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The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has successfully completed its first test flight to demonstrate a crew escape system for the Gaganyaan mission that aims at putting humans in space, after twice rescheduling the flight due to bad weather and then temporarily delaying the launch just five seconds before scheduled lift-off due to an anomaly in the system.
The Test Vehicle Abort Mission 1 (TV-D1) flight was meant to simulate an abort situation, and demonstrate the system to safely carry the crew module out of the vehicle in case of emergencies.
Though it was scheduled to lift off, when the mission director initiated the automatic launch sequence, with the lift-off again rescheduled.
However, just five seconds before lift-off, the launch was put on hold as the engine ignition did not happen nominally.
The engine ignition has to happen in the nominal course. What has happened is the onboard computer, which is doing the function, has withheld the launch in view of the anomaly observed.
ISRO scientists and engineers at Sriharikota quickly corrected all anomalies and sprang back to launch the TV-D1.
News
Army’s Project Udbhav to tap indigenous military knowledge (Page no. 7)
(GS Paper 3, Defence)
An ambitious effort for the integration of India’s “ancient strategic acumen” into the contemporary military domain and develop an “indigenous strategic vocabulary”, rooted in India’s “philosophy and culture”, was launched under Project Udbhav.
The project’s objective is to synthesise ancient wisdom with contemporary military practices, forging a unique and holistic approach to address modern security challenges, said Lt. Gen. Tarun Kumar Aich, Deputy Chief of the Army Staff (Strategy), giving an overview.
Project Udbhav, a collaboration between the Army and the United Service Institution of India (USI), a defence services think tank, was launched at the first Indian Military Heritage Festival (IMHF) being organised by the USI.
It aims to effectively integrate ancient wisdom with modern military pedagogy through interdisciplinary research, workshops and leadership seminars... It will facilitate emergence of previously under-explored thoughts and theories related to strategic thinking, statecraft and warfare, foster deeper understanding and contribute to enriching military training curricula.
Going forward, a series of events and workshops will dwell on various facets of our strategic culture and culminate in January next year, with a publication, to document and institutionalise such knowledge.
Rare butterfly clicked in Himachal Pradesh (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
A butterfly that is rare in the western Himalayas, the paintbrush swift has been photographed and documented for the first time in Himachal Pradesh’s Chamba district. The State is home to about 25% of the total number of butterfly species found in India.
The paintbrush swift(Baoris farri), a butterfly species of the Hesperiidae family, was sighted and photographed in the second week of October during a field survey conducted under the Wild Bhattiyat Project initiated by the Bhattiyat Forest Range of the Dalhousie Forest Division of the Himachal Pradesh Forest Department in 2022.
The species has never been photographed in Himachal Pradesh since its discovery in 1878. This is the first time that we have photographed and documented it.
It was first described by lepidopterist Frederic Moore, more than 145 years ago, from the eastern Himalayas,” Sanjeev Kumar, Range Forest Officer at the Bhattiyat Forest Range, who is leading the project. Since the launch of the project, the department has so far documented 120 butterfly species.
We have recorded and documented various uncommon butterfly species like the anomalous nawab, blank swift, tailed jay, siren, etc., which are frequently sighted, but the paintbrush swift has been sighted and photographed for the first time in the lower hills of the Dhauladhar mountain range.
We are hopeful of finding more rare butterfly species in the region in the coming days,” Mr. Kumar said that the paintbrush swift’s habitat distribution is common in northeast, central and south India, and rare in Uttarakhand.
Dogra architecture gets a revival at J&K’s Maharaj Gunj (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 1, Culture)
A project that recreates the past glory of Srinagar’s Maharaj Gunj market, which has disappeared from sight with encroachment and deviations for several decades, throws new light on rare architectural elements introduced in Kashmir by Dogra Hindu kings between 1846 and 1947.
Now, Srinagar Smart City Ltd. and the Kashmir chapter of the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) have joined hands to conserve vernacular elements of Kashmiri architecture, including colonnaded walkways, decorative pilasters, and exposed moulded brickwork, in an effort to bring that past to life again.
The area has a rich mix of vernacular and colonial architecture. Most residential buildings lining the streets are of mixed use, with shops on the ground floor and living quarters on the upper floors, constructed in the taq or dhajji dewari styles.
Some of the houses going up four floors still bear testament to the rich architectural legacy of Srinagar, with highly ornate exteriors and interiors,” Saima Iqbal, principal conservation architect with INTACH.
One of the approach roads from the beautiful 607-year-old Budshah Tomb has already been uplifted with a subtle colour palette, including lime for the walls and brown for the windows.
A uniform, traditional character of fenestrations is already changing the character of the location. Shop shutters are being realigned, and repainted with an appropriate colour. A uniform wooden signage has been designed for all the shops, with standardised typeface and size.
World
EU, U.S. envoys urge Kosovo and Serbia to resume dialogue (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
The envoys of the European Union and the United States urged on Saturday Kosovo and Serbia to resume dialogue as the only way to de-escalate the soaring tension between the two nations.
This is the first such visit since September 24 when nearly 30 Serb gunmen crossed into northern Kosovo, killing a police officer and setting up barricades, before launching an hours-long gun battle with Kosovo police. Three gunmen were killed.
EU envoy Miroslav Lajcak and his U.S. counterpart Gabriel Escobar, accompanied by top diplomats from Germany, France and Italy, met with Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti in the capital, Pristina, after which they will head to Belgrade.
“If there is no dialogue, there might be a repetition of escalation,” said Mr. Lajcak after meeting with Mr. Kurti.
Mr. Lajcak said they strongly denounced “the terrorist attack against Kosovo police by armed individuals (that) constitutes a clear and unprecedented escalation.”
Myanmar’s junta orders air strikes to recover lost outposts (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
Myanmar’s ruling junta ordered air strikes and troop reinforcements as it tried to recover lost outposts near the Chinese border from rebels.
The toppling of Aung San Suu Kyi’s civilian government in a 2021 coup sparked a huge backlash and the military junta is now battling opponents across the country.
The Kachin Independence Army (KIA) attacked Myanmar military positions around Muse district in northern Shan state on Thursday and near the remote town of Laiza in Kachin state.
The military was forced to retreat on Friday afternoon and ordered air strikes, and artillery and troop reinforcements, the junta said in a statement shortly before Friday. The KIA said Saturday that the military had counter-attacked with air strikes and ground artillery.
It added that the junta had suffered some fatalities in the latest clashes this week but did not provide a death toll. The KIA controls large parts of the Christian-majority Kachin state and has clashed with Myanmar’s military for decades.
Science
Avian influenza viruses undergo major evolutionary changes (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
A recent study published in Nature reveals major changes in the ecology and evolution of highly pathogenic avian H5 influenza viruses, including a shift in global distribution.
The findings suggest that the epicentre of these viruses has extended beyond Asia to new regions including parts of Africa and Europe.
Highly pathogenic avian H5N1 virus activity has intensified globally since 2021, infecting and killing increasing numbers of wild birds and poultry, as well as posing a risk to mammals (including humans).
H5N1 emerged in China in 1996. The scale of H5 outbreaks in wild birds has escalated beyond Asia since 2014, but the origins of recent resurgences and the underlying evolution of these viruses has been unclear.
Dr. Vijaykrishna Dhanasekaran from the University of Hong Kong and others examined the changing origins and trends of highly pathogenic avian H5 outbreaks using epidemiological data collected by the Food and Agricultural Organization and the World Organization for Animal Health between 2005 and 2022, alongside the analysis of more than 10,000 whole viral genomes.
‘All four quakes were in the same fault system’ (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 1, Geography)
In a short span of about a week, a region about 40 km from Herat, Afghanistan was struck by four shallow focus earthquakes of 6.3 magnitude.
The first earthquake of 6.3 magnitude occurred at a depth of 14 km at around 11 am local time on October 7. This was followed by another earthquake of 6.3 magnitude (at 13.5 km depth) about 30 minutes after the first quake.
Two more shallow focus earthquakes of 6.3 magnitude at 9 km and 6.3 km depths struck the region close to Herat on October 11andOctober 15, respectively. All four earthquakes occurred on east-west striking fault planes that dip to either the north or south. The earthquakes occurred within the Eurasia plate in an intracontinental mountain belt.
Aftershocks, by default, have magnitudes less than the main event. However, all the four earthquakes near Herat have the same magnitude.
Because these two earthquakes [on October 7] and the two subsequent earthquakes [on October 11 and October 15] are all approximately the same magnitude, we would call them ‘multiplets’ rather than mainshocks, foreshocks, or aftershocks,” geophysicist Dr. William Bill Barnhart, Assistant Coordinator at the USGS Earthquake Hazards Program told.
On whether the earthquakes had occurred in the same fault, Dr. Barnhart said: “Preliminary, though uncompleted analysis, indicates that all four M6.3 [magnitude] earthquakes occurred along the same fault or fault system.
They did not occur in the exact same spot; rather, they ruptured different portions of the same fault along its length. It is rare for an earthquake to rupture the entire length of the fault that the earthquake occurred on, so it often requires multiple earthquakes, spread out over some unknown amount of time, to fully rupture a geologic fault.”
Possible pathway for Long COVID pathogenesis uncovered (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
Researchers have finally uncovered a multiorgan pathway with important implications for the pathogenesis of Long COVID. Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain the causes of Long COVID.
These include the presence of a viral reservoir long after initial infection; chronic inflammation, development of antibodies that mistakenly target and damage a person’s own tissues or organs; platelet dysfunction and increased tendency to form blood clots inside blood vessels; and finally autonomic nervous system dysfunction in which the nervous system cannot control processes like heart rate or blood pressure.
In addition, people suffering from Long COVID also exhibit reduced levels of peripheral serotonin, which prevents the activity of the vagus nerve system, which transmits signals between the body and the brain, thus impairing hippocampal responses and memory.
A study published recently in the journal Cell, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, who led the study, have found reduced levels of serotonin, a neurotransmitter, being associated with Long COVID.
Memory problems, brain fog, and the inability to focus on tasks that people with Long COVID seem to suffer from might be due to reduced serotonin, the authors say. They followed a cohort of more than 1,500 individuals with Long COVID and characterised their spectrum of symptoms.
FAQ
Why did SC not allow same-sex marriage? (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 2, Social Justice)
On October 17, a five-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court, declined to legalise same-sex marriage, leaving it to Parliament to legislate on the subject.
The Bench ruled that there is no fundamental right to marry, and the court cannot intervene. Though all five judges accepted that it was time to end discrimination against same-sex couples, they failed to reach a consensus on giving queer couples the status of a legally recognised “civil union,” with a majority of three judges holding that any legal status to such a union can only be through enacted law.
The petitioners had sought a ruling by which the Special Marriage Act (SMA), 1954, which provides for a civil marriage for couples who cannot marry under their personal law, should be interpreted as gender-neutral, thus allowing same-sex couples to marry under it.
The SMA, they argued violated Articles 14, 15, 19, 21 and 25 by not allowing marriage between same-sex, gender non-conforming, LBGTQIA+ couples, and sought the words “husband” and “wife” as well as any other gender-specific term to be substituted by the word “party” or “spouse”.
They also sought joint adoption rights, nominee rights with respect to healthcare decisions, “preventative, remedial, protective and punitive measures” by all State governments to guarantee their safety and security, and directions to the Union and State governments, district and police authorities to provide protection to adult, consenting LGBTQIA+ couples from their families.
Will the Sikkim flood impact hydel projects? (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 1, Geography)
During the early hours of October 4, a sudden surge in the Teesta river washed away habitations in Sikkim, the Chungthang Dam, several bridges and parts of National Highway 10, leaving scores of people dead and missing and thousands homeless.
As experts debate the reasons for the collapse, including the failure of automated weather stations, at two high-risk glacial lakes South Lhonak and Shako Cho, the focus is also on the status of other dams and hydel power projects in the State.
Experts point out that the floods in the Teesta river in Sikkim and West Bengal was triggered by a phenomenon called GLOF (Glacial Lake Outburst Flood).
GLOF is a sudden release of water from a lake fed by glacier melt that has formed at the side, in front, within, beneath, or on the surface of a glacier.
In case of the Sikkim floods, satellite images reveal a large chunk of ice may have fallen from the glacier into the lake creating waves that toppled the moraine dam leading to a GLOF and causing severe flash floods downstream in the Teesta.
Anil V. Kulkarni, glaciologist and scientist at the Divecha Centre of Climate Change, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru said the South Lhonak lake is one of the most studied lakes for GLOF.
According to the glaciologist, recent satellite images suggest the risk has not been eliminated despite the floods because the lake has not dewatered or drained substantially.
Most of the lake is still intact; earlier, based on satellite images, experts thought that the lake had dewatered. But later it was found that under ice there is water.
Profiles
A wake-up call (Page no. 13)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
As tension between Moscow and Washington mounts, Russia passed the second and third readings of a Bill to revoke its ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).
Russian President Vladimir Putin had on October 5 urged the Duma, the Lower House of the country’s Parliament, to make the change to “mirror” the position of the U.S., Reuters reported.
The CTBT seeks to ban all nuclear explosions, for both military and peaceful purposes. So far, 187 countries have signed the treaty and 178 have ratified it.
The treaty, however, has not legally come into force; it can only do so when it has been signed and ratified by the 44 countries which are part of the treaty's Annex 2 and had formally participated in the 1996 session of the Conference on Disarmament. These countries possessed nuclear power or research reactors at the time.
Of these, North Korea, India and Pakistan have not signed the CTBT. Five of the 44 countries — China, Egypt, Iran, Israel, and the U.S. — have signed but are yet to ratify the treaty; nine countries have nuclear weapons, while the remaining 35 possess nuclear power and research reactors.
The U.S. conducted the first nuclear test on July 16, 1945, at Alamogordo in New Mexico. Barely a month later, it dropped two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan. The devastation caused by the bombings drew attention to the nuclear armament race.