May 18, 2026
34 articles published on this date
Can India’s waste solve its energy crisis? Diving into bioenergy technologies
India's growing energy security concerns have intensified focus on bioenergy technologies that convert agricultural residue, food waste, sewage sludge, and o...
The warning signs in India’s import bill
India's total imports in FY26 stood at approximately $775 billion, with crude oil alone costing over $134 billion — the single largest import item. Gold impo...
Citizenship rule tweak for Bangladesh, Pakistan, Afghanistan applicants
The Ministry of Home Affairs notified amendments to the Citizenship Rules, 2009 through the Citizenship (Amendment) Rules, 2026, introducing new procedural r...
Bail under UAPA: How different Supreme Court benches have delivered different rulings in the past
A Supreme Court bench of Justices B.V. Nagarathna and Ujjal Bhuyan, while granting bail to a Jammu & Kashmir accused in a narco-terror funding case (*Syed If...
Unlearnt lessons: On India’s inadequate strategic petroleum and gas reserves
With the West Asia crisis disrupting Strait of Hormuz transit and pushing global crude prices higher, India's inadequate strategic petroleum and gas reserves...
Inquiry committee probing allegations against Justice Varma submits report to Speaker
The Judges Inquiry Committee investigating Justice Yashwant Varma submitted its statutory report to Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla on May 18, 2026, following a p...
Politicial decision must on cut-off for mid-term polls under the simultaneous election system: Joint Parliamentary Committee chairman
The Chairman of the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) examining the Constitution (129th Amendment) Bill, 2024 stated on May 16, 2026 that the political dec...
Free trade pact by year-end: EU Chief
The India-EU Free Trade Agreement, whose negotiations concluded on 27 January 2026, is targeted for formal signing by the end of 2026, with an operationalisa...
Cash recovery row: Inquiry committee submits report on Justice Yashwant Varma to LS speaker
The three-member Judges Inquiry Committee, constituted under the Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968, submitted its report on Justice Yashwant Varma to Lok Sabha Spea...
PM Modi visits Dutch water management project Afsluitdijk as India, Netherlands sign Kalpasar pact
India's Ministry of Jal Shakti and the Netherlands' Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management signed a Letter of Intent on May 17, 2026, for technical ...
Leaked NEET Chemistry question bank found at arrested Maharashtra teacher’s home
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested a coaching institute owner from Latur, Maharashtra — Shivraj Raghunath Motegaonkar of RCC Coaching Institu...
‘I proudly declare — India is now Naxal-free’: Amit Shah in Bastar on first visit after his March 31 deadline
The Union Home Ministry declared India free of Left Wing Extremism (LWE) following the successful conclusion of Operation Kagar, a large-scale anti-insurgenc...
India, Norway elevate ties to Green Strategic Partnership, ink pacts on space, health, digital development
India and Norway elevated their bilateral relationship to a "Green Strategic Partnership" on May 18, 2026, during a state visit to Oslo. A Memorandum of Unde...
Experts Explain | India’s federalism challenges, and how consensus building is the way forward
Experts have examined the structural tensions in India's federal arrangement, focusing on the gap between formal devolution percentages and effective transfe...
Fertiliser subsidy bill for FY27 may rise by ₹70,000 crore on West Asia crisis: Official
The Department of Fertilisers has indicated that India's fertiliser subsidy bill for FY 2026-27 may rise by approximately ₹70,000 crore — a roughly 20% incre...
Iran-Israel war LIVE: Iran officially announces new body to manage Strait of Hormuz
Iran's Supreme National Security Council announced the establishment of the Persian Gulf Strait Authority (PGSA), a formal regulatory body to manage transit ...
India-EU FTA to create new opportunities for industries, investors, innovators: Modi
India and the European Union formally concluded negotiations on a landmark Free Trade Agreement in January 2026, described by both sides as the largest trade...
Iran officially announces new body to manage Strait of Hormuz
Iran's Supreme National Security Council officially announced the creation of the Persian Gulf Strait Authority (PGSA), a dedicated regulatory body to govern...
Deeply concerned: India on drone strike near UAE's Barakah nuclear plant
India's Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) issued a strong statement expressing deep concern over a drone attack targeting the Barakah Nuclear Energy Plant i...
Indian scientists create world’s first AI-designed gene editor for crops
Indian scientists have developed and validated a suite of plant genome-editing tools based on OpenCRISPR-1 (OC1), an AI-generated RNA-guided nuclease — marki...
Why Agroforestry is key to India’s twin goals of carbon reduction and farmer income growth
Agroforestry — the deliberate integration of trees and shrubs into crop and livestock systems — is gaining renewed policy attention as a tool to simultaneous...
Govt imposes ₹3 per litre duty on petrol exports, cuts levies on diesel and ATF
Effective 16 May 2026, the government imposed a Special Additional Excise Duty (SAED) of Rs 3 per litre on exports of petrol — the first such levy on petrol ...
Australia orders China-linked investors to sell stakes in rare earths firm
Australia's government directed six investors with ties to China and Hong Kong to divest their combined holdings in Northern Minerals Ltd., a rare earths min...
China committed to not providing material support to Iran: U.S. trade representative Jamieson Greer
US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer publicly confirmed that China has committed not to provide "material support" to Iran, a pledge secured during the hig...
U.S. Treasury to extend sanction waiver on Russian seaborne oil, source says
The US Treasury Department is considering a 30-day extension of the sanction waiver that previously allowed countries to purchase Russian seaborne oil, accor...
Why has the WHO declared a PHEIC over the Ebola outbreak in Africa ?
On 16 May 2026, the World Health Organization declared the Ebola Disease Virus epidemic in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Uganda a Public Hea...
Revisiting India’s entry onto the nuclear stage
May 18, 1974 marked the 52nd anniversary of India's first nuclear test — codenamed Operation Smiling Buddha — conducted at the Pokhran Test Range in Rajastha...
Bail is the rule is not an empty slogan, even in UAPA and ‘terror’ cases: Supreme Court
A Supreme Court bench of Justices Ujjal Bhuyan and B.V. Nagarathna granted bail to a Jammu and Kashmir national accused in a narco-terror case investigated b...
India to keep buying Russian oil regardless of US sanctions waivers, says official
A senior official from India's Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas stated that India will continue purchasing Russian crude oil irrespective of whether US ...
Current account deficit to widen to 2.3 per cent of GDP in FY27 from 0.9 pc in FY26: Report
India's current account deficit (CAD) is projected to widen to approximately 2.3% of GDP in FY27, up sharply from an estimated 0.9% of GDP in FY26, according...
India's fertiliser subsidy bill for FY27 may rise by Rs 70,000 cr on West Asia crisis, official says
The fertiliser subsidy bill for FY27 is projected to rise by approximately Rs 70,000 crore—or about 20%—over the budgeted estimate of Rs 1.71 lakh crore, dri...
JPC open to changes in ‘One Nation, One Election’ Bill, says panel chief
The chairperson of the Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) examining the Constitution (One Hundred and Twenty-Ninth Amendment) Bill, 2024 stated that the com...
Parliamentry panel summons NTA chief after NEET paper leak; reform in focus
The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education, Women, Children, Youth and Sports summoned the Chairperson of the National Testing Agency (NTA) and the Se...
Suvendu govt ends religion-based schemes in Bengal, scraps state OBC list
The West Bengal state government has decided to discontinue all welfare schemes introduced by the previous administration that were based on religious catego...