Current affairs, 13 August 2026: World Organ Donation Day, and Har Ghar Tiranga returns before the 80th Independence Day

Two items today, both the sort an awareness section reaches for in August: a health-and-important-days topic that is easy to get half-right, and the national-symbols material the run-up to Independence Day always brings. Each one links to its source, and for each we set out the concept an examiner would actually build a question around.

Important days: World Organ Donation Day, and the day India marks separately

13 August is observed around the world as World Organ Donation Day, a public-awareness day meant to encourage pledging and to clear up the myths that keep donation rates low. Pace Hospitals

The trap worth learning is that India has a separate national day. The Indian Organ Donation Day is marked on 3 August, moved to that date in 2023 to mark the anniversary of the country’s first successful deceased-donor heart transplant, done at AIIMS New Delhi on 3 August 1994; before 2023 it was held on 27 November. So a question that pairs a date with a name can offer both 13 August and 3 August, and only one of them is the Indian day. AffairsCloud

The concept being tested. The law and the machinery behind transplants in India.

• Organ donation is governed by the Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Act (THOTA), 1994 — enacted as the Transplantation of Human Organs Act in 1994 and renamed after the 2011 amendment brought human tissues within its scope. The Act permits donation by both living donors and brain-stem-dead donors, and it bans commercial dealing in organs.
• A point that recurs: the Act gives brain-stem death legal recognition as death, which is what makes deceased-donor transplantation possible in the first place.
• The apex body is the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation (NOTTO), under the Directorate General of Health Services, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. Below it sit the Regional (ROTTO) and State (SOTTO) organisations, a three-tier structure worth memorising as NOTTO to ROTTO to SOTTO. NOTTO FAQs

National: Har Ghar Tiranga returns, 9 to 17 August 2026

The Ministry of Culture is running Har Ghar Tiranga again, with citizens encouraged to hoist the national flag at home from 9 to 17 August 2026. Begun in 2022 under Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav, the 2026 edition is dedicated to the Spirit of Vande Mataram. Har Ghar Tiranga 2026, Ministry of Culture

The concept being tested. The National Flag and the code that governs it, a reliable static-GK block.

• The flag’s design is based on the one by Pingali Venkayya, and the design was adopted by the Constituent Assembly on 22 July 1947. It is a horizontal tricolour of saffron, white and green in a 3:2 ratio, with a navy-blue Ashoka Chakra of 24 spokes at the centre, taken from the Sarnath Lion Capital of Ashoka.
• Display is governed by the Flag Code of India, 2002. Two amendments are commonly tested: the 2021 change allowing flags made of polyester and by machine, alongside the earlier cotton, wool, silk and khadi; and a later change allowing the flag to be flown day and night when displayed in the open, where earlier it was sunrise to sunset.
• The flag must be treated with dignity, never allowed to touch the ground and never used as drapery — the kind of do-and-do-not detail a single-line question likes.

What to write in your notebook

Four lines:

1. World Organ Donation Day is 13 August (global); India’s own Organ Donation Day is 3 August, for the first deceased-donor heart transplant at AIIMS Delhi, 3 August 1994.
2. Transplants run under the THOTA, 1994 (tissues added by the 2011 amendment); it recognises brain-stem death and bans organ trade.
3. The apex body is NOTTO (under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare), with ROTTO regional and SOTTO state bodies below it.
4. Har Ghar Tiranga runs 9 to 17 August 2026 (Ministry of Culture). The flag: Pingali Venkayya design, adopted 22 July 1947, ratio 3:2, 24-spoke Ashoka Chakra; displayed under the Flag Code of India, 2002.