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The Supreme Court on August 23, 2022 agreed to consider listing a plea challenging the grant of remission by the Gujarat government to 11 convicts in the BilkisBanogangrape case.
Chief Justice of India N.V. Ramana told advocate Aparna Bhat and senior advocate KapilSibal to file the case records. Ms. Bhat pressed the court to list the petition on Wednesday itself.
We are challenging the remission. Fourteen people were killed and a pregnant woman was assaulted, who orally mentioned the case for urgent hearing.
Gujarat government relied on its remission policy of 1992 to approve the convicts' applications for remission of the sentence and not the current policy of 2014.
In May 2022, the apex court had directed the Gujarat government to consider the application of one of the convicts, RadheshyamBhagwandas Shah @ LalaVakil, for premature release in terms of its remission policy of July 9, 1992. The 1992 policy was prevalent on the date of conviction
The Supreme Court has followed its judgment in the State of Haryana versus Jagdish which had held that the policy applicable at the time of conviction must be considered for deciding an application of pre-mature release.
In its May 13 judgment, a Bench led by Justice Ajay Rastogi concluded that Gujarat was the "appropriate government" under Section 432 of the Code of Criminal Procedure to decide the remission of the convicts in the case.
Undisputedly, in the instant case, the crime was committed in the State of Gujarat which is the appropriate Government competent to examine the application filed for pre-mature release.
We are not faulting the Supreme Court judgment.The petition challenging the release of the convicts on August 15 has been filed by CPI(M) leader Subhasini Ali, independent journalist and filmmaker RevatiLaul and former philosophy professor and activist RoopRekh Varma.
Trinamool Congress MP MahuaMoitra has also filed a petition challenging the remission.The State government’s decision to remit the sentence of the 11 convicts has raised a furious public outcry. There is a plethora of precedents to guide the apex court
In April 2022, an apex court Bench led by Justice D.Y. Chandrachud said that the State cannot exercise its remission powers arbitrarily.
The court, in State of Haryana versus Mohinder Singh, has underscored that the grant of remission should be “informed, fair and reasonable”.
States
Yediyurappa inaugurates Savarkaryatra in Mysuru (Page no. 4)
(GS Paper 1, History)
The former Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa inaugurated the SavarkarRathYatra in Mysuru with a call to counter the “negative propaganda” against Hindutva ideologue V.D. Savarkar in the State by spreading his message.
The eight-day-long yatra, which will traverse through parts of Mysuru, Chamarajanagar, and Mandya districts, comes at a time when Congress leaders, including the former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, had questioned Savarkar’s contribution to the freedom struggle.
Speaking on the occasion, Mr. Yediyurappa, who was recently appointed a member of the BJP’s Parliamentary Board, recalled the glowing descriptions of Savarkar by eminent personalities, including former Prime Ministers Indira Gandhi and Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
While Vajpayee, about 50 years ago, had emphasised the need for taking Savarkar’s message to each and every household in the country, Mr. Yediyurappa claimed that Indira Gandhi had called him a “remarkable son of India”.
The BJP leader said that a number of eminent personalities in the country, including former Presidents S. Radhakrishnan and Zakir Hussain, besides socialist Ram Manohar Lohia had also praised Savarkar. “When Savarkar died in Mumbai, Congress and Communist leaders attended his funeral.
Contending that Savarkar was a patriot, who also tried to reform the Hindu religion, Mr. Yediyurappa said he was a freedom fighter who spent several years in jail.
Though he did not name anybody for the negative propaganda about Savarkar while addressing the gathering at the launch of the yatra, Mr. Yediyurappa said it was a crime to defame such a personality for petty political gains.
Meanwhile, while speaking to reporters, Mr. Yediyurappa lashed out Mr. Siddaramaiah for questioning Savarkar’s role in the freedom movement.
He said the Congress leader was speaking irresponsibly and added that such utterances did not behove his stature. People of the State would soon teach him a lesson, he said.
Security was tightened for Mr. Yediyurappa’s visit to Mysuru in the wake of the protests against the black flag demonstrations and hurling of eggs at Mr. Siddaramaiah’s car during the latter’s recent visit to Kodagu.
Editorial
The case of the missing scientific Indian (Page no. 6)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
This 75th year of Independence is a major milestone for India; a time to take stock of the developments in various spheres over the last seven decades.
Sadly, with some notable exceptions such as this newspaper, the print and electronic media have not really taken stock of what has happened to science education in this country.
While politicians, writers, artists, actors and other celebrities have been given their due, science and scientists seem to have been largely ignored.
The general apathy towards science, and the lack of scientific temper among the public and politicians, is a poor commentary on the Indian sensibility.
Although India has made some significant scientific advances in research fields such as molecular biology, agricultural/pharmaceutical science, and solid-state chemistry, and some creditable leaps in space, nuclear science, and information technology, it has failed to propagate scientific literacy not only among the public, but also among scientists themselves.
Parliament underscored our commitment to propagate scientific temper by including it as a duty in Article 51A of the Constitution through the 42nd Amendment.
Article 51A says, “It shall be the duty of every citizen of India to develop the scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform.”
But despite these efforts, scientific temper has continued to remain a lofty ideal and has not really percolated into society. This has left much of our national psyche a prisoner of obscurantism and paved the way for retrogressive religion-based politics at the expense of constitutionally guaranteed secular values.
A solid foundation for modern science was built by scientists in the 1950s and 1960s, facilitated by the then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. So, what went wrong?
A part of the problem may lie with scientists themselves and the science academies they belong to. Scientists half-heartedly stood up for scientific causes, even when the situations demanded that they fully do so.
The bulk of scientists in the country, including many who were occupying high positions, were themselves not committed to scientific temper which calls for rationality, reason and lack of belief in any dogma, superstition or manifest falsehood.
The implications of the 5G rollout for law enforcement (Page no. 6)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently announced that 5G deployment in India will commence sooner than expected. Reports suggest that the government will launch 5G at the inauguration of the India Mobile Congress on September 29.
The long-awaited upgrade from 4G to 5G will allow ultra-fast Internet speeds and seamless connectivity across the country compared to 4G. The implications of the 5G roll-out could be significant, particularly for law enforcement in India.
On the one hand, the 5G roll-out is set to enhance efficiency, productivity, and security by helping the police access critical information in real-time and nab criminals. 5G has high bandwidth and low latency, so its adoption would ensure the best performance of police devices such as body cams, facial recognition technology, automatic number-plate recognition, drones, and CCTVs. 5G promises to transmit clearer images.
This will simplify the task of the police who, at present, often look at hazy images from devices and attempt to decipher them while working on cases.
The increased storage capacity promised by 5G will allow the police to streamline their investigation methods. 5G will also allow rapid and secure communication within the organisation as well as between civilians and emergency responders.
With 5G, the police can remotely access and analyse crime data and information from other infrastructure such as traffic lights.
But there are challenges in adopting 5G. The government and telecommmunication companies must first ensure that law enforcement agencies have the necessary infrastructure to take full advantage of all that 5G can offer.
Even if law enforcement agencies get access to secure data from telecom operators, they will still need tools to access this data. Also, most police systems are outdated and may not be compatible with 5G.
To bridge this technology gap, the police must invest in modern tools, software and infrastructure. They require funds to do this.
As many have pointed out, there are many concerns about 5G too. The first is, of course, cyber security. Deploying 5G when we have a shaky cyber security foundation is like erecting a structure on soft sand.
As the previous networks were hardware-based, India could practise cyber hygiene. But 5G is a software-defined digital routing.
This makes it susceptible to cyber threats such as botnet attacks, man-in-the-middle attacks, and distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) overloads. Besides, as 5G lacks end-to-end encryption, hackers can plot their attacks more precisely and perpetrate cybercrimes by hacking into systems or disseminating illegal content.
The bandwidth expansion due to 5G will enable criminals to embezzle data bases easily. With time, as 5G connects with additional devices, the frequency of attacks could increase.
OPED
Are freebies a way to mask state inaction? (Page no. 7)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
In March 2021, ThulamSaravanan, a legislative Assembly candidate for the Madurai South constituency in Tamil Nadu, offered extraordinary sops such as ₹1 crore and a car worth ₹20 lakh for each household, a robot for every homemaker, ₹1 crore to youth looking to start a business, a 100-day trip to the moon, a 300-feet artificial glacier to keep people cool etc.
He lost the polls. Nevertheless, his promises weren’t far off from those of the major political parties in power. In promising freebies, parody has increasingly meshed with reality.
All political parties offer freebies now. In 1967, DMK founder C.N. Annadurai promised a ₹4.5 kg bag of rice at ₹1 if his party was elected to power.
His campaign, for “three measures of rice for ₹1”, saw the party sweep the elections. The party could provide just 1 kg of rice for ₹1 instead.
Once launched, the scheme continued to grow, with ₹146 crore allocated in July 2020 to provide 5 kg of free rice per person to all PMKAY cardholders in Tamil Nadu.
Over time, freebies expanded beyond rice, to gas stoves, colour TVs, laptops, payments for household work etc.
Spreading beyond Tamil Nadu, the trend has caught on in other States as well – the Delhi government has notably offered water and electricity (up to a certain limit) free for the city’s voters; the Himachal Pradesh government is offering locals free power upto 125 units, along with free water in villages and a 50% discount in bus fares for women; in Assam, the State government has announced direct and indirect cash benefit schemes worth ₹6,000 crore impacting nine lakh beneficiaries.
This begs the question – has an entitlement mentality been encouraged, creating a cradle-to-grave welfare state?
Of course, welfarism as a political philosophy has long roots – whether in the West or in India. Our political economy is riven with such schemes – whether one calls them freebies, loan write-offs, waivers or simply direct transfers.
Every year, governments at the Centre and State expand the distribution of private goods such as LPG cylinders to ordinary citizens, while offering subsidies and in some cases covering the full cost.
Does a shift to such policies mean that Indian policymakers have simply given up on tackling poverty and inequality? Instead of pushing for building public assets, social capacity and society, India’s policymakers seem to have pivoted towards direct transfers and welfarism (via distribution of private goods for free).
Is the state only going to be compensatory in nature in the future, in lieu of government inaction and a lack of focus on delivering good public services?
Text & context
Reinvigorating the Chabahar port (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 2, International Relations)
After months of what appeared to be a “go-slow”, the Union government has revved up its interest in using Iran’s Chabahar port to connect to Afghanistan and Central Asia for trade, with the visit of the Union Minister of Ports, Shipping & Waterways SarbanandaSonowal to the port on August 20.
Ahead of the visit to Iran, where Mr. Sonowal met with senior Ministers as well as officials connected to the ShahidBeheshti terminal project development, an official statement said that the visit would be a chance to “strengthen ties and the maritime relationship” between the two countries.
“Due to [the] pandemic, there were less number of visits from India to Iran and vice-versa... This visit will also highlight the importance of Chabahar as a gateway for Indian trade with Europe, Russia and CIS [Commonwealth of Independent States] countries,” the statement said.
During the Chabahar visit, Mr. Sonowal reviewed the progress in the work on the terminal and handed over six mobile harbour cranes “to improve efficiency” and “invigorate the potential of Chabahar” in the loading and unloading operations at the port.
When the first agreement for Chabahar was signed by then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2003, the plan had a three-fold objective: to build India’s first offshore port and to project Indian infrastructure prowess in the Gulf; to circumvent trade through Pakistan, given the tense ties with India’s neighbour and build a long term, sustainable sea trade route; and to find an alternative land route to Afghanistan, which India had rebuilt ties with after the defeat of the Taliban in 2001.
Subsequently, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s government constructed the Zaranj -Delaram Highway in Afghanistan’s South, which would help connect the trade route from the border of Iran to the main trade routes to Herat and Kabul, handing it over to the Karzai government in 2009.
In 2016, Prime Minister Narendra Modi travelled to Tehran and signed the agreement to develop Chabahar port, as well as the trilateral agreement for trade through Chabahar with Afghanistan’s President Ashraf Ghani.
Since the India Ports Global Chabahar Free Zone (IPGCFZ) authority took over the operations of the port in 2018, it has handled 215 vessels, 16,000 TEUs (Twenty-foot Equivalent Units) and four million tons of bulk and general cargo, the government said in Parliament last month.
In the last few years, a fourth strategic objective for the Chabahar route has appeared, with China’s Belt and Road Initiative making inroads in the region. The government hopes to provide Central Asia with an alternate route to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) through Iran for future trade.
Speaking a few days earlier on the occasion of a “Chabahar Day” function in Mumbai, Mr. Sonowal said that it is India’s vision to make the ShahidBeheshti port a “a transit hub” and link it to the International North South Trade Corridor (INSTC), that also connects to Russia and Europe.
Chinese tech firms under wider scrutiny in India (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 3, Cyber Security)
Having experienced income tax searches, exclusion from 5G telecom trials and increasing restriction on research collaborations, The Hindu learnt from sources that Chinese telecom major Huawei may downsize its research and development (R&D) facilities in India — indicative of an endgame for its Indian operations.
Other than Huawei, sector peers ZTE, Vivo, Xiaomi and Oppo too have had their offices searched in the past few months. This is believed to be part of a series of government measures aimed at checking Chinese corporate influence in the country.
In India, Vivo, Xiaomi and Oppohave been broadly accused of tax evasions, discharging illegal remittances, forged identifications and incorrect disclosures.
In April this year, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) seized ₹5,551.27 crore from the Xiaomi’s India unit. It alleged that the company had remitted foreign currency equivalent to the mentioned amount to three foreign-based entities, including one Xiaomi group entity, under the guise of ‘royalty’.
The company was alleged to have not availed any service from either of the entities and that the remittances ultimately benefited its group entities. This was seen to be in violation of certain provisions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (1999).
Xiaomi denied the allegations and said that the payments were made for in-licensed technologies and IPs used in their Indian products under the purview of a legitimate commercial arrangement.
Continuing this trend, in July, the ED carried out searches at 48 Vivo locations in the country. The ED was acting on an FIR by the Ministry of Corporate Affairs that the Grand Prospect International Communication Pvt Ltd (GPICPL), one of Vivo’s associated companies, had used forged identification documents and falsified addresses at the time of incorporation.
As per the ED,the company’s registered address was that of a government building and the house of a senior bureaucrat. This pointed to the presence of a shell company carved to sidestep taxation.
The companies were said to have transferred “huge amount of funds to Vivo India”. Moreover, Vivo India allegedly remitted about 50% of its total sale proceeds to China to disclose huge losses in Indian-incorporated companies to avoid paying taxes. This was in violation of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (2002).
In the same month, Oppo was issued a show-cause notice after the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) detected customs duty evasion of ₹4,389 crore.
The DRI’s searches placed evidence that alleged Oppo had wilfully declared incorrect descriptions of certain imported items for manufacturing their mobile phones in India. This resulted in the company wrongfully availing duty exemption benefits of ₹2,981 crore.
Further, the import of intellectual rights acquired from outside the Indian territory was not accounted in their balance sheets for imported products.
This is in violation of various provisions of the Customs Act (1962) and Customs Valuation (Determination of Value of Imported Goods) Rules, 2007.
Acculturation (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 1, Society)
The concept of acculturation was coined in 1880 by American geologist John Wesley Powel in a report for the U.S. Bureau of Ethnology.
He defined it as the psychological changes induced in people due to cross-cultural imitation, resulting from the interaction with different cultures.
At present, acculturation is defined as the process in which a person or group from one culture comes in contact with another culture, adopting the values and practices of the other while still retaining their own distinct identity.
The most prevalent use of the concept is in relation to the cultural exchange between a minority group, that migrates to a new society, with a predominant majority group.
The concept became popular among American sociologists in the early 20th century as they analysed the integration of immigrants into American society.
The study by W.I. Thomas and Florian Znaniecki in 1918 on Polish immigrants in Chicago, resulted in a better understanding of the concept of assimilation — a process in which groups adopt a new culture that virtually replaces their original culture, leaving only traces behind.
On the other hand, the study on Black Americans within white American society gave researchers insight into the concept of acculturation.
Sociologists understand acculturation as a two-way process, wherein the minority culture adopts aspects of the majority to fit in and the culture of the majority is also influenced by that of the minority.
Acculturation affects various aspects of life, including dietary patterns, fashion, art, architecture, work culture, and literature. The process can occur at both individual and group levels, as well as between groups that may not be a majority or a minority in society.
Though used interchangeably by most, acculturation is different from the concept of assimilation. Assimilation is just one of the many eventual outcomes of acculturation.
Depending on the strategies adopted by individuals or groups involved in a cultural exchange, acculturation may result in rejection, integration, marginalisation or transmutation. Moreover, since cultures are ever-evolving, the outcomes of the process may transform with time.
Assimilation refers to the process by which individuals or groups eventually become indistinguishable from the culture they came in contact with.
It occurs when the importance given to one's culture is minuscule and where ‘fitting in’ is given high significance, deeming it necessary for survival in a new cultural space. This outcome is likely to occur in societies that are "melting pots" into which new members are absorbed.
Separation refers to the process wherein an individual/group comes in contact with a new cultural group, but does not embrace aspects of the new culture, as they wish to maintain their own unique identity without being ‘contaminated’ by the values and norms of another culture.
News
Sex ratio at birth normalises slightly: study (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 1, Social Issues)
The latest study by Pew Research Center has pointed out that “son bias” is on a decline in India and the average annual number of baby girls “missing” in India fell from about 480,000 (4.8 lakh) in 2010 to 410,000 (4.1 lakh) in 2019.
The “missing” here refers to how many more female births would have occurred during this time if there were no female-selective abortions.
The problem began in the 1970s with the availability prenatal diagnostic technology allowing for sex selective abortions.
Among the major religions, the biggest reduction in sex selection seems to be among the groups that previously had the greatest gender imbalances, particularly among Sikhs.
World over, boys modestly outnumber girls at birth, at a ratio of approximately 105 male babies for every 100 female babies.
That was the ratio in India in the 1950s and 1960s, before prenatal sex tests became available across the country. India legalised abortion in 1971 but the trend of sex selection started picking up in the 1980s due to the introduction of ultrasound technology.
In the 1970s, India’s sex ratio was at par with the global average of 105-100, but this widened to 108 boys per 100 girls in the early 1980s, and reached 110 boys per 100 girls in the 1990s.
“From a large imbalance of about 111 boys per 100 girls in India’s 2011 census, the sex ratio at birth appears to have normalised slightly over the last decade, narrowing to about 109 in the 2015-16 wave of the National Family Health Survey and to 108 boys in the latest wave of the NFHS, conducted from 2019-21,” the report states.
The Pew Research Center report points out that between 2000-2019, nine crore female births went “missing” because of female-selective abortions. The report has also analysedreligion-wise sex selection, pointing out that the gap was the highest for Sikhs.
“In the 2001 census, Sikhs had a sex ratio at birth of 130 males per 100 females, far exceeding that year’s national average of 110. By the 2011 census, the Sikh ratio had narrowed to 121 boys per 100 girls.
It now hovers around 110, about the same as the ratio of males to females at birth among the country’s Hindu majority (109), according to the latest NFHS,” the report states.
Both Chirstians (105 boys to 100 girls) and Muslims (106 boys to 100 girls) have sex ratios close to the natural norm, and this trend is holding.
The study points out that while the Sikhs make up less than 2% of the Indian population, they accounted for an estimated 5%, or approximately 440,000 (4.4 lakh), of the nine crore baby girls who went “missing” in India between 2000 and 2019.
DRDO, Indian Navy test indigenous missile (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 3, Defence)
The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and the Indian Navy on Tuesday successfully flight tested the indigenously developed Vertical Launch Short Range Surface-to-Air Missile (VL-SRSAM) from the Integrated Test Range (ITR), Chandipur off the coast of Odisha.
The VL-SRSAM, a ship-borne weapon system, is meant for neutralising various aerial threats at close ranges, including sea-skimming targets, and was the last test-fired in June.
The flight test was carried out from an Indian Naval Ship against a high-speed unmanned aerial target for demonstration of vertical launch capability. The missiles, equipped with indigenous Radio Frequency (RF) seeker, intercepted the target with high accuracy.
During the test launch, flight path and vehicle performance parameters were monitored using flight data captured by various Range instruments such as Radar, Electro-optical tracking system (EOTS), and Telemetry systems deployed by ITR, Chandipur.
The launch was monitored by senior scientists from various DRDO labs involved in the design and development of the system such as Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL), Research Centre Imarat (RCI), Hyderabad, and R&D Engineers, Pune.
RakshaMantri Shri Rajnath Singh complimented the DRDO, the Indian Navy, and associated teams on the successful flight trial of VL-SRSAM and stated that the missile will prove to be a force multiplier for the Indian Navy.
Secretary Department of Defence R&D and DRDO Chairman Dr. Satheesh Reddy observed that the missile will further strengthen the Navy‘s ability to neutralise various aerial threats at close ranges, including sea-skimming targets.
Tensions mar a mission to Tiangong (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
Tension between India and China since May 2020 is worrying Indian astrophysicists involved in an ambitious project to install an India-made spectroscope aboard the developing Chinese space station, Tiangong.
Scientists at the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bengaluru, were among nine groups selected from 42 applicants in 2019 as part of a United Nations-led initiative that invites research teams from all over the world to compete for an opportunity to design payloads that will be shuttled to Tiangong aboard rockets of the Chinese Manned Space Agency.
The project, called Spectrographic Investigation of Nebular Gas (SING), also involves collaboration with the Institute of Astronomy, Russian Academy of Sciences, and has been designed and developed by research students at the IIA.
The plan is to have it ready by the year end so that it can be launched in the summer of 2023. Though the plan is on schedule, scientists at the IIA are now consulting with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) as well as the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) on whether they are in the clear to go ahead with the project.
Chinese and Indian troops have been engaged in a prolonged stand-off in eastern Ladakh. The two sides have so far held 16 rounds of Corps Commander-level talks to resolve the stand-off, which erupted on May 5, 2020, following a violent clash in the Pangong lake area.
At the moment [the India-China] relationship is going through an extremely difficult phase after what China did at the border.
We are cautiously hopeful that the project will progress as scheduled,” said Jayant Murthy, Senior Professor, IIA, and the coordinator for the project.
Technical discussions on the payload are still on with China and we have conveyed to them that we need an export clearance from Indian authorities to go ahead. We have written to our relevant agencies and are awaiting their response.
The SING project would be the first space-collaboration involving India and China, and primarily deals with sending and positioning a spectrograph, an instrument that splits light into constituent frequencies and wavelengths, to study ultraviolet radiation.
This will help analyse the make-up and sources of interstellar gas in the region that swept by the space station as it orbits around the earth.
We could certainly launch this instrument aboard other space missions, including those by ISRO. However, every mission that carries payloads carries a certain cost — in terms of making space, assigning manpower, etc. — at the end of the launch vehicle, and that requires planning and budgeting time.
Right now, we have an opportunity aboard the CSS (Chinese space station) and it would be wonderful to have the payload on it.
Benami law can’t be applied retrospectively: SC (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
The Supreme Court on Tuesday declared as “unconstitutional and manifestly arbitrary” the amendments introduced to the Benami law in 2016, which apply retrospectively and can send a person to prison for three years even as it empowers the Centre to confiscate “any property” subject to a benami transaction.
In a decision much awaited by businesses, a three-judge Bench, led by Chief Justice of India N.V. Ramana, declared as unconstitutional Sections 3(2) and 5 introduced through the Benami Transactions (Prohibition) Amendment Act, 2016. The 2016 law amended the original Benami Act of 1988, expanding it to 72 Sections from a mere nine.Section 3(2) mandates three years of imprisonment for those who had entered into benami transactions between September 5, 1988 and October 25, 2016. That is, a person can be sent behind bars for a benami transaction entered into 28 years before the Section even came into existence.
Justice Ramana, who wrote the 96-page judgment, held that the provision violated Article 20(1) of the Constitution.Article 20(1) mandates that no person should be convicted of an offence, which was not in force “at the time of the commission of the act charged as an offence”.
Section 5 of the 2016 Amendment Act said that “any property, which is subject matter of benami transaction, shall be liable to be confiscated by the Central Government”. The court held that this provision cannot be applied retrospectively.
The CJI dismissed the government’s version that forfeiture, acquisition and confiscation of property under the 2016 Act was not in the nature of prosecution and cannot be restricted under Article 20.
The court observed that the 2016 Act condemned not only transactions that were traditionally denominated as benami but also a “new class of fictitious and sham transactions”.
The court said the intention of Parliament was to condemn property acquired from ill-gotten wealth. These proceedings cannot be equated as enforcing civil obligations.
Business
Commerce dept. being rejigged to make it future ready: Goya (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
The Department of Commerce is being restructured to make it ‘future ready’ and put in place an ecosystem to achieve the $2 trillion export target by 2030.
Talking to reporters here, the Commerce and Industry Minister said that as part of the restructuring exercise, a dedicated trade promotion body would be set up to devise an overall strategy to achieve targets.
The focus of the restructuring, he said, would also be on strengthening negotiations capability at the World Trade Organization (WTO) and for bilateral free trade agreements;centralisation and digitisation of trade facilitation processes and rehauling the data analytics ecosystem. The objective was to increase India’s share in global exports and also to create jobs, he noted.
Mr. Goyal also said that there would be no reduction of manpower in the Commerce Ministry on account of restructuring, rather it may go up.
Indian trade and commerce will not only be a strong element in India’s march to prosperity, towards becoming a developed nation in the AmritKaal , but also play an extremely important role in serving the needs of the whole world.
He said his Ministry was preparing for greater multilateral and bilateral engagement with other countries.
All of this had been studied and researched as a part of the restructuring exercise, Mr. Goyal said while releasing ‘The Department of Commerce Restructuring Dossier’.