CDS Weekly Current Affairs Quiz: 5–11 October 2026

The Ministry of Defence announced that the India–UAE joint military exercise Mountain Guardian 2026 began at the Foreign Training Node in Chaubatia, Uttarakhand, with equal participation from both armies and mountain warfare as the theme.

The yard is building all five Fleet Support Ships ordered by the Indian Navy, and FSS-1 will be launched there on 6 October 2026 into the waters of the Bay of Bengal, eighteen months after its steel was first cut.

The two-thousandth engine from this plant is being handed over on 6 October 2026, with the Raksha Mantri inaugurating the event and the Chief Minister of Odisha among those attending.

The Ministry of Defence signed the contract with BrahMos Aerospace Private Limited on 6 October 2026 in New Delhi, and the value of the order for BrahMos Fire Control Systems and launchers meant for ships of the Indian Navy was fixed at Rs 661.50 crore.

The release states that this laboratory is designing and developing the High-Altitude Platform, a lighter-than-air system meant to work as a long endurance stratospheric aerial surveillance platform.

The Defence Minister was present at Koraput for this handover, which came six decades after the Division was set up in 1964.

The Government has appointed Air Marshal Ashutosh Dixit, PVSM, AVSM, VM, VSM, as the twenty-ninth officer to head the Indian Air Force, and he takes charge in the rank of Air Chief Marshal from the afternoon of 31 October 2026.

Mt Kamet stands in the Chamoli district of Uttarakhand and is the third-highest mountain within India, which places exactly those two peaks above it.

The exercise is being held off the Paradip coast of Odisha and is inaugurated by the Minister of State for Defence, with the search and rescue demonstration at sea following a day later.

The Fleet Support Ships are under construction at HSL in Visakhapatnam, and FSS-1, the first of the class, was launched there on 6 October 2026 with Raksha Mantri Rajnath Singh as chief guest.

The exercise was inaugurated by the Raksha Rajya Mantri on 7 October 2026 and the sea phase was set to be conducted off Paradip, on the Odisha coast, the next day.

The waiver of proof and testing charges for this set of projects is the central financial relief in the revised Standard Operating Procedure, and the stated reason is the promotion of self-reliance in defence.

The Indian Coast Guard conducted the 12th edition of the National Maritime Search and Rescue Exercise in the sea off Paradip on 8 October 2026, and the Paradip Port Authority along with the Odisha state administration took part in it.

The force completed 94 years of service on 8 October 2026 and held its ceremonial Air Force Day parade at Hindan, where the Chief of the Air Staff, Air Chief Marshal AP Singh, reviewed the parade in the presence of the Army and Navy chiefs, former air chiefs and other…

He is also Secretary of the Department of Military Affairs, and he opened the new housing for senior sailors and naval defence civilians, along with trunk utility and amenity infrastructure, at the Karwar base.

Speaking at the eighth annual session of the Society of Indian Defence Manufacturers in New Delhi, the Defence Minister said exports of defence goods had touched this figure in the financial year 2025-26, the highest India has ever reached, and that the rise over the preceding year was more than…

Tarang Shakti is an air exercise, and the second edition was hosted by the Indian Air Force from 26 September to 12 October 2026, with the Defence Minister addressing the participants at Air Force Station Jodhpur.

The mela, named Sainya Sampark Mela - Sadaiv Aapke Saath, was held at Deoghar and was organised by the Indian Army together with the Deoghar district administration.

The Ministry of Defence has said that the Defence Secretary, Rajesh Kumar Singh, will undertake an official visit to these two countries from 12 to 15 October 2026, with the Cyprus leg falling on 12 and 13 October and Greece forming the second half of the tour.

The correct answer is Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers, Kolkata, where Shreyas, carrying the yard number 3040, was launched.

The Defence Correspondents Course ended there once the participating journalists had completed the Navy, Air Force and Army legs of the programme, and the valedictory function was held at the same place.

The Ministry of Defence stated that the guided missile stealth frigate INS Trishul had reached Plymouth in the United Kingdom, where it is scheduled to exercise with the Royal Navy in KONKAN-26.

INDRA is the bilateral exercise between India and Russia, and in this edition the Indian Navy works with the Russian Federation Navy.

The Ministry of Defence stated that a total of 92 personnel are taking part in the exercise, with the Indian Army and the UAE Army represented in equal numbers.

Each of the five Fleet Support Ships is a vessel of this size, built to replenish warships while they remain at sea by passing across fuel, stores and provisions, so that a task force can keep operating without returning to harbour.

That is the investment behind the second Shakti engine production line being highlighted at the Koraput event, and the added capacity is intended for indigenous helicopter platforms, named in the announcement as the Dhruv Advanced Light Helicopter and the Prachand Light Combat Helicopter.

The order for BrahMos Fire Control Systems and launchers was placed with BrahMos Aerospace Private Limited under this category, which is reserved for equipment that is indigenously designed, developed and manufactured.

In the experimental flight the High-Altitude Platform climbed to that altitude above mean sea level, and it then remained at 20 km above mean sea level for more than 30 minutes before it was commanded to descend back to the ground.

The second Shakti engine line carries this outlay and will be able to produce up to 100 engines a year once it is fully established by 2028-29, feeding indigenous helicopters such as the Dhruv Advanced Light Helicopter and the Prachand Light Combat Helicopter.

That was the appointment Air Marshal Ashutosh Dixit held when the Government named him the next Chief of the Air Staff in the rank of Air Chief Marshal.