Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Indira Sawhney Case
Mains level: Creamy Layer Issue
The basis of exclusion of ‘creamy layer’ cannot be merely economic, a Supreme Court Bench has observed in their judgment, while referring to the court’s Indra Sawhney verdict of 1992.
What was the case?
- The court was hearing a petition challenging some notifications by the Haryana government sub-classifying backward classes solely on economic basis while fixing the criteria for creamy layer.
- The notifications said children of persons having “gross annual income” of up to ₹3 lakh annually would get the benefit of reservation in services and admission in educational institutions.
- The remaining quota would go to those from backward families, which earn between₹3 lakh and ₹6 lakh per annum.
- The sections earning over ₹6 lakh annually were considered as ‘creamy layer’ under Section 5 of the 2016 Act.
- The apex court held that the Haryana’s notifications have violated the law declared in the Indra Sawhney judgment by identifying creamy layer only on the basis of income.
Defying Indra Sawhney Verdict (1992)
- The case had declared that ‘creamy layer’ in a backward community should be excluded from reservation so that the more deserving were able to come up.
- Explaining this verdict, court said that such persons were to be treated as ‘creamy layer’ without any further inquiry.
Who else would be excluded from such reservation?
- Likewise, people with sufficient income who were in a position to provide employment to others should also be taken to have reached a higher social status and therefore, should be treated as outside the backward class.
- Similarly, persons from backward classes who had higher agricultural holdings or were receiving income from properties, beyond a prescribed limit, do not deserve the benefit of reservation.
Key takeaways from the Judgement
- The Supreme Court has held that the government cannot deny reservation to a person belonging to a backward community solely on the ground that he or she is rich.
- Social advancement, higher employment in government services, etc, played an equal role in deciding whether such a person belonged to the creamy layer and could be denied quota benefits.
- The court had illustrated that ‘creamy layer’ would include persons from backward classes who occupied posts in higher services like IAS, IPS, and All India Services.
- These persons had reached a higher level of social advancement and economic status,and therefore, were not entitled to be treated as backward.
What is the Creamy Layer?
- Creamy Layer is a concept that sets a threshold within which OBC reservation benefits are applicable.
- While there is a 27% quota for OBCs in government jobs and higher educational institutions, those falling within the “creamy layer” cannot get the benefits of this quota.
Basis of Creamy Layer
- It is based on the recommendation of the Second Backward Classes Commission (Mandal Commission).
- The government in 1990 had notified 27% reservation for Socially and Educationally Backward Classes (SEBCs) in vacancies in civil posts and services that are to be filled on direct recruitment.
- After this was challenged, the Supreme Court in the Indira Sawhney case (1992) upheld 27% reservation for OBCs, subject to exclusion of the creamy layer.
How is it determined?
- Following the order in Indra Sawhney, an expert committee headed by Justice (retired) R N Prasad was constituted for fixing the criteria for determining the creamy layer.
- In 1993, the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) listed out various categories of people of certain rank/status/income whose children cannot avail the benefit of OBC reservation.
- For those not in government, the current threshold is an income of Rs 8 lakh per year.
- For children of government employees, the threshold is based on their parents’ rank and not income.
- For instance, an individual is considered to fall within the creamy layer if either of his or her parents is in a constitutional post; if either parent has been directly recruited in Group-A; or if both parents are in Group-B services.
- If the parents enter Group-A through promotion before the age of 40, their children will be in the creamy layer.
- Children of a Colonel or higher-ranked officer in the Army, and children of officers of similar ranks in the Navy and Air Force, too, come under the creamy layer.
- Income from salaries or agricultural land is not clubbed while determining the creamy layer (2004).
Back2Basics: Indira Sawhney Case
In the famous Mandal case (Indra Sawhney Case, 1992), the scope and extent of Article 16(4), which provides for reservation of jobs in favor of backward classes, has been examined thoroughly by the Supreme Court.
- Though the Court has rejected the additional reservation of 10% for poorer sections of higher castes, it upheld the constitutional validity of a 27% reservation for the OBCs with certain conditions.
- The advanced sections among the OBCs (the creamy layer) should be excluded from the list of beneficiaries of reservation.
- No reservation in promotions; reservation should be confined to initial appointments only. Any existing reservation in promotions can continue for five years only (i.e., up to 1997).
- The total reserved quota should not exceed 50% except in some extraordinary situations. This rule should be applied every year.
- The ‘carry forward rule’ in case of unfilled (backlog) vacancies is valid. But it should not violate the 50% rule.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Immunities of ministers
Mains level: Parliamentary privileges
The Maharashtra Police has arrested the Union Minister for MSMEs for allegedly making derogatory remarks against the CM.
Procedure to arrest a Cabinet Minister
- If Parliament is not in session, a cabinet minister can be arrested by a law enforcement agency in case of a criminal case registered against him.
- As per Section 22 A of the Rules of Procedures and Conduct of Business of the Rajya Sabha, the Police, Judge, or Magistrate would, however, have to intimate the Chairman of the Rajya Sabha about the reason for the arrest, the place of detention or imprisonment in an appropriate form.
What is the procedure to be followed by the Chairman of the Rajya Sabha in case of an arrest?
- The Chairman is expected to inform the Council if it is sitting about the arrest.
- If the council is not sitting, he/she is expected to publish it in the bulletin for the information of the members.
What about the privileges of the Rajya Sabha members vis-a-vis arrests?
- As per the main privileges of Parliament, in civil cases, they have freedom from arrest during the continuance of the House and 40 days before its commencement and 40 days after its conclusion, as per section 135 of the Code of Civil Procedure.
- The privilege of freedom from arrest does not extend to criminal offences or cases of detention under preventive detention.
Can a person be arrested from the precincts of the House?
- No arrest, whether of a member or of a stranger, can be made within the precincts of the House without the prior permission of the Chairman/Speaker and that too in accordance with the procedure laid down by the Home Ministry in this regard.
- Similarly, no legal process, civil or criminal, can be served within the precincts of the House without obtaining the prior permission of the Chairman/Speaker whether the House is in session or not.
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Back2Basics: Parliamentary Privileges
- Article 105 and Article 194 grant privileges or advantages to the members of the parliament so that they can perform their duties or can function properly without any hindrances.
- Such privileges are granted as they are needed for democratic functioning.
- These powers, privileges, and immunities should be defined by the law from time to time.
- These privileges are considered special provisions and have an overriding effect in conflict.
Freedom from being arrested
- The member of parliament cannot be arrested 40 days before and 40 days after the session of the house.
- If in any case a member of Parliament is arrested within this period, the concerned person should be released in order to attend the session freely.
Right to exclude strangers from its proceedings and hold secret sessions
- The object of including this right was to exclude any chances of daunting or threatening any of the members.
- The strangers may attempt to interrupt the sessions.
Right to prohibit the publication of its reporters and proceedings
- The right has been granted to remove or delete any part of the proceedings that took place in the house.
Right to regulate internal proceedings
- The House has the right to regulate its own internal proceedings and also has the right to call for the session of the Legislative assembly.
- But it does not have any authority in interrupting the proceedings by directing the speaker of the assembly.
Right to punish members or outsiders for contempt
- This right has been given to every house of the Parliament.
- If any of its members or maybe non-members commit contempt or breach any of the privileges given to him/her, the houses may punish the person.
- The houses have the right to punish any person for any contempt made against the houses in the present or in the past.
Article 105(3) and Article 194(3) states that the parliament should from time to time define the laws or pass the laws on the powers, privileges and immunities of the members of the parliament and members of the legislative assembly.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Sri Guru Granth Sahib
Mains level: Not Much
A union minister has received one of the Saroops of the holy Guru Granth Sahib flown in from Afghanistan.
What is Saroop?
- Saroop is a physical copy of Sri Guru Granth Sahib, also called Bir in Punjabi.
- Every Bir has 1,430 pages, which are referred to as Ang. The verses on every page remain the same.
- The Sikhs consider the Saroop of Guru Granth Sahib a living guru and treat it with utmost respect.
- They believe that all the 10 Gurus were the same spirit in different bodies, and the Guru Granth Sahib is their eternal physical and spiritual form.
Compilation of Sri Guru Granth Sahib
- It was the fifth Sikh master, Guru Arjan Dev, who compiled the first Bir of the Guru Granth Sahib in 1604, and installed it at the Golden Temple in Amritsar.
- Later, the tenth Sikh master, Guru Gobind Singh, added verses penned by the ninth master, his father Guru Tegh Bahadur, and compiled the Bir for the second and last time.
- It was in 1708 that Guru Gobind Singh declared the Guru Granth Sahib the living Guru of the Sikhs.
- Guru Granth Sahib is a compendium of hymns written by six Sikh gurus,15 saints, including Bhagat Kabir, Bhagat Ravidas, Sheikh Farid and Bhagat Namdev, 11 Bhatts (balladeers) and four Sikhs.
- The verses are composed in 31 ragas.
What does the act of carrying the saroop on one’s head signify?
- The installation and transportation of Guru Granth Sahib is governed by a strict code of conduct called rehat maryada.
- As a mark of respect, the Bir of the Guru Granth Sahib is carried on the head, and the person walks barefoot.
- Whenever a devout sees the Bir of Guru Granth Sahib passing by, s/he removes her shoes and bows.
- A ceremonial whisk is waved high over the Guru Granth Sahib either on the move or while reading from it.
- Gurdwaras have a separate resting place for the Saroop, called ‘Sukh Asan Sthan’ or ‘Sachkhand’ where the Guru rests at night.
- This takes place at the end of the day when the holy book is ceremoniously shut and rested. In the morning, the saroop is again installed in a ceremony called ‘prakash’.
- Many tourists specially come to watch the prakash and sukha asan ceremony of the Guru Granth Sahib at the Golden Temple.
Where are copies of the Guru Granth Sahib published?
- There was a tradition among Punjabis, both Sikhs and Hindus, to copy the Guru Granth Sahib by hand and produce multiple copies.
- The Udasi and Nirmla sects also played a role in making handwritten copies of the Birs until the British introduced the printing press.
- Nowadays, the Shiromani Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (SGPC) has the sole rights to publish the Birs of the Guru Granth Sahib, and this is done at Amritsar.
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Try answering this PYQ:
Consider the following Bhakti Saints:
- Dadu Dayal
- Guru Nanak
- Tyagaraja
Who among the above was/were preaching when the Lodi dynasty fell and Babur took over? (CSP 2018)
(a) 1 and 3
(b) 2 only
(c) 2 and 3
(d) 1 and 2
Post your answers here:
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Transport Initiative for Asia
Mains level: Not Much
NITI Aayog and World Resources Institute (WRI), India, jointly launched the ‘Forum for Decarbonizing Transport’ in India as part of the NDC-Transport Initiative for Asia (NDC-TIA).
Transport Initiative for Asia
- The NDC Transport Initiative for Asia (TIA 2020-2023) is a joint programme that will engage China, India, and Vietnam in promoting a comprehensive approach to decarbonizing transport in their respective countries.
- The project is part of the International Climate Initiative (IKI).
- NITI Aayog is the implementing partner for the India component of the project.
- The project aims at bringing down the peak level of GHG emissions (transport sector) in Asia (in line with a well below 2-degree pathway), resulting in problems like congestion and air pollution.
Why need such initiative?
- India has a massive and diverse transport sector, which is also the third most CO2 emitting sector.
- Data suggests that within the transport sector, road transport contributes to more than 90% of the total CO2 emissions.
- The NDC-TIA India component focuses on developing a coherent strategy of effective policies and the formation of a multi-stakeholder platform for decarbonizing transport in the country.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: E-Shram Portal
Mains level: Welfare of the unorganized workers
The Union Ministry of Labour & Employment will launch the e-Shram portal – National Database on Unorganized Workers (NDUW).
What is the E-Shram Portal?
- The government aims to register 38 crore unorganized workers, such as construction labourers, migrant workforce, street vendors and domestic workers, among others.
- The workers will be issued an e-Shram card containing a 12-digit unique number, which, going ahead, will help in including them in social security schemes.
- The government had earlier missed deadlines for creating the database, inviting criticism from the Supreme Court.
How will the registration for workers happen on the portal?
- The registration of workers on the portal will be coordinated by the Labour Ministry, state governments, trade unions and CSCs.
- Awareness campaigns would be planned across the country to enable nationwide registration of workers.
- Following the launch of the portal, workers from the unorganized sector can begin their registration from the same day.
- A national toll free number — 14434 — will also be launched to assist and address the queries of workers seeking registration on the portal.
- A worker can register on the portal using his/her Aadhaar card number and bank account details, apart from filling other necessary details like date of birth, home town, mobile number and social category.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Jim Corbett NP, NTCA
Mains level: Tiger Conservation
The Delhi High Court has asked the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) to consider as a representation a petition to stop the alleged illegal construction of bridges and walls within the tiger breeding habitat of the Corbett Tiger Reserve.
Jim Corbett National Park
- Jim Corbett NP is the oldest national park in India and was established in 1936 as Hailey National Park to protect the endangered Bengal tiger.
- It is located in Nainital district and Pauri Garhwal district of Uttarakhand and was named after hunter and naturalist Jim Corbett.
- The park was the first to come under the Project Tiger initiative.
- It has sub-Himalayan belt geographical and ecological characteristics.
- Dense moist deciduous forest mainly consists of sal, haldu, peepal, rohini and mango trees.
- Forest covers almost 73% of the park, while 10% of the area consists of grasslands.
Try answering this PYQ:
Among the following Tiger Reserves, which one has the largest area under “Critical Tiger Habitat” ? (CSP 2020)
(a) Corbett
(b) Ranthambore
(c) Nagarjunasagar- Srisailam
(d) Sunderbans
Post your answers here:
Back2Basics: National Tiger Conservation Authority
- The NTCA was established in December 2005, following a recommendation of the Tiger Task Force, constituted by the Prime Minister of India.
- The Wildlife Protection Act of 1972 was amended in 2006 to provide for constituting NTCA responsible for the implementation of the Project Tiger plan to protect endangered tigers.
- It works for the reorganized management of Project Tiger and the many Tiger Reserves in India.
- A program for protection called, ‘Tiger Protection Program’ (popularly known as Project Tiger) was started in 1973, by the GOI in co-operation with WWF.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: India's expenditure on health
Mains level: Paper 2- India needs NHS like healthcare model
Context
Even after the pandemic, the Indian government continues to budget less than 1 per cent of GDP for healthcare, one of the lowest in the world.
About NHS
- Every year, Britain’s legendary health network National Health Service (NHS) cures 15 million patients with chronic ailments, at a fraction of the cost spent by the US.
- The NHS funded by direct taxes is also the fifth largest employer in the world, after McDonalds and Walmart.
- One of every 20 British workers is employed as a doctor, nurse, catering and technical personnel.
Public healthcare in India
- Even after the pandemic, the Indian government continues to budget less than 1 per cent of GDP for healthcare, one of the lowest in the world.
- In contrast, China invests around 3 per cent, Britain 7 per cent and the United States 17 per cent of GDP.
- So, 62 per cent of health expenses in India are paid for by patients themselves
- This is one of the main reasons for families falling into poverty especially during the pandemic.
- In India, hospitals are beleaguered with absentee staff.
- As per a Niti Aayog database, in the worst state of Bihar in 2017-18, positions for 60 per cent of midwives, 50 per cent of staff nurses, 34 per cent of medical officers and 60 per cent of specialist doctors were vacant.
- Those on the job, despite being handsomely paid, are chronically overworked.
Conclusion
In the 21st century, not much has improved in India’s public hospitals. Still, in India doctors are often equated with gods. What India needs in NHS like healthcare model.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Tauktae and Yaas
Mains level: Paper 3- Need for long term mitigation measures to deal with the cyclones
Context
The severe cyclones, Tauktae and Yaas, battered India earlier this year. With a rise in the frequency of devastating cyclones, India needs to look at long-term mitigation measures.
India’s vulnerability
- The Indian coastline is around 7,500 km; there are 96 coastal districts (which touch the coast or are close to it), with 262 million people exposed to cyclones and tsunamis.
- The World Bank and the United Nations (2010) estimate that around 200 million city residents would be exposed to storms and earthquakes by 2050 in India.
- Between 1891 and 2020, out of the 313 cyclones crossing India’s eastern and western coasts, the west coast experienced 31 cyclones, while 282 cyclones crossed the east coast.
- Among the natural disasters, cyclones constituted the second most frequent phenomena that occurred in 15% of India’s total natural disasters over 1999-2020.
- According to the Global Climate Risk Index report 2021, India ranks the seventh worst-hit country globally in 2019 due to the frequent occurrence of extreme weather-related events.
- Increase in frequency: According to India Meteorological Department (IMD), 2013 data frequency of cyclones in the coastal States accounting increased by 7%.
- Factor’s responsible: Increasing sea surface temperatures in the northern Indian Ocean and the geo-climatic conditions in India are the factors responsible for the increase in frequency.
Economic cost
- Between 1999 and 2020, cyclones inflicted substantial damage to public and private properties, amounting to an increase in losses from $2,990 million to $14,920 million in the absence of long-term mitigation measures.
- India lost around 2% of GDP and 15% of total revenue over 1999-2020.
- Between 1999-2020, around 12,388 people were killed, and the damage was estimated at $32,615 million.
- Cyclones are the second most expensive in terms of the costs incurred in damage, accounting for 29% of the total disaster-related damages after floods (62%).
- In addition, they are the third most lethal disaster in India after earthquakes (42%) and floods (33%).
Odisha model
- In the aftermath of the 1999 super cyclone, the Government of Odisha took up various cyclone mitigation measures.
- These included installing a disaster warning system in the coastal districts, and construction of evacuation shelters in cyclone-prone districts.
- Other steps were the setting up of the Odisha State Disaster Management Authority (OSDMA), conducting regular cabinet meetings for disaster preparedness, and building the Odisha Disaster Rapid Action Force (ODRAF).
Way forward
- Still, Odisha’s disaster management model is inadequate to minimise the economic losses that result from cyclones.
- Therefore, the Government of India should adopt a few measures to minimise disaster damage and fatalities.
- Improve warning system: It is imperative to improve the cyclone warning system and revamp disaster preparedness measures.
- Increase cover under shelterbelt plantation: The Government must widen the cover under shelterbelt plantations and help regenerate mangroves in coastal regions to lessen the impact of cyclones.
- In addition, adopting cost-effective, long-term mitigation measures, including building cyclone-resilient infrastructure such as constructing storm surge-resilient embankments, canals and improving river connectivity to prevent waterlogging in low-lying areas are important.
- Disaster resilient power infrastructure: installing disaster-resilient power infrastructure in the coastal districts, providing concrete houses to poor and vulnerable households, and creating massive community awareness campaigns are essential.
- Coordination between Centre-State: Healthy coordination between the Centre and the States concerned is essential to collectively design disaster mitigation measures.
- Collective mitigation effort by the Centre and States that can help reduce the fiscal burden of States and also be effective in minimising disaster deaths.
Conclusion
Long term mitigation measures are essential to minimise the impact of the disasters such as cyclones.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Cities in Afghanistan
Mains level: Paper 2- Implications of Taliban control over Afghanistan
Context
Notwithstanding the current triumphalism in Pakistan at “overthrowing” the US-backed order in Kabul and “pushing” India out of Afghanistan, India can afford to step back and signal that it can wait.
Uncertainties about the future
Two interconnected political negotiations unfolding are likely to determine Afghanistan’s immediate future.
1) Setting up political order
- One is focused on building a new political order within Afghanistan.
- More than a week after President Ghani fled Kabul, there is no government, let alone an inclusive and internationally acceptable one, in sight.
- Before Pakistan can get the Taliban to share power with other groups, it has to facilitate an acceptable accommodation between different factions of the Taliban.
- Then there is the problem of including the non-Taliban formations in the new government.
2) Gaining international recognition
- The international community has set some broad conditions for the recognition of the Taliban-led government.
- Besides an inclusive government at home, the world wants to see respect for human rights, especially women’s rights, ending support for international terrorism, and stopping opium production.
- Pakistan will hope to get some of its traditional friends like China and Turkey or new partners like Russia to break the current international consensus.
- Pakistan and the Taliban, however, know Chinese and Russian support is welcome but not enough.
- They need an understanding of the US and its allies to gain political legitimacy as well as sustained international economic assistance.
- The West, too, needs the Taliban to facilitate the evacuation of its citizens from Kabul and, sooner rather than later, deliver humanitarian assistance.
How India differs from Pakistan in its approach towards Afghanistan?
- India has never been in strategic competition with Pakistan in Afghanistan. India’s lack of direct geographic access to Afghanistan has ensured that.
- Both their strategies have roots in the 19th-century policies of the Raj.
- Forward policy: The Pakistan Army’s quest for strategic depth in Afghanistan harks back to the “forward policy” school that sought to actively control the territories beyond the Indus.
- The forward policy seeks political dominance over Afghanistan in the name of a “friendly government” in Kabul.
- Masterly inactivity: India, in contrast, stayed with a rival school in the Raj that called for “masterly inactivity” — a prudent approach to the badlands beyond the Indus.
- India’s strategy seeks to strengthen Kabul’s autonomy vis-à-vis Rawalpindi and facilitate Afghanistan’s economic modernisation.
- The Afghan values that India supports — nationalism, sovereignty, and autonomy — will endure in Kabul, irrespective of the nature of the regime.
Consider the question “What are the implications of the return of Taliban in Afghanistan for India? What should be India’s approach in dealing with the Taliban controlled Afghanistan?”
Conclusion
Strategic patience coupled with political empathy for Afghan people, and an active engagement will continue to keep India relevant in Kabul’s internal and external evolution.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Right to Protest
Mains level: Reasonable restrictions on Fundamental Rights
The Supreme Court took a nuanced stand saying farmers have the right to protest but the agitation should not hinder traffic or public movement.
Right to Protest
- When a group, community, or even a person goes up to protest, it is usually to showcase their disapproval or demur against any action, policy, statement, etc of state or government or any organization.
- Mostly the flow of protest is driven through political waves that also demonstrate the collective organization of people to make the government or state address their issues and take steps to overcome them.
- In India, the right to protest is the manifestation of the right to freedom of assembly, the right to freedom of association, and the right to freedom of speech.
Constitutional Backing
- Article 19(1) states that All citizens shall have the right:
(a) to freedom of speech and expression;
(b) to assemble peaceably and without arms;
(c) to form associations or unions;
(d) to move freely throughout the territory of India;
(e) to reside and settle in any part of the territory of India; and
(f) omitted
(g) to practice any profession, or to carry on any occupation, trade or business
Reasonable restrictions on Protest
- Article 51A makes it a fundamental duty for every person to safeguard public property and to avoid violence during the protests and resorting to violence during public protests results in infringement of key fundamental duty of citizens.
- Article 19(1)(b) states about the right to assemble peaceably and without arms. Thereby, the right to peaceful protest is bestowed to Indian citizens by our Constitution.
- Article 19(2) imposes a restriction on a person to prevent him from making a defamatory statement which defames the reputation of another person.
- Article 19(3): The reasonable restrictions are imposed in the interests of the sovereignty & integrity of India, the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, decency or morality or in relation to contempt of court, defamation, or incitement to an offense.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Smog Tower
Mains level: Air quality issue in New Delhi
Ahead of its infamous smog season, Delhi has got a ‘smog tower’, a technological aid to help combat air pollution.
What are Smog Towers?
- Smog towers are structures designed to work as large-scale air purifiers. They are fitted with multiple layers of air filters and fans at the base to suck the air.
- After the polluted air enters the smog tower, it is purified by the multiple layers before being re-circulated into the atmosphere.
Structure of the Delhi smog tower
- The structure is 24 m high, about as much as an 8-storey building — an 18-metre concrete tower, topped by a 6-metre-high canopy. At its base are 40 fans, 10 on each side.
- Each fan can discharge 25 cubic metres per second of air, adding up to 1,000 cubic metres per second for the tower as a whole. Inside the tower in two layers are 5,000 filters.
- The filters and fans have been imported from the United States.
How does it work?
- The tower uses a ‘downdraft air cleaning system’ developed by the University of Minnesota.
- Polluted air is sucked in at a height of 24 m, and filtered air is released at the bottom of the tower, at a height of about 10 m from the ground.
- When the fans at the bottom of the tower operate, the negative pressure created sucks in air from the top.
- The ‘macro’ layer in the filter traps particles of 10 microns and larger, while the ‘micro’ layer filters smaller particles of around 0.3 microns.
- The downdraft method is different from the system used in China, where a tower uses an ‘updraft’ system — air is sucked in from near the ground, and is propelled upwards by heating and convection.
- Filtered air is released at the top of the tower.
Likely impact
- Computational fluid dynamics modelling suggests the tower could have an impact on the air quality up to 1 km from the tower.
- The actual impact will also determine how the tower functions under different weather conditions, and how levels of PM2.5 vary with the flow of air.
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From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Bhuvan Yuktdhara Portal
Mains level: MGNREGA
A new portal under Bhuvan “Yuktdhara” has been released to facilitate planning of new MGNREGA assets using Remote Sensing and GIS based information.
Bhuvan Yuktdhara Portal
- Yuktdhara is a geospatial planning portal meant for facilitating Gram Panchayat level planning of MGNREGA activities across India.
- Portal integrates a wide variety of spatial information contents to enable a holistic approach towards planning using open-source GIS tool.
- Subsequent to pan Indian initiative of geo-tagging assets created under Mahatma Gandhi NREGA, harnessing the strength of GIS for identifying upcoming activities and their locations was a natural corollary.
Features of the portal
- The current level of integration under Yuktdhara, as part of Bhuvan, incorporates multi-temporal IRS satellite data of better than 3M detail in natural color, digital terrain, thematic layers as wed as locations of MGNREGA works and watershed management assets.
- The interface currently has a Gram Panchayat-specific logo to address planning as well as approval mechanisms intended to ensure the evaluation and acceptance of proposed activities.
- This will be enhanced for other levels of users gradually.
- Access for other Gram Panchayat will be facilitated at the earliest, by addressing the case multiple logins created for geotagging and moderation.
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Back2Basics: MGNREG Scheme
- The MGNREGA stands for Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act of 2005.
- This is labour law and social security measure that aims to guarantee the ‘Right to Work’.
- The act was first proposed in 1991 by P.V. Narasimha Rao.
The objectives of the MGNREGA are:
- To enhance the livelihood security of the rural poor by generating wage employment opportunities.
- To create a rural asset base that would enhance productive ways of employment, augment and sustain a rural household income.
Features of the program
- MGNREGA is unique in not only ensuring at least 100 days of employment to the willing unskilled workers, but also in ensuring an enforceable commitment on the implementing machinery i.e., the State Governments, and providing a bargaining power to the labourers.
- The failure of provision for employment within 15 days of the receipt of job application from a prospective household will result in the payment of unemployment allowance to the job seekers.
- Employment is to be provided within 5 km of an applicant’s residence, and minimum wages are to be paid.
- Thus, employment under MGNREGA is a legal entitlement.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Sree Narayana Guru
Mains level: SNDP Movement
The Prime Minister has paid tributes to Sree Narayana Guru on his Jayanti.
Sree Narayana Guru (1856-1928)
- Narayana Guru was a philosopher, spiritual leader and social reformer in India.
- He led a reform movement against the injustice in the caste-ridden society of Kerala in order to promote spiritual enlightenment and social equality.
His legacy:
Temple Entry
- He was in the forefront of the movement for universal temple entry and against the societal ills like the social discrimination of untouchables.
- He gave the famous slogan “One Caste, One Religion, One God for All”.
- In 1888, he built a temple dedicated to Lord Shiva at Aruvippuram which was against the caste-based restrictions of the time.
- In one temple he consecrated at Kalavancode, he kept mirrors instead of idols. This symbolised his message that the divine was within each individual.
Untouchability
- The social protest of Vaikom Satyagraha (1924-25) was an agitation by the lower caste against untouchability in Hindu society of Travancore.
- He taught equality but felt the inequalities should not be exploited to carry out conversions and therefore generate strife in society.
Philosophy
- Sree Narayana Guru became one of the greatest proponents and re-evaluators of Advaita Vedanta, the principle of non-duality put forward by Adi Shankara.
Answer this PYQ:
Q.Which one of the following pairs does not form part of the six systems of Indian Philosophy?
(a) Mimamsa and Vedanta
(b) Nyaya and Vaisheshika
(c) Lokayata and Kapalika
(d) Sankhya and Yoga
Post your answers here.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Indira Point
Mains level: NA
The Swarnim Vijay Varsh Victory Flame was taken to Indira Point, the southernmost tip of the country on August 22, 2021, as part of its voyage to the Nicobar Group of Islands.
Indira Point
- Indira Point is the southernmost point of Indian Territory.
- It is a village in the Nicobar district at Great Nicobar Island of Andaman and Nicobar Islands in India.
- Rondo Island, Indonesia’s northernmost island in Sabang district of Aceh province of Sumatra, lies 163 km south of Little Andaman Island and 145 km or 80 nautical miles from Indira point.
- The point was formerly known as Pygmalion Point and Parsons Point. It was renamed in honour of Indira Gandhi during mid-1980s.
- Galathea National Park and Lighthouse are the major attractions here.
India and Indonesia are upgrading the deep sea port Sabang under the strategic military and economic collaboration to protect the channel between Great Nicobar Island and Rondo Island which is 612 km or 330 nautical miles from Indira Point.
What is Swarnim Vijay Varsh?
- It marks the 50th anniversary of the 1971 India-Pakistan war.
- Vijay Diwas is celebrated every year on December 16 to mark India`s triumph in liberating Bangladesh.
- The journey of the Victory Flame is taken from north to south corners of India.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Parliamentary Committees
Mains level: Paper 2- Issues with legislative process
Context
The recent Monsoon Session of Parliament is proof that the speed of passing laws trumps their rigorous scrutiny in our legislative process.
Issues with lawmaking process in India
1) Avoiding pre-legislative scrutiny
- In our parliamentary system, a majority of laws originate from the government.
- Each ministry decides the path its legislative proposals will take from ideation to enactment.
- For example, last year, the Shipping Ministry requested public feedback on the two bills — Marine Aids and Inland Vessels.
- This mechanism enables the strengthening of the legal proposal through stakeholder inputs before being brought to Parliament.
- However, ministries expedite their bills by not putting them through a similar pre-legislative scrutiny process.
2) Misuse of Ordinance route
- Over the years, successive governments have exploited the spirit of this constitutional provision.
- Governments have promulgated an ordinance a few days before a parliamentary session, cut a session short to issue one, and pushed a law that is not urgent through the ordinance route.
- But the executive sometimes fails to follow through on the legislative urgency.
- Bringing in law through the ordinance route also bypasses parliamentary scrutiny.
- But parliamentary committees rarely scrutinise bills to replace ordinances because this may take time and defeat the issuing of the ordinance.
- Over the last few years, bills like GST, Consumer Protection, Insolvency and Bankruptcy, Labour Codes, Surrogacy, and DNA Technology have benefited from parliamentary committees’ scrutiny.
- Their closed-door technical deliberations, inputs from ministry officials, subject-matter experts, and ordinary citizens have strengthened government bills.
3) Delay in rule framing
- Unnecessary urgency in getting laws passed by Parliament does not result in their immediate implementation.
- For the law to work on the ground, the government is supposed to frame rules.
- Last year the Cabinet Secretary twice requested the personal intervention of secretaries heading the Union ministries to frame regulations for bringing into force the laws made by Parliament.
- Before the Monsoon Session, he wrote a follow-up letter on similar lines to his colleagues.
Implication of fast-tracking the law-making
- Difficulty in achieving desired outcomes: Hurriedly-made and inadequately-scrutinised laws hardly ever achieve their desired outcomes.
- Wastage of time of legislature: Enacting statutes without proper scrutiny also wastes the legislature’s time when the government approaches Parliament to amend such laws.
- Loss of opportunity: But the unmeasurable cost of a poorly-made law is in the loss of opportunity to an entire nation that has to comply with it.
Way forward
- The government must ensure that it identifies the gaps in our legal system proactively.
- All its bills should go through pre-legislative scrutiny before being brought to Parliament.
- The legislature, on its part, should conduct in-depth scrutiny of government bills.
- Mandatory scrutiny of bills by parliamentary committees should become the rule and not the exception.
Conclusion
India is in urgent need of course correction in its legislating process. What we need is a robust law-making process.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Asset Monetization
Mains level: National Monetization Pipeline (NMP)
The Union Finance Minister has launched the National Monetization Pipeline for the brownfield infrastructure assets.
What is Asset Monetization?
- Asset Monetization involves the creation of new sources of revenue by unlocking of the value of hitherto unutilized or underutilized public assets.
- Internationally, it is recognized that public assets are a significant resource for all economies.
- Many public sector assets are sub-optimally utilized and could be appropriately monetized to create greater financial leverage and value for the companies and of the equity that the government has invested in them.
- This helps in the accurate estimation of public assets which would help in the better financial management of government/public resources over time.
National Monetization Pipeline (NMP)
- The NMP comprises a four-year pipeline of the Central Government’s brownfield infrastructure assets.
- It will serve as a medium-term roadmap for the Asset Monetization initiative of the government, apart from providing visibility for the investors.
- Incidentally, the 2021-22 Union Budget, laid a lot of emphasis on Asset Monetization as a means to raise innovative and alternative financing for infrastructure.
- It has to be noted that the government views asset monetization as a strategy for the augmentation and maintenance of infrastructure, and not just a funding mechanism.
What is the plan?
- NMP is envisaged to serve as a medium-term roadmap for identifying potential monetization-ready projects, across various infrastructure sectors.
- It estimates aggregate monetization potential of Rs 6.0 lakh crores through core assets of the Central Government, over a four-year period, from FY 2022 to FY 2025.
Objectives of the program
- NMP aims for universal access to high-quality and affordable infrastructure to the common citizen of India.
- Asset monetization, based on the philosophy of Creation through Monetization, is aimed at tapping private sector investment for new infrastructure creation.
- This is necessary for creating employment opportunities, thereby enabling high economic growth and seamlessly integrating the rural and semi-urban areas for overall public welfare.
- The strategic objective of the programme is to unlock the value of investments in brownfield public sector assets by tapping institutional and long-term patient capital.
Framework
The framework for core asset monetization has three key imperatives:
- The pipeline has been prepared based on inputs and consultations from respective line ministries and departments, along with the assessment of total asset base available therein.
- Monetization through disinvestment and monetization of non-core assets have not been included in the NMP.
- Further, currently, only assets of central government line ministries and CPSEs in infrastructure sectors have been included.
- Process of coordination and collation of asset pipeline from states is currently ongoing and the same is envisaged to be included in due course.
Estimated Potential
- The aggregate asset pipeline under NMP over the four-year period, FY 2022-2025, is indicatively valued at Rs 6.0 lakh crore.
- The estimated value corresponds to ~14% of the proposed outlay for Centre under NIP (Rs 43 lakh crore). This includes more than 12-line ministries and more than 20 asset classes.
- The sectors included are roads, ports, airports, railways, warehousing, gas & product pipeline, power generation and transmission, mining, telecom, stadium, hospitality and housing.
- The top 5 sectors (by estimated value) capture ~83% of the aggregate pipeline value. These top 5 sectors include: Roads (27%) followed by Railways (25%), Power (15%), oil & gas pipelines (8%) and Telecom (6%).
Implementation & Monitoring Mechanism
- As an overall strategy, significant share of the asset base will remain with the government.
- The programme is envisaged to be supported through necessary policy and regulatory interventions by the Government in order to ensure an efficient and effective process of asset monetisation.
- These will include streamlining operational modalities, encouraging investor participation and facilitating commercial efficiency, among others.
- Real time monitoring will be undertaken through the a separate dashboard.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: UPI
Mains level: Paper 3- Account Aggregators
Context
Account Aggregators will enable the use and enrich the quality of information needed for lenders to extend loans without collateral back-up.
Issue of preference for a collateralised loan in India
- Demand for credit in India far outstrips institutional supply.
- Financial Service Providers (FSPs) are well aware of this demand.
- And they have been looking for ways to provide credit without collateral back-up.
- Historically, financial service providers (FSPs) like banks and non-bank finance companies (NBFCs) have relied on collateral while making lending decisions.
- In the absence of collateral pledges, the only way to assess a consumer’s willingness and ability to repay is by examining the prospective borrower’s cash flows.
- Your bank account statement is a digital representation of your financial life.
- However, this bank account statement-driven process is highly manual, time-consuming, expensive and fraught with potential for abuse.
- These shortcomings have held back cash-flow based lending for too long in India.
- Borrowers in the country have been underserved because of the preference for collateralized loans.
- Both FSPs and consumers are in dire need of a seamless digital way of sharing account information.
Account Aggregator (AA) framework
- The account aggregator framework announced by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) promises to solve these problems.
- It aims to make financial data sharing as easy as making a Unified Payments Interface (UPI) transfer.
- This is the promise of account aggregation, as envisaged by RBI.
- Account aggregators (AAs), with their user interface, will play a pivotal role in closing the trust deficit between FSPs and consumers.
Fenefits of Account Aggregator would work
- User control over data: They permit users to control who gets access to their data, track and log its movement and reduce the potential risk of leakage in transit.
- A single-window format allows user-friendly data movement and reduces the need for physical transfers and post-facto attestations.
- Industry-standard for consent: AAs create a default industry standard for consent that cuts through the dense fine print buried in most privacy policies.
- Wider data points to rely on: With the security of this data as a given, AAs allow lenders (or other FSPs for that matter) to rely on a wider selection of data points to determine the trustworthiness of a borrower.
- Through AAs, FSPs have a chance to provide cash-flow based credit, personalized financial management tools, robo-advisory services and many more innovative financial products and services to a wider cross-section of people.
Conclusion
By incorporating security, transparency and agility into data sharing, AAs could usher in the most significant transformation of India’s fintech landscape yet.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Article 142 (1)
Mains level: Paper 2- Issue of judicial appointments
Context
For the first time ever, the Supreme Court Collegium led by the Chief Justice of India (CJI) recommended/selected as many as nine persons at one go to be appointed to the apex court.
Significance of the move
- It is a happy augury that the present CJI, Justice N.V. Ramana, could, along with his colleagues in the Collegium, select the judges within a short period of his assumption of office.
- It is a tough task to build a consensus around one person or a few persons, the CJI being the head of the Collegium, has an unenviable task in building that consensus.
- Therefore, it can be said without any fear of contradiction that the job of selecting as many as nine judges for appointment to the Supreme Court was done admirably well.
- The latest resolution of the Collegium gave effect to the multiple judicial pronouncements of the top court on the subject.
- The selection of three women judges, with one of them having a chance to head the top court, a judge belonging to the Scheduled Caste and one from a backward community and the nine selected persons belonging to nine different States, all point towards an enlightened and unbiased approach of the members of the Collegium.
- A needless controversy is sought to be raised by a section of the media about this round of selection citing the non-existing ‘Rule of Seniority’.
Various norms to be followed in judicial appointment
1) Consideration of merit
- Article 142 (1) contains the concept of ‘complete justice’ in any cause or matter which the Supreme Court is enjoined to deliver upon.
- So, while selecting a judge to adorn the Bench, the fundamental consideration should be his/her ability to do complete justice.
- In the Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association and Another vs Union of India (1993), the Court spelt out the parameters within which to accomplish the task of selecting candidates for appointment to the higher judiciary.
- The most crucial consideration is the merit of the candidates.
- The merit is the ability of the judge to deliver complete justice.
2) Plurality
- The nine judges who decided the above case were quite aware of these compelling realities.
- So, they said, “In the context of the plurastic [pluralistic] society of India where there are several distinct and differing interests of the people with multiplicity of religions, race, caste and community and with the plurality of culture, it is inevitable that all people should be given equal opportunity in all walks of life and brought into the mainstream.”
3) Transparency
- India is perhaps the only country where the judges select judges to the higher judiciary.
- It is, therefore, necessary to make the norms of selection transparent and open.
- In 2019, a five judge Bench of the Supreme Court, of which the present CJI was also a member, laid emphasis on this point.
- The Bench observed: “There can be no denial that there is a vital element of public interest in knowing about the norms which are taken into consideration in selecting candidates for higher judicial office and making judicial appointments”.
Thus, the essence of the norms to be followed in judicial appointments is a judicious blend of merit, seniority, interests of the marginalised and deprived sections of society, women, religions, regions and communities.
Consider the question “What are the various norms to be followed by the Collegium for judicial appointments? What are the issues with Collegium system of judicial appointment?”
Conclusion
The Collegium has started doing its job. Now, it is time for the Government to match the pace and take the process of appointments to its logical conclusion at the earliest.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Article 235
Mains level: Paper 2- Independence of judiciary
Context
The August 11 order of the Himachal Pradesh High Court directed that “hereinafter, all the courts in the state other than the high court shall be referred to as district judiciary”. Furthermore, “these courts shall not be referred to as subordinate court” but as trial courts.
Issues with the judicial hierarchy Vs. hierarchy of judges
- The expression “subordinate courts” used by Part VI, Chapter 6, of the Constitution of India cannot signify that judges are subordinate.
- The term subordinate has implications for the independence of the judiciary, entrenched with and since Kesavananda Bharati (1973) as the essential feature of the basic structure of the Indian Constitution.
- No judge is “subordinate” to any other, constitutionally judges are limited in the jurisdiction but also supreme within their own jurisdiction.
- However, Article 235 speaks of “control over subordinate courts”.
- This Article created the notion of subordination by describing these entities and agents as persons “holding a post inferior to the post of a district judge”.
Constitutional provision
- The Constitution no doubt contemplates a hierarchy of jurisdictions, but no judge, acting within her jurisdiction, is “inferior” or “subordinate”.
- On appeal, or review, a court with ample jurisdiction may overturn and even pass judicial strictures but this does not make the concerned courts “lower” or “inferior” courts.
- Supervisory powers: High courts always have considerable powers of superintendence on the administrative side but this “supervisory“ power has been recognised by the apex court as a “constitutional power” and subject to the right of appeal as granted by Article 235.
- While the Constitution allows “supervision”, it does not sanction judicial despotism.
- Despite this, arbitrary practices in writing confidential reports of district justices seem to continue.
Way forward
- Constitutional amendment: A complete recasting of Article 235 is needed, which does away with the omnibus expression of “control” powers in the high courts.
- The amendment should specifically require the high courts to satisfy the criteria flowing from the principles of natural and constitutional justice and all judicial officers who fulfil due qualification thresholds should be treated with constitutional dignity and respect.
- Collegiate system at high court’s level: For most matters (save elevation), senior-most district judges and judges of the high courts should constitute a collegiate system to facilitate judicial administration, infrastructure, access, monitoring of disposal rates, minimisation of undue delays in administration of justice, alongside matters concerning transfers, and leave.
- If an ACR is to be adversely changed in the face of a consistent award for a decade or more, it should be a collegiate act of the five senior-most justices, including the Chief Justice of the High Court.
- CJI Ramana has recently agreed in principle, following the request of the Supreme Court Bar Association, that chief justices of the high courts should consider lawyers practising in the Supreme Court for elevation to the high courts.
Consider the question “Do you agree with the view that the Constitution contemplates a hierarchy of jurisdictions, but no judge, acting within her jurisdiction, is “inferior” or “subordinate”. Give reason in support of your argument.”
Conclusion
The changes suggested here needs to be implemented to ensure the independence of the judiciary at all levels.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: A25, A21
Mains level: Anti-Conversion Law
The Gujarat High Court this week stayed key provisions of The Gujarat Freedom of Religion (Amendment) Act, 2021 pertaining to marriages involving religious conversion of either of the two parties.
What is the Anti-Conversion Law?
- The legislation has amended the 2003 Gujarat Freedom of Religion Act.
- The amendment was brought in line with several similar laws enacted last year by right-wing-ruled states, starting with Uttar Pradesh.
- The laws seek to end conversion through unlawful means, specifically prohibit any conversion for marriage, even if it is with the consent of the individual except when a prior sanction is obtained from the state.
- Apart from UP and Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh too, have also enacted similar laws.
Controversial provisions
- Vagueness: It gives powers to the state to conduct a police inquiry to verify the intentions of the parties to convert for the purposes of marriage.
- Burden of proof: Section 6A reverses the burden of proof on the partner of the converted spouse to prove that he/she did not coerce the other spouse.
- Intent of marriage: Section 4 allows the aggrieved person, their parents, brother, sister, or any other person related by blood or marriage or adoption to file an FIR challenging the conversion and subsequent marriage.
- Conversion as Allurement: The law considers lawful conversions as “allurement” in vague.
- Discrimination: It defines over-broad terms; prescribes different jail terms based on gender; and legitimizes the intrusion of family and the society at large to oppose inter-faith marriages.
Issues with such laws
- Stereotyping of lawful conversion: The new anti-conversion laws shift the burden of proof of a lawful religious conversion from the converted to his/her partner.
- Curb on individual freedom: Legal experts have pointed out that the laws interfere in an individual’s agency to marry a partner from different faith and to choose to convert from one’s religion for that purpose.
- Interference of state: Apart from being vague and sweeping, the laws also test the limits to which the state can interfere in the personal affairs of individuals.
- Violative of FRs: The freedom to propagate one’s religion (A25) and the right to choose a partner are fundamental rights (A21) that the new anti-conversion laws impinge upon.
What has the Gujarat High Court held?
- A Division Bench of the Gujarat High Court has granted an interim stay on certain provisions of the amendment that interfere with inter-faith marriages.
- It has held that the bill interferes with the intricacies of marriage including the right to the choice of an individual, thereby infringing Article 21.
- The interim stay on certain provisions will have to be confirmed when the larger challenge is decided.
What was the government’s defence?
- The state government had argued that the law did not prohibit all inter-faith marriages, but only the ones based on fraud and coercion.
- To buttress its submission, Advocate General had argued that the Act must be read as a whole to interpret the provision, and the provision alone could not be read by itself.
- However, the court said that the wider interpretation would happen at a later stage, and stayed the provisions for the time being. A larger challenge would determine the fate of the law eventually.
Significance of the ruling
- The HC ruling, although preliminary, comes as a relief to interfaith couples from being harassed.
- The reading could have a bearing on challenges pending in other HCs (namely in MP, UP, Himachal etc).
- However, its real impact on the ground could be limited, as larger constitutional nuances are often difficult to permeate, especially when it is not a final and binding verdict.
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