In 2023, the National Congress Party (NCP) split after the party chief, Sharad Pawar’s nephew, Ajit Pawar decided to form an alliance with the BJP. In the 2024 state elections in Maharastra, the Congress Thackeray Sena-Sharad Pawar NCP (MVA) only won 46 seats whereas BJP-Shinde Sena-Ajit Pawar NCP (Mahayuti) coalition won 214 out of 288 seats

 Article 370 of the Indian Constitution was a provision that granted special autonomy to the region of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), which allowed the state to have its own Constitution, flag, and the authority to make laws on al matters except defense, foreign affairs, finance, and communications. In 2023, the Supreme Court of India upheld the abrogation of Article 370 by the Government of India.

Vairagya is the concept of non-attachment which means letting go of clinging to things, people, and outcomes.

Collective Salvation is the religious belief that members of a religious group collectively influence the salvation of the group to which they belong, while Individual Salvation is the religious belief that one solely influences their own salvation

The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), was formed in 2007, to oppose the Pakistani military, enforce strict interpretation of the Sharia law and diminish the Pakistan government’s influence in federally administered tribal areas.

In 2024 it caused over 685 fatalities through 444 attacks. In response, Pakistan launched military operations against TTP strongholds along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, pledging to "crush the TTP”.

Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is a Sunni Islamist rebel group in Syria. It emerged from a coalition of militant groups, including Jabhat al-Nusra, a former al-Qaeda affiliate. While HTS claims to have distanced itself from global jihadist networks, the U.S. designates it as a terrorist organization, and has targeted it with airstrikes numerous times. HTS, along with other Syrian opposition groups, toppled the Assad regime on 8 December 2024, and now controls most of the country.

The Darién Gap is a highly dangerous passage in Panama used by immigrants from Venezuela and Haiti on their way to the United States. In recent months, Panama signed an agreement with the Biden administration to deport all illegal immigrants back to their home countries before they enter Panama through the Darién Gap, withthe United States covering the logistical costs.

For the purposes of this debate, need based allocation refers to budgetary allocations based on the needs of a state (population size, poverty, level of inequality, etc.), while contribution based allocation refers to budgetary allocations based on the tax revenue that a state provides relative to the national tax revenue.

For the purposes of this debate, The ‘places of worship act’ freezes the religious identity of places of worship of each religion, and prevents the destruction of existing religious structures

In Criminal Justice, the American Rule for paying lawyer fees requires each party to pay its own lawyers, regardless of winning or losing a case.

On the other hand, the English Rule requires the losing party to pay the winner’s lawyer fees, alongwith their own lawyer fees.

A balance of probabilities" refers to a burden of proof of "more likely than unlikely", or 51%. That's in opposition to the burden of "beyond reasonable doubt", sometimes equivocated to 98% likelihood, in which the prosecution ought to prove guilt is overwhelmingly likely. In the status quo, criminal lawsuits require a burden of proof of "beyond reasonable doubt" to end in conviction, whereas civil lawsuits require a "balance of probabilities"

In common law, a binding precedent is a legal principle or rule established in a prior case that must be followed by a court when deciding a subsequent case with similar facts or legal issues. It is obligatory for lower courts to adhere to decisions made by higher courts within the same jurisdiction.

In contrast, a persuasive precedent is a decision from another court that is not binding but may influence a court's judgment. It can come from courts of equal or lower rank, courts in other jurisdictions, or even scholarly writings. While not mandatory, it is considered when it offers compelling reasoning or guidance on an unresolved legal issue

Pleasure marriages in Indonesia refers to temporary marriages that young women from poor backgrounds in Indonesia are entering into, with male tourists primarily from the Middle East, in exchange for money. 

There's a technology that enables people to erase all of their memories from a person in their lives. Before doing so, they are required to record in detail the history of their relationship with that person and the reasons for wanting to forget them. Recently, you began dating someone incredible with whom you feel a deep connection you have never experienced before with anyone else. Surprisingly, you both receive recordings that reveal to you that you have already been in a relationship in the past and you both chose to break up and delete the memories. The recording is both sweet as well as painful memories. 

Woke culture emphasizes addressing systemic injustices and inequalities by advocating for transformative action to challenge oppressive societal norms and structures, often including practices like holding individuals and institutions accountable through cancel culture, etc.  

Over the past decade, figure skating and gymnastics have adopted the code of points system that assigns values to individual elements based on their difficulty. This replaced the previous scoring systems (from 2006 onwards) which awarded scores to routines holistically considering the technical merit of the routine and its artistic elements based on composition, originality, style, and expression.

Disciplined art creation refers to treating art creation as a work routine. It is characterised by blocking regular time slots to work on art and having a plan of what you want to make. Spontaneous art creation refers to treating art creation as something that must be driven by natural drive. It ish characterised by spontenous outbursts of creation following periods of no work you are an artist who is relatively unknown and unable to make a living of your art. Hence, you work a low-skill job and focus on your art in your spare time

Freight equalisation policy was adopted by the government of India to facilitate the equal growth of industry all over India post independence. This meant a factor could be set up anywhere in India and the transportation of minerals from the extraction site to anywhere within India from which it could be processed or sold, would be subsidised by the union government