# Supreme Court

• The Supreme Court on Monday orally observed that it is “contrary to law” to identify religious and linguistic minorities district wise.
• A bench of Justices U. U Lalit and S. Ravindra bhat remarked that minority status of linguistic and religious communities has to be considered state wise.
• Court had indicated that a religious or linguistic community which were a minority in a particular state could inherently claim protection and the right to administer and run their own educational institutions under article 29 and 30 of the Constitution.

# Energy conservation bill

• The Lok sabha on Monday passed the energy conservation (amendment) bill, 2022, which provides for the establishment of carbon credit markets and brings large residential buildings under the energy conservation regime.
• The bill mandates the use of non-fossil sources, including green hydrogen, green ammonia, biomass, for energy and feedstock, according to the statement of objects and reasons.
• The lok sabha also passed the New Delhi International arbitration centre (amendment) bill 2022, which changed the name of the arbitration centre to the India international arbitration centre.

# Fake currency notes

• The value of counterfeit currency in the banking system reduced from ₹43.47 crore in 2016-17 to about ₹8.26 crore in 2021-22, amounting to a sharp decline of more than 80%, according to finance ministry reply in the Lok sabha on Monday.
• By national crime records bureau data, the value of fake currency seized by various enforcement agencies in 2017 was ₹28 crore. However, it shot up to ₹92.18 crore in 2020.

# Israel

• A ceasefire between Israel and Palestinian militants took effect late on Sunday in a bid to end nearly three days of violence that killed dozen of Palestinians including militants and disrupted the lives of hundreds of thousands of israelis.
• The flare up was the worst fighting between Israel and Gaza militant groups since Israel and Hamas fought an 11 day war last year.