25 December 2025

• Indian Space Research Organisation successfully launched the BlueBird Block-2 communication satellite using LVM3 (Gaganyaan-class heavy-lift launcher).
• Launch conducted from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, marking the first dedicated commercial launch by LVM3 for a U.S. customer.
• Satellite developed by AST SpaceMobile to provide direct-to-mobile space-based broadband.
• Mission achieved two milestones: largest commercial communications satellite in LEO and heaviest payload (6,100 kg) launched by LVM3 from Indian soil.
• Demonstrated high orbital injection precision (<2 km error), underscoring launch vehicle reliability.
• The mission is part of a global LEO constellation enabling 4G/5G connectivity directly to standard smartphones.

Key Points

• Launcher: LVM3 (also called Bahubali), India’s heavy-lift launch vehicle.
• Orbit: Low Earth Orbit (LEO), suitable for low latency communication services.
• Satellite Specs: ~6,100 kg; 223 m² phased-array antenna—largest of its kind in commercial LEO satellites.
• Mission Count: 104th launch from Sriharikota; 9th successful LVM3 mission.
• Commercial Significance: Expands India’s footprint in global launch services market.
• Strategic Value: Reinforces readiness for human spaceflight (Gaganyaan) and complex missions.

Static Linkages

• Space Technology: Advantages of LEO—low latency, higher bandwidth potential (NCERT Geography/Science basics).
• Public Sector & Strategic Sectors: Role of state-led R&D institutions in technology diffusion (Economic Survey).
• Atmanirbhar Bharat: Indigenous launch capability reducing dependence on foreign heavy-lift providers.
• Science & Innovation Ecosystem: Technology spillovers to telecom, electronics, and manufacturing (NITI Aayog reports).

Critical Analysis

• Pros
  • Enhances India’s share in global launch market.
  • Supports digital inclusion via satellite broadband.
  • Validates LVM3 for future human spaceflight.
• Challenges
  • LEO congestion & space debris risks.
  • Regulatory clarity needed for satellite telecom services.
  • Intense competition from private global launchers.

Way Forward

• Implement space traffic management norms.  
• Boost commercialisation via IN-SPACe/NSIL.  
• Invest in reusable launch systems.
•  Integrate satellite broadband with Digital India.

DOWRY A CROSS- CULTURAL EVIL: SC

KEY HIGHLIGHTS

• The Supreme Court of India, while deciding a dowry death case, described dowry as a “cross-cultural evil” prevalent across religions.
• The case involved the death of a 20-year-old woman due to unmet dowry demands, highlighting the continued relevance of dowry despite legal prohibition.
• The judgment analysed dowry through sociological, constitutional, and gender-justice perspectives.

Sociological Basis of Dowry

• Dowry is rooted in hypergamy, where daughters are married into equal or higher- status families.
• In patriarchal systems with male-lineage inheritance, marriage becomes a tool to preserve or enhance family status.
• Over time, dowry evolved into a negotiated economic transaction, commodifying women.

Constitutional Dimensions

• The Court held dowry to be incompatible with constitutional values:
  • Article 14: Dowry treats women as unequal and extractive assets.
  • Dignity: Women are reduced to economic instruments.
• Justice and fraternity:
• Dowry entrenches hierarchy and discrimination.
  • Dowry was thus framed as a constitutional wrong, not merely a social evil.

Limits of Legal Prohibition

• Despite the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961, dowry persists.
• The practice survives by disguising itself as:
  • “Gifts”
  • “Customary practices”  “Social expectations”
  • This reflects the limitations of criminal law without social change.

Dowry Across Religious Communities

• The Court rejected the idea that dowry is religion-specific.
• It noted that among urban Muslim families, dowry has overshadowed mehr.
• Mehr was intended to ensure women’s economic security, whereas dowry often remains under the husband’s control.
• This increases women’s economic vulnerability, undermining original religious intent.

Institutional Directions

• Reform educational curricula to emphasise equality in marriage.
• Ensure appointment and public disclosure of Dowry Prohibition Officers.
• Mandatory sensitisation training for police and judiciary.
• High Courts to monitor and ensure speedy disposal of dowry cases.

Broader Significance

• Reinforces substantive equality over formal equality.
• Establishes gender justice as central to constitutional governance.
• Shows judicial integration of law, sociology, and ethics.

UNMAKING INDIA’S RIGHT TO WORK

• Parliament repealed the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act and enacted the Viksit Bharat–Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) Act, 2025.
• MGNREGA provided a legally enforceable, demand-driven right to employment.
• The new Act shifts to a supply-driven, discretionary framework.
• Centre now controls allocations, coverage, and scale of employment.
• Funding ratio changed from ~90:10 to 60:40, increasing State burden.

Key Points

• Right → Welfare: Employment no longer a legal entitlement.
• Demand-driven → Supply-driven: Work depends on budgetary sanction.
• Centralisation: Reduced role of States and Panchayats.
• Fiscal Stress on States: Poorer States may curtail works.
• Ideological Shift: Removal of Gandhi’s name signals retreat from rights-based welfare.

Static Linkages

• Article 21: Right to life includes livelihood with dignity
• Articles 38, 39: Social justice and reduction of inequality
• Article 41: Right to work (within State capacity)
• 73rd Amendment: Panchayat-led local development
• Social audits: Democratic accountability tool

Critical Analysis

• Pros
  • Greater fiscal control for Centre
  • Alignment with national priorities
• Cons
  • Dilution of enforceable rights
  • Weakening of cooperative federalism
  • Risk of job suppression during distress   
  • Welfare becomes executive discretion, not citizen claim Ethical Dimension
  • Shifts State role from duty-bound guarantor to benevolent provider.

Way Forward

• Restore demand-based statutory guarantee
• Rebalance Centre–State funding
• Strengthen Gram Sabha & social audits  
• Link works to climate-resilient assets
• Mandatory parliamentary scrutiny of welfare reforms

• Four Labour Codes (2019–20) aim to consolidate 29 labour laws.
• Trade unions oppose the Codes due to lack of tripartite consultation.
• Implementation through State rules has raised concerns in labour-welfare–oriented States.
• Issue is critical as 90%+ workforce is unorganised and largely outside formal protection.

Key Points

• Codes cover wages, industrial relations, social security, and occupational safety.
• Unorganised workers receive limited protection, mainly via welfare schemes.
• Sector-specific safeguards (e.g., BOCW Act) diluted or removed.
• Web-based inspections weaken enforcement in hazardous sectors.
• Abolition of labour cesses under GST reduced assured welfare funding.
• Centralised portals (e-Shram) may affect State control over welfare funds.

Static Linkages

• Social justice as a core objective of the Constitution.
• Evolution from a protective labour law regime to a flexibility-oriented regime.
• Welfare boards as instruments of targeted redistribution.
• International norms on labour inspection and occupational health.
• Informalisation of labour as a structural feature of developing economies.

Critical Analysis

• Positives
  • Simplification of labour laws.
  • Uniform definitions improve compliance.  
  • First-time recognition of gig workers.
• Concerns
  • Shift from rights to discretionary schemes.  
  • Weaker safety norms for informal workers.
  • Reduced inspections undermine compliance.  
  • Fiscal uncertainty due to loss of cesses.
  • Federal tensions in labour administration.  
  • Partial deviation from standards of the
  • International Labour Organization.

Way Forward

• Protect existing State welfare boards.
• Restore sector-specific safety standards.
• Ensure statutory, ring-fenced funding.
• Strengthen physical inspections.
• Revive tripartite consultation mechanisms.

GREEN WASHING

Context of the News

• On Nov 20, the Supreme Court of India barred fresh mining leases in the Aravallis till a Management Plan for Sustainable Mining (MPSM) under central supervision is framed.
• Decision driven by rampant mining, quarrying and deforestation leading to groundwater depletion and severe air pollution in Delhi– NCR and Haryana.
• Mining allowed only for government-approved ‘critical minerals’, balancing ecology with development needs.
• Court accepted an expert view defining Aravalli hills as landforms ≥100 m above local relief.
• As per Forest Survey of India (2010), this could exclude ~92% of hills from protection.
• Centre simultaneously promoting the Aravalli Green Wall Project.

Key Points

• MPSM: A centrally supervised framework aimed at regulating mining through environmental safeguards, compliance monitoring and enforcement.
• Critical minerals exception: Recognises strategic importance for energy transition, infrastructure and industry.
• Federal constraint: Mining is a State revenue source; enforcement capacity of States remains weak.
• Definitional shift: The 100-metre ‘local relief’ criterion significantly narrows the legally recognised Aravalli extent.
• Transparency gap: Expert reports and rationale for definitional choice are not fully in the public domain.
• Afforestation limits: Scientific consensus indicates reforestation cannot reliably substitute for natural hill ecosystems.

Static Linkages

• Fragile ecosystems act as natural groundwater recharge zones and dust barriers.
• Watershed management and hill conservation as tools for climate resilience.
• Sustainable mining principles: precautionary principle, polluter pays, intergenerational equity.
• Judicial environmentalism and continuing mandamus in India.
• Role of scientific institutions in environmental decision-making.

Critical Analysis

• Pros
  • Prevents irreversible ecological damage.
  • Central oversight limits regulatory capture.
• Concerns
  • Narrow hill definition may dilute protection.
  • Weak State enforcement encourages illegal mining.
  • Over-reliance on afforestation solutions.

Way Forward

• Publish expert reports and GIS maps for transparency.
• Use FSI-based scientific definitions consistently.
• Strengthen monitoring via remote sensing.
• Link Green Wall Project to landscape ecology, not plantation counts.
• Reduce State revenue dependence on mining.