Why in the News?

• India has received an invitation to join NASA's Moon Base programme, an initiative that could mark a turning point for ISRO and significantly accelerate India's space technology development.

What’s in Today’s Article?

• About Moon Base Programme (Background, Objectives, Artemis Accords, India’s Gains, Rationale, Concerns, Significance, etc.)

About the Moon Base Programme

• The Moon Base programme aims to create a permanent research station on the Moon that can be inhabited by astronauts and robots for prolonged periods.
• The base is to be built in stages over several years and is meant to facilitate lunar research while allowing exploration and exploitation of lunar resources.
• It is expected to be one of the most challenging engineering exercises ever undertaken, requiring several trips to the Moon by both crewed and robotic missions. It could also become the costliest scientific project in history.
• In scale and ambition, the programme can be compared only to the Apollo missions.
• In terms of its long-term impact on humanity and the future of the planet, it may prove far more consequential.

Why NASA Is Seeking Partners?

• NASA is not in a position to execute this programme entirely on its own, nor does it intend to.
• Its budget has been significantly reduced under the current US administration, and most of its hardware production has shifted to the private sector.
• As a result, NASA is actively seeking partners from both the international community and private industry to collaborate on the project.

The Artemis Accords

• Countries that have signed the Artemis Accords have already demonstrated a willingness to participate in such collaboration.
• The Accords now include 70 nations, among them major space-faring countries such as Japan, India, South Korea, and Israel, along with several European nations. India joined as the 27th signatory in 2023.
• The Accords are essentially a set of principles and good practices that countries agree to follow while carrying out space activities.
• However, they are increasingly viewed as a US-led grouping seeking to write its own rules for space exploration and the use of extraterrestrial resources, somewhat bypassing established multilateral arrangements.
• The absence of two major space powers, Russia and China, lends weight to this perception.
• India has traditionally been reluctant to join such groupings, but its early signing of the Artemis Accords made its choice clear.
• While there is no official confirmation yet, ISRO is widely expected to accept the invitation to collaborate on the Moon Base programme.

What India Stands to Gain?

• Joining the programme makes strategic sense for ISRO for several reasons.
• ISRO has its own plans for human spaceflight missions, a space station, and eventually landing humans on the Moon.
• Participating in the Moon Base programme offers the opportunity to gain valuable experience in planning and executing complex missions of this nature, allowing India to leapfrog in technology development.
• ISRO has demonstrated it can execute such missions independently, but doing so would require considerable time and enormous financial resources.
• Space exploration has reached a stage where a ten-year gap in technology development can leave a nation significantly behind. It would also make little economic sense to reinvent capabilities that already exist elsewhere.

The Economic Rationale

• ISRO's current plans are extremely ambitious. They include:
  • An independent human spaceflight programme,
  • A Moon landing programme, and
  • A full-fledged space station.
• While it is important for India to possess these capabilities, sustaining all of them independently raises serious economic questions.
• The Bharat Antariksh Station illustrates this well. While ISRO must have the technology to build such infrastructure, it is unlikely that India will have, within a decade, a scientific ecosystem large enough to require an entire space station for its exclusive use throughout the year.
• It will almost certainly have to function as shared infrastructure, much like the International Space Station does today.
• Similarly, while independent capabilities to send humans into space and land them on the Moon are crucial, maintaining a separate full-fledged lunar exploration programme may not be economically viable.
• The costs are prohibitively high even for the world's largest economy. For India, which is pursuing multiple parallel development goals, allocating resources on that scale would be difficult.

Addressing Concerns About Alignment

• Concerns that India is joining a US-led bloc may be overstated.
• The Artemis Accords are not comparable to a geopolitical or military alliance. Space, at present, is not adversarial.
• If the US lands on the Moon ahead of others, it does not gain control over the area or its resources, nor does it harm the interests of China or Russia, which are pursuing similar objectives through their own partnership.
• The Moon is large enough, and its resources abundant enough, to support the efforts of all parties in the foreseeable future.
• This is why the current global trend of de-globalisation and go-it-alone approaches in critical technologies such as semiconductors, clean energy, and artificial intelligence does not apply to space. There is no domination of supply chains or control over resources in the same way.
• Importantly, signing the Artemis Accords or joining the Moon Base effort does not prevent India from continuing its long-standing space cooperation with Russia.

Caveats for ISRO

• While the opportunity is significant, ISRO must navigate it carefully.
• It needs to ensure that it does not lose sight of its own targets and objectives while collaborating with the US.
• It must also avoid becoming locked into the US technology ecosystem to the point of creating overdependence.
• The Artemis Accords do emphasise the development of interoperable systems.
• However, this is not a major restriction for ISRO, which is only beginning to develop these systems and can build interoperability in from the start.

Significance

• Space cooperation with the US represents a major opportunity for ISRO to fast-track project timelines and reach the frontiers of technology development.
• Such collaboration typically generates substantial spin-off benefits, advances in materials, robotics, life support systems, communications, and computing that can produce cascading dividends across multiple sectors of the economy.
• For a country building its scientific and industrial base, these secondary gains can be as valuable as the primary mission objectives.

Why in news?

Maharashtra's Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued show-cause notices to actors Shah Rukh Khan, Ajay Devgn, and Tiger Shroff, alleging that their advertisement for Vimal Elaichi amounts to surrogate advertising for the banned Vimal Pan Masala brand.

This marks the first instance of the regulator examining surrogate advertising, even as it intensifies its crackdown on tobacco-containing products.

What’s in Today’s Article?

• What Is Surrogate Advertising?
• What the FDA Notices Allege?
• What the Actors Have Been Asked to Do?
• The Legal Framework on Misleading and Surrogate Ads
• Past Regulatory History

What Is Surrogate Advertising?

• Surrogate advertising promotes a product under a different, permitted brand name, logo, or visual style.
• It is used for goods like alcohol, tobacco, and pan masala, which face advertising bans or restrictions.
• The technique keeps the original brand visible in consumers' minds despite the restriction.

What the FDA Notices Allege?

• The FDA claims the Vimal Elaichi ad's presentation, dialogue, product name, and market context raise a "serious question" over whether it indirectly promotes Vimal Pan Masala — a product currently prohibited in Maharashtra.
• Maharashtra has banned gutkha and pan masala containing tobacco or nicotine since 2012 under Section 30(2)(a) of the Food Safety and Standards (FSS) Act, 2006.
  • This prohibition is renewed annually.
• The FDA has invoked:
  • Section 24 of the FSS Act — restricts misleading and deceptive food advertisements.
  • Section 53 of the FSS Act — penalty of up to Rs 10 lakh for anyone "party to the publication" of a misleading advertisement.
  • The Food Safety and Standards (Advertising and Claims) Regulations, 2018.

What the Actors Have Been Asked to Do?

• The FDA has given the actors 15 days to respond with written explanations and has directed them to:
  • Immediately discontinue participation in and endorsement of the ad, and remove it from their social media handles.
  • Submit their endorsement contracts, campaign briefs, product information, and payment details.
  • Disclose details of the due diligence carried out before endorsing the product.
  • Furnish evidence on whether Vimal Elaichi is an independently sold product or a surrogate/brand extension of Vimal Pan Masala.
  • Disclose any material connection with the advertiser or brand owner, as required under the CCPA (Central Consumer Protection authority) Guidelines, 2022.

The Legal Framework on Misleading and Surrogate Ads

• The Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA), established under Section 10 of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019, notified guidelines in 2022 to curb misleading advertisements and endorsements.
• Under Section 2(28) of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019, a "misleading advertisement" includes one that falsely describes a product, gives false guarantees, implies an unfair trade practice, or conceals important information.
• The guidelines define "surrogate advertisement" as one that circumvents a legal prohibition by advertising a permitted product to indirectly promote a prohibited one.
• Penalties under Section 21 of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019:
  • Up to Rs 10 lakh for a first violation, and up to Rs 50 lakh for subsequent violations.
  • The CCPA can bar an endorser from making any endorsements for up to 1 year (first violation) or up to 3 years (subsequent violations).

Past Regulatory History

• In 2018, the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), under the Union Health Ministry, issued show-cause notices to Vishnu Pouch Packaging Pvt Ltd (the brand's promoter) under the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products Act, 2003, alleging indirect tobacco advertising.
• In January 2024, the Delhi High Court dismissed DGHS's appeals, allowing the company to continue advertising its tobacco-free product, while observing that businesses have a "fundamental right to carry on business" involving pan masala without tobacco, so long as it has constitutional sanction.

Conclusion

The Vimal Elaichi case highlights the persistent regulatory challenge of distinguishing genuine product advertising from surrogate promotion of banned substances.

As Maharashtra tightens enforcement against tobacco products, this episode could set an important precedent for celebrity accountability and brand-endorsement due diligence under India's consumer protection framework.

Why in news?

Parliament has passed the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2026, reigniting a long-standing tussle between the Centre and states over the taxation of mineral resources and the revenues they generate.

What’s in Today’s Article?

• What Does the Amendment Change?
• Background: The Supreme Court's 2024 Ruling
• Centre's Rationale
• Need for a Balanced Approach
• Conclusion

What Does the Amendment Change?

• The Bill restricts states from imposing specified levies on mineral rights and mineral-bearing land.
• This comes even as several mineral-rich states had begun exploring such levies following the Supreme Court's landmark 2024 ruling that upheld states' power to tax mineral rights.
• The Bill will also extinguish unpaid or unrecovered dues arising from such levies imposed before it comes into force — estimated at around Rs 2 lakh crore across the mining sector.
• According to the Mines Ministry, around 14 levies currently exist in the mineral sector; these will continue, but their cumulative burden will be capped at a percentage to be decided after consultation with states.

Background: The Supreme Court's 2024 Ruling

• In July 2024, the Supreme Court upheld states' power to levy taxes on mineral rights and mineral-bearing land, overruling the 1989 judgment in India Cement Ltd v. State of Tamil Nadu.
  • The 1989 judgement had held that royalty was a tax falling under the Union List, beyond states' legislative competence.
• The 2024 ruling also waived interest and penalties on pre-judgment tax demands and allowed staggered payment of dues over 12 years from April 1, 2026.
• This opened the door for states to raise additional mining revenue — Jharkhand and Tamil Nadu introduced Mineral-Bearing Land (MBL) taxes, while Karnataka proposed a tax on non-auctioned iron ore mines.
  • Jharkhand's MBL tax on iron ore rose from Rs 100 to Rs 400 per tonne.
  • Tamil Nadu imposed an MBL tax of Rs 160 per tonne on limestone.

Centre's Rationale

• The Centre argues that unchecked state-level levies raise the cost of key minerals, feeding into inflation and infrastructure costs.
• Mining industry experts note that beyond royalty, companies already pay District Mineral Foundation and National Mineral Exploration Trust contributions, along with environmental and pollution cesses — with the MBL tax seen as the largest additional burden.
• Industry voices argue the amendments provide fiscal certainty without causing material revenue loss to states, since many of these levies have been under legal dispute for decades.

States' Opposition and Revenue Concerns

• Jharkhand: CM of Jharkhand has cited potential revenue loss. In a letter to the Prime Minister, he stated mining revenue formed about 84.9% of the state's own non-tax revenue in 2024-25, with the Mineral Bearing Land Cess alone expected to generate around Rs 11,000 crore annually.
• Kerala: The govt has raised concerns over implications for India's federal structure.
• Data on dependence
  • As per the CAG report on state finances, states' own non-tax revenue stood at Rs 3.3 lakh crore in 2024-25, of which 41% (Rs 1.36 lakh crore) came from mineral and petroleum receipts.
  • Nationally, this forms just 3.4% of states' revenue receipts, but the share is far higher for mineral-rich states: 23% for Odisha, 13% for Jharkhand, and 5% for Chhattisgarh.

Need for a Balanced Approach

• Experts caution against framing the issue as a binary choice between competitive mining and state revenues.
• Instead, they recommend the Centre use the new framework to set transparent guardrails through genuine consultation with mineral-producing states, ensuring cost predictability for industry without leaving states fiscally shortchanged.

Conclusion

The Mining Amendment Bill, 2026, revives the classic Centre-state fiscal federalism debate — balancing industry's need for tax certainty against resource-rich states' dependence on mineral revenue for welfare and development.

Its success will hinge on transparent, consultative implementation rather than a one-sided assertion of central authority.

About Loggerhead Sea Turtle:

• It is a species of oceanic turtle belonging to the family Cheloniidae.
• Scientific Name: Caretta caretta
• It is the world’s largest hard-shelled turtle, slightly larger at average and maximum mature weights than the green sea turtle and the Galapagos tortoise.
• It is also the world’s second largest extant turtle after the leatherback sea turtle.
• Habitat and Distribution:
  • Loggerheads live in oceans all over the world, except in the coldest seas.
  • The majority of loggerhead nesting occurs in the western rims of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans, primarily in Oman, the United States, and Australia.
  • They may be found hundreds of miles out to sea, as well as in inshore areas such as bays, lagoons, salt marshes, and creeks.
• Features:
  • Loggerheads are named for their relatively large heads, which support powerful jaws and enable them to feed on hard-shelled prey, such as whelks and conchs.
  • They have a large, reddish-brown, hard shell; a pale yellow underbelly (or ‘plastron’); and four flippers with two (or sometimes three) claws on each.
  • Adult males are distinguished by long tails that extend beyond the rear carapace and a narrowing of the carapace that tapers towards the rear.
  • They use the geomagnetic field as a map when navigating large distances.
  • Lifespan: Loggerheads can live up to 80 years or more.
• Conservation Status:
  • IUCN Red List: Vulnerable.

About Friedreich ataxia (FA):

• It is a rare, inherited disorder that causes progressive damage to the nervous system.
• The damage affects your spinal cord and the nerves that control muscle movement in your arms and legs.
• Cause:
  • It is caused when a gene called FXN becomes mutated.
  • The FXN gene codes for a protein called frataxin. Frataxin is essential for mitochondria, which are our cells’ powerhouses.
  • The chemical ATP, which is the cell’s energy currency, is made mostly in the mitochondria.
  • Nerve, spinal cord, brain, and heart muscle cells use a lot of energy.
  • When their frataxin levels become abnormally low, the mitochondria produce ATP less effectively and also accumulate toxic by-products.
  • This renders the cell dysfunctional, leading to the symptoms of FA.
  • Individuals who inherit two defective copies of the FXN gene, one from each parent, will develop the disease.
  • A person who inherits only one abnormal copy of the gene is called a carrier.
  • Most of the affected individuals come from consanguineous marriages. That is, marriages between relatives, such as uncles and nieces, or between cousins.
• Treatment:
  • There is currently no cure for FA.
  • Treatment focuses on easing symptoms and maintaining comfort and function for as long as possible.

About Mount Elbrus:

• Located in Southern Russia, Mount Elbrus is the highest peak of the Caucasus Mountains.
• Mount Elbrus is the world’s 10^th most prominent peak as well as the highest mountain peak in both the European continent and Russia.
• It is one of the Seven Summits of the world, which are the tallest mountains on each of the seven continents.
• Mount Elbrus is an inactive volcano that consists of two principal summits, both of which are dormant volcanic domes. It is also Eurasia’s highest stratovolcano.
• Formation:
  • It is believed that the Caucasus Mountains were formed due to the northward collision of the Arabian Plate with the Eurasian Plate.
• Major Glaciers: Bolshoi Azaou and Irik Glacier.
• Many Russian rivers like the Baksan, Malka, and Kuban rivers originate from these glaciers.

About Mahadayi River:

• The Mahadayi River, also known as the Mandovi or Mhadei River, is a rain-fed river shared between Karnataka and Goa.
• Course:
  • It originates from the Bhimgad Forest in the Western Ghats, located in the Belagavi district of Karnataka.
  • It flows westward to join the Arabian Sea at Panaji, Goa.
• Panaji, the state capital, and the town of Old Goa are situated on the left bank of the Mandovi River.
  • Near the town of Old Goa, there are three large freshwater islands, Divar, Chorao, and Vashee, in the Mandovi River. The island of Chorao houses Salim Ali Bird Sanctuary.
• It has several tributaries, namely Rogaro, Kushavati, Nanorem, Nanuz, Valvota, and Mapusa.
• The river is central to a decades-long dispute between Karnataka and Goa, primarily over Karnataka’s plans to divert water from the Kalasa and Bhandura tributaries to the Malaprabha basin for drinking water needs.
• The Mahadayi Water Disputes Tribunal (MWDT) in 2018 allocated 13.42 tmc (380 Mcum) of water to Karnataka, including permissions for limited diversion from the Kalasa (1.72 tmc) and Bhandura (2.18 tmc) streams.

About New Development Bank (NDB):

• The New Development Bank (NDB), formerly known as the BRICS Development Bank, is a multilateral development bank established by Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (BRICS).
• Objective: NDB aims to mobilize resources for infrastructure and sustainable development projects in BRICS countries and other emerging economies and developing countries.
• The agreement for establishing the NDB was signed during the BRICS Summit held in Fortaleza, Brazil, on July 15, 2014.
• The bank became operational in 2015 and is headquartered in Shanghai, China, with a regional office in Johannesburg and additional offices later opened in São Paulo and Moscow.
• Membership in NDB is open to any member of the United Nations.
• NDB’s key areas of operation include clean energy and energy efficiency; transport infrastructure; water and sanitation; environmental protection; social infrastructure; and digital infrastructure.
• Capital: Its founding capital was set at USD 100 billion, with initial subscribed capital of USD 50 billion divided equally among the five founding members.
• Governance Structure:
  • The bank is governed by a Board of Governors made up of the finance ministers of the five BRICS countries, and a Board of Directors.
  • Both the presidency and vice-presidency of the NDB are rotated among BRICS founding members.
  • Unlike in the case of the World Bank or Asian Development Bank (ADB), each member in the NDB has an equal voting power.

About Earthquake Swarm:

• Occurrence: It occurs when multiple seismic events of comparable intensity strike a small area in relatively quick succession.
• Intensity: It involves a series of many (sometimes thousands) low-intensity earthquakes without a discernible main shock that can occur over weeks in active geothermal areas.
• When seismic energy piles up inside the Earth and is released in small amounts from certain points, such a series of earthquakes can occur.

What Causes Swarm Sequences?

• Fluid movement:
  • In volcanic environments, this can be fluid released from deeper magma or circulating within active geothermal areas (in volcanic areas such as the Taupō Volcanic Zone).
  • The earthquakes triggered by fluids occur as fault slip on the cracks and faults through which the water is moving.
• Active volcanism:
  • Magma movement can also act as the ‘driving mechanism’ for swarms, creating the earthquakes as magma-filled cracks push their way through the Earth’s crust.
  • In such a case the earthquakes commonly occur near the crack tip (ahead of the magma where the crack is starting to open), or off to the side of the crack.
• Slow-slip events:
  • A slow-slip event is essentially an earthquake in slow-motion, and typically involves centimetres to tens of centimetres of movement along a fault, over weeks to years.
  • It is seen at the Hikurangi subduction zone, usually at least one or two per year.

About Hara Mangrove Forest:

• Location: The Hara forests are a vital ecological treasure of the Persian Gulf, spanning the Strait of Hormuz.
• These mangrove forests consist mainly of grey mangrove trees (Avicennia marina).
• They have a special filtration system in their roots that allows them to thrive in saline conditions.
• The forests are designated as a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve.
• Ecological Role:
  • The same roots also protect the coast against erosion and are voluminous carbon sinks, sequestering significantly more carbon than terrestrial forests.
  • They serve as an important nursery for marine life as they shelter shrimp, crabs, and numerous fish species that sustain the region’s fisheries.
  • The Hara forests’ canopy is also a major migratory hub for birds like the great stone-curlew and various herons.
  • The mangroves are the backbone of the sustainable tourism programmes of Qeshm, an Iranian island in the Persian Gulf, and draw visitors to their labyrinthine waterways.