International Mount Everest Day
- Every year the International Mount Everest Day is celebrated on May 29.
- The theme for the Everest Summiteers Summit held in celebration of International Everest Day is “Uniting Voices for the Future of the Himalaya”.
Thirukkural (No. 428)
Fear is ignorance;
fear is the profession of the wise.
- Meaning: Not to fear what is worthy of fear is ignorance; to fear what is worthy of fear is the profession of the wise.
- Chapter: Possession of knowledge
Transgender Persons Protection of Rights (Amendment) Act 2026
- It restricts legal gender recognition by shifting away from self-identification to mandatory medical certification and introduces strict penal provisions to prevent forced gender conversions or coerced identities.
Key Provisions & Amendments
- Shift from Self-Perceived Identity: The 2026 Act removes the right to self-identification.
- Narrowed Legal Definition:It limits the definition of transgender persons to specific socio-cultural identities and intersex variations.
- New Criminal Offenses:
- To stop the coercion of individuals into adopting transgender identities ,the act introduces new criminal categories.
- Kidnapping an adult to force a transgender identity is punishable by 10 years to life in prison
Hydrogen-powered train
- Indian Railways is set to introduce the country’s first indigenous hydrogen fuel cell-based train on the Jind-Sonipat section of Northern Railway in Haryana.
- Hydrogen fuel cell technology produces electricity through a chemical reaction using hydrogen, with water vapor being the only emission, making it a clean alternative to fossil fuel based railway traction systems.
Sample Registration System (SRS) Statistical Re-port 2024.
- Nationally, 2.1% of women who got married in 2024 were below 18 years of age, while 24.5% married be-tween 18 and 20 years.
- Nearly three-fourths – 73.5% married at 21 years or above.
- Overall, more than one in -four women in India still got married before the age of 21 in 2024, the report showed.
- Bengal recorded the country’s highest proportion of girls marrying before 18 years at 6.3%, followed by Jharkhand at 4.9%.
- Chhattisgarh was also identified among states where a consid-erable proportion of girls (2.9%) continue to marry before adulthood.
