖 Explanation

A ZCZP instrument is a special security where the investor receives neither interest (coupon) nor the original amount (principal) back. In economic substance it is a donation to the social-purpose organisation, but it is routed through a SEBI-regulated stock-exchange ecosystem so that it is transparent and traceable. The Social Stock Exchange sits within the BSE and NSE and lists registered NPOs and social enterprises raising funds for verified social welfare projects.

📖 Explanation

The Union Cabinet has approved a Rs 37,500 crore incentive package to support the gasification of about 75 million tonnes of coal and lignite. This is in addition to an earlier Rs 8,500 crore scheme cleared in January 2024. The overall target set by the Coal Ministry is to gasify 100 million tonnes of coal by 2030. Coal gasification converts coal into syngas, which can be processed into urea, methanol, ammonia, synthetic natural gas, hydrogen and other products, reducing India's heavy import dependence in fertilisers and chemicals.

📖 Explanation

Indian coal is characterised by high ash content, variable gross calorific value and complex mineral matter. Fluidised-bed gasification uses a rising gas stream that lifts coal away from the heavy ash before gasification takes place, making it well suited to such fuel. China, Australia and the United States use coals of lower ash content and rely on different gasifier designs. BHEL has developed an indigenous pressurised fluidised-bed gasifier specifically tuned to Indian coal properties.

📖 Explanation

Navy Chief Admiral Dinesh K. Tripathi has stated that Operation Sindoor was launched after the Pahalgam terror attack. The Navy deployed submarines, warships and almost its entire naval aviation in full combat readiness, and a Carrier Battle Group took up a forward operational posture in the Northern Arabian Sea. This forced the Pakistan Navy to remain close to the Makran coast and inside its ports, while pushing up shipping and insurance costs for Pakistan's maritime trade.

📖 Explanation

MAHASAGAR stands for 'Mutual and Holistic Advancement for Security and Growth Across Regions'. It is the updated maritime vision being implemented by the Indian Navy, building on the earlier SAGAR (Security and Growth for All in the Region) doctrine. Under MAHASAGAR the Navy has undertaken 23 bilateral, 16 multilateral and 70 maritime partnership exercises over two years, along with humanitarian missions such as Operation Brahma in Myanmar after an earthquake and Operation Sagar Bandhu in Sri Lanka after Cyclone Ditwa.

📖 Explanation

The Philippines became the first foreign buyer of BrahMos in 2022 through a contract worth nearly USD 375 million. India has now confirmed that the Vietnam deal has been signed and that the Indonesia contract, announced in intent in March 2026, is in its final stages. BrahMos is a joint India-Russia supersonic cruise missile developed by the Defence Research and Development Organisation and NPO Mashinostroyeniya, and can be launched from land, sea, submarine and air platforms.

📖 Explanation

After the latest rebalancing, India's weight in the MSCI Emerging Markets Index slipped to 11.94 per cent, ranking behind Taiwan (24.84 per cent), China (23.05 per cent) and South Korea (18.69 per cent). The artificial intelligence and semiconductor boom has pushed up share prices of East Asian chip makers such as TSMC, SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics. TSMC alone now carries 14.21 per cent weight in the index, more than the combined weight of all listed Indian firms in it.

📖 Explanation

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), the world's largest contract chip foundry, alone carries a 14.21 per cent weight in the MSCI Emerging Markets Index. Its share price has more than doubled in the past year on AI-driven demand for advanced chips. Together with South Korea's SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics, which have each crossed the USD 1 trillion market-cap mark, East Asian chip firms make up almost a tenth of the index, a structural shift that has reduced India's relative weight even as Indian markets themselves continued to grow.

📖 Explanation

The Tungabhadra Dam is constructed on the Tungabhadra river, a tributary of the Krishna, near Hosapete in Karnataka. It is a joint project of Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh and irrigates command areas in Koppal, Raichur, Ballari and the adjoining districts of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. Crest Gate No. 19 was washed away on August 10, 2024 when the reservoir was at its Full Reservoir Level of 1,633 feet. All 33 spillway gates were replaced between December 24, 2025 and April 25, 2026 at a cost of around Rs 51 crore.

📖 Explanation

Article 341 deals with Scheduled Castes and, by its terms and the relevant Presidential Order, restricts SC status to persons of certain Hindu, Sikh and Buddhist origins, which is why the Supreme Court has held that Dalit converts to Christianity or Islam cannot claim SC status. Article 342 deals with Scheduled Tribes and contains no religion-based restriction. The Patna High Court in the Kartik Oraon case held that tribal identity is primarily based on community, ethnicity and culture, not religion. This drafting difference is central to the current 'delisting' debate.

📖 Explanation

The Lokur Committee (1965) laid down five criteria that are still used to identify Scheduled Tribes: primitive traits, distinctive culture, geographical isolation, shyness of contact with the larger community, and backwardness. These criteria are based on community and ethnographic features and do not include religion. The criteria are central to debates around inclusion or exclusion in the Scheduled Tribes list and were referred to extensively in the current discussion on whether religious conversion should affect ST status.

📖 Explanation

The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), signed in 2015, capped Iran's uranium enrichment at 3.67 per cent — the level adequate for civilian power reactors, which typically need 3 to 5 per cent enrichment. The deal was signed between Iran and the P5+1 group: the United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Russia and China, along with the European Union. In return for sanctions relief, Iran accepted wide-ranging IAEA inspections. The first Trump administration withdrew the United States from the JCPOA in 2018, after which Iran progressively expanded enrichment up to 60 per cent.

📖 Explanation

Between 2023 and 2025, the Strait of Hormuz carried about 25 per cent of all seaborne oil and around 20 per cent of all liquefied natural gas (LNG) traded globally. The strait connects the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and is just about 33 kilometres wide at its narrowest point, between the Iranian coast and Oman's Musandam Peninsula. Iran controls seven of the eight main islands in the strait, including Qeshm, Hormuz, Larak and Abu Musa, giving it a strong physical hold over the shipping lanes.

📖 Explanation

The Priority Postpaid service uses 5G network slicing, a feature of the standalone 5G architecture. Network slicing divides the same physical 5G network into many virtual 'lanes', each of which can be tuned for a specific use such as ultra-low-latency industrial robots, autonomous vehicles or premium consumer connectivity. It relies on software-defined networking and cloud-native infrastructure to allocate resources dynamically. Operators argue that within a slice all apps are treated equally, but critics say creating premium slices for paying users may dilute India's strong net neutrality regime that emerged after the campaign against Facebook's Free Basics.