Whatsapp 93125-11015 For Details
A day after the Chief Judicial Magistrate’s court in Surat convicted former Congress president Rahul Gandhi in a criminal defamation case over his Modi surname remark, the Lok Sabha Secretariat issued a notification to disqualify Mr. Gandhi as the Lok Sabha member from Wayanad.
Calling it a “black day” for Indian democracy, the Congress accused the ruling party of “strangulating” democracy by trying to silence the voices of Mr. Gandhi and other Opposition leaders.
It would fight the battle legally as well as politically, the party said and announced a nationwide agitation against the disqualification.
Mr. Gandhi, who had come to the Lok Sabha in the morning and attended a meeting of Congress MPs before the notification was issued, later tweeted, “I am fighting for the voice of India. I am ready to pay any price.”
Stating that the Wayanad MP’s disqualification from Lok Sabha was the natural outcome of the court order and emphasising that the law was equal for everyone, the BJP was quick to claim that Mr. Gandhi’s 2019 comment about the Modi surname was an insult to Other Backward Classes (OBC).
At an election rally ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha poll, Mr. Gandhi had said: “I have a question. Why do all of them — all of these thieves — have Modi Modi Modi in their names? Nirav Modi, Lalit Modi, Narendra Modi. And if we search a bit more, many more Modis will come out.”
Editorial
Why Tipu Sultan must be killed, again (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 1, History)
Tipu Sultan was feared and envied not just during his reign (1782-99) by his fiercest enemies, the British, when he became the stuff of folklore in England.
In the Passage to England, news of his fearless opposition inflated his strengths and exaggerated his vices. He and his island abode, ‘Seringapatam’, were assured a place in cartoons, skits, plays, children’s games; as a design element on writing paper, cigarette cards, ship’s figureheads, soup tureens; as metaphor in multiple art objects.
Nineteenth century ‘Tipu Mania’ even ensured him a place in the English nursery, as a dreadful warning of what awaited the recalcitrant child.
Well into the 1820s, British theatre audiences were promised that ‘a whole stud of horses will appear!’ alongside ‘an array of zemindars!’.
The fascination with this figure did not end with his defeat and death on the battlefield on May 4, 1799. His death powered legend, art, theatre and song — this time not just in England but in his native land.
Tipu’s bravery is immortalised by Amar Chitra Katha and became the emblem of anti-colonialism in the Constitution; more controversial memories have been stoked by the troubling legacies of conversion in regions populated by his enemies.
Even artists who had never set foot in India — Robert Ker Porter, David Wilkie, or Henry Singleton — portray the Last Siege of Seringapatam, the discovery of his body by General David Baird, and the melodramatic portrait of his family’s grief.
Such portrayals of his defeat and death, which circulated widely, served to reassure the people of England that the one obstacle to the growth of the British Empire in India had indeed been removed. In other words, the pictorial versions satisfied a very British need, asserting a badly dented British valour following decades of Mysore opposition to easy conquest.
The portrayal of his death in art also served other purposes: when David Wilkie was commissioned to paint his famous painting in 1843, it was to assure Baird, not Tipu, a place in British history, rescuing him from the shadows of that other hero of Seringapatam, Arthur Wellesley (later, Duke of Wellington).
News
Govt. extends ₹200 subsidy under PMUY by a year (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 2, Welfare Schemes)
The government extended the subsidy of ₹200 per 14.2 kg LPG cylinder under the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) for a year, in view of the high prices of petroleum products in the international market. The decision will benefit 9.6 crore women. The subsidy is given up to 12 refills per year
The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approved the move, Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur told reporters.
This will entail an outgo of ₹7,680 crore in 2023-24 for the government, but our sisters will benefit from this.Mr. Thakur said there had been a sharp increase in international prices of LPG due to various geopolitical reasons and it was important to shield the PMUY beneficiaries from high LPG prices.
ICMR releases ethical guidelines for AI usage in healthcare (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has released the country’s first ‘Ethical Guidelines for Application of Artificial Intelligence in Biomedical Research and Healthcare’, aimed at creating “an ethics framework which can assist in the development, deployment, and adoption of AI-based solutions” in the fields specified.
Through this, they hope to make “AI-assisted platforms available for the benefit of largest section of common people with safety and highest precision possible,” while also addressing emerging ethical challenges when it comes to Artificial Intelligence in biomedical research and healthcare delivery.
The document, prepared by the Department of Health Research and the ICMR Artificial Intelligence Cell, Delhi, will be updated as and when the need arises.
Developed through extensive discussions with experts and ethicists, the guidelines include sections on ethical principles, guiding principles for stakeholders, an ethics review process, governance of AI usage, and informed consent.
It [the document] is intended for all stakeholders involved in research on AI in biomedical research and healthcare, including creators, developers, researchers, clinicians, ethics committees, institutions, sponsors, and funding organisations.
As per the guidelines, the ethical review process for artificial intelligence in health comes under the domain of the ethics committee.
The document notes that the regulation of AI technologies in healthcare is still in its nascent stage even in developed countries.
Business
Lok Sabha approves setting up of GST Appellate Tribunal (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
Lok Sabha cleared changes in the Finance Bill to pave the way for setting up of an appellate tribunal for resolution of disputes under GST.
Currently, taxpayers are filing writ petitions before high courts in the absence of an appellate tribunal. As per the amendments proposed in the Finance Bill 2023, which were passed by the Lok Sabha, benches of the GST Appellate Tribunal would be set up in every State while there will be a principal bench in Delhi which will hear appeals related to ‘place of supply.’
Even after more than five years of implementation of the Goods and Services Tax, the appellate tribunal had not been set up. As a result, unresolved legal matters accumulated.
Nangia Andersen India’s Tanushree Roy, Director- Indirect Tax, said the tribunals would lower burden on high courts, Supreme Court and provide taxpayers reprieve.
Govt. raises Securities Transaction Tax on derivatives (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
The Government has raised the Securities Transaction Tax (STT) on futures and options contracts in the stock market by 25% from April 1, 2023, a move that may push some traders to offshore markets and dent trading volumes on the bourses.
Options contracts will now attract 0.0625% STT, from 0.05% earlier, and futures contracts will attract a levy of 0.0125%, up from 0.01%, officials said after the Finance Bill was cleared by the Lok Sabha.
While the proposed increase in STT will shore up revenues of the government to a certain extent, the main idea behind this could be to discourage excessive trading in the futures and options (F&O) segment where a large number of retail traders end up losing money,” Deepak Jasani, head of retail research at HDFC Securities.
An incidental effect of this could be shifting the F&O trades to other locations that do not attract such taxes for participants who have access to them.
The measure will have the intended effect of curbing excessive F&O trades only in flat markets as when markets are volatile, traders will hope to offset the higher tax by higher payoffs.
Govt. scraps long-term tax benefit for debt funds (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
The government has scrapped the long-term capital gains treatment (with indexation benefits) for income from debt mutual funds and other schemes that invest up to 35% in equity shares of domestic companies.
The returns from such funds will now be treated as short term capital gains. Currently, capital gains arising from transfer of mutual fund units, other than equity-oriented funds held for more than three years, are considered as long-term investments and taxed at 20% with indexation benefits.
“The amendment will treat gains from transfer of units of specified mutual funds as short term and tax them at slab rates,” said Tapati Ghose, partner at Deloitte India. “The proposed move seems to bring taxation of such mutual funds on par with bank deposits and will impact such investments made on or after April 1, 2023,” she said.
Noting that these tax changes would also apply to categories such as gold funds, international funds and domestic fund of funds that have an equity exposure of up to 35%, V.K. Vijayakumar, chief investment strategist at Geojit Financial Services said there would be far reaching consequences.
Roopali Prabhu, chief investment officer and executive director at JM Financial, said investors would have to take higher risks due to this shift.