Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Community Forest Resource (CFR) rights
Mains level: Read the attached story
The Chhattisgarh government has become the only second state in the country to recognize the Community Forest Resource (CFR) rights of a village inside a national park.
What is the news?
- The CFR rights of tribals living in a hamlet inside the Kanger Ghati National Park in Bastar district, were recognised.
- It gave the community the power to formulate rules for forest use.
Try this PYQ first:
Q.Under the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006, who shall be the authority to initiate the process for determining the nature and extent of individual or community forest rights or both?
(a) State Forest Department
(b) District Collector/Deputy Commissioner
(c) Tahsildar/Block Development Officer/Mandal Revenue Officer
(d) Gram Sabha
Post your answers here.
What is a Community Forest?
- The community forest resource area is the common forest land that has been traditionally protected and conserved for sustainable use by a particular community.
- The community uses it to access resources available within the traditional and customary boundary of the village; and for seasonal use of landscape in case of pastoralist communities.
- Each CFR area has a customary boundary with identifiable landmarks recognised by the community and its neighboring villages.
- It may include forest of any category – revenue forest, classified & unclassified forest, deemed forest, DLC land, reserve forest, protected forest, sanctuary and national parks etc.
Legal basis for Community Forest Resource (CFR) rights
- The CFR rights are acknowledged under the Section 3(1) (i) of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act.
- This is commonly referred to as the Forest Rights Act or the FRA.
- It aims to provide for recognition of the right to “protect, regenerate or conserve or manage” the community forest resource.
- These rights allow the community to formulate rules for forest use by itself and others and thereby discharge its responsibilities under Section 5 of the FRA.
Nature of rights included
- CFR rights, along with Community Rights (CRs) under Sections 3(1)(b) and 3(1)(c), which include: nistar rights and rights over non-timber forest products, ensure sustainable livelihoods of the community.
- ‘Nistar’ means the concession granted for removal from forest coupes (small trees) on payment at stipulated rates, specified forest produce for bonafide domestic use, but not for barter or sale.
- These rights give the authority to the Gram Sabha to adopt local traditional practices of forest conservation and management within the community forest resource boundary.
Why is the recognition of CFR rights important?
- Aimed at undoing the “historic injustice” meted out to forest-dependent communities due to curtailment of their customary rights over forests, the FRA came into force in 2008.
- It is important as it recognises the community’s right to use, manage and conserve forest resources, and to legally hold forest land that these communities have used for cultivation and residence.
- It also underlines the integral role that forest dwellers play in the sustainability of forests and in the conservation of biodiversity.
- It is of greater significance inside protected forests like national parks, sanctuaries and tiger reserves as traditional dwellers then become a part of management of the protected forests.
How many CFR certificates have been given in Chhattisgarh?
- According to state government officials, Chhattisgarh has recognised nearly 4,000 CFR rights in the state.
- Kanger Ghati National Park is the second national park, after Simlipal in Odisha, where CFR rights have been recognised.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Surrogacy (Regulation) Act, 2021
Mains level: Issues with Surrogacy Laws
The Delhi High Court issued a notice to the Union government on a petition challenging some provisions of the Surrogacy (Regulation) Act and the Assisted Reproductive Technology (Regulation) Act.
Issues raised by the petition
- Currently, the laws does not allow single men to have child through surrogacy.
- Married women can only avail surrogacy services if they are unable to produce a child due to medical conditions.
- Otherwise, for women to avail of surrogacy services, they must be aged between 35 and 45 and widowed or divorced.
- Women can only offer surrogacy if they are aged between 25 and 35 and married with at least one biological child.
- The laws also require a surrogate to be genetically related to the couple who intend to have a child through this method, their petition said.
Basis of the Petition
- The personal decision of a single person about the birth of a baby through surrogacy, i.e., the right of reproductive autonomy is a facet of the right to privacy guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution.
- Thus, the right to privacy of every citizen or person affecting a decision to bear or beget a child through surrogacy cannot be taken away.
Distinct features of the Surrogacy (Regulation) Act, 2021
- Definition of surrogacy: It defines surrogacy as a practice where a woman gives birth to a child for an intending couple with the intention to hand over the child after the birth to the intending couple.
- Regulation of surrogacy: It prohibits commercial surrogacy, but allows altruistic surrogacy which involves no monetary compensation to the surrogate mother other than the medical expenses and insurance.
- Purposes for which surrogacy is permitted: Surrogacy is permitted when it is: (i) for intending couples who suffer from proven infertility; (ii) altruistic; (iii) not for commercial purposes; (iv) not for producing children for sale, prostitution or other forms of exploitation; and (v) for any condition or disease specified through regulations.
- Eligibility criteria: The intending couple should have a ‘certificate of essentiality’ and a ‘certificate of eligibility’ issued by the appropriate authority ex. District Medical Board.
Eligibility criteria for surrogate mother:
- To obtain a certificate of eligibility from the appropriate authority, the surrogate mother has to be:
- A close relative of the intending couple;
- A married woman having a child of her own;
- 25 to 35 years old;
- A surrogate only once in her lifetime; and
- Possess a certificate of medical and psychological fitness for surrogacy.
- Further, the surrogate mother cannot provide her own gametes for surrogacy.
Also read
[Burning Issue] Surrogacy in India
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Rice cultivation
Mains level: Sustainable agricultural practices
Experts in Punjab has said that System of Rice Intensification (SRI) Technique is beneficial for the soil, environment and farmers at par with the Direct Seeding of Rice (DSR) technique.
What is SRI technique?
- SRI was first developed in Madagascar in the 1980s and since then several countries in the world have been practising it, including India.
- It promises to save 15 to 20% ground water, improves rice productivity, which is almost at a stagnant point now.
- Experts said that it gives equal or more produce than the conventional rice cultivation, with less water, less seed and less chemicals.
- The net effect is a substantial reduction in the investments on external inputs.
How does it take place in the field and in which soil?
- First, the field is prepared by ploughing.
- It should be laser levelled before transplanting for proper water management and efficiency for a good crop stand.
- Then irrigation is applied in the field which is not a flooding of field like traditional methods but less than that of a well irrigated field.
- Then 10-12 days old nursery (young paddy plants) along with soil particles around the root with minimum disturbance to the roots are transplanted in lines.
- They are marked at a distance of 10 inches from each other with the help of a rope meter.
Benefits over DSR technique
- Unlike DSR, which is suitable only for mid to heavy textured soils, SRI is suitable in all types of soil including less fertile soil as in such soil the number of seedlings can be increased to double.
- Under SRI 2kg seed is required to grow a nursery for one acre against 5kg seed required in the traditional method.
Does the SRI method require continuous flooding after transplantation of nursery?
- In traditional sowing from the day of transplanting till the crop turns 35-40 days fields are kept under flood-like conditions.
- And then fields are filled every week till a few weeks before harvesting.
- But SRI doesn’t require continuous flooding, it needs intermittent irrigation.
- Indeed the plants’ roots should not be starved for oxygen through flooding.
- Irrigation is given to maintain soil moisture near saturation initially, and water is added to the field when the surface soil develops hairline cracks.
What are the limitations of SRI?
- If unchecked, greater weed growth will cause substantial loss of yield.
- In Punjab, it is not promoted by the government except demonstration plots sown over a decade ago.
- It can be sustainable if organic inputs in the soil structure are maintained.
Try this PYQ:
Q.With reference to the current trends in the cultivation of sugarcane in India, consider the following statements:
- A substantial saving in seed material is made when ‘bud chip settlings are raised in a nursery and transplanted in the main field.
- When direct planting of setts is done, the germination percentage is better with single-budded setts as compared to setts with many buds.
- If bad weather conditions prevail when setts are directly planted, single-budded setts have better survival as compared to large setts.
- Sugarcane can be cultivated using settlings prepared from tissue culture.
Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
(a) 1 and 2 only
(b) 3 only
(c) 1 and 4 only
(d) 2,3 and 4 only
Post your answers here.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Man Booker Price
Mains level: NA
Author Geetanjali Shree’s translated Hindi novel, Tomb of Sand, became the first Indian language book to win the International Booker Prize.
Note: Such topics hold very little relevance for CSE prelims. However, last year experience make such topics more uncertain. Still such topics hold relevance for other exams such as CAPF and state PSCs.
What is the Booker Prize?
- The Booker Prize is one of the best-known literary awards for fiction writing in English, including both novels and collections of short stories.
- It was first awarded in 1969.
- Every year a panel of judges decides the best work of the year, with the criteria being that it must be written in English and published in the UK and Ireland.
- This panel of judges is picked from among eminent cultural historians, writers, professors, and novelists, and others from related fields.
- For the Booker Prize, the winner receives £50,000.
About the book
- The 2018 novel titled ‘Ret Samadhi’ was translated by Daisy Rockwell and published as ‘Tomb of Sand’ in 2021.
- The prize is one of two literary awards given out annually by the Booker Prize Foundation, a charity whose stated aim is to “promote the art and value of literature for the public benefit”.
What about the International Booker Prize?
- The International Booker Prize began in 2005.
- A biennial prize initially, it was then awarded for a body of work available in English, including translations, with Alice Munro, Lydia Davis and Philip Roth becoming some of the early winners.
- In 2015, the rules of the International prize changed to make it an annual affair.
- The new rules stipulated that it will be awarded annually for a single book, written in another language and translated into English.
- The £50,000 prize money is divided equally between the author and translator each year.
Why is it called the ‘Booker’?
- The Booker Prize, from 1969 to 2001, was named simply after the Booker Group Limited – a British food wholesale operator that was its initial sponsor.
- The Man Group, an investment management firm based in the UK, began to sponsor the prize in 2002 and it thus came to be known as The Man Booker Prize.
- The Man Group ended their sponsorship in 2019.
- Crankstart, an American charitable foundation, has been the sponsor after that. The prize name has changed back to the ‘Booker’ since then.
Who have been some prominent winners?
- Prominent winners of the coveted prize include Margaret Atwood (‘The Testaments’), Yann Martel (‘Life of Pi’), and Julian Barnes (‘The Sense of an Ending’).
- Many Indian-origin writers have won the Booker in the past, such as Arundhati Roy (‘The God of Small Things’), Salman Rushdie (‘Midnight’s Children’), Kiran Desai (‘The Inheritance of Loss’), and Aravind Adiga (‘The White Tiger’).
- Shree is the first Indian to win an international prize.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Sela Macaque, Sela Pass
Mains level: Not Much
A new species of old world monkey recorded from Arunachal Pradesh has been named after a strategic Sela pass at 13,700 ft above sea level.
Sela macaque (Macaca selai).
- This new primate was identified and analysed by a team of experts from the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) and the University of Calcutta.
- Earlier it was called as White- Cheeked Macaque displaying white cheeks, long and thick hairs on the neck area, and a longer tail.
- Their study has been published in the latest edition of Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution.
- Phylogenetics relate to the evolutionary development and diversification of a species or group of organisms.
- The phylogenetic analysis revealed that the Sela macaque was geographically separated from the Arunachal macaque (Macaca munzala) of Tawang district by Sela.
- This mountain pass acted as a barrier by restricting the migration of individuals of these two species for approximately two million years.
Protection status
- It has NOT been yet included in the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 of India.
- The potential threat to all species of macaques in the landscape is due to hunting by locals for consumption and habitat degradation due to urbanization and infrastructure development.
About Sela Pass
- The Sela Pass is a high-altitude mountain pass located on the border between the Tawang and West Kameng districts in Arunachal Pradesh.
- It has an elevation of 4170 m and connects the Indian Buddhist town of Tawang to Dirang and Guwahati.
- The pass supports scarce amounts of vegetation and is usually snow-covered to some extent throughout the year.
- While Sela Pass does get heavy snowfall in winters, it is usually open throughout the year unless landslides or snow require the pass to be shut down temporarily.
- The strategically-significant Sela Tunnel project is now nearing completion well before the deadline.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: AKRUTI Program
Mains level: NA
The Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited is all set to launch AKRUTI programme in the villages surrounding Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project (KKNPP).
AKRUTI Program
- The Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited is assisting unemployed youth living near the Tarapur Atomic Power Station (TAPS) through AKRUTI.
- AKRUTI stands for Advanced Knowledge and Rural Technology Implementation (AKRUTI) program.
- Areas of water, food processing, agriculture and waste management in rural areas are covered under the AKRUTI program.
- The scheme aims at empowering villages through implementing different technologies for usage.
- This scheme will lead to sustainable growth of the rural sector across the country.
What is the objective?
- To provide information and mechanism for implementation of BARC technologies in rural areas thereby aiming at overall rural development.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Lok Adalat
Mains level: Paper 2- Use of technology by judiciary
Context
The Indian judiciary has increasingly started using technology and the change is reflected in the legal profession in general as well.
Increasing use of digital technology in the judiciary
- With the digitisation of judicial records and the establishment of e-courts, significant developments had taken place in 2020.
- Use of technology to better utilise potential: It is imperative that the use of digital technology be discussed to better utilise its potential, particularly in terms of digitisation of court records, e-filing of cases and their virtual hearing, live streaming of court proceedings.
Background
- In India, e-governance in the field of administration of justice began in the late 1990s, but it accelerated after the enactment of the Information and Technology Act, 2000.
- In the year of 2006, e-courts were launched as a part of the National e-Governance Plan (NEGP).
Digitisation of case files
- When he was the Chief Justice of Allahabad HC, Justice D Y Chandrachud had conceptualised and initiated the project to digitise approximately one crore case files in one year.
- Saving of space and preservation of old documents: This was necessary as not only was a large space required to store so many files, it was also becoming difficult to manually preserve the decades-old documents.
- Traceability: Another purpose was to ensure that these files are traceable electronically as and when required.
- It has also been observed that cases are adjourned simply because affidavits filed several years ago were not restored with the record or were not traceable.
- Once the documents are digitised and e-filed by counsels, at least the cases would not get adjourned by the courts on this account.
- Reducing the risk of missing court records: In State of Uttar Pradesh v. Abhay Raj Singh, it was held by the Supreme Court that if court records go missing and re-construction is not possible, the courts are bound to set aside the conviction.
- Saving of time: With digitisation, it will take much less time for the lower courts to transmit the records as and when called for.
- The lawyers benefit because they or their staff are no longer required to visit the reporting sections or other sections of the court to know about the status of their cases.
- This has been sought to be implemented by the e-Committee of the Supreme Court by issuing directions to ensure that e-filing of cases/petitions by state governments in all matters be made mandatory from January 1, 2022.
Scope for virtual hearing in certain cases
- Cases related to matrimonial issues and domestic violence bounced cheques, motor accident compensation referred to mediation centres and lok adalats could be included in the list of cases fit for disposal through the virtual hearing.
- The hearing of matrimonial cases through video-conferencing was approved by the Supreme Court in the matter of Krishna Veni Nagam v Harish Nagam (2017).
- The direction was short-lived and a coordinate bench of the Supreme Court in the case of Santhini v Vijaya Venkatesh (2018) referred the matter for reconsideration before a larger bench.
- Virtual hearings cannot be a substitute for physical court hearings in all cases.
- However, in appropriate cases and certain categories of cases as identified by the court administration in consultation with the members of the Bar, virtual hearing should be made mandatory.
Live streaming of cases
- In 2018, the Supreme Court allowed the live-streaming of cases of constitutional and national importance on the basis of the judgment in Swapnil Tripathi.
- Step towards transparency: The livestreaming of court proceedings is a step towards ensuring transparency and openness.
- While several reservations were expressed against it, the Gujarat HC in July 2021 became the first court in the country to livestream its proceedings.
- Its example was followed by other HCs like Karnataka, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh and Patna.
Challenges
- Internet connectivity issues and the need for a well-equipped space where lawyers can conduct their cases are some of the major problems requiring attention.
- Political will and the support of judges and lawyers are also necessary.
- Awareness and training: Judges, court staff and lawyers are not well-versed with digital technology and its benefits.
- The need of the hour is for them to be made aware of these and receive adequate training.
Conclusion
Adoption of technology will bring drastic changes in the field of law and will transform the Court system.
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Note4Students
From UPSC perspective, the following things are important :
Prelims level: Not much
Mains level: Paper 2- Criminal justice system
Context
The key to an improved criminal justice system is quality forensic labs and well-trained staff, not more legislation and harsher punishments.
About forensic science
- Forensic science is the application of scientific perspectives and techniques to the legal process, including investigations and courtroom protocol.
- It is the use of scientific data and procedures specifically for the legal system.
- There is rigorous procedure involved, including controlled conditions, reliable data collection and the attempt to disprove hypotheses.
- Methodologies like the autopsy procedures, fingerprinting, testing and matching for poisons, blood spatter analysis, matching guns to bullets fired (ballistics), voice sample matches, handwriting assessments and DNA analysis are all facets of forensic science.
Inadequate state forensic facilities
- We have a woefully inadequate number of forensic science laboratories (FSL).
- There are seven central forensic laboratories in India at Hyderabad, Kolkata, Chandigarh, New Delhi, Guwahati, Bhopal and Pune.
- Six of these laboratories, barring Delhi, are under the control of the Directorate of Forensic Science Services (DFSS), and its mission is to render high quality and credible forensic services to the justice delivery system.
- A National Forensic Sciences University was established in Gandhinagar, Gujarat in 2020.
- The existing National Institute of Criminology and Forensic Science in Delhi has been integrated into this new university.
- There are 32 state FSLs and about 529 mobile FSL units, of which Delhi has one state FSL and six mobile units.
- The DNA tests discovered in 1985 are used to identify individuals involved in alleged crimes.
- In 2017, The Hindu reported that while the United Kingdom completes DNA testing on over 60,000 crimes annually, India with over 13 times the population completes such tests on less than 7,500 cases.
- The average pendency at each lab is huge.
- In all states, there were over 50 per cent vacancies in personnel at their facilities.
Way forward
- More investment: We certainly need more investment in the establishment of FSL laboratories, the training and appointment of personnel adept at forensic methodologies and reforms within our police to establish a trained and skilled detective cadre tasked with solving complex and heinous crimes.
- Quality training and accreditation: There is a desperate need for good quality training facilities, standards of accreditation and continuous education programmes for our forensic experts.
Conclusion
It is not more legislation and harsher punishments that will solve crimes, but well-trained forensic staff plying their craft in good quality laboratories that will aid our criminal justice system.
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