Prelims Focus 29th April 2026

29/04/2026

23 2 minutes read

Luzon Island

In News: China has staged naval exercises, including live-fire drills, east of the Philippines’ Luzon Island.

It is the largest and most important island of the Philippines.
It forms the northernmost part of the Philippine islands, it is washed by the Philippine Sea to the east, Sibuyan Sea to the south and South China Sea to the west.
To its north is the Luzon Strait, which separates Taiwan from Luzon.

CAR-T Cell Therapy

In News: Engineered T-cells can sense the “weak” signals emitted by cancer, providing a new approach to treatment for solid tumours, including kidney, ovarian and pancreatic cancer, researchers have just shown.

CAR T-cell therapy is an immunotherapy (using the body’s immune system to help treat disease).
This type of therapy uses a patient’s T cells (white blood cells that fight infection).
They produce a protein called a Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR).
When injected back into the body, the CAR T cells kill cancer cells.
Typically, CAR T cells will target the protein CD19 (found on B cells, which is expressed at higher levels in some types of blood cancers).

Nahargarh Wildlife Sanctuary

In News: The Rajasthan High Court (April 2026) set aside a National Board for Wildlife (NBWL) standing committee decision that denied wildlife clearance to the Kanha Hotels and Spa Pvt Ltd (Taj Amber) near Nahargarh Wildlife Sanctuary. The Court allowed the petition, treating the project as an “existing unit” with prior statutory approvals, overturning the Feb 2024 rejection.

Key Aspects of the High Court Decision:

“Existing Unit” Status: Justice Sameer Jain observed that the petitioner secured various approvals—including JDA approval in 2011, environment clearance in 2017, and Consent to Operate in 2022—before the Feb 2024 rejection, meaning it was not subject to the same restrictions as new constructions.
Arbitrary Rejection: The court found the NBWL standing committee’s rejection arbitrary, non-speaking, and made without giving the petitioner a proper opportunity to be heard, ignoring earlier statutory permissions.
Previous Site Report: The court relied on a March 2020 report by the Deputy Conservator of Forests, which had recommended wildlife clearance, noting no negative impact on the sanctuary.
Previous Legal Issues: The project, located ~97m from the sanctuary, had previously faced demolition threats in 2024 from the ESZ monitoring committee due to a 1km restriction on new constructions.