Big events of 2023: current affairs for CUET

On 11 December 2023 the Supreme Court upheld the decision of 5 August 2019 to abrogate Article 370, which had given Jammu and Kashmir special status. The Prime Minister called the verdict historic, saying it constitutionally upheld Parliament's decision. The Home Minister said it showed the abrogation was entirely constitutional.

The Constitution (One Hundred and Sixth Amendment) Act, 2023 — the Nari Shakti Vandan Adhiniyam — received the President's assent on 28 September 2023. It reserves, by rotation, one-third of seats for women in the Lok Sabha and in every State Legislative Assembly, including Delhi's. The Lok Sabha passed the Bill with 454 votes in favour and 2 against, and the Rajya Sabha passed it unanimously. It takes effect after the first census and delimitation that follow it.

Parliament enacted the Digital Personal Data Protection Act on 11 August 2023, India's first full law on protecting digital personal data. It places duties on 'data fiduciaries' that handle the data, sets out the rights and duties of 'data principals' whose data it is, and creates the Data Protection Board of India. Its rules were notified on 14 November 2025, making the Act fully operational.

On 28 May 2023 the Prime Minister dedicated the new Parliament House in New Delhi to the nation. Earlier that day he installed the Sengol — a sceptre that, in the Chola tradition, stood for the path of service and duty, and that with the guidance of Rajaji and the Adheenams became a symbol of the transfer of power in 1947 — in the Lok Sabha chamber.

On 17 September 2023, Vishwakarma Jayanti, the Prime Minister launched PM Vishwakarma, a central sector scheme with an outlay of ₹13,000 crore from 2023-24 to 2027-28 for artisans and craftspeople in 18 traditional trades. It offers recognition through a certificate and ID card, skill training with a stipend of ₹500 a day, a toolkit incentive, and collateral-free loans of up to ₹3 lakh in two tranches at a concessional 5 per cent interest. It is run by the Ministry of MSME.

On 31 December 2023 the government, with the President's approval, constituted the Sixteenth Finance Commission under Article 280(1) of the Constitution, with Dr Arvind Panagariya — former Vice-Chairman of NITI Aayog and a professor at Columbia University — as Chairman. It was asked to report by 31 October 2025 on the sharing of taxes between the Union and the states for the five years from 1 April 2026.

On 19 May 2023 the Reserve Bank of India decided to withdraw ₹2000 banknotes from circulation, under its 'clean note' policy, while keeping them legal tender. The note had been introduced in November 2016 under Section 24(1) of the RBI Act, 1934, to meet the economy's currency needs quickly after the old ₹500 and ₹1000 notes lost legal tender status. Banks exchanged the notes until 7 October 2023; after that, only the RBI's issue offices did.

On 21 February 2023 the real-time payment systems of India and Singapore — UPI and PayNow — were linked, with the two Prime Ministers joining the launch virtually. The RBI Governor and the Managing Director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore made the first live cross-border transfers on their phones. Singapore was the first country with which a person-to-person UPI payment link was launched, making remittances faster and cheaper.

At the extended 45th session of the World Heritage Committee in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, India had two sites inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in two days. Santiniketan in West Bengal, the ashram that Rabindranath Tagore turned into a school and centre for art, became India's 41st World Heritage site on 17 September 2023. On 18 September the Sacred Ensembles of the Hoysalas followed as the 42nd: three 13th-century temples in Karnataka, the Channakeshava temple at Belur, the Hoysaleshvara temple at Halebidu and the Keshava temple at Somanathapura.

That left India with 42 World Heritage properties — 34 cultural, 7 natural and 1 mixed — the sixth-largest number of any country.

India hosted the G20 Leaders' Summit in New Delhi on 9–10 September 2023, under the theme 'Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam — One Earth, One Family, One Future'. The African Union, representing 55 countries, was admitted as a permanent member, and the New Delhi Leaders' Declaration was adopted unanimously by all members. India handed the presidency to Brazil at the end of its year.

On the sidelines of the G20 Summit in New Delhi on 9 September 2023, the Prime Minister launched the Global Biofuels Alliance with the leaders of the United States, Brazil, Italy, Argentina, Singapore, Bangladesh, Mauritius and the UAE, as an initiative of India's presidency. Nineteen countries and twelve international organisations agreed to join. The alliance is meant to speed up the adoption of sustainable biofuels through capacity building, technical support and shared policy lessons.

The 23rd Summit of the SCO Council of Heads of State was held in virtual format on 4 July 2023, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi — India had taken the rotating chair at Samarkand in September 2022. Its theme was 'Towards a SECURE SCO', an acronym the Prime Minister had coined in 2018. At this summit Iran was admitted as a full member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.

According to UN population data presented on 24 April 2023, India's population was expected to reach 1,425,775,850 by the end of April 2023, matching and then passing that of mainland China, making India the world's most populous country.

On 21 October 2023 ISRO flew TV-D1, the first test vehicle mission of Gaganyaan, India's human spaceflight programme, from Sriharikota. A single-engine rocket carried an early, unpressurised version of the crew module to about 17 km, where the crew escape system pulled it clear in an abort; the module came down under parachutes into the Bay of Bengal and was recovered. It tested the system that would save a crew if a launch failed.

On 23 August 2023 Chandrayaan-3's Vikram lander made a soft landing on the Moon and deployed the Pragyan rover. India became the fourth country to land on the Moon and the first to land near its southern polar region. The landing site was named the 'Shiv Shakti' point, and 23 August was declared National Space Day. The mission had been launched on 14 July 2023 by an LVM3 rocket from Sriharikota.

On 19 April 2023 the Union Cabinet approved the National Quantum Mission at a cost of ₹6,003.65 crore, from 2023-24 to 2030-31. It aims to build intermediate-scale quantum computers with 50 to 1,000 physical qubits in eight years, and satellite-based secure quantum communication between ground stations 2,000 km apart within India. It is run by the Department of Science and Technology.

The UN Climate Change Conference COP28 closed in Dubai, UAE, on 13 December 2023 with the first 'global stocktake' of progress under the Paris Agreement. Nearly 200 parties agreed on transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems in a just, orderly and equitable way — the first COP text to name fossil fuels — along with a phase-down of unabated coal power. UN Climate Change's Executive Secretary called it the beginning of the end of the fossil fuel era.

At Mysuru on 9 April 2023, marking fifty years of Project Tiger, the Prime Minister released the summary of the fifth All India Tiger Estimation (2022), which put India's tiger population at a minimum of 3,167. He also launched the International Big Cat Alliance, for the conservation of seven big cats: tiger, lion, leopard, snow leopard, cheetah, jaguar and puma. A commemorative coin was released for the anniversary.

Australia won the ICC Men's Cricket World Cup for a sixth time on 19 November 2023, beating hosts India by six wickets in the final at the Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad. Travis Head scored 137. India had reached the final unbeaten; Australia had lost their first two and then won nine in a row. Australia's earlier titles came in 1987, 1999, 2003, 2007 and 2015.

The 4th Asian Para Games were held at Hangzhou, China, from 22 to 28 October 2023, with 44 countries taking part. India won a record 111 medals, 29 of them gold, passing every earlier haul; athletics alone brought 55 medals, including 18 golds. The Asian Para Games are recognised by the International Paralympic Committee and are held in the same city as the Asian Games, though they are organised separately.

On 16 October 2023 the 141st Session of the International Olympic Committee, meeting in Mumbai, added five sports to the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic programme: baseball/softball, cricket (T20), flag football, lacrosse (sixes) and squash. They were proposed by the LA28 organisers for that edition only. Cricket and lacrosse return after more than a century; flag football and squash make their Olympic debut.

India finished the 19th Asian Games at Hangzhou, China, on 8 October 2023 with 107 medals — 28 gold, 38 silver and 41 bronze — its highest tally ever, well past the 70 won at Jakarta–Palembang in 2018. The Prime Minister called it the country's best Asian Games performance in 60 years. Athletics gave the most medals (29), followed by shooting (22) and archery (9).

At the World Athletics Championships in Budapest, Hungary, Neeraj Chopra won the men's javelin on 27 August 2023 with a second-round throw of 88.17 m. It was India's first gold in any event at the championships, two years after he became the country's first Olympic champion in athletics. Pakistan's Arshad Nadeem took silver with 87.82 m, and two more Indians, Kishore Jena and DP Manu, finished fifth and sixth — the first time three Indians reached a javelin final at the championships.

On 20 December 2023 the Sports Ministry announced the National Sports Awards 2023. The Major Dhyan Chand Khel Ratna went to the badminton doubles pair Chirag Shetty and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy, both honoured because their achievement was a team one. Twenty-six sportspersons got the Arjuna Award, among them the cricketer Mohammed Shami, the chess player R. Vaishali and the para-archer Sheetal Devi. The President gave the awards at Rashtrapati Bhavan on 9 January 2024.

The 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine went to Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman for the work that made mRNA vaccines against COVID-19 possible. Physics went to Pierre Agostini, Ferenc Krausz and Anne L'Huillier for attosecond pulses of light; Chemistry to Moungi Bawendi, Louis Brus and Alexei Ekimov for quantum dots; Literature to the Norwegian writer Jon Fosse; and Economics to Claudia Goldin, for her work on women's labour-market outcomes. On 6 October the Peace Prize was awarded to Narges Mohammadi, imprisoned in Iran, for her fight against the oppression of women there.

On 26 September 2023 the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting announced that Waheeda Rehman would receive the Dadasaheb Phalke Lifetime Achievement Award for 2021, the 53rd. Her films include Pyaasa, Kaagaz ke Phool, Chaudhvin Ka Chand, Saheb Biwi Aur Ghulam, Guide and Khamoshi, and she won the National Award for Best Actress for Reshma aur Shera. A Padma Shri (1972) and Padma Bhushan (2011) awardee, she worked in more than 90 films over five decades. The award was presented at the 69th National Film Awards.