INSIGHTS 14 Feb 2026 Present Affairs Evaluation

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 14 February 2026 covers necessary present affairs of the day, their backward linkages, their relevance for Prelims examination and MCQs on essential articles

InstaLinks : Insta Hyperlinks make it easier to suppose past the present affairs challenge and make it easier to think multidimensionally to develop depth in your understanding of those points. These linkages supplied on this ‘trace’ format make it easier to body attainable questions in your thoughts that may come up(or an examiner may think) from every present occasion. InstaLinks additionally join each challenge to their static or theoretical background.

Desk of Contents

GS Paper 1:

1. China’s Inhabitants Woes

GS Paper 3:

2. Girls led decentralised renewable power India

 Content material for Mains Enrichment (CME):

1. Spirit of ‘Nagrikdevo Bhava’

2. Complaints In opposition to Judges in India

Info for Prelims (FFP):

1. 40 Years of Agricultural and Processed Meals Merchandise Export Growth Authority (APEDA)

2. Novel Oral Polio Vaccine Sort 2 (nOPV2)

3. The Sangtam Neighborhood

4. Military Ant Species

5. Navy Workout routines in Information

 Mapping:

1. Reynisfjara Seashore

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 14 February 2026

GS Paper 1 :

China’s Inhabitants Woes

Supply:  IE

Topic:  Demography and related points

Context: China’s beginning charge has plunged to a file low of 5.63 births per 1,000 folks in 2025, marking the fourth consecutive 12 months of inhabitants contraction.

• This decline persists regardless of the 2016 reversal of the One-Youngster Coverage (OCP), highlighting deep-seated structural and social failures.

About China’s Inhabitants Woes:

What it’s?

• China is at the moment going through a demographic dying spiral the place the inhabitants isn’t solely shrinking however growing older quickly. A long time of the One-Youngster Coverage created a “4-2-1” household construction (4 grandparents, two dad and mom, one little one), inserting an immense financial burden on the youth.
• The disaster has transitioned from an absence of permission to have kids to an absence of potential or want, pushed by the excessive prices of housing, training, and healthcare.

Causes for China’s Woes:

• The Key Colleges Funnel: The state concentrated 70–80% of sources right into a tiny tier of elite faculties, making training a high-stakes competitors.
• Housing as a “2+1” Debt Lure: Urbanization centered on small 50–70 sqm residences designed particularly for a three-person household unit.

E.g. Excessive price-to-income ratios and land-sale-dependent native budgets saved housing costly and bodily too small for a couple of little one.

• Privatized Healthcare Burden: Out-of-pocket medical bills surged from 20% to 60% because the state-led welfare retreated in favor of a market economic system.
• The Motherhood Penalty: In a hyper-competitive job market, girls are sometimes considered as high-risk property as a result of lack of state-subsidized maternity go away.

E.g. Firms favor males to keep away from productiveness gaps, forcing girls to decide on between profession development and a second (and even first) little one.

• The Social Reflex Mindset: A long time of reinforcement have made the one-child household a psychological and social norm that persists even after the legal guidelines modified.

E.g. Professional-natalist insurance policies just like the three-child restrict are failing as a result of the 4-2-1 household construction has turn into a social reflex hard-coded into the tradition.

Key Information on India’s Inhabitants Points

• Whole Fertility Price (TFR): India’s nationwide TFR has fallen to 2.0, which is under the substitute stage of two.1.
• Regional Imbalance: Southern states like Sikkim (1.1) and Goa (1.3) are growing older quicker, whereas northern states like Bihar (3.0) nonetheless have excessive progress.
• Median Age: India’s median age is 28.2 years, considerably youthful than China’s (~39), offering a demographic dividend window till roughly 2047.
• Working-Age Inhabitants: India is predicted so as to add 144 million staff by 2050, whereas China is projected to lose practically 239 million.

Challenges Related:

• Job Creation Hole: A big youth inhabitants is a dividend provided that there are sufficient jobs; in any other case, it turns into a demographic bomb.

E.g. Excessive youth unemployment charges (above 20% in some brackets) result in social unrest and mind drain of expert professionals.

• Skilling Mismatch: The present training system usually fails to provide industry-ready graduates.

E.g. Latest experiences recommend solely about 50% of Indian graduates are employable, necessitating huge re-skilling via initiatives just like the Talent India Mission.

• Ageing Earlier than Affluence: In contrast to Western nations, elements of India are beginning to age earlier than the nation has reached high-income standing.

E.g. States like Tamil Nadu are already going through the necessity for elevated geriatric care and pension funds earlier than their per-capita GDP reaches international developed requirements.

• Useful resource Pressure: Speedy urbanization is placing a Malthusian pressure on primary sources like water and air high quality.

E.g. The water disaster in Bengaluru and the hazardous air high quality in Delhi-NCR are direct outcomes of failing to scale infrastructure alongside inhabitants density.

• Dependency Ratio Shifts: Because the youth inhabitants peaks and finally declines, the burden of supporting the aged will fall on a smaller workforce.

E.g. The Previous-Age Dependency Ratio is projected to almost double by 2050, which is able to pressure India’s restricted social safety and pension techniques.

Classes for India from China’s Woes:

• Keep away from Coercion: Inhabitants management must be achieved via training and healthcare (just like the Kerala mannequin) somewhat than inflexible, top-down legislative mandates.
• Subsidize Social Pillars: The state should be certain that the prices of residing—training, well being, and housing—stay reasonably priced in order that household measurement is a alternative, not a monetary impossibility.
• Assist Working Girls: To take care of beginning charges, India should bridge the motherhood penalty by subsidizing maternity go away and increasing the Nationwide Creche Scheme.
• Plan for Regional Divergence: India wants completely different insurance policies for growing older South India (aged care) and youthful North India (major training and job creation).
• Give attention to ‘High quality’ with out Shortage: As an alternative of Key Colleges that restrict entry, India should scale up high quality training throughout the board to stop the funnel of shortage that bankrupted Chinese language households.

Conclusion:

China’s disaster proves that after a society hard-codes low fertility into its financial and social structure, money incentives alone can’t reverse the pattern. India should leverage its present youthful window to construct inclusive techniques that help households somewhat than penalizing progress. In the end, the aim must be to attain wealth earlier than wrinkles by investing in human capital in the present day.

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 14 February 2026 GS Paper 3:

Girls led decentralised renewable power India

Supply:  TH

Topic:  Renewable Power

Context: The India Distributed Renewable Power Summit (IDRES) 2026 just lately highlighted women-led decentralised renewable power (DRE) as a strategic pillar for India’s net-zero transition.

• Concurrently, Chhattisgarh launched “Anjor Imaginative and prescient 2047,” aiming to determine 5,000 women-led DRE options and create 50,000 inexperienced jobs by 2030.

About Girls led decentralised renewable power India:

What it’s?

• Girls-led DRE is a transformative mannequin that strikes rural girls from being passive last-mile shoppers to energetic designers, house owners, and operators of small-scale power techniques (like photo voltaic pumps, mini-grids, and photo voltaic dryers).
• It integrates power entry with gender fairness, guaranteeing that clear power infrastructure is managed by native girls collectives, equivalent to Self-Assist Teams (SHGs), to energy each home wants and rural livelihoods.

Key Information and Info:

• Illustration Hole: Girls at the moment symbolize solely 11% of India’s renewable power workforce, in comparison with a 32% international common.
• Earnings Influence: 90% of girls utilizing DRE options report an earnings improve, with common earnings rising by one-third inside a 12 months.
• Well being Disaster: Indoor air air pollution from conventional biomass causes roughly 2,00,000 untimely deaths yearly in India, primarily amongst girls.
• Financial Potential: Empowering girls within the power sector may add $2.9 trillion to India’s economic system by 2025-26.
• Scale of Influence: Applied sciences like photo voltaic silk-reeling have helped girls improve month-to-month incomes from ₹1,500 to ₹6,000.

Wants for Girls-Led DRE:

• Bridging the Reliability Deficit: Whereas grid connectivity is excessive, rural consistency is low; DRE supplies the dependable high quality energy wanted for important providers.

E.g. In rural Chhattisgarh, forest-fringe villages use DRE to energy well being facilities, guaranteeing refrigeration for life-saving vaccines throughout grid outages.

• Mitigating Time Poverty: Girls spend 3–4 hours day by day gathering fuelwood; DRE automates drudgerous duties, releasing time for training or relaxation.

E.g. In Odisha, solar-powered silk-reeling machines have changed handbook thigh-reeling, saving hours of bodily labor for tribal girls weavers.

• Enhancing Rural Security: Lack of dependable lighting restricts girls’s mobility and security after darkish.

E.g. Photo voltaic-powered streetlights in Uttar Pradesh villages have reportedly elevated girls’s participation in night neighborhood conferences and SHG actions.

• Productive Use of Power (PURE): Reasonably priced power is required to mechanize small-scale rural enterprises to make them aggressive.

E.g. Girls-run dairies in Rajasthan use solar-powered bulk milk chillers to stop spoilage, permitting them to promote to bigger markets.

• Local weather Resilience: Centralized grids are susceptible to excessive climate; decentralized techniques managed by locals guarantee neighborhood resilience.

E.g. In the course of the latest cyclones in coastal Andhra Pradesh, solar-powered micro-grids managed by girls’s teams remained the one supply of energy for cellular charging and emergency lights.

Initiatives Taken So Far:

• PM Surya Ghar (Photo voltaic Villages): Goals to determine 10,000 photo voltaic villages by 2030 with a give attention to neighborhood and women-led administration.
• Lakhpati Didi Scheme: Targets creating 3 crore Lakhpati Didis by integrating DRE applied sciences into SHG-led companies like meals processing and textiles.
• Anjor Imaginative and prescient 2047 (Chhattisgarh): A devoted state roadmap to extend RE share to 66% via women-led inexperienced jobs and Photo voltaic Didis.
• Photo voltaic Urja Lamp (SoUL) Mission: An IIT Bombay-led initiative that educated rural girls (particularly in Bihar) to assemble and preserve photo voltaic lamps.

Key Challenges Related:

• Excessive Upfront Prices: DRE home equipment like photo voltaic fridges or photo voltaic pumps require important preliminary capital that rural girls lack.

E.g. A photo voltaic bulk milk chiller can price as much as ₹25 lakh, a prohibitive sum for a typical village SHG with out low-interest inexperienced credit score.

• Technical Talent Hole: There’s a scarcity of native girls technicians (Oorja Sakhis) to deal with upkeep and repairs.

E.g. In lots of distant districts of Jharkhand, photo voltaic installations usually lie defunct for months as a result of the closest technician is a person situated in a distant metropolis.

• Deep-Seated Patriarchy: Conventional gender roles usually exclude girls from technical decision-making or asset possession.

E.g. Agriculture Census information exhibits girls personal solely 13.9% of land in India, making it tough for them to safe financial institution loans for power property like photo voltaic pumps.

• Restricted Market Consciousness: Many rural entrepreneurs are unaware of the revenue potential or existence of DRE livelihood applied sciences.

E.g. Small-scale fruit processors in Himachal Pradesh usually proceed utilizing costly diesel turbines as a result of they lack info on solar-dryer subsidies.

• Service Infrastructure Deficit: Submit-sale service and spare elements for DRE machines are hardly ever accessible on the village stage.

E.g. In Western Odisha, seasonal demand for photo voltaic irrigation is excessive, however system downtime throughout peak harvest persists because of an absence of native spare-part depots.

Manner Forward:

• Asset Possession: Insurance policies ought to mandate girls as major or joint house owners of power property, much like the Ujjwala Yojana mannequin.
• Inexperienced Credit score Entry: Launch devoted credit score strains and First Loss Default Ensures (FLDG) for women-led clean-tech enterprises.
• Photo voltaic Didis: Scale up vocational coaching for girls in STEM and technical roles to create an area cadre of upkeep sakhis.
• Panchayat Integration: Empower Gram Panchayats to make use of Personal Supply Income to companion with girls’s collectives for Power-as-a-Service.
• Mainstreaming DRE: Combine DRE applied sciences into present flagship schemes just like the Nationwide Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM).

Conclusion:

India’s power transition will solely be really simply when the ladies on the final mile transition from being beneficiaries to being leaders of the system. By scaling women-led DRE, India can concurrently handle power poverty, local weather targets, and gender inequality. Turning the final mile into the entrance line of progress is the quickest option to a Viksit Bharat.

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 14 February 2026 Content material for Mains Enrichment (CME)

Spirit of ‘Nagrikdevo Bhava’

Context: Prime Minister of India devoted ‘Seva Teerth’ to the nation, emphasizing the guideline of ‘Nagrikdevo Bhava’ (Citizen is God).

• The initiative symbolically reinforces the federal government’s dedication to citizen-centric governance below the imaginative and prescient of India First.

About Spirit of ‘Nagrikdevo Bhava’:

What it’s?

• ‘Nagrikdevo Bhava’ interprets to “Could the citizen be handled as God”, drawing inspiration from the traditional Indian ethos of Atithi Devo Bhava.
• It locations the citizen on the middle of governance, redefining public service as a sacred responsibility somewhat than mere administrative duty.

Philosophical Basis

• Rooted in Indian civilizational values, significantly the idea of Seva (selfless service) and Dharma (duty-bound conduct).
• Resonates with Gandhian philosophy of Antyodaya, which prioritizes the welfare of the final particular person.
• Aligns with the constitutional morality embedded in Articles 14 and 21, guaranteeing dignity and equality of each citizen.
• Displays the moral dimension of governance the place public workplace is seen as a belief (Lok Seva).

Significance:

• Citizen-Centric Governance: Reinforces service supply reforms like Digital India, Jan Dhan-Aadhaar-Cellular (JAM) trinity, and Direct Profit Switch.
• Administrative Accountability: Encourages transparency, responsiveness, and grievance redressal mechanisms.
• Ethical Legitimacy of State Energy: Shifts governance from authority-driven to service-driven administration.
• Inclusive Growth: Helps the Viksit Bharat 2047 imaginative and prescient by guaranteeing that progress advantages each citizen.

Relevance in UPSC Examination Syllabus

• GS Paper II: Polity & Governance

• • Citizen-centric governance, transparency, accountability, and public service ethics.
  • Position of civil providers in a democracy; welfare schemes and inclusive improvement.
  • Constitutional values and rules of justice, equality, and dignity.

• GS Paper IV: Ethics, Integrity & Aptitude

• • Ideas of Seva, Compassion, Obligation, and Integrity in public service.
  • Case research associated to citizen-first governance and ethical management.
  • Emotional intelligence and empathy in administration.

Complaints In opposition to Judges in India

Context: The Union Regulation Minister knowledgeable the Lok Sabha that the workplace of the Chief Justice of India obtained 8,630 complaints in opposition to sitting judges between 2016 and 2025.

About Complaints In opposition to Judges in India:

What it’s?

• Complaints in opposition to judges of the Supreme Court docket and Excessive Courts relate to allegations of corruption, sexual misconduct, abuse of authority, or critical impropriety.

Key Information & Info (2016–2025):

• Whole Complaints: 8,630 complaints obtained by the CJI’s workplace.
• 12 months-wise Traits:

• Mechanism: Complaints may also be routed via CPGRAMS and are forwarded to the CJI or respective Excessive Court docket Chief Justices.
• Authorized Framework: Elimination of judges is ruled by Articles 124(4) and 217 of the Structure and the Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968, requiring a particular majority in Parliament.

Significance:

• Judicial Accountability: Rising complaints spotlight the significance of sustaining public belief within the larger judiciary.
• Transparency Hole: Lack of publicly accessible information on motion taken fuels issues over opacity within the in-house process.
• Institutional Credibility: Making certain moral conduct is central to upholding judicial independence and rule of legislation.

Relevance in UPSC Examination

• GS Paper II – Polity & Governance

• • Judiciary: Construction, appointment, removing, and accountability of judges.
  • Separation of powers and checks and balances.
  • Transparency and reforms in judicial establishments.

• • Integrity in public workplace.
  • Institutional ethics and public belief.
  • Accountability vs independence dilemma.

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS –14 February 2026 Info for Prelims (FFP)