Current Affairs 06 February 2026

Content

1. Illegal Coal Mining Tragedy in Meghalaya
2. Cyberchondria and Health Misinformation
3. Sodium-Ion Battery Technology
4. Motion of Thanks in Parliament
5. Artificial Intelligence Racing Ahead of Regulation
6. India AI Stack

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Illegal Coal Mining Tragedy in Meghalaya

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Coal Mining in India 

What is Coal Mining ?

• Coal mining is extraction of coal seams for energy and industry, conducted through open-cast or underground methods, regulated in India by central mining, labour, and environmental laws.

Importance of Coal

• Coal remains India’s primary baseload energy source, supporting thermal power, steel production, and cement, making mining economically important but environmentally and socially sensitive.

Rat-Hole Mining

Definition

• Rat-hole mining involves digging narrow horizontal tunnels, often barely one metre high, where miners crawl to extract coal manually, common in Meghalaya’s hilly coal-bearing areas.

Why Practised ?

• Practised due to thin coal seams, private land ownership patterns, low capital requirement, and quick returns, despite severe safety, health, and environmental risks.

Legal Status

• NGT banned rat-hole mining in 2014, citing environmental damage and unsafe labour conditions, but illegal operations continue due to weak enforcement and local economic dependence.

Geological and Regional Factors

Meghalaya’s Coal Geology

• Meghalaya has tertiary coal deposits in fragmented seams within fragile hill ecosystems, making mechanised mining difficult and encouraging small, unsafe, manual extraction methods.

Terrain Constraints

• Steep slopes, high rainfall, and loose soil increase risks of flooding, tunnel collapse, and landslides, turning unscientific mining sites into high-risk zones for workers.

Safety and Labour Dimension

Mine Safety Basics

• Scientific mining requires ventilation, structural supports, gas monitoring, and emergency exits, which are usually absent in illegal rat-hole mines, raising accident probability.

Labour Profile

• Workers often include migrant and economically vulnerable populations, accepting hazardous conditions due to limited livelihood options and informal employment arrangements.

Use of Explosives

• Use of dynamite or explosives in unregulated settings increases risks of blasts, toxic fumes, and tunnel instability, especially without certified handlers or safety protocols.

Environmental Impacts

Land and Forests

• Unregulated mining causes deforestation, soil erosion, and landscape degradation, permanently altering fragile hill ecosystems and reducing ecological stability.

Water Pollution

• Coal mining generates acid mine drainage, contaminating rivers with heavy metals and acidity, harming aquatic life and affecting downstream communities’ water quality.

Governance and Regulation

Constitutional Position

• Mining and mineral development fall under Union regulation (MMDR Act), but land and local enforcement involve States, requiring coordinated governance for effective control.

Enforcement Challenges

• Illegal mining persists due to monitoring gaps, local political economy, difficult terrain, and livelihood dependence, weakening regulatory effectiveness despite formal bans.

Disaster Management Basics

Response Framework

• Rescue operations involve State Disaster Response Force, police, and medical teams, focusing on evacuation, medical aid, and site stabilisation in hazardous underground conditions.

Preventive Approach

• Prevention requires strict licensing, regular inspections, worker registration, and closure of illegal mines, alongside alternative livelihoods to reduce economic reliance on unsafe mining.

Ethical and Developmental Angle

Development vs Safety

• The tragedy highlights conflict between livelihood needs and human safety, where economic desperation often pushes workers into life-threatening informal sectors.

State Responsibility

• Welfare state principles require government to ensure safe working conditions, environmental protection, and sustainable livelihoods, not merely post-disaster compensation.

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Cyberchondria and Health Misinformation 

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Context :

Triggering Incident

• A filicide case in Bhilwara, Rajasthan, where a mother killed her children fearing terminal illness after consuming online medical misinformation, highlighted extreme consequences of unchecked digital health content.

Broader Relevance

• With 1+ billion Internet subscriptions in India, social media has become a major health information source, raising concerns about misinformation-driven anxiety, self-diagnosis, and erosion of trust in medical systems.

Cyberchondria

Definition

• Cyberchondria refers to excessive, anxiety-driven online health searches where individuals repeatedly seek medical information online, leading to heightened fear of serious illness despite limited clinical evidence.

Origin of Term

• The term combines “cyber” (digital space) and “hypochondria” (illness-anxiety disorder), indicating technology-amplified health anxiety rather than a new psychiatric disorder category.

Clinical Nature

• Considered a behavioural and cognitive pattern linked to health anxiety, obsessive checking, and reassurance-seeking, sometimes overlapping with anxiety or obsessive-compulsive spectrum conditions.

Hypochondria vs Cyberchondria

Traditional Hypochondria

• Hypochondria involves persistent fear of illness despite medical reassurance, traditionally triggered by bodily sensations, media reports, or anecdotal experiences, even before the Internet era.

Digital Amplification

• Cyberchondria intensifies these fears because search engines and social media provide vast, decontextualised medical information, often highlighting worst-case scenarios.

How Algorithms Influence Health Anxiety ?

Recommendation Systems

• Social media algorithms prioritise engagement-based content, promoting sensational or fear-inducing health videos because they generate longer watch time and user interaction.

Personalisation Loops

• AI-driven feeds track pauses, clicks, and watch duration, then recommend similar content, creating echo chambers that repeatedly expose users to alarming medical claims.

Engagement Bias

• Research shows misleading medical content often achieves higher engagement than accurate information, making algorithms unintentionally amplify misinformation.

Medical Misinformation

What is Medical Misinformation ?

• Medical misinformation is false, misleading, or unverified health-related information presented without scientific consensus, often simplified to appear authoritative or relatable.

Source Patterns

• A large share of misleading health content is produced by non-professionals, influencers, or anecdotal storytellers rather than certified medical practitioners.

Doctor–Patient Disconnect

Limits of Online Diagnosis

• Online searches cannot replace clinical examination, patient history, and diagnostic testing, which doctors use to differentiate between common symptoms and serious disease.

Anxiety Spiral

• Since many symptoms overlap across diseases, search results often highlight severe illnesses like cancer, triggering catastrophic thinking in vulnerable individuals.

Psychological Dimension

Conspiratorial Thinking

• When institutions like medicine feel like “black boxes,” people may turn to simplified or conspiratorial explanations, which provide psychological comfort and perceived control.

Authority Bias

• People tend to trust information that appears authoritative online, even if credibility is weak, making them vulnerable to persuasive but inaccurate medical claims.

Public Health and Governance Angle

Digital Health Literacy

• Low health and digital literacy limits people’s ability to evaluate sources, understand probabilities, or distinguish correlation from causation in medical claims.

Platform Responsibility

• Platforms have misinformation policies, but enforcement is inconsistent; algorithms are designed for engagement, not public health outcomes.

Ethical and Social Angle

Mental Health Impact

• Cyberchondria can increase anxiety, stress, unnecessary medical visits, and mistrust in doctors, burdening both individuals and healthcare systems.

Family and Social Consequences

• Extreme anxiety-driven decisions can affect families and children, showing misinformation is not only informational risk but also a social and ethical concern.

Preventive Understanding

Responsible Health Seeking

• Verified medical sources, second opinions, and consultation with qualified doctors are essential to counterbalance algorithm-driven misinformation exposure.

Role of Awareness

• Public awareness campaigns on digital health literacy and mental health can reduce vulnerability to misinformation-driven panic.

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Sodium-Ion Battery Technology

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Context

Strategic Debate in India

• India is reassessing battery strategy due to import dependence and critical mineral risks in lithium-ion, with sodium-ion emerging as a viable alternative for energy storage and EV transition.

Energy Transition Relevance

• As batteries underpin EVs, grid storage, and digital devices, technology choice directly affects India’s energy security, manufacturing self-reliance, and clean energy transition goals.

Batteries

What is a Battery ?

• A battery is an electrochemical device that stores energy through reversible chemical reactions, converting chemical energy into electrical energy via movement of ions between electrodes.

Key Components

• Every battery contains anode, cathode, electrolyte, and current collectors, which together enable ion flow internally and electron flow through an external circuit.

Lithium-Ion Batteries (Li-ion)

Working Principle

• Lithium-ion batteries function by lithium ions shuttling between graphite anode and metal-oxide cathode, offering high energy density and long cycle life.

Strengths

• High energy density, low self-discharge, and mature manufacturing ecosystem made Li-ion dominant in EVs and electronics globally.

Structural Constraints

• Li-ion depends on lithium, cobalt, nickel, and graphite, minerals concentrated in few countries, creating supply, price, and geopolitical vulnerabilities.

Sodium-Ion Batteries (Na-ion)

What is Sodium-Ion Technology ?

• Sodium-ion batteries operate similarly to Li-ion but use sodium ions as charge carriers, with sodium sourced from abundant materials like soda ash and salt deposits.

Material Advantage

• Sodium is abundant, geographically diversified, and low-cost, reducing critical mineral dependence and exposure to global commodity volatility.

Current Collectors

• Na-ion uses aluminium for both electrodes, unlike Li-ion which needs copper on anode, lowering cost, weight, and corrosion-related risks.

Energy Density

Specific Energy (Wh/kg)

• Specific energy measures energy stored per unit mass; Na-ion is lower because sodium atoms are heavier than lithium, affecting weight-to-energy ratio.

Practical Gap

• Performance gap narrows when cell design optimises other components’ weight, and some Na-ion chemistries approach lithium iron phosphate (LFP) levels.

Safety Characteristics

Thermal Stability

• Sodium-ion cells show lower peak temperatures during thermal runaway, reducing fire and explosion risks compared to conventional lithium-ion cells.

Transport Safety

• Li-ion is classified as Dangerous Goods requiring charge limits during transport, while Na-ion can be stored at zero volts safely without degradation.

Manufacturing Compatibility

Production Lines

• Existing lithium-ion factories can be adapted for sodium-ion with minor changes, lowering capital barriers and enabling dual-chemistry production flexibility.

Moisture Sensitivity

• Na-ion requires deeper vacuum drying during production because residual moisture affects performance more strongly than in lithium-ion cells.

Global Industry Status

Capacity Trends

• Around 70 GWh Na-ion capacity exists globally (2025), projected to reach nearly 400 GWh by 2030, indicating commercial-scale momentum.

Cost Outlook

• Long-term projections indicate Na-ion could undercut Li-ion costs by 2035, especially for stationary storage and low-range mobility segments.

Indian Policy Context

PLI Scheme

• India’s PLI for Advanced Chemistry Cells (2021) allocated ~40 GWh capacity but is currently lithium-focused, with limited upstream mineral processing ecosystem.

Import Dependence

• Limited domestic lithium reserves and refining capacity mean continued import reliance, increasing strategic vulnerability.

Application Suitability

Best Use Cases

• Sodium-ion suits grid storage, two- and three-wheelers, and stationary applications, where cost, safety, and cycle life matter more than ultra-high energy density.

Strategic Significance for India

Energy Security

• Sodium-based systems reduce reliance on imported critical minerals, strengthening long-term supply chain resilience.

Industrial Opportunity

• Early adoption can help India build domestic battery manufacturing ecosystem, avoiding late-entry disadvantage seen in lithium-ion sector.

Way Forward

Policy Support

• Technology-neutral incentives, R&D funding, and standards recognition can support diversified battery ecosystem.

Ecosystem Development

• Developing domestic materials, components, and recycling infrastructure is key for long-term sustainability.

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Motion of Thanks in Parliament 

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Context

Recent Instance

• Lok Sabha passed the Motion of Thanks on the President’s Address amid Opposition protests and adjournments, with debate continuing despite Prime Minister’s absence during part of the discussion.

Procedural Significance

• The episode renewed attention on parliamentary conventions, executive accountability, and rules governing the Motion of Thanks, a key constitutional practice in India’s Parliament.

President’s Address — Constitutional Basis

Article 87

• Article 87 of the Constitution mandates the President to address both Houses at the first session after each general election and at the first session each year.

Purpose of Address

• The address outlines the government’s policies, priorities, and legislative agenda, functioning as a statement of intent by the executive to Parliament.

Motion of Thanks 

What is Motion of Thanks ?

• Motion of Thanks is a formal parliamentary motion moved in each House to thank the President for the Address and discuss its contents.

Nature of Discussion

• Debate allows MPs to critique government policies, omissions, and achievements, making it one of the widest-ranging discussions in Parliament.

Procedural Features

Moving and Seconding

• The motion is moved and seconded by ruling party MPs, after which members across parties participate in debate and propose amendments.

Amendments

• MPs may move amendments highlighting policy failures or omissions; adoption of an amendment symbolically signals political disapproval of government.

Prime Minister’s Reply

• Conventionally, the Prime Minister replies to the debate, addressing issues raised; this reply represents the government’s official response.

Political and Constitutional Importance

Confidence Dimension

• Though not formally a no-confidence motion, defeat of Motion of Thanks is seen as serious political setback indicating loss of majority support.

Accountability Tool

• Provides early-session platform for executive accountability, allowing Parliament to review government’s agenda.

Role of Speaker and House Discipline

Speaker’s Authority

• Speaker regulates proceedings, maintains order, and may adjourn House during disorder, ensuring decorum under Rules of Procedure.

Parliamentary Privilege

• Disruptions, slogan-shouting, or entering the Well of the House may be treated as breach of decorum and privilege, though political protests are common.

Conventions vs Rules

Conventions

• PM’s presence during debate and reply is a strong convention, but Constitution does not legally mandate continuous presence during entire discussion.

Democratic Norms

• Parliamentary democracy relies on mutual respect, debate, and dissent, not only numerical majority.

Comparative Perspective

Westminster Model

• Motion of Thanks originates from British parliamentary practice, where monarch’s speech is similarly debated.

Broader Democratic Significance

Deliberative Democracy

• Motion of Thanks embodies deliberative democracy, enabling comprehensive policy review at start of parliamentary year.

Opposition’s Role

• Opposition uses debate to highlight governance gaps and represent alternative viewpoints, strengthening democratic scrutiny.

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Artificial Intelligence Racing Ahead of Regulation

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Context 

Global Governance Push

• The United Nations announced an Independent International Scientific Panel on AI to guide global governance, reflecting rising concern over AI’s cross-border risks and uneven national regulations.

Technological Leap

• Simultaneously, emergence of bot-only platforms like Moltbook, where AI agents interact without humans, signals rapid evolution of autonomous digital ecosystems beyond traditional regulatory control.

Artificial Intelligence  

What is AI ?

• Artificial Intelligence refers to computer systems performing tasks requiring human intelligence, including learning, reasoning, language processing, perception, and decision-making.

Core Subfields

• AI includes machine learning, deep learning, natural language processing, and computer vision, which enable pattern recognition and adaptive performance from data.

AI Governance

Meaning

• AI governance involves laws, policies, standards, and ethical norms guiding AI development and deployment to ensure safety, fairness, accountability, and transparency.

Why Needed ?

• Because AI affects economies, elections, security, and rights, unregulated systems can produce large-scale societal harm or cross-border externalities.

Global Governance Frameworks

UN Role

• The UN acts as a multilateral platform for norm-setting, similar to climate or nuclear governance, aiming for shared principles rather than binding global AI laws.

Pact for the Future

• The panel is mandated under the UN’s Pact for the Future, focusing on science-based advice for global public goods and emerging technologies.

AI Race — Strategic Dimension

Geopolitical Competition

• Countries view AI as strategic infrastructure influencing economic power, military capability, and technological leadership, intensifying global competition.

Investment Surge

• Massive public and private investments in AI reflect its role in productivity growth, digital economy, and national security systems.

Risks Associated with AI

Misinformation

• Generative AI can create deepfakes, synthetic media, and automated propaganda, complicating information integrity and democratic processes.

Labour Disruption

• Automation threatens routine cognitive and manual jobs, creating transitional unemployment and skill mismatches.

Surveillance

• AI-powered analytics enable mass surveillance and profiling, raising civil liberty and privacy concerns.

Bias and Ethics

• Algorithms trained on biased data can produce discriminatory outcomes, affecting fairness in hiring, lending, and policing.

AI Agents — Basic Concept

What are AI Agents ?

• AI agents are autonomous software entities capable of perceiving environments, making decisions, and performing tasks with minimal human intervention.

Functional Scope

• They handle tasks like document drafting, data analysis, scheduling, and system coordination, increasingly acting as digital assistants.

Bot-to-Bot Ecosystems

Concept

• Bot-only platforms allow AI-to-AI communication, where agents post, evaluate, and respond to each other without human participation.

Significance

• Such spaces test how AI systems behave collectively, raising questions about control, accountability, and emergent behaviours.

Regulation vs Innovation Gap

Pace Mismatch

• Technology evolves faster than law-making because policy processes require consensus, consultation, and legislative cycles, while AI innovation is market-driven and rapid.

Jurisdiction Limits

• Digital systems operate across borders, making national regulations insufficient for global AI platforms.

Ethical and Societal Dimension

Human Oversight

• Ethical AI emphasises human-in-the-loop decision-making, ensuring accountability and value alignment.

Digital Autonomy Risks

• Fully autonomous systems risk reduced human control and opaque decision chains, challenging traditional liability frameworks.

Way Forward 

Multi-Stakeholder Governance

• Effective governance requires cooperation among states, industry, academia, and civil society.

Principle-Based Regulation

• Safety, transparency, accountability, and fairness can serve as core guiding principles even amid rapid innovation.

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India AI Stack 

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Context

Policy Push

• India is advancing a population-scale AI Stack under the IndiaAI Mission, integrating data, models, compute, infrastructure, and energy to democratise AI and reduce dependence on foreign ecosystems.

Development Significance

• The AI stack approach positions AI as public digital infrastructure, similar to Aadhaar or UPI, aiming to deliver inclusive, sovereign, and scalable AI-led development.

AI Stack — Basic Concept

What is an AI Stack ?

• An AI stack is the end-to-end ecosystem of technologies and infrastructure required to build, train, deploy, and scale AI applications from data collection to user delivery.

Purpose

• It ensures AI systems are scalable, reliable, and deployable at population level, converting research innovations into real-world services across sectors.

Layer 1 — Application Layer

Meaning

• The application layer includes user-facing AI services such as chatbots, diagnostics tools, translation apps, and advisory platforms that convert AI capability into usable solutions.

Agriculture Use

• AI advisories support crop planning, pest control, and input optimisation, with state deployments reporting productivity gains of 30–50%, improving farm incomes and resource efficiency.

Healthcare Use

• AI supports early detection of TB, cancers, and neurological disorders, strengthening preventive healthcare and reducing diagnostic delays in resource-constrained regions.

Education Use

• AI integration through NEP 2020, DIKSHA, and YUVAi promotes digital and AI literacy, preparing students for future technology-driven labour markets.

Governance Use

• AI in e-Courts Phase III and IMD forecasting improves translation, case management, and disaster prediction, enhancing transparency and citizen service delivery.

Layer 2 — AI Model Layer

Meaning

• The model layer is the core intelligence layer, where algorithms learn patterns from data to generate predictions, language processing, recognition, and decision support.

Sovereign Models

• India is developing indigenous foundation and multimodal models to ensure cultural, linguistic, and policy alignment rather than relying solely on foreign-trained models.

IndiaAIKosh

• IndiaAIKosh hosts 5,700+ datasets and 250+ models, serving as national AI repository to support startups, research, and public-sector innovation.

Language Inclusion

• Platforms like Bhashini and Sarvam AI strengthen Indian-language AI, enabling voice interfaces and multilingual governance services in a linguistically diverse country.

Layer 3 — Compute Layer

Meaning

• Compute layer provides high-performance processing power needed to train large AI models using GPUs, TPUs, and specialised AI chips.

IndiaAI Compute

• The IndiaAI Compute Portal offers 38,000 GPUs and 1,050 TPUs at subsidised rates, lowering entry barriers for startups and academic institutions.

Supercomputing

• Systems like PARAM Siddhi-AI and AIRAWAT support NLP, climate modelling, and drug discovery, strengthening domestic research capacity.

Semiconductor Push

• The ₹76,000 crore Semiconductor Mission and indigenous processors like SHAKTI and VEGA aim to build long-term hardware self-reliance.

Layer 4 — Data Centres & Networks

Meaning

• This layer includes data centres, broadband, fibre networks, and 5G, enabling fast data transfer and reliable AI deployment.

Connectivity Scale

• 5G covers 99.9% districts and 85% population, supporting real-time AI services and IoT-based applications.

Data Centre Capacity

• India holds ~960 MW capacity (3% global share), projected to reach 9.2 GW by 2030, reflecting AI-driven infrastructure growth.

Investment Momentum

• Large investments by global firms in Indian data centres strengthen digital sovereignty and domestic hosting of AI workloads.

Layer 5 — Energy Layer

Meaning

• AI systems require continuous, high-volume electricity, making energy reliability and affordability critical for AI scaling.

Power Availability

• India’s installed capacity exceeds 500 GW, with energy shortages at only 0.03%, ensuring reliable power for data centres.

Clean Energy Link

• Over 51% capacity from non-fossil sources aligns AI growth with climate commitments and sustainable development.

Grid Stability

• Pumped storage and battery systems enhance grid flexibility, supporting AI centres operating alongside renewable energy variability.

Strategic Significance

Digital Sovereignty

• A domestic AI stack reduces reliance on foreign platforms, ensuring data control, regulatory alignment, and strategic autonomy.

Inclusive Growth

• Population-scale AI enables targeted welfare delivery, productivity gains, and service efficiency, supporting inclusive development.

Way Forward 

Ecosystem Integration

• Success requires coordination across policy, research, industry, and energy sectors to prevent siloed AI growth.

Responsible AI

• Ethical safeguards, data protection, and transparency are essential to maintain public trust and fairness in AI deployment.

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