Daily Current Affairs | March 5 2025 |

1) AI for Criminal Justice

• After USA’s $100 billion Stargate AI initiative & China’s stride with DeepSeek AI, the global AI race is on between countries.

• India needs to make significant investments to catch-up as AI is now touching each and every aspect of personal & public life.

• Like the expansion of the internet and cyber technology, AI’s impact on crime and crime control is inevitable.

AI in Crime

• Policing - Predictive Policing under SMART policing initiative, facial recognition tech, AI chatbots in police stations & e-FIR system.

• Cybercrime Detection - AI-Driven Fraud Monitoring System by RBI, AI Deepfake Detection tools, AI-Driven Virus & Malware detection softwares.

• Judiciary - Supreme Court’s SUPACE (AI assistant for Judges), e-Court project for document management, AI for fraud detection in documents.

Issues with AI in Criminal Justice

• AI Biases - AI-driven risk assessment models in the US, like COMPAS (Correctional Offender Management Profiling for Alternative Sanctions), have faced racial bias issues. India must ensure bias-free AI training data.

• Data Privacy - These AI models are trained on people’s data and hence a proper data privacy regime needs to be in place.

• Need for a Legal Framework for AI - The B.N. Srikrishna Committee on AI Governance has emphasised the need for a legal framework for AI in the judiciary. This legal framework shall establish guardrails for AI to prevent its misuse.

2) Shram Yogi Mandhaan Scheme

• The Pradhan Mantri Shram Yogi Maandhan (PM-SYM) is a pension scheme launched by the Government of India to provide financial security to workers in the unorganised sector.

• It is a voluntary and contributory scheme that guarantees a minimum monthly pension of ₹3,000 after the age of 60 to workers earning up to ₹15,000 per month.

• Launched in the Interim Budget of 2019.

Other Features

• Administered by the Ministry of Labour and Employment in collaboration with LIC and Common Service Centres.

• Govt’s contribution, matches the worker’s contribution on a 1:1 basis. Contribution amount depends on the worker’s age at the time of enrolment.

• Enrolment is facilitated through CSCs & Mandhan portal. Offers flexible exit options.

• Not eligible - Income taxpayers, EPFO subscribers, NPS subscribers etc.

3) Supply Shortage of Gum Arabic

• About 70% of the world’s supply of gum arabic, for which there are few substitutes, comes from the acacia trees in the Sahel region that runs through Africa’s third-largest country, which is being torn apart by Civil War.

• Gum Arabic is a key ingredient in everything from fizzy drinks to candy and cosmetics, and has no viable substitute.

• Major companies like Coca-Cola and PepsiCo face potential shortages in the coming months.

About Gum Arabic

• It is a natural resin derived from the Acacia trees found in the Sahel region of Africa.

• It is used as a stabiliser, emulsifier, and thickening agent in various industries.

• Sudan caters to 70% of the global demand.

• Applications - Food & Beverages, Cosmetics, Binding agent in medicines & capsules, Used in inks & dyes.

4) NASA's PUNCH Mission

• NASA is set to launch its latest solar mission from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

• Polarimeter to Unify the Corona & Heliosphere (PUNCH), will be the 3rd major solar mission to be launched in the past 18 months.

• The increase in the number of solar missions is no coincidence. The reason behind this has to do with the solar cycle.

About the Mission

• PUNCH is a first-of-its-kind solar mission that will study the solar corona — the outermost layer of the Sun’s atmosphere.

• Four identical suitcase-sized satellites will continuously image the Sun’s inner corona and provide origins of solar flares, etc.

• This constellation of 4 satellites will be sent in Low Earth Orbit and shall weigh 64 Kg each.

Why so many Solar Missions in the recent past ?

• Solar Cycle - Every 11 years or so, the Sun’s magnetic field completely flips, meaning its north and south poles switch places. This periodic change is known as the solar cycle.

• Sun is at its most active when the magnetic field flips. This phase is called the solar maxima and during this time sunspot activity and solar flares increase.

• After the flip, the star calms down until it reaches the solar minima, and a new cycle begins.

• The present solar activity and number of sunspots suggest that this cycle may be nearing its maxima, though the official confirmation of the same is yet to be made.

• The solar maximum is the best possible window available for physicists to both launch and observe the sun. This explains the launch of so many solar missions.