INSIGHTS 25 Feb 2026 Present Affairs Evaluation

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 25 February 2026 covers essential present affairs of the day, their backward linkages, their relevance for Prelims examination and MCQs on principal articles

InstaLinks : Insta Hyperlinks aid you assume past the present affairs challenge and aid you think multidimensionally to develop depth in your understanding of those points. These linkages supplied on this ‘trace’ format aid you body attainable questions in your thoughts which 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 & 2:

1. World Financial institution’s Ladies, Enterprise and the Regulation 2026 report

GS Paper 3:

2. India’s Power Shift by way of the Inexperienced Ammonia Route

 Content material for Mains Enrichment (CME):

1. India–GCC Free Commerce Settlement (FTA)

Info for Prelims (FFP):

1. Union Cupboard approves renaming Kerala as Keralam

2. seventy fifth Anniversary of Workers’ State Insurance coverage Company (ESIC)

3. Human Papillomavirus (HPV) Vaccination

4. Congo Lakes (Mai Ndombe and Tumba)

5. Navy Workout routines in Information

6. Double Taxation Avoidance Conference (DTAC)

 Mapping:

1. Israel

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 25 February 2026

GS Paper 1 & 2 :

World Financial institution’s Ladies, Enterprise and the Regulation 2026 report

Supply:  DTE

Topic:  Position of Ladies and Weak Part

Context: The World Financial institution’s Ladies, Enterprise and the Regulation 2026 report highlights a major world implementation hole, the place legal guidelines for ladies’s financial equality exist on paper however usually fail in follow as a consequence of weak enforcement and lack of supportive techniques.

Concerning the World Financial institution’s Ladies, Enterprise and the Regulation 2026 report:

What it’s?

• The Ladies, Enterprise and the Regulation (WBL) 2026 report is the eleventh in a collection of annual research measuring the legal guidelines and insurance policies affecting ladies’s financial alternatives in 190 economies.
• This version makes use of the WBL 2.0 framework, which benchmarks three pillars:
  • Authorized Frameworks (the legal guidelines),
  • Supportive Frameworks (insurance policies and providers), and
  • Enforcement Perceptions (how legal guidelines are utilized in actuality).

Key Highlights of the Report:

• The World Rating: The worldwide common rating for authorized frameworks is 67.9 out of 100, but it surely drops sharply to 47.3 for supportive frameworks and 53.4 for enforcement perceptions.
• Security Hole: Security is the lowest-scoring space; whereas many international locations have some legal guidelines, enforcement fails roughly 80% of the time, and solely one-third of the mandatory security legal guidelines are in place globally.
• The 4% Benchmark: Solely 4% of ladies stay in economies which have achieved practically full authorized equality (scoring 90 or above) throughout all three pillars.
• Financial Stakes: Closing the gender hole in labor drive participation might improve world GDP by greater than 20% over the subsequent decade.
• Childcare Deficit: Lower than half of the 190 economies have legal guidelines offering monetary help for households, and in low-income economies, just one% of the required childcare help mechanisms exist.
• Entrepreneurship Limitations: Though ladies can legally begin companies in most locations, solely half of economies promote equal entry to credit score.
• Reform Momentum: Over the past two years, 68 economies enacted 113 optimistic authorized reforms, with Sub-Saharan Africa main with 33 reforms.
• Implementation Disaster: On common, economies have established fewer than half of the insurance policies and providers wanted for efficient enforcement of equality legal guidelines.

World Greatest Practices:

• Built-in Implementation: Greatest-performing economies align authorized adjustments with devoted budgets and specialised enforcement businesses, reminiscent of gender-specific police models for security.
• Incentivizing Care: Economies that present direct subsidies for childcare and mandate paid parental go away for each mother and father see considerably greater feminine labor participation.
• Gender-Responsive Procurement: Nations like Viet Nam have enacted laws together with gender-responsive provisions for public procurement processes to help women-led companies.

Challenges Related:

• Ineffective Security Protections: Legal guidelines in opposition to harassment usually lack the specialised businesses wanted for actual safety.

E.g. In lots of economies, legal guidelines in opposition to sexual harassment exist, however specialised courts or hotlines to deal with circumstances are regularly lacking.

• The Motherhood Penalty: An absence of inexpensive childcare usually forces ladies to exit the workforce.

E.g. In lots of growing economies, there’s a complete absence of monetary or tax help for households to entry high-quality childcare providers.

• Monetary Exclusion: Cultural norms and credit score biases stop ladies from securing loans even after they have the authorized proper to start out a enterprise.

E.g. Solely half of the world’s economies have legal guidelines that particularly prohibit gender-based discrimination in monetary providers.

• Weak Monitoring Programs: Governments fail to trace how legal guidelines are literally impacting ladies’s lives.

E.g. Most economies lack the data-gathering techniques required to observe if equal pay for equal work is definitely being practiced within the non-public sector.

• Authorized Gaps in Fundamental Rights: In some areas, legal guidelines nonetheless limit ladies’s mobility or rights inside marriage.

E.g. In components of the Center East and North Africa, authorized reforms are sluggish to handle fundamental points like a girl’s proper to decide on the place to stay.

Manner Forward:

• Bridge the Implementation Hole: Concentrate on constructing the institutional capability and funding required for the supportive frameworks that flip legal guidelines into actuality.
• Put money into Care Infrastructure: Prioritize the growth of private and non-private childcare providers to cut back the unpaid care burden on ladies.
• Mandate Equal Credit score Entry: Enact legal guidelines that prohibit gender discrimination in lending and promote credit-reporting fashions that acknowledge ladies’s reimbursement histories.
• Strengthen Security Companies: Set up 24/7 hotlines, specialised police models, and authorized assist providers for survivors of violence.
• Undertake Gender-Disaggregated Information: Use information to trace coverage impacts and establish particular areas the place enforcement is failing on the native stage.

Conclusion:

The 2026 report demonstrates that whereas authorized progress is being made, the worldwide group is failing on the implementation of those rights. To unlock huge financial development, governments should transfer past legislative milestones and spend money on the enforcement and help techniques that guarantee true equality in follow. Solely then will the 600 million ladies coming into the workforce this decade have a good likelihood at success.

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 25 February 2026 GS Paper 3:

India’s Power Shift by way of the Inexperienced Ammonia Route

Supply:  TH

Topic:  Power

Context: India not too long ago carried out a landmark public sale by way of the Photo voltaic Power Company of India (SECI), discovering record-low costs for inexperienced ammonia which can be 40%–50% decrease than European benchmarks.

About India’s Power Shift by way of the Inexperienced Ammonia Route:

What it’s?

• Inexperienced ammonia is produced by combining nitrogen from the air with inexperienced hydrogen (generated by splitting water utilizing renewable power).
• In contrast to conventional gray ammonia, which depends on pure gasoline and emits important CO2, inexperienced ammonia has a near-zero carbon footprint.

Key Information/Stats:

• File Low Value: SECI’s public sale found a worth of ₹49.75 to ₹64.74/kg ($572–$744/tonne), practically half the price of the EU’s H2Global public sale ($1,153/tonne).
• Demand Aggregation: The tender focused an annual demand of 724,000 tonnes of inexperienced ammonia throughout 13 fertilizer vegetation.
• Funding Purpose: PM highlighted funding alternatives value $500 billion throughout India’s power sector.
• Import Discount: Inexperienced ammonia is predicted to exchange 30% of India’s ammonia imports, insulating the financial system from gasoline market volatility.
• Emission Financial savings: The Nationwide Inexperienced Hydrogen Mission goals to keep away from practically 50 MMT of CO2 emissions yearly by 2030.

Potential of Inexperienced Ammonia:

• Decarbonizing Agriculture: It replaces fossil-fuel-based feedstock in fertilizers, making the meals provide chain sustainable.

E.g. The provision of 75,000 tonnes of inexperienced ammonia to Paradeep Phosphates in Odisha marks the beginning of this transition in India’s fertilizer hubs.

• Zero-Carbon Marine Gasoline: Ammonia is less complicated to retailer than hydrogen and can be utilized as a clear different to heavy gasoline oil in ships.

E.g. India is growing the Rotterdam-India-Singapore inexperienced transport hall to operationalize maritime decarbonization.

• Hydrogen Service: Ammonia acts as a secure medium to move hydrogen over lengthy distances.

E.g. India is positioning its coastal ports like Kandla and Tuticorin as Hydrogen Hubs for world exports to Japan and South Korea.

• Power Storage: It serves as a long-duration power storage resolution, serving to steadiness the grid throughout renewable power fluctuations.

E.g. Integration of hybrid renewable techniques (photo voltaic + wind + storage) is being piloted to make sure round the clock inexperienced ammonia manufacturing.

Initiatives Taken:

• SIGHT Programme: An outlay of ₹17,490 crore underneath the Strategic Interventions for Inexperienced Hydrogen Transition to supply production-linked incentives (PLI).
• Inexperienced Hydrogen Hubs: Recognition of Deendayal, Paradip, and V.O. Chidambaranar ports as devoted hubs for hydrogen and its derivatives.
• Nationwide Inexperienced Hydrogen Mission (2023): An umbrella mission to create a 5 MMTPA manufacturing capability and entice ₹8 lakh crore in investments by 2030.
• SECI Public sale Mannequin: Implementing 10-year fixed-price offtake agreements and aggregated procurement to supply market certainty to builders.

Challenges Related:

• Price Hole with Gray Ammonia: Regardless of the worth drop, inexperienced ammonia continues to be barely costlier than gray ammonia (approx. $515/tonne).

E.g. Even with incentives, the Inexperienced Premium stays a hurdle for price-sensitive industries with out obligatory mixing norms.

E.g. Present e-fuel demand at ports like VOC (Tuticorin) is inadequate to justify high-cost devoted bunkering infrastructure with out additional scaling.

• Regulatory Fragmentation: Inconsistent state-level insurance policies on grid banking and transmission prices.

E.g. Many states discover it fiscally strained to supply the 60% subsidy promised of their native inexperienced hydrogen insurance policies.

• Expertise Readiness: Excessive capital price of electrolysers and the necessity for large-scale ammonia cracking models.

E.g. India nonetheless depends closely on imported electrolyser expertise, although native manufacturing PLIs try to handle this.

• Security and Toxicity: Ammonia is very corrosive and poisonous, requiring stringent dealing with protocols.

E.g. Increasing its use as a marine gasoline requires re-engineering ship engines and coaching maritime workers in new security requirements.

Manner Forward:

• Harmonize Rules: Implement secure and uniform guidelines throughout all states for grid entry, energy banking, and wheeling prices.
• Blended Finance: Leverage long-tenor, low-interest capital from multilateral banks to enhance mission bankability.
• World Certification: Align India’s inexperienced hydrogen requirements with world norms (just like the EU) to facilitate seamless exports.
• Obligatory Mixing: Introduce inexperienced hydrogen/ammonia consumption mandates for refineries and fertilizer vegetation to make sure a assured market.
• R&D in Security: Put money into indigenous security monitoring and sensor applied sciences to handle the dangers related to ammonia dealing with.

Conclusion:

India’s transfer towards inexperienced ammonia marks a decisive shift from power safety to power independence. By making a aggressive market by way of the SIGHT programme and SECI auctions, India is successfully narrowing the hole between clear and fossil-fuel-based power. If supported by sustained coverage and infrastructure funding, inexperienced ammonia will turn out to be the cornerstone of India’s journey towards Internet Zero by 2070.

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS – 25 February 2026 Content material for Mains Enrichment (CME)

India–GCC Free Commerce Settlement (FTA)

Context: India and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) signed a Joint Assertion formally launching negotiations for the India–GCC Free Commerce Settlement (FTA).

About India–GCC Free Commerce Settlement (FTA):

What it’s?

• The India–GCC FTA is a proposed complete commerce settlement between India and the Gulf Cooperation Council (Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, and Bahrain).
• It goals to ascertain a structured framework to boost bilateral commerce, funding flows, and financial integration by way of diminished commerce boundaries and improved market entry.

Key Options:

• Formal Launch of Negotiations: Joint Assertion signed in February 2026, marking the start of structured negotiations for a broad-based commerce pact.
• Complete Financial Protection: Anticipated to incorporate commerce in items, providers, funding facilitation, and regulatory cooperation for smoother enterprise operations.
• Main Commerce Partnership: GCC is India’s largest buying and selling associate bloc, with bilateral commerce of USD 178.56 billion (FY 2024–25), accounting for over 15% of India’s world commerce.
• Sectoral Complementarity: India exports engineering items, textiles, rice, gems & jewelry, whereas importing crude oil, LNG, petrochemicals and valuable metals from GCC nations.
• Funding and Diaspora Linkages: GCC nations are main traders in India (over USD 31 billion FDI) and host practically 10 million Indians, strengthening financial and social ties.

Relevance in UPSC Examination Syllabus

• GS Paper II – Worldwide Relations

• • India and its neighbourhood & regional groupings
  • Bilateral, regional and world commerce agreements
  • India’s relations with West Asia / Gulf area

• GS Paper III – Indian Financial system

• • Exterior sector and commerce coverage
  • Free Commerce Agreements and export diversification
  • FDI flows and financial integration

UPSC CURRENT AFFAIRS –25 February 2026 Info for Prelims (FFP)