The Supreme Court abolished Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), the 1862 law which criminalised homosexuality. The Delhi High Court had decriminalised homosexuality in 2009, but the decision was overturned by the Supreme Court in 2013. According to Section 377, consensual sexual acts are also considered unnatural and are punishable.

On 5th September 2018, actor Akshay Kumar was made the first honorary ambassador of Lal Bahadur Shastri Memorial Foundation. Lal Bahadur Shastri Memorial Foundation was founded by the family of India’s second Prime Minister, Lal Bahadur Shastri. His grandson Vinamra Shastri, is the current president of the foundation. Akshay Kumar will support the ‘Jai Jawan Jai Kisan’ motto for the welfare of the soldier (jawan) and the farmer (kisan).

Recently, the Delta Force has celebrated its 25th Raising Day on September 6 in the memory of those who sacrificed their lives in the line of duty. It is the counter insurgency force of the Indian Army that has been instrumental in eliminating terrorism from the Chenab Valley and ushering peace in the region. Till date, the Force has been honoured with 1,380 Gallantry Awards including one Ashok Chakra, five Kirti Chakras and 46 Shaurya Chakras

The Mahatma Gandhi International Sanitation Convention (MGISC-2018) will be organized by the Union Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation in New Delhi from September 29 to mark the beginning of the 150th birth anniversary celebrations of Mahatma Gandhi. It will be a 4-day international conference that will bring together Sanitation Ministers and other leaders in WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) from around the world. The purpose of the Convention is to share sanitation success stories and lessons from the participating countries. It will culminate on October 2nd, Gandhi Jayanti, which is also celebrated as the Swachh Bharat Diwas. Several mass mobilisation events and campaigns are being planned across the States in the run up to this Day.

Andhra Pradesh, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh have been awarded the three best performing states under AMRUT (Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation) on Ease of Living Index.

The Rajasthan government has decided to provide free mobile phones to women of Below Poverty Line (BPL) families under the Bhamashah Yojana.

The Indo-Kazakhstan joint Army exercise ‘KAZIND 2018’ will be conducted between the Indian and Kazakhstan Army from 10 to 23 Sep 2018 in Otar region, Kazakhstan. This is the 3rd joint military exercise between the two countries which have a history of extensive cooperation in the defense arena. The aim of the 14-days exercise is to build and promote bilateral Army to Army relations and exchange skills and experiences between Kazakhstan Army and the Indian Army. The exercise will also serve as a platform for the exchange of drills and procedures. The conduct of the joint exercise will set the stage for greater defence cooperation and consequently, will manifest in stronger ties between the two great nations.

On September 6, 2018, the Odisha Assembly passed a resolution for establishing Legislative Council ( Vidhan Parishad or second House of legislature). As per the resolution, the proposed Council will function similar to the Rajya Sabha in Parliament and will have 49 members.

The International Executive Council, the highest decision making body of International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage (ICID), accorded Heritage Irrigation Structure (HIS) status on the 127-year-old Sadarmatt anicut and the iconic Pedda Cheruvu tank, located in Telangana.

The Reserve Bank of India asked all scheduled commercial banks with more than 10 branches to appoint an internal ombudsman. It has excluded regional rural banks (RRB) from its directive.

On 10th September 2018, Aegon Life Insurance appointed Ahmed Zackaria as the Chief Distribution Officer. As the Chief Distribution Officer, he will manage all the sales channels for the company. Earlier, he has worked with IndusInd Bank and ICICI Bank. Vineet Arora is the MD and CEO Aegon Life Insurance.

The Kempegowda International Airport (KIA) in Bengaluru is set to become the first airport in Asia to use face recognition as the boarding procedure for passengers to board flights and move across different sections of the airport. For this, the agreement was signed between Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL) & Portuguese software firm ‘Vision-Box’ in Lisbon to launch paperless biometric self-boarding technology. The first implementation milestone at Kempegowda will be completed in the first quarter of 2019, with Jet Airways, Air Asia and SpiceJet passengers as first users. The goal of the programme is to simplify the journey by making it paperless from registration to boarding. Biometric technology will identify passengers by their face as they move across the airport. The technology will avoid stops and the repeated presentation of boarding passes, passports or other physical identity documents.

The Delhi government has launched a scheme that will enable doorstep delivery of 40 essential government services such as caste and marriage certificates, driving license and new water connections in the first phase.

The Centre on September 6, 2018 decided to end the permit requirements for automobiles run on alternative fuel and electric vehicles. However, hybrid and mild hybrid vehicles will remain out of the purview of the decision and also electronic vehicles for personal use will not get additional incentives. Alternative fuels, known as non-conventional and advanced fuels like; ethanol, biodiesel, CNG, methanol and biofuels.

National Rail and Transportation Institute (NRTI), the first of its kind university on the transport sector in India, started has started functioning. National Rail and Transportation Institute (NRTI): India’s first railway varsity starts operations in Vadodara.At present it is functioning at the National Academy of Indian Railways, Vadodara. It is funded by Ministry of Railways. University of California, Berkeley and Cornell University are its international partners. It offers two undergraduate courses: BSc Transportation Technology and BBA Transportation Managements.

At the first-ever Women in Film and Television (WIFT-2018) India Award, Actress Aishwarya Rai Bachchan has been honoured with the Meryl Streep Award for Excellence in Washington, United States. The award was established to honour the best female talent in Bollywood and Hollywood. WIFT India is part of WIFT International, a network which promotes professional development and achievement for women in the film industry, video, and other screen-based media.

On September 11, the Haryana government signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) to set up an ethanol plant in Panipat with an outlay of over Rs 900 crore. The initiative at village Bohali with a proposed capacity of 100 kilolitres of ethanol per day will manage crop residue and prevent straw burning before the upcoming paddy season. The state Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare department will motivate the farmers in the 50 km radius of the plant to provide crop residue or feedstock on regular basis as raw material. The pact will be valid for one year.

The Union Home Ministry announced that the Census 2021 will for the first time collect data on Other Backwards Castes (OBC). The exercise will involve 25 lakh trained enumerators. The 2011 Census collected information in 29 categories that included a separate column for Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribes.

Jharkhand Chief Minister Raghubar Das was on a four-day visit to China at the invitation of the International Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC). He invited China to participate in food processing summit, which will be organised by Jharkhand Government in November.

The Bogibeel Bridge is a combined road and rail bridge over the Brahmaputra River in Assam, which is expected to complete at the end of 2018. Sited about 17 km downstream of Dibrugarh town, the 4.94km bridge will facilitate road and rail connectivity between the north and south banks of the Brahmaputra in the eastern part of Assam and Arunachal Pradesh. The bridge is 32m above the water level of the Brahmaputra and is fashioned on a bridge that links Sweden and Denmark. It has three lane roads on top and double line rail below. Upon completion, Bogibeel will be the longest rail-cum-road bridge in India and 2nd longest bridge over the Brahmaputra after Dhola-Sadiya Bridge which is a road bridge of length 9.15 km.

The government had also roped in Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan as brand ambassador to promote GST and inform people about its benefits.

COMCASA is an India-specific version of the Communication and Information on Security Memorandum of Agreement (CISMOA). The Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA) is one of the four foundational agreements that a country needs to sign to become a major defence partner of the United States. The agreement comes into effect immediately and has a lifespan of 10 years.