In Focus by The Hindu

This month, there’s been a lot of excitement in the medical world over the approval given to treatments for diseases that based on genome editing. What’s this all about? In 2020, the Nobel Prize for Chemistry was given to two women scientists, Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna for their discovery of what is essentially a genetic scissors, a tool that allows scientists to cut specific site...

This has been a question that has triggered a lot of research, a lot of debate and a lot of questions. A recent meta-analysis of 34 studies looked at excessive screen use and its links to your cognitive functioning. The results of the analysis, conducted by researchers in Australia, says that there is a clear link between disordered screen behaviour – or persisting with screen use even when it’s h...

As Israel continues its indiscriminate bombardment of Gaza, causing thousands of civilian deaths, it has continued to enjoy unconditional military and political backing from the United States. Last week, as the US vetoed yet another resolution at the UN calling for a ceasefire, it found itself almost completely isolated on the world stage. A few days ago, President Joe Biden said that Israel risks...

In August this year, the Union government introduced three Bills to overhaul the country’s criminal justice system. The were – the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023 to replace the Indian Penal Code, 1860; Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023 to replace the Criminal Procedure Code, 1973; and the Bharatiya Sakshya Bill, 2023 to replace the Indian Evidence Act, 1872. Last week, the gover...

A five-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court has upheld the abrogation of Article 370 and the subsequent reorganisation of the state of Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories. While the judgement has been hailed as a historic one, it has also raised concerns regarding the federal system, which is understood to be part of the basic structure of the Constitution. So, what exactly was t...

This year’s edition of the United Nations climate summit, COP-28, concluded in Dubai earlier this week. It began with a lot of expectations – especially on the key issue of phasing out fossil fuels. In the end, a deal seems to have been worked out – to transition away from fossil fuels. What exactly does the ‘Dubai Consensus’ entail? What are the other major takeaways from the summit? What progres...

Argentina’s president-elect Javier Milei, a self-described ‘anarcho-capitalist’, has threatened to disband his country’s currency, the peso, and adopt the US dollar in its place. Argentina has been grappling with hyperinflation for a long time – it was above in November 2023. Milei has argued that dollarisation of the Argentine economy will bring inflation down, and usher in a stable climate favou...

Reports of a spike in respiratory illnesses in China have recently caused some amount of panic. Perhaps this is not surprising considering that next month will mark four years since the Covid-19 pandemic broke out and changed the world as we knew it. The current surge of illnesses however, have been reported primarily among children.  On November 22, the World Health Organisation requested informa...

The BJP has won the elections in three of the four states whose results were declared on Sunday. It has won in Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh, while the Congress bagged Telengana. In Mizoram, the Zoram People’s Movement is headed for a majority. The BJP has stamped its dominance in the Hindi heartland. The results, however, seem to have taken many by surprise – especially the margins o...

A politician known as the ‘Dutch Donald Trump’ has won the general elections in the Netherlands. Geert Wilders, the leader of the far-right Party for Freedom, or PVV as it is known, is a frontrunner to be the next Dutch Prime Minister after his party won 37 seats, ahead of the outgoing PM Mark Rutte’s VVD, which got only 24. Wilders is both anti-Islam and anti-immigration. He is also anti-EU and i...

The 28th UN climate conference, or COP28, is starting today in Dubai, and will go on till December 12th. Delegates from almost 200 countries, as well as climate scientists, business leaders, and other stakeholders will take part in the meeting. It is clear the world is not on course to meet the target set in the Paris Agreement – which is to keep the global rise in temperatures within the 1.5-degr...

After winning ten matches on the trot, India could not win one more and bring home the World Cup. It started the final as favourites, but things did not go according to the expectations that fans had built up over one month of pure magic. So, what went wrong for India? Was the match lost with the toss itself? Was Australia too good on the day? Or did India make mistakes? If it did, what were they,...

Most of us would remember the sudden shortage of semiconductor chips during the pandemic – how it affected automobile manufacturing, delaying deliveries, and in many cases, even caused manufacturers to deliver cars without some features. But semiconductors form an integral component of not just cars but almost any high tech device we use today – from smartphones and laptops to televisions, satelli...

The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) released a set of guidelines last month for the Central and State governments to tackle the problem of Child Sexual Abuse Material or CSAM on the internet. Over the past few years, there has been a colossal increase in the availability of CSAM online. In its 2023 report, WeProtect Global Alliance, which consists of governments, companies and charities wo...

As we keep hearing everyday, artificial Intelligence is on the verge of fundamentally changing the way human beings live and work. There are also many fears about the dangers posed by AI – which range from mass disinformation and privacy risks, to extinction of the human race itself. Amid this debate over how to regulate AI so that we are able to benefit from it while keeping it safe, governments...

Just about a month ago, Rescurity, an American cyber security firm, said that personal information of 815 million Indians was being sold on the dark web. This included details such as Aadhar numbers and passport details. The persons selling this information claimed that it was from the Indian Council of Medical Research or ICMR, the country’s premier scientific research body. This is not the first...

Can breathing in polluted air, day after day, increase your risk of diabetes? A study conducted in India and published in the BMJ Open Diabetes Research and Care journal last month, says, yes. Researchers studied over 12,000 adults in Chennai and in Delhi over a period of seven years from 2010 to 2017. Their blood sugar levels were measured periodically. A satellite-based hybrid exposure model was...

A court in Qatar has handed death sentences to eight Indian citizens, all of them former personnel of the Indian navy. The ex-navymen were convicted on espionage charges. India has termed the sentencing ‘deeply shocking’ and has said it is exploring all legal options. The Indians were all employees of a defunct company, Doha-based Dahra Global, and had been arrested in August 2022. How did these I...

This year’s Nobel Prize in Economics was awarded to Prof Claudia Goldin for having advanced our understanding of women’s labour market outcomes. Prof Goldin’s work has looked at women’s participation in the labour force, changes across decades and the gender gap in earnings that continues to exist even today. In fact, the 2023 Global Gender Gap report pegged the gap score at 68.4%, and said it wou...

Maldives has elected a new President, Mohamed Muizzu from the Progressive Party of Maldives. In the elections that concluded in September, he defeated the incumbent, Ibrahim Mohamed Solih of the Maldivian Democratic Party. The elections were also viewed by many as a referendum on the country’s foreign policy. While Solih was perceived as pro-India, Muizzu is seen as pro-China. One of the main elec...

Five states go to the polls this month – Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana, and Mizoram. Political analysts have taken to describing them as the ‘semi-finals’ before the finals, the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Part of the reason for this characterisation is that in three of the states – Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh – the elections will see a direct face-off between the...

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said earlier this month that India will leave no stone unturned in its bid to host the 2036 Olympics. While India has hosted major multi-nation, multi-discipline sports events --- the Commonwealth Games of 2010 and the Asian Games of 1982 come to mind – the Olympics is of an altogether different order of magnitude. Several questions pop up as India aspires to host the...

Earlier this month, a married woman, who was 26 weeks pregnant, approached the Supreme Court, asking to be allowed to terminate her pregnancy. This was the woman’s third pregnancy, and she told the Court that she did not want to have the baby. She also said she was suffering from post-partum depression and other health issues. She did not know of her pregnancy until quite late, as she was breastfe...

In Part 1 of this series, we looked at the origins of this conflict, which began with the steady influx of Jewish settlers in Palestinian territories and culminated in the founding of the state of Israel in 1948. In the second part, we explored the key developments of the conflict from 1948 to the present – the wars that took place in 1948, 1956, 1962, 1982, the First Intifada, the Second Intifada...

In the first part of this series, we looked at the origins of this conflict, which began with the steady influx of Jewish settlers in Palestinian territories and culminated in the founding of the state of Israel in 1948. In this episode, we explore key developments from 1948 to the present – the wars that took place in 1948, 1956, 1967, 1973, the Camp David agreement, the First Intifada, the Oslo...