In the Lok Sabha, the Taxation and Other Laws ( Amendment) Bill, 2026 is listed for consideration and passing in today’s business of the House. The Bill seeks to amend the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007, the Income-tax Act, 2025, and the Finance Act, 2026.

In the Rajya Sabha, the Appropriation (No.3) Bill, 2026 is listed in the business of the House for consideration and return. The legislation provides for the authorisation of appropriation of moneys out of the Consolidated Fund of India to meet the amounts spent on certain services during the financial year ended on the 31st of March, 2023, in excess of the amounts granted for those services and for that year. The Lok Sabha has already given its approval to the Bill.

Marking the United Nations' declaration of 2026 as the International Year of Women Farmers, the Tamil Nadu government has unveiled a series of women-centric initiatives in the revised agriculture budget for 2026-27, led by the launch of the "Vetri Vaanmagal" Scheme to create a new cadre of women drone operators in agriculture.

Under the flagship scheme, 500 eligible persons, including 100 women, will be imparted drone operator training and awarded drone pilot licences through the Remote Pilot Training Organisation of the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University at a cost of Rs 1.50 crore. Of the trained candidates, 50 women will receive agricultural drones with a 50 per cent subsidy, for which Rs 2.50 crore has been earmarked. The government said the initiative would help women undertake fertiliser and pesticide spraying, crop monitoring and other precision farming operations while addressing the shortage of farm labour.

Rashtrapati Bhavan is auctioning 300 selected gift items, presented to President Droupadi Murmu during her official engagements, through an online portal called E-Upahaar from today. In a social media post, President Murmu said that the bidding will be open till 5th of next month. Interested persons can place their bids on the portal upahaar.rashtrapatibhavan.gov.in. All proceeds from the auction will be used for social cause.

Indian Railways has approved modifications in the Model Concession Agreement. Under this, Container Train Operators, or CTOs, will now be permitted to run container trains on all routes across the Indian Railways network under a single All India licence, with a uniform registration fee of 25 crore rupees. The government has also removed the earlier system of separate permissions and fees for different route categories.

The Ministry further informed that the approved amendments provide that the permission granted to a Container Train Operator may be extended for a further period of 20 years after its expiry.

The Ministry said the uniform registration fee and removal of extension fees are expected to reduce regulatory costs and simplify the approval process, encouraging greater private participation and expansion of container train operations. It added that a higher shift of container traffic from road to rail will help ease highway congestion, reduce fuel consumption and carbon emissions, and promote sustainable freight transportation. The approved amendments also provide for the extension of a Container Train Operator’s permission for a further period of 20 years after its expiry.

The government on Monday introduced the Indian Statistical Institute Bill, 2026 in the Lok Sabha, proposing a new legal framework for the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) with a sharper focus on data science, frontier technologies and industry collaboration as India seeks to build a stronger data-driven economy.

The Bill seeks to replace the Indian Statistical Institute Act, 1959, while retaining ISI's status as an Institution of National Importance.

It proposes converting the existing society into a statutory body corporate with greater administrative and financial autonomy.

According to the Bill, the objective is to expand the institute's role beyond traditional statistics to create an ecosystem of high-quality statisticians and data scientists capable of supporting evidence-based policymaking through frontier technologies.

The Government has extended the tenure of Dr. T.V. Somanathan as the Cabinet Secretary by one year. The Appointments Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) has approved the one-year extension in the service of Dr. T.V. Somanathan, as Cabinet Secretary beyond 30 August 2026.

The ACC has also approved the tenure extension of Govind Mohan as the Home Secretary by one year.

On the occasion of International Clouded Leopard Day, India has reaffirmed its commitment to the conservation of one of Asia’s most elusive wild cats through the newly launched Clouded Leopard Conservation Action Plan (CAP). The action plan provides a comprehensive framework for securing habitats, restoring forest connectivity, strengthening scientific monitoring and empowering local communities for conservation of the species. Ministry of Environment, Forest, Climate Change noted that the action plan focuses on Habitat Protection, Scientific Monitoring, Landscape Connectivity and Community Participation across Northeast India.

The Ministry further added that a key component of the Action Plan is the identification of fourteen priority conservation landscapes across Northeast India, along with landscape-scale habitat restoration and corridor conservation to strengthen connectivity between forest habitats. It said that CAP provides for standardised scientific monitoring and promotes community-based conservation and sustainable livelihood support. Further, the action plan integrates climate resilience and adaptive management into conservation planning, strengthening the long-term resilience of Clouded Leopard habitats and landscapes.

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has projected GDP growth to 6.7 percent in this fiscal year, deciding to keep the Repo rate unchanged at 5.25 percent with neutral stance. RBI Governor Sanjay Malhotra has said that country’s economic growth continues to be supported by resilient demand and it remains world’s fastest growing large economy. He said, country’s economy has performed better than expected in April-June quarter of this fiscal year.

Announcing the Monetary Policy Committee’s decision today, Mr. Malhotra said, RBI has decided to keep repo rate unchanged at 5.25 percent and retained a neutral stance. Repo rate is the interest rate at which the central bank lends short-term money to commercial banks against government securities.

He said, RBI has lowered CPI inflation projection to 5 percent from earlier estimate of 5.1 percent for financial year 2027. The Governor said the recent rise in inflation was largely driven by food and fuel prices rather than broad-based demand pressures.

The 13th BRICS Education Ministers’ Meeting and the 3rd BRICS Senior Officials’ Meeting will be held from today till August 7 in Bhubaneswar, Odisha. The Education Ministry said that these meetings will bring together education ministers, senior officials and delegates from BRICS member countries.

During the meeting, they will deliberate on the topics of collaboration, including the following priority areas such as strengthening early childhood care and education, strengthening skill development and enhanced cooperation and promoting collaborative research, innovation and start-ups. Union Education Minister Prahlad Joshi will participate in the 13th BRICS Education Ministers’ Meeting.

The Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) has developed India's first fully annotated telomere-to-telomere (T2T) reference genome of pigeonpea (matar), which is expected to speed up the development of climate-resilient, high-yielding and nutritionally superior varieties of the country's second most important pulse crop.

As per reports, telomere-to-telomere sequencing is an advanced DNA sequencing and assembly method that creates complete, gap-free genomic sequences from one end of a chromosome to the other.

The genome sequence of the pigeonpea variety named 'Asha' has also been approved as the global reference genome, making it India's first fully annotated T2T reference genome for the crop, an official statement said.