Current Affairs: 26 October 2026

On 25 October Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Reserve Bank of India's new data centre and its Cybersecurity Training Institute at Info Valley-II, Jatni, near Bhubaneswar, Odisha. Reports put the cost of the data centre at about ₹169 crore. Governor Sanjay Malhotra said the facility has Tier-IV certification from the Uptime Institute and called it "sovereign" because the RBI will not depend on third-party cloud providers. The complex has four independent data centres. It will run critical systems including RTGS and NEFT, as well as government banking operations. The RBI's three existing data centres are all in Maharashtra, so the Odisha site gives geographical separation. NPCI runs UPI, but UPI transactions are finally settled through the RBI's systems. The training institute will train staff of the RBI, banks and other financial institutions in cybersecurity, AI and quantum computing, and will also carry out research. The foundation stone was laid on 22 March 2023.

A study published in the RBI Bulletin compared how banks passed policy changes on to borrowers. In the tightening phase (March 2022 to January 2025) the repo rate rose 250 bps, and lending rates on existing loans rose 191 bps, a pass-through of 76.4%. In the easing phase (February 2025 to March 2026) the repo rate was cut 125 bps, but lending rates fell only 80 bps, a pass-through of 64%. The weighted average lending rate (WALR) on fresh loans fell 93 bps over the easing phase. The study also found that, when measured on the headline WALR, which reflects shifts in the mix of loans as well as price changes, the gap almost disappears: 74.4% in easing against 72.4% in tightening.

The Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) is considering an Interest Stabilisation Reserve of about ₹25,000 crore. The aim is to keep the annual interest credited to its roughly 30 crore members steady when corporate bonds in its portfolio default or have to be sold at a loss. The proposal comes from a study by IIM Kozhikode, which EPFO's investment committee has discussed. The reserve would be built up gradually from surplus capital gains on ETFs and excess interest income, and kept only in liquid government securities. The report has gone to a high-powered panel that is reviewing EPFO's investment framework. No decision has been taken yet.

In a stock-exchange filing on 21 October, State Bank of India said its preliminary review of about 3.75 lakh records posted on the dark web had found 3,897 SBI customer records containing personal data such as names, mobile numbers, dates of birth, addresses and loan details. The bank said it had been alerted on 16 October by its threat-intelligence vendor, the Defence Cyber Agency and CERT-In, that it had activated its incident-response process, and that core operations were not affected. A CERT-In-empanelled agency is investigating the source of the leak. Digital-rights groups noted that the breach-notification duty under the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act takes full effect only in May 2027.

India's benchmark 10-year government bond yield closed at about 7.47% on 23 October, its highest level since March 2023. It has risen about 78 bps in four months. Traders cite high crude prices (Brent has been above $110 a barrel), heavy government borrowing, tight banking liquidity and expectations of more rate hikes after the RBI's October move. Some dealers expect the yield to reach 7.65–7.75% by December. Retail inflation rose to 5.54% in September.

Reliance Industries' digital arm Jio Platforms is due to list on the NSE and BSE on 28 October after its ₹30,213 crore initial public offering, the largest ever in India. The issue was a fresh issue of about 27 crore shares in a price band of ₹1,065–1,119 per share. It was open from 21 to 23 October, and qualified institutional buyers drove most of the demand. Several smaller IPOs open this week, including EAAA India Alternatives (about ₹1,200 crore).

Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have made net sales of ₹48,056 crore of Indian equities so far in October, according to depository data. That figure includes about ₹5,281 crore they put into IPOs and other primary-market issues; their net selling on the stock exchanges alone was about ₹53,337 crore. FPI outflows from equities in 2026 now total about ₹3.08 lakh crore, the highest for any year. Analysts point to crude above $110 a barrel, US Treasury yields near 5% and a rupee close to ₹95 per dollar.

The Ernakulam bench of the GST Appellate Tribunal (GSTAT) ruled that an airline can get back the GST it paid on cancelled tickets if it refunded both the fare and the tax to passengers and can prove it. The case, Singapore Airlines v. Commissioner of CGST & Central Excise, Kochi, covered eight refund claims totalling about ₹45.92 lakh for October 2019 to March 2021, a period of COVID-19 cancellations. The tribunal set aside the rejection of the claims and ordered the department to process the refund within two weeks, with interest.

In a circular dated 24 October, the Ministry of Corporate Affairs gave companies until 31 December 2026 to file their FY 2025-26 financial statements (Form AOC-4 and its variants) and until 31 January 2027 to file annual returns (Forms MGT-7 and MGT-7A), without additional fees. The move follows complaints about downtime and slow response on the MCA21 portal; the Institute of Company Secretaries of India had sought the extension. The deadline for holding annual general meetings has not been extended.

New operational guidelines for the ₹84,084 crore Samudra Manthan scheme, the National Offshore Exploration Scheme, set out how the Centre will share drilling risk. It will fund up to 50% of the cost of 56 deepwater exploratory wells, capped at ₹675 crore a well, and up to 100% of four stratigraphic wells, capped at ₹1,350 crore each. All the wells are in water deeper than 400 metres. If a well is dry, the support is not recovered. If it finds oil or gas, the operator repays the government in annual instalments, without inflation indexation. Repayment starts after seven years of commercial production or once the operator has recovered half of its exploration and development cost, whichever comes first. Only blocks awarded under the revenue-sharing contract regime since 2016 qualify.

On 25 October Ladakh's Lieutenant Governor V. K. Saxena declared Ladakh India's first fully organic Union Territory. The declaration follows a July 2026 order that banned the procurement, distribution, sale, marketing and use of chemical and synthetic fertilisers in farming across the UT, with a minimum fine of ₹10,000 for violations. The administration distributed organic fertiliser to farmers before the March 2026 sowing season. The change is being supported by a ₹500 crore Mission Organic Development Initiative. Crops expected to benefit include apricot, sea buckthorn, buckwheat and barley.

Prime Minister Modi broadcast the 139th episode of Mann Ki Baat on 25 October and called the programme's 12-year journey a "pilgrimage". He paid tribute to Narinder Singh Kapany, the "Father of Fibre Optics", ahead of his birth centenary on 31 October. He praised the Nav Trinjan organic-cotton handloom project of the Kheti Virasat Mission in Punjab and mentioned brain-mapping research at IIT Madras. He also repeated his "vocal for local" call for the festive season and paid tribute to Maharishi Valmiki.

Home Minister Amit Shah announced the results of "Operation Trident", a multi-agency crackdown led by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) with Mizoram Police and the Enforcement Directorate (ED). On 23 October, teams raided 38 locations at the same time in Assam, Mizoram and Manipur. Eighteen people were arrested and about ₹100 crore of hawala transactions came to light. The agencies froze 1,424 bank accounts, attached property worth ₹17.82 crore and seized 500 detonators and ₹12 lakh in cash. Shah said the cartel moved drugs from Myanmar through what he called the "Death Triangle" corridor on the India–Myanmar–Bangladesh border.

In an order dated 22 October, the Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) fined Britannia Industries ₹1 lakh for advertising a bread as "100% Whole Wheat Bread". Whole wheat flour made up only about 62% of the bread, below the 75% minimum that food-labelling rules require for a product to be called whole wheat bread. The CCPA rejected the company's argument that a small-print note explained the claim. Britannia must stop the advertisements and file a compliance report within 15 days.

Om Prakash Mathur took the oath as Governor of Kerala (Keralam) on 23 October at Lok Bhavan, Thiruvananthapuram, administered by Kerala High Court Chief Justice Soumen Sen. He is the state's 29th Governor. He was earlier Governor of Sikkim. He succeeds Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar, who has moved to Tamil Nadu as full-time Governor. President Droupadi Murmu announced the changes in a reshuffle of six Governors on 12 October.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the Workers' Party won Brazil's runoff on 25 October, beating Senator Flávio Bolsonaro, son of former President Jair Bolsonaro. With all votes counted, Lula led by nearly 4.4 million votes, about 51.8% to 48.2%. Bolsonaro had led the first round on 4 October. It is the first time since the end of military rule in 1985 that the first-round runner-up has won the presidency. Lula, 80, begins his non-consecutive fourth term on 5 January 2027.

Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, winner of the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize, returned home on 25 October after about ten months abroad. She first appeared at a church in Lara state and then went to Caracas, where crowds of supporters greeted her. She had left Venezuela secretly in December 2025 to collect the prize in Oslo. Venezuela is now led by interim President Delcy Rodríguez, who took over after US forces captured Nicolás Maduro in January 2026. Machado and her allies want a date set for a presidential election.

Israel holds a general election for its 120-seat Knesset on 27 October. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is seeking re-election, and his main challenger is former army chief Gadi Eisenkot, whose Yashar party has led or run close to Likud in polls. About 7.3 million people are eligible to vote. Polls suggest no bloc will win a majority on its own, so coalition talks are likely after the vote.

The 12th BRICS Parliamentary Forum is being held at the Parliament complex in New Delhi on 26–27 October 2026, chaired by Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla. The agenda includes people-centred development, parliamentary cooperation, artificial intelligence and digital technologies. India took over the forum's chair at the 11th meeting in Brasília in June 2025. India holds the BRICS chairship in 2026.

The Prime Minister used Mann Ki Baat to mark the coming birth centenary of physicist Narinder Singh Kapany, who was born in Moga, Punjab, on 31 October 1926. Kapany's research in the 1950s showed that light could be carried along bendable glass fibres. That work underpins today's optical-fibre networks for the internet and telecommunications, as well as medical endoscopes. He was awarded the Padma Vibhushan posthumously in 2021.

Chief of the Air Staff Air Chief Marshal A.P. Singh, who retires on 31 October, said the IAF does not favour dividing its fighter aircraft permanently among geographical theatre commands. He argued for a structure based on "centralised control, decentralised execution" and cited joint planning during Operation Sindoor. Air Marshal Ashutosh Dixit, named on 6 October, takes over as the 29th Chief of the Air Staff on 31 October.

The IAF held its "Wings Over Ganges" display over Namo Ghat, Varanasi, to mark its 94th anniversary, with the final show on 25 October attended by Prime Minister Modi. About 100 aircraft took part, including 52 fighters, among them the Rafale, Su-30MKI, Tejas and Jaguar, along with transport aircraft and helicopters such as the Chinook and the indigenous LCH Prachand. Displays were also held on 22 and 24 October.

P. V. Sindhu lost the women's singles final of the French Open (BWF Super 750) in Paris on 25 October to South Korea's world No. 1 An Se Young, 21-16, 11-21, 12-21. An won her fourth French Open title, and she now leads Sindhu 11-0 in their head-to-head record. It was Sindhu's second Super 750 final of 2026, after her Japan Open win in July.

India women beat Zimbabwe by 121 runs in the second ODI at Vadodara on 25 October and took an unbeatable 2–0 lead in the three-match series. India made 328/6 after recovering from 148/4. Captain Harmanpreet Kaur scored 126 off 121 balls and was named player of the match, and Deepti Sharma made an unbeaten 106, her second ODI century. Zimbabwe were bowled out for 207 in 48.5 overs. Vaishnavi Sharma took four wickets and Deepti took 3/32.

India's Yuki Bhambri and Ryan Seggerman of the US won the doubles title at the Almaty Open, an ATP 250 event in Kazakhstan, on 25 October. The fourth seeds beat the top-seeded Austrians Lucas Miedler and Neil Oberleitner 7-6(3), 6-7(1), 10-2. It was Bhambri's fifth ATP Tour doubles title and his first of 2026.

The men's Asian Champions Trophy hockey tournament begins on 27 October at the Olympian Surjit Hockey Stadium in Jalandhar, Punjab. India, the defending champions, play Bangladesh in the opening match. Six teams take part: India, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Japan, South Korea and China. Bangladesh replaced Pakistan, which withdrew. The league stage runs in Jalandhar until 2 November, and the knockout matches move to Mohali, with the final on 5 November. Harmanpreet Singh captains India.

Maharishi Valmiki Jayanti falls on 26 October 2026. It is observed on Ashwin Purnima, the full-moon day of the month of Ashwin. Valmiki is regarded as the author of the Ramayana and is called the Adi Kavi (first poet) of Sanskrit literature. The Prime Minister paid tribute to him in Mann Ki Baat, and Punjab and Haryana held state-level events.

Painter Jogen Chowdhury died in Kolkata on 25 October, aged 87, after an illness that included a rare blood cancer. Born in 1939 in Faridpur, now in Bangladesh, he studied in Kolkata and Paris. He was curator of the art collection at Rashtrapati Bhavan from 1972 to 1987 and later taught at Kala Bhavana, Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan. He was known for figures drawn with dense cross-hatched lines. He was a Rajya Sabha member from 2014 to 2020 and received the Banga Bibhushan in 2012.