March 2026
In short: India's science, environment and technology this month — distilled for SI/Constable Prelims.
Current Affairs — India › Science, Environment & Technology · 20 min read · Free to read · English & Telugu
Bilingual study notes for the Andhra Pradesh Police SI & Constable exams (SLPRB AP) by AP Police Hub, a product of Anvil Academy.
India updated its climate NDCs and released a first-ever Nagoya Protocol report, while ISRO/DRDO-adjacent stories ranged from a Kerala 3D printer for space tech to India's own Defence Forces Vision 2047 — alongside global firsts like NASA's dark-oxygen discovery and a record-breaking asteroid-deflection follow-up study.
Male gharial (Gavialis gangeticus) on the Chambal River, Uttar Pradesh — India's only tri-state riverine sanctuary, under Supreme Court scrutiny this month over illegal sand mining threatening this critically endangered species · Charles J. Sharp / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
March 2026 — At a Glance
March 2026 was busy on environment governance — India submitted its first national report on the Nagoya Protocol, updated its Nationally Determined Contributions to 2035, and the Supreme Court took suo motu note of illegal sand mining in the National Chambal Sanctuary. On technology, Kerala's Akasha300 3D printer reached ISRO, IIT Guwahati unveiled an MXene catalyst for clean hydrogen, and India's own Defence Forces Vision 2047 set out a roadmap for a self-reliant military. Globally, scientists reported 'dark oxygen' on the Pacific seafloor and NASA ruled out an asteroid-moon collision risk for 2032.
1. Environment, Wildlife & Climate
India's updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), 2031–2035
- What — Union Cabinet approved India's updated NDCs (2031-2035) under the Paris Agreement/UNFCCC, raising all three earlier thresholds.
- Targets — 60% non-fossil electricity capacity by 2035 (already at 52.57% as of Feb 2026); 47% emissions-intensity reduction from 2005 GDP levels by 2035 (already 36% reduced by 2020); carbon sink of 3.5-4 billion tonnes CO₂-equivalent; Net Zero by 2070.
- Trend — India's emissions growth slowed to just 0.7% in 2025 (vs 4-11% in past years) — power-sector emissions fell 3.8%, though steel (+8%) and cement (+10%) emissions rose.
First National Report on the Nagoya Protocol; 7th National Report to the CBD
- Nagoya Protocol report — MoEF&CC submitted India's first national report (2017-2025) on implementing the Nagoya Protocol on Access & Benefit Sharing — 12,830 ABS approvals issued, 3,556 Internationally Recognized Certificates of Compliance (60%+ of the global total), ₹216+ crore mobilised for communities.
- 7th National Report to CBD — India submitted its NR-7 biodiversity assessment (142 indicators, 23 National Biodiversity Targets) — forest & tree cover 25.17%, Ramsar sites up from 26 to 98, 58 Tiger Reserves, 33 Elephant Reserves, 106 National Parks, 574 Wildlife Sanctuaries; flagship species: tigers 3,682, elephants 22,446, rhinos 4,014, Asiatic lions 891.
National Chambal Sanctuary and the State of the World's Migratory Species
- Chambal Sanctuary — SC took suo motu cognizance of illegal sand mining degrading this ~600 km, tri-state (Rajasthan-MP-UP) river sanctuary — India's only tri-state riverine protected area, a key breeding habitat for gharials, mugger crocodiles and the Gangetic river dolphin.
- Migratory species report — Interim update to the UN's State of the World's Migratory Species finds 49% of CMS-listed species declining (up from 44%), 24% threatened with extinction (up from 22%) — bird flu (H5N1) causing mass deaths across birds and marine mammals is a key driver.
Other environment & wildlife notes — March 2026| Item | Key fact |
|---|
| Anavaran Portal (deforestation alerts) | Forest Survey of India's near-real-time forest-loss alert system (built on Google Earth Engine + Sentinel satellites), operational since Jan 2024, sends location-specific alerts every ~15 days. |
| Kashmir Markhor — critical decline | India's largest wild goat (up to 100 kg, spiral horns to 160 cm), endemic to J&K, now down to just 200-300 individuals; IUCN status Near Threatened (downlisted from Endangered in 2015 globally, though Indian population remains critically low). |
| 20 Cities Towards Zero Waste | UN Secretary-General's Advisory Board on Zero Waste named 20 global city leaders, including Varkala (Kerala) — the initiative tackles 2.1 billion tonnes/year of municipal solid waste. |
| Bhavasagara Referral Centre | CMLRE's (Kochi) 'Bhavasagara' Referral Centre officially designated a National Repository for Deep-Sea Fauna under the Biological Diversity Act, 2002 — holds 3,500+ geo-referenced marine specimens. |
| Ladakh Magmatic Arc & Waste Foundry Sand | Scientists traced the ~130-million-year igneous belt in Trans-Himalayan Ladakh recording Neo-Tethys plate subduction; separately, IIF and CSIR-CRRI signed an agreement to use metal-casting byproduct 'waste foundry sand' in road construction. |
| Radiative Forcing-based Accounting (RFA) | New climate-accounting method measures emissions by actual heat-trapping effect and atmospheric lifetime (vs the static CO₂e/GWP100 method), which under-credits methane-mitigation projects by ~36-40%. |
| Safe Disposal of Unused Medicines | UNEP report flags improper medicine disposal as a driver of antimicrobial resistance and pollution; India's response includes NAP-AMR 2.0 and Kerala's nPROUD drug take-back initiative. |
2. Space, Frontier Science & Applied Technology
Kerala's Akasha300 3D printer delivered to ISRO
- What — A Kerala start-up delivered the Akasha300, an indigenous industrial-grade multi-material 3D printer, to ISRO's Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre — developed by the Indian Institute of Space Science & Technology and Kerala Startup Mission.
- Capability — Supports dual extrusion at up to 350°C (upgradable to 500°C), a heated bed + enclosed chamber for precision, and a modular design for hybrid manufacturing — boosting rapid prototyping for propulsion/materials.
DART Mission follow-up: a whole asteroid pair's orbit was altered
- What — A new study found NASA's 2021-launched DART Mission — which struck the moonlet Dimorphos (binary asteroid target with Didymos) in 2022, shortening its orbit by ~33 minutes — also slightly altered the entire asteroid pair's orbit around the Sun, due to their gravitational linkage.
- Significance — First-ever human-caused asteroid-trajectory change — a proof-of-concept for planetary defence via kinetic impact.
Other space & frontier-science notes — March 2026| Item | Key fact |
|---|
| "Dark oxygen" on the Pacific seafloor | Oxygen produced thousands of feet deep without sunlight/photosynthesis — polymetallic nodules act as natural electrochemical batteries, electrolysing seawater; raises deep-sea mining concerns and astrobiology relevance. |
| Asteroid 2024 YR4 — Moon-collision risk ruled out | NASA officially ruled out this Apollo-type Near-Earth asteroid colliding with the Moon in 2032; discovered 2024 by the ATLAS telescope (Chile), ~1,468-day orbit. |
| ALMA Telescope maps Milky Way's centre | Astronomers used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (Chile; 66 movable antennas) to unveil filaments of cosmic gas near the Milky Way's core in unprecedented detail — ~10x sharper resolution than Hubble in its wavelength domain. |
| Minor Planet Centre — 15 new moons | Global hub for small Solar System body data (under the International Astronomical Union) announced 15 new moons — 4 around Jupiter, 11 around Saturn. |
| SWOT Satellite maps the ocean floor | NASA-CNES joint satellite (2022) using Ka-band Radar Interferometry produced a new ocean-floor map, covering ~90% of Earth every 21 days. |
| IISc's 'Moonshot' brain co-processor project | Flagship IISc project (funded by Pratiksha Trust) to develop AI-powered, implantable/non-invasive brain co-processors that decode-process-re-encode brain signals, aimed at restoring motor/cognitive function in stroke patients. |
| Deinococcus radiodurans | The most radiation-resistant known organism ('Conan the Bacterium', discovered 1956) found to withstand 14,000-24,000 Earth atmospheres of pressure, suggesting it could survive planetary ejection — relevant to astrobiology. |
MXene catalyst, Dimethyl Ether and other applied-materials breakthroughs
- MXene catalyst (IIT Guwahati) — IIT Guwahati developed an MXene-based catalyst that both produces hydrogen from water and acts as a photocatalyst for desalination; MXenes are 2D materials (e.g. titanium carbide) with high conductivity, mechanical strength and hydrophilicity, used in batteries, water treatment and filtration.
- Dimethyl Ether (DME) technology — CSIR-NCL is scaling up DME — a clean alternative fuel blended with LPG/diesel, made from methanol — to industrial scale; could cut LPG imports (India imports 60-65% of its LPG) and save ~₹9,500 crore annually if domestic methanol production develops.
Other applied-tech notes — March 2026| Item | Key fact |
|---|
| Floating LiDAR Buoy System | NIOT-developed indigenous buoy (tested off Muttom, Tamil Nadu) uses LiDAR laser pulses to measure ocean wind speed/direction up to 300m above sea level — supports offshore wind energy, cyclone tracking. |
| Helium supply risk | India's semiconductor/PCB industry faces potential helium disruption after Iran's attack on Qatar's Ras Laffan LNG hub; India's Rajmahal Volcanic Basin (Jharkhand) holds a significant helium reservoir, though largest global reserves are in the US, Algeria and Russia. |
| G-SPIDER robot for manual-scavenging alternative | Thiruvananthapuram deployed an AI-powered canal-cleaning robot (under Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban 2.0) using machine vision and robotic arms to remove waste from high-risk canals without human entry. |
| Low Temperature Thermal Desalination (LTTD) | Union Minister reviewed the LTTD plant at Kavaratti, Lakshadweep — evaporates warm surface seawater at low pressure, condenses it using cold deep-sea water; no chemicals/membranes needed, ideal for islands. |
| Orbital Data Centres | SpaceX plans up to 1 million space-based data-centre satellites to bypass terrestrial power/water/cooling limits — key challenges are radiative cooling inefficiency, high launch cost, and radiation exposure. |
| The Axios (npm) supply-chain hack | Attackers hijacked a trusted npm account to publish fake updates of the widely-used Axios JavaScript library, secretly installing self-destructing, multi-platform malware — one of the most sophisticated software supply-chain attacks recorded. |
3. Defence Technology & Security
Defence Forces Vision 2047
- What — Defence Minister Rajnath Singh released *Defence Forces Vision 2047: A Roadmap for a Future-Ready Indian Military*, prepared by HQ Integrated Defence Staff — India's first long-term strategy document for all three armed services together.
- Vision — Envisions an integrated force (jointness across Army/Navy/Air Force), a multi-domain force (land, sea, air, space, cyber) and an agile force, with a phased roadmap and stronger indigenous (Aatmanirbhar) capability by 2047 — the centenary of Independence.
Missile interceptors and gravity bombs in the US–Iran conflict
- What — Fresh West Asia hostilities activated an upgraded regional air-defence network — layered systems (Arrow 3/SM-3 outermost, THAAD/Arrow 2 mid-layer, Iron Dome/Iron Beam for drones) on one side, Iran's Bavar-373, Arman and Sevom-e-Khordad systems on the other.
- Gravity bombs — US military used precision gravity bombs — unpowered "free-fall" munitions modernised with JDAM kits (GPS receivers + steerable fins) that turn them into precision-guided weapons — marking a tactical shift in the conflict.
Other defence & security-tech notes — March 2026| Item | Key fact |
|---|
| AI in India's internal security (Parliamentary report) | A Standing Committee report shows MHA using AI as a "critical enabler" — an AI-assisted complaint system for the 1930 cybercrime helpline, 'Surakshini' for proactive CSAM detection, IIT Bombay collaboration for mule-account 'suspect scoring', and the new IVFRT 3.0 immigration platform from April 2026. |
| Exercise LAMITIYE-2026 | 11th edition of the India-Seychelles Joint Military Exercise, held at the Seychelles Defence Academy — historic as the first tri-services edition, with Army, Navy and Air Force personnel from both sides. |
| Naval incident near Sri Lanka / MILAN-2026 | A foreign submarine reportedly struck an Iranian warship near Sri Lanka's EEZ while it was returning from India's International Fleet Review and MILAN-2026 exercise off Visakhapatnam — an India-adjacent extension of the West Asia conflict; over 100 Indian seafarers were repatriated from stranded Gulf-region vessels in 2025-26. |