Current affairs — 3 October 2026

The Tribunals Reforms Act, 2026 (introduced and passed in the Lok Sabha on 10 August 2026, passed by the Rajya Sabha on 11 August 2026, assent on 13 August 2026) repeals the Tribunals Reforms Act, 2021 and creates a statutory National Tribunals Commission (NTC) to run appointments to, and review the performance of, 16 tribunals. The Centre published the operational NTC Rules, 2026 on 1 October 2026, so the new architecture is moving from statute to working machinery. The law is Parliament's response to the Supreme Court's 19 November 2025 judgment in Madras Bar Association v. Union of India, which struck down core provisions of the 2021 Act and ordered an NTC within four months.

Gujarat became the second State after Uttarakhand to enact a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) when President Droupadi Murmu gave assent on 17 September 2026 to the Gujarat Uniform Civil Code, 2026, which the Assembly had passed on 24 March 2026. The law was published in an extraordinary Gazette on 1 October 2026; it will come into force on a date to be notified by the State Government. It governs marriage, divorce, succession and live-in relationships, excludes Scheduled Tribes, and needed Presidential assent because it touches subjects on the Concurrent List.

US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said on 1-2 October 2026, after meeting Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on the sidelines of the G20 trade ministers' meeting in Milwaukee, that the India-US trade deal is 'in the short strokes' and 'towards the end' but 'I don't think there's something imminent'. He said both sides had identified the 'universe of items that are sticking points' and that Narendra Modi and Donald Trump, who spoke by phone a day earlier, may speak again soon. The talks now run under a changed US legal toolkit: the 10% duty India pays is a Section 301 duty, and a new US law lets the President tariff India for buying Russian energy.

The tripartite Suspension of Operations (SoO) agreement between the Centre, the Manipur government and the Kuki-Zo militant umbrella groups KNO and UPF lapsed on 4 September 2026, one year after its revised version was signed, and is now reported to be 'in abeyance' until weapons are surrendered. The Centre has since sent 30 additional CRPF companies and 2 CoBRA battalions to Manipur as Naga-Kuki clashes in Ukhrul, Kangpokpi and Kamjong continue, and Union Home Minister Amit Shah is expected in Senapati on 7 October. On 1 October the state Cabinet under Chief Minister Y. Khemchand Singh approved Rs 10 lakh each for kin of 49 missing persons.

On 2 October 2026 the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) announced that the Centre, in consultation with the Union Territory of Ladakh, has identified 28 places and geographical features in Ladakh whose names are to be standardised on the official Survey of India (SoI) map of the UT. The list covers 10 peaks, 7 land areas, 3 mountains, 2 glaciers, 2 passes, a valley, a river, a lake and a hot-spring water body, including the sensitive Gogra area. It follows the August 2026 standardisation of 27 places in Arunachal Pradesh and comes against China's repeated renaming of places in that State.

The Union Cabinet approved the revamped GOBARdhan (Galvanizing Organic Bio-Agro Resources Dhan), now titled the National Circular Bioenergy Scheme, on 6 August 2026 with an outlay of Rs 23,731 crore for FY 2026-27 to FY 2035-36, to be run by the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG). Petroleum Minister Hardeep Singh Puri formally launched it on 1 October 2026. The scheme aims to raise domestic compressed biogas (CBG) production nearly ten-fold by guaranteeing demand, price and capital support.

India's foreign exchange reserves fell by US$18.343 billion to US$747.557 billion in the week ended 25 September 2026, according to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) weekly statistical supplement released on 2 October 2026; Bloomberg-based reports flagged it as a record weekly decline. Reserves are now US$38.15 billion below the all-time high of US$785.706 billion (week ended 4 September 2026), which had been inflated by the RBI's concessional FCNR(B) swap window. The unwinding comes as the RBI sells dollars to defend a rupee pressured by crude oil and rising US yields, and as the central bank's short forward book swells to a record.

On 2 October 2026 the G7, under the French presidency of Emmanuel Macron, announced a coordinated release of 100 million barrels of diesel and other emergency petroleum stocks through the International Energy Agency (IEA), spread over four months with a substantial diesel release front-loaded within the first 20 days. Members also pledged not to impose energy export restrictions on one another and urged producers to do likewise. The move follows a record IEA release of 400 million barrels in March 2026 and seeks to ease diesel prices that rose after the Iran war disrupted the Strait of Hormuz.

On 2 October 2026, during Wildlife Week, a three-year-old tigress, T138, captured in Valmiki Tiger Reserve (Bihar), was released into Buxa Tiger Reserve in Alipurduar district, West Bengal, in the presence of Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav and West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari. It is the first tiger brought in under the Tiger Augmentation and Recovery Project run by the State with the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the Wildlife Institute of India (WII), and it marks an attempt to rebuild a breeding tiger population in a reserve that had no stable resident tigers for years.

At the G20 Trade Ministers' Meeting in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, hosted by the United States under its 2026 G20 presidency, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said India has no structural excess capacity in the sectors identified by the G20, called India's commitment to eliminating forced labour "absolute and unconditional", and defended the Most-Favoured-Nation (MFN) principle and WTO-consistent trade remedies. The interventions came days after the US applied a 10% additional duty on India under a Section 301 forced-labour action, and weeks after India amended its Foreign Trade Policy to bar imports made with forced labour.

Maharashtra declared drought in 265 of its 358 talukas by a Government Resolution issued on 25-26 September 2026, after a weak monsoon and an emerging El Niño; Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis described it as the worst drought since 1972. In the same week the state began issuing Woman Farmer Certificates (from 2 October 2026, Gandhi Jayanti) under the Maharashtra Women Farmers Empowerment Act, 2026, the first state law that recognises a woman as a farmer without a land title. The two developments together raise one question: who counts as a farmer when relief, credit and compensation are paid out in a drought year?

The Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court (Justices Rajan Roy and Manjive Shukla) has registered a suo motu public interest litigation on noise pollution and compliance with statutory provisions, in an order reported on 1 October 2026. The trigger was the death of a Class II girl at Divine Public School, Balrampur, who collapsed on 22 September 2026 while a procession with loudspeakers and a DJ sound system passed nearby; the Court expressly drew no conclusion on the cause of death. The matter will next be heard on 12 October 2026.

Researchers at the CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad, working with clinicians of the Government Medical College and Hospital, Nagpur, have developed two India-specific clinical severity scores for sickle cell anaemia (SCA), ISS1 and ISS2, because the Western-derived Pediatric Severity Score (PSS) classified Indian children poorly. In a cohort of 171 patients aged 0-18 years, ISS1 and ISS2 matched expert paediatricians' grading in 82.75% and 85.10% of cases against 66.67% for PSS. The work, led by Suraj S. Nongmaithem and Giriraj R. Chandak, is a preprint posted on medRxiv on 9 October 2025 and had not been peer-reviewed or published in a journal when last checked; it was reported on 3 October 2026 in the context of the National Sickle Cell Anaemia Elimination Mission.

As of 2 October 2026, not a drop of the 3 tmcft of Krishna water that Karnataka agreed in principle to release to Telangana had flowed from the Almatti or Narayanpur reservoirs, as farmer groups in Karnataka's Krishna basin protested against the release.

On 2 October 2026, Deputy CM Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka said infrastructure works worth ₹52,000 crore are under way in Hyderabad, including ₹35,000 crore of roads, flyovers and bridges within HMDA limits.

On 2 October 2026, the Telangana government issued a GO revising autorickshaw fares: a minimum of ₹30 for the first 1.6 km and ₹14 for every further kilometre.

The RBI's borrowing calendar for October–December 2026, released on 2 October, shows Telangana raising ₹13,000 crore through State Development Loans (SDLs): ₹4,500 crore in October, ₹4,500 crore in November and ₹4,000 crore in December.

A report by S&P Global, released on 2 October 2026, found Telangana offers the most attractive data-centre policy package in India, backed by strong electricity and regulatory incentives.

On 2 October 2026, CM A. Revanth Reddy announced that all central kitchens for the breakfast scheme in government schools will be inaugurated together on 9 December; works must be completed by 30 November.

On 2 October 2026 (Gandhi Jayanti), special Gram Sabhas were held in every gram panchayat in Telangana to prepare Gram Panchayat Development Plans (GPDPs).

The Telangana Standards Authority for Food and Essential Drugs (TG-SAFE) is planning an exclusive police station to handle arrests and criminal cases in serious food and drug safety offences — which could be the first of its kind in India.

The Telangana fire department has raised the height above which new residential apartments need a provisional Fire NOC from 18 m (usually G+5) to 24 m (usually G+7), with effect from 7 October 2026.

As of 2 October 2026, the Nizamsagar project stood at 1,400.32 ft against its full level of 1,405 ft, with 11.701 tmc of its 17.802 tmc capacity, releasing about 2,000 cusecs into the main canal.

A Ground Water Department report released on 2 October 2026 shows Ranga Reddy district's average groundwater level in September at 11.74 m below ground, against 6.31 m a year earlier, across 84 observation wells.

On 2 October 2026, scientists announced two new gecko species from Telangana, described in the European Journal of Taxonomy, raising the number of reptile species endemic to the State to six.

On 2 October 2026, the Department of Heritage Telangana and the Deccan Heritage Academy Trust met Narayanpet Collector Ch. Priyanka on plans to protect and promote the Mudumal megalithic site; the Collector assured support.

A four-day workshop (2–5 October 2026) to standardise a Gondi–Koya dictionary opened at Bhadrachalam, Bhadradri Kothagudem district, with about 120 participants from eight States.

On 2 October 2026, Governor Shiv Pratap Shukla and CM A. Revanth Reddy paid tributes at Bapu Ghat and reopened the renovated Gandhi Digital Museum, closed since Covid.

On 2 October 2026, Agriculture Minister Tummala Nageswara Rao, with Minister D. Sridhar Babu, inaugurated the Vijaya Mega Oil Packing Station of TGOILFED at Shivarampally, Rajendranagar.

On 2 October 2026, Transport Minister Ponnam Prabhakar said recruitment to 4,538 posts in TGSRTC would be completed soon, and that free bus passes for senior citizens are being considered.

The GST Appellate Tribunal (GSTAT) has introduced an online mechanism for taxpayers to seek transfer of appeals involving an identical question of law pending before different benches, as reported on 3 October 2026.