UPSC Civil Services GK Questions 2026

The release records that Bhagwat Prasad Makwana served as a Member of the Central Monitoring Committee constituted under that Act, before his appointment as Chairperson of the National Commission for Safai Karamcharis.

The release is issued by that Ministry, and the appointments were made by its Department of Social Justice and Empowerment.

The release states that the appointments will be effective up to that date, which corresponds to the remaining tenure of the present Commission.

The Department of Social Justice and Empowerment appointed him Chairperson of the Commission, and the release sets out his background: a Master's degree in Economics, long experience in social work for Scheduled Caste communities, earlier service as Vice-Chairman and then Chairman of the Safai Karamchari Commission under the Government of…

The release says the second term will commence in January 2027 and continue until December 2030, which matches the four-year term the union works to.

The release states plainly that the APPU works as a Regional Union of the UPU, which is the United Nations specialised agency for the postal sector.

The release describes the Asian-Pacific Postal Union as an inter-governmental organisation headquartered in Bangkok with 32 member countries, and it was in Bangkok that the 14th Congress met on 4 September 2026 and re-elected its Secretary-General.

He is a 1988 batch officer of the Indian Postal Service and was declared elected unopposed, by acclamation, at the 14th APPU Congress held in Bangkok on 4 September 2026.

Speaking on Access and Benefit Sharing, the Union Minister said the National Biodiversity Authority has shared more than that amount of ABS funds with farmers, local communities, Biodiversity Management Committees, State Biodiversity Boards, Union Territory Biodiversity Councils and research institutions.

The release says India's updated National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan, covering the period from 2024 to 2030, has been aligned with it, and that States and Union Territories were encouraged to become partners in meeting the global 30-by-30 conservation target that flows from it.

The Union Minister referred to it as the foundation of the country's biodiversity governance and noted that two later measures have strengthened and streamlined it: the Biological Diversity (Amendment) Act, 2023 and the Biological Diversity Rules, 2024.

The release states that the 16th National Meet, organised by the National Biodiversity Authority, was inaugurated there and runs for two days, on 6 and 7 September.

The release says this coffee table book was brought out during the inaugural session at Panchkula. It records the country's vulture conservation story, moving from a falling population to a working conservation breeding programme built around the centre at Pinjore.

Pinjore lies in Haryana, and the centre there is described in the release as a joint initiative of the Haryana Forest Department and the Bombay Natural History Society.

The release records that the Jatayu Conservation Breeding Centre at Pinjore housed that many vultures during 2025-26 and bred 35 chicks successfully in the same period.

Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav inaugurated the national workshop under this theme at Panchkula in Haryana, and the release uses the same phrase again at the close to describe the journey the country has made in vulture conservation through science, policy, conservation breeding, safe landscapes and community participation.

The release gives this as the theme under which the four CSIR laboratories are jointly organising the conclave in Kolkata.

The release names her as an inaugural session speaker in that capacity.

The release places this 4M framework at the heart of the conclave and explains that the four words represent the complementary strengths of the four CSIR laboratories hosting it.

The release says the sixth edition opened at the CSIR-Indian Institute of Chemical Biology in Salt Lake, Kolkata, and runs on 6 and 7 September.