NATIONAL UPDATES:
1. Sowcar Janaki Dies at 94 in Chennai: Veteran South Indian actress Sankaramanchi Janaki, known as Sowcar Janaki, died at the age of 94 in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, on 21 August 2026. She was associated with Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, and Malayalam cinema, and her debut film was the 1950 Telugu film Shavukaru. Sankaramanchi Janaki became widely known by the screen name Sowcar Janaki after her debut in Shavukaru, directed by L. V. Prasad. The film title was rendered as Sowcar in some references, and the name remained attached to her career in South Indian cinema. Her film career extended across several decades and included work in multiple South Indian languages. News references placed her film count at nearly 400 films in some accounts and over 450 films in others, which reflects a factual variation in published filmography totals.
2. Types of Bio-based Materials and Their Uses: Bio-based materials are made wholly or partly from biomass and are used as renewable alternatives to fossil-fuel-based products. They include plastics, composites, textiles, adhesives, and resins, with applications ranging from packaging and construction to medical and industrial uses. A clear distinction exists between bio-based and biodegradable. Bio-based refers to the origin of the raw materials, focusing on the beginning of the product life cycle. Biodegradable refers to the end-of-life recovery pathway, meaning the material can break down into natural elements through microbial action. Some bio-based materials, such as bio-polyethylene, are not biodegradable. Conversely, some fossil-fuel-based polymers, such as polycaprolactone (PCL), are fully biodegradable.
3. North Eastern Railway Runs Longest Awadh Mahashakti Freight Train: The Lucknow Division of the North Eastern Railway (NER) operated the “Awadh Mahashakti” freight train on 20 August 2026. The train was formed by combining three cargo trains and ran as the longest train in the history of the zonal railway. Freight trains carry goods such as coal, cement, foodgrains, fertilisers, petroleum products, and containers across the Indian Railways network. Indian Railways uses heavy-haul operations, multiple locomotives, and long rakes to move larger volumes of cargo on a single path. The Awadh Mahashakti freight train had 129 wagons and three heavy-duty locomotives. It departed from Gonda Junction at 1:50 p.m. on 20 August 2026 and moved towards the Moradabad Division via Sitapur. The train was assembled at the Gonda ROH depot, where ROH stands for Routine Overhaul. Routine Overhaul depots handle inspection, maintenance, and servicing of railway rolling stock.
4. India’s First Large-Scale Biopolymer Plant Set for October Launch: India’s first large-scale biopolymer plant is under construction in Lakhimpur Kheri district of Uttar Pradesh and is scheduled for commissioning in October 2026. The facility is being developed at the Kumbhi sugar unit of Balrampur Chini Mills in Gola Gokarannath and is planned as a fully integrated industrial campus. The foundation stone for the project was laid on 22 February 2025 by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath. The site is located within the Kumbhi sugar unit, which links sugar production with downstream bioplastic manufacturing on the same campus. The project cost has been cited at ₹3,080 crore in recent official references, while early 2025 estimates placed it at ₹2,850 crore. Lakhimpur Kheri District Magistrate Anjani Kumar Singh inspected the facility on 20 August 2026 to review production workflows, technical layouts, and construction progress.
5. Maharashtra Bans Sale of Loose Edible Oil: Maharashtra’s Food and Drug Administration issued a statewide order on 20 August 2026 banning the sale of loose or unpackaged edible oil and fats. The order applies across the edible oil supply chain, including oil expellers, refiners, blenders, repackers, importers, wholesalers, transporters, retailers, and e-commerce platforms. Edible oil in India is regulated under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, and related food safety rules. Packaged edible oil must carry labels with product identity, source details, batch information, and expiry date. Food safety authorities can act against unsafe, substandard, and misbranded food products under the Act. The Maharashtra directive requires edible oil to be sold only in sealed and tamper-evident packages. It also mandates complete labelling on every pack. Multi-sourced vegetable oil packs are restricted to a maximum size of 15 kg under the order. Types of Food Labelling and Traceability Rules: Food labelling and traceability are key tools for consumer safety, transparent choice, and supply chain accountability in India. FSSAI regulates these requirements under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006. Food packages must display nutritional values per 100 grams or 100 milliliters, or per single-serve pack. This declaration must include energy, protein, carbohydrates, fats, total sugars, added sugars, and sodium. A brown-filled triangle inside a square with a brown outline. This replaced the old brown circle in 2021 to help color-blind consumers distinguish the symbol by shape.
6. ISRO’s Former Chairman S. Somanath Appointed to RBI Central Board: Former Indian Space Research Organisation Chairman S. Somanath was appointed as a part-time, non-official director on the Central Board of the Reserve Bank of India on 20 August 2026. His appointment took effect for a four-year term, and Anand Gopal Mahindra was reappointed to the same board for another four-year term on the same date. The Central Board of Directors is the apex decision-making body of the Reserve Bank of India under the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934. The board includes official directors, non-official directors, and government nominees, and it deals with general supervision of the central bank. S. Somanath served as the 10th Chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation and Secretary of the Department of Space from 15 January 2022 to 14 January 2025. He retired in January 2025 after a tenure that included the Chandrayaan-3 lunar mission, which achieved a soft landing near the lunar south pole on 23 August 2023.
INTERNATIONAL UPDATES:
1. Sri Lankan singer Nanda Malini dies at 82: Visharad Dr. Nanda Malini, a Sri Lankan vocalist and musician, died on 20 August 2026 at the age of 82. She was one of Sri Lanka’s best-known playback and stage singers, and her career spanned nearly 70 years. Nanda Malini was a prominent figure in Sinhala music and was known for songs linked with social and cultural themes. She received 11 Sarasaviya Awards and 8 Presidential Awards for Best Female Singer during her career. The Government of Sri Lanka declared a three-day national mourning period for 21, 22 and 23 August 2026. The Parliament of Sri Lanka observed a one-minute silence on 21 August 2026 during its morning session after a proposal by Prime Minister Harini Amarasuriya. Her mortal remains were placed at her residence and the Nanda Malini Music Academy, also known as Sangeetha Ashramaya, on Wijayaba Mawatha, Nawala Road, Nugegoda. Public homage began at 10:00 a.m. on 21 August 2026, and the final rites were scheduled for 22 August 2026 at Borella Cemetery.
2. 12th BRICS Communications Ministers Meeting Held in Pune: India hosted the 12th BRICS Communications Ministers Meeting in Pune on 21 August 2026 under its BRICS Chairship theme, “Building for Resilience, Innovation, Cooperation and Sustainability”. The meeting was chaired by Union Minister for Communications Jyotiraditya M. Scindia and brought together communications ministers and representatives from the 11 BRICS member countries. BRICS is an intergovernmental grouping of Brazil, China, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and the United Arab Emirates. The 2026 ICT Track carried the theme “Innovate, Cooperate and Transform (ICT) for a Resilient Future”, which is linked to digital cooperation among BRICS members.
3. India and Mauritius Sign Oil and Gas Cooperation MoU: India and Mauritius signed a Government-to-Government Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in the oil and gas sector in Port Louis, Mauritius, on 20 August 2026. The agreement was signed by Hardeep Singh Puri, Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas, and John Michaël Tzoun Sao Yeung Sik Yuen, Mauritius Minister of Commerce and Consumer Protection. A Government-to-Government, or G2G, agreement is a formal arrangement between two sovereign states for cooperation in a specific sector. In this case, the MoU covers oil and gas cooperation and forms part of bilateral energy engagement between India and Mauritius. Port Louis is the capital and largest city of Mauritius, which is an island nation in the Indian Ocean. Mauritius has long depended on imported petroleum products for transport, power, and marine fuel requirements. Alongside the MoU, Indian Oil Corporation and the State Trading Corporation of Mauritius signed a five-year sales and purchase agreement. The agreement provides for the supply of petrol, diesel, marine gas oil, and Aviation Turbine Fuel.
4. Six Indians Aboard Cargo Ship Hijacked by Pirates off Somalia: The Cameroon-flagged general cargo vessel M/V LUTUF was seized by armed pirates on 17 August 2026 off Marraya in Somalia’s Puntland region. Six Indian nationals are among the 10 hostages on board, along with one Turkish national, one Georgian national, and two Serbian security guards. The vessel was boarded about 3.5 to 4 nautical miles off the coast in the Eyl district of Puntland. The ship was later directed towards the Nugaal coast near Garmaal in Dangoroyo district. The vessel is owned by Polar Movement Shipping and was carrying Turkish weapons, communications equipment, and satellite equipment bound for a military training facility in Mogadishu. Somalia’s coastline along the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean has remained linked with maritime piracy since the late 2000s. Puntland, a semi-autonomous region in north-eastern Somalia, has repeatedly featured in piracy-related incidents because of its long and difficult-to-police shoreline.
5. MC²+ Launches Ignite Programme for Energy Startups: MC²+ Ignite is a sector-specific accelerator programme for deep-tech startups in India’s energy sector. MC²+, a brand of MC² Foundation, launched the programme on 19 August 2026 at IIT Madras, with participation from the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, oil and gas public sector undertakings, and bp India. MC² Foundation was created to pool technology problem statements from India’s oil and gas majors on a single platform. The foundation works with public sector undertakings and research institutions to reduce duplication in research and investment across the energy value chain. MC²+ Ignite plans to select about 30 startups at the prototype-to-early-pilot stage for its first cohort. Selected startups can receive up to ₹2 crore in milestone-linked convertible funding, with up to ₹50 lakh as initial funding and up to ₹1.5 crore as milestone-based funding.
6. Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir Elected Bangladesh President: Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir, a veteran Bangladesh Nationalist Party leader, was elected as the 23rd President of Bangladesh on 20 August 2026 in a parliamentary vote held in Dhaka. He won 255 votes against Colonel (retd) Oli Ahmed of the Liberal Democratic Party, who secured 88 votes. The election took place inside the chamber of the Jatiya Sangsad between 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. local time on 20 August 2026. Three transparent ballot boxes were used in the voting process. Chief Election Commissioner AMM Nasir Uddin announced that 343 valid votes were cast out of 349 eligible members of parliament, and six lawmakers did not vote. The President of Bangladesh is the head of state under the Constitution of Bangladesh. The office is largely ceremonial in the parliamentary system, while executive authority rests with the Prime Minister and the Cabinet. Bangabhaban in Dhaka serves as the official residence and principal workplace of the President of Bangladesh. The presidential oath is administered at the Darbar Hall of Bangabhaban.
7. RIL Proposes India’s First Integrated Underground Coal Gasification Complex in Andhra Pradesh: Reliance Industries Limited has proposed an investment of about ₹2.73 lakh crore over 30 years for India’s first integrated Underground Coal Gasification (UCG) complex in Eluru district, Andhra Pradesh. The project will use deep coal reserves in the Chintalapudi and Recherla coal blocks, which together contain an estimated 3,130.61 million tonnes of coal at depths of more than 600 metres. Underground Coal Gasification is an in-situ process that converts coal into synthesis gas, or syngas, without conventional mining. The method uses controlled injection of oxidants into deep coal seams to produce a combustible gas mixture that can be used as an industrial feedstock. The proposed project has three stages. The first stage is a pilot and exploration phase with a budget of up to ₹3,000 crore, scheduled from the third quarter of 2026 to the fourth quarter of 2027. The second stage is a development phase from 2028 to 2030 with an estimated outlay of ₹1,20,000 crore. The third stage is a production phase from 2030 with a budget of ₹1,50,000 crore.
OTHER UPDATES:
DEFENCE
1. Second Gideon Aerial Refuelling Tanker Joins Israeli Air Force: The Israeli Air Force inducted its second “Gideon” aerial refuelling and transport aircraft at Nevatim Airbase in southern Israel on 20 August 2026. The aircraft is a modified Boeing KC-46 Pegasus and arrived from the United States as part of Israel’s tanker modernisation programme. The Boeing KC-46 Pegasus is a military aerial refuelling aircraft developed in the United States. Israel’s “Gideon” is a modified version configured for refuelling and transport missions. The aircraft can carry over 90 tonnes of fuel and up to 18 cargo pallets. The KC-46 uses a fly-by-wire boom system for refuelling. It also has a drogue-based refuelling system, which allows compatibility with aircraft that use probe-and-drogue refuelling. The second aircraft is one of six Boeing KC-46 tankers ordered by Israel. The fleet may expand to eight approved aircraft through United States military aid. The new tankers are intended to replace the Boeing 707 “Re’em” refuelling aircraft, which have served for nearly 60 years. The first “Gideon” aircraft entered Israeli service on 27 May 2026. The second aircraft reached Israel less than three months later and was expected to achieve full combat readiness within days of landing at Nevatim Airbase.
2. Territorial Army Launches Terrier Cyber Quest 2026: The Territorial Army of India launched Terrier Cyber Quest 2026 (TCQ 3.0) on 21 August 2026 in partnership with CyberPeace. The national hackathon focuses on indigenous defence and digital security solutions and includes three competition tracks for students, startups, security researchers, and digital content creators. The Bug Hunting track includes an online Capture-the-Flag qualifier and a 36-hour live sandbox finale. Finalists in this track must identify and document vulnerabilities in simulated critical infrastructure. The AI Kavach track invites solutions based on machine learning and artificial intelligence for automated cyber defence, predictive threat intelligence, and anomaly detection. The National Creators Challenge asks digital content creators to design educational media campaigns against deepfakes, phishing, and misinformation.
SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
1. Important Environmental Technologies in Industries: Industrial growth needs cleaner technologies to control pollution, reuse water, manage waste, and cut emissions. The main industrial environmental systems used for this purpose are listed below. ESPs remove fine dust particles from flowing gases using electrical energy. Dirty gas passes through electrodes, which give the particles a negative charge. The charged particles then stick to positively charged collector plates. Periodic rapping knocks the dust into hoppers for disposal. Scrubbers remove both particulate matter and acid gases from industrial exhaust streams. Wet scrubbers spray a liquid, usually water mixed with chemical reagents, into the gas flow. The liquid traps the pollutants. Dry scrubbers inject dry reactants into the exhaust to neutralize acids. Flue Gas Desulfurization (FGD) is a common scrubbing process. It uses limestone or lime slurry to neutralize sulfur dioxide (SO2), converting it into synthetic gypsum.
2. Major High-Energy Cosmic Phenomena: High-energy cosmic phenomena are the universe’s most violent events, producing X-rays, gamma rays, cosmic rays, neutrinos and gravitational waves. They reveal extreme conditions that cannot be reproduced in laboratories on Earth. An Active Galactic Nucleus (AGN) is a compact, highly luminous region at the center of a galaxy, powered by a supermassive black hole. Supernovae are catastrophic stellar explosions at the end of a star’s life. They spread heavy elements into space and can trigger new star formation. Neutron stars are the collapsed cores of massive stars, packing more mass than the Sun into a sphere only about 20 kilometers wide.
3. NASA Abandons Swift Telescope Rescue Mission: The Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory is a NASA space telescope launched on 20 November 2004 to study gamma-ray bursts and other high-energy cosmic events. NASA later approved a commercial rescue effort for the observatory, but the planned capture and reboost operation was cancelled after repeated control failures in the rescue spacecraft. The Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory is a $500 million space observatory designed for rapid detection and follow-up of gamma-ray bursts. It has observed about 1,800 cosmic explosions over more than two decades in orbit. The observatory was orbiting at about 216 miles, or 347 kilometres, before the rescue mission was abandoned. In September 2025, NASA awarded a $30 million contract to Katalyst Space Technologies, an Arizona-based startup, to develop a commercial mission for orbit-raising of Swift.
BANKING AND FINANCE
1. India and ADB Sign $230 Million Chennai Water Loan: The Government of India and the Asian Development Bank signed a $230 million loan agreement on 21 August 2026 for the Chennai Climate-Resilient Water Security and Sewerage Project. The project covers water supply and sanitation infrastructure in the Greater Chennai area and targets about 4.5 million residents. The project includes construction of more than 170 kilometres of water supply and sewer pipelines. It also covers the upgradation of 7 water pumping stations and 38 sewer pumping stations in Chennai. The project will make Chennai the first city in India to implement a closed-loop ring-main system for water supply. The system is designed to balance water pressure across the network and improve resilience to natural hazards. The project also includes digital monitoring of networks and mechanised equipment for sewer inspection.
2. IRDAI Bars Niva Bupa from Branch Expansion: The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) issued an order on 19 August 2026 barring Niva Bupa Health Insurance from opening any new place of business for six months. The action followed the insurer’s non-compliance with the prescribed Expense of Management (EoM) limits for the 2024–25 financial year (FY25). Expense of Management refers to the operating expenses incurred by an insurer, including employee costs, commissions, and administrative expenditure. IRDAI prescribes limits on EoM to control operating costs and maintain financial discipline in the insurance sector.
For FY25, Niva Bupa’s actual EoM stood at ₹2,652.12 crore, while the regulator-prescribed limit was ₹2,403.75 crore. The excess amount was ₹248.37 crore, and the insurer missed its EoM target for the second consecutive year.
AWARDS AND HONOURS
1. FIFA Unveils 2027 Women’s World Cup Schedule: FIFA released the 64-match schedule for the 10th edition of the FIFA Women’s World Cup on 20 August 2026. The tournament will run from 24 June to 25 July 2027 in Brazil and will feature 32 national teams. The 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup will be the 10th edition of the competition. The opening match will be played on 24 June 2027, and the final will be held on 25 July 2027. The event will use a 32-team format for the second and final time before expansion to 48 teams in 2031. Brazil will stage matches across eight host cities: Belo Horizonte, Brasília, Fortaleza, Porto Alegre, Recife, Rio de Janeiro, Salvador, and São Paulo. Each host city will stage at least seven matches, and each city will host at least one knockout match. Rio de Janeiro’s Maracanã Stadium will host both the opening match and the final. The schedule also places the third-place play-off in São Paulo.
2. Ashutosh Parida to Receive 47th Sarala Puraskar: Odia poet, essayist and former CSIR-IMMT scientist Dr. Ashutosh Parida has been selected for the 47th Sarala Puraskar for his poetry collection Bishwas De Pruthwi. The award ceremony is scheduled in Bhubaneswar, Odisha, on 25 October 2026, and the honour carries a citation, a copper plaque and a cash prize of Rs 7 lakh. The Sarala Puraskar is a literary award associated with Odisha and is presented by the Indian Metals Public Charitable Trust (IMPaCT), the charitable arm of IMFA. The award recognises works in Odia literature and is among the prominent literary honours in the state. Dr. Parida’s book was chosen from a final shortlist of seven books compiled in 2026. The shortlist included works by Aparna Mohanty, Padmaja Pal and Archana Nayak, along with other writers considered by the jury.
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