Whatsapp 93125-11015 For Details
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin called for transferring education back to the State List of the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution.
He said that only this would help abolish the centralised examinations like NEET. Education, originally a State subject, was moved to the Concurrent List by the Indira Gandhi government during the Emergency.
Hoisting the national flag at Fort St. George on Independence Day, Mr. Stalin recalled the stand taken by former Chief Ministers C.N. Annadurai and M. Karunanidhi on State autonomy.
All subjects that interact with people directly should be transferred to the State List. Especially, education should be transferred [back] to the State List.
The Tamil Nadu government would constitute a welfare board for workers attached to service providers, such as Ola, Uber, Swiggy, and Zomato, who have been serving their consumers in major cities.
The Chief Minister’s Breakfast Scheme would be expanded to all State-run schools across Tamil Nadu from August 25 and he would visit a school at Thirukkuvalai for inaugurating the scheme that day.
Mr. Stalin said the scheme to provide a subsidy of ₹1 lakh to women autorickshaw drivers would be expanded to cover 500 women. The monthly pension for freedom fighters and their families would be increased from ₹10,000 to ₹11,000, he said.
HC bats for animals’ right to live without fear, orders relocation of 495 families near T.N. tiger reserve (Page no. 1)
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
Highlighting the right of animals to live free from fear and distress, the Madras High Court has ordered relocation of 495 families of Thengumarahada, a village situated in the eastern boundary of the Mudumalai Tiger Reserve, on payment of ₹15 lakh each in compensation.
Justices N. Sathish Kumar and D. Bharatha Chakravarthy ordered that the total compensation amount of ₹74.25 crore be released from the funds of the the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) to the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) forthwith.
The NTCA was directed to transfer the amount to the Tamil Nadu Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (PCCF) within two months. After receiving the amount, the PCCF must disburse the compensation and relocate the villagers within a month, the judges ordered and called for a compliance report by October 10.
Merely because Thengumarahada is located in Tamil Nadu and the State contributes only a negligible or minimum share to the CAMPA funds on account of its laudable policies of not parting with any of the forestlands, the avowed and noble purpose of relocating the village cannot suffer.
Authoring the judgment, Justice Chakravarthy said Thengumarahada was formed after a government order was issued on August 5, 1948, for leasing out 100 acres to Thengumarahada Vivasaya Corporation (now Thengumarahada Cooperative Society) for farming. In 1961, the extent was increased to 500 acres.
But, subsequently, it was found that human settlement in the forest area was leading to man-animal conflicts as the village was located at the confluence of the Eastern Ghats and the Western Ghats and serving as a corridor for most of the long-ranging wild animals.
Thengumarahada area and the adjoining landscape is one of the rare places in India where healthy breeding populations of tiger, elephant, leopard, sloth bear, wild dog, hyena, black buck, four-horned antelope, barking deer, mouse deer and sambar are found together.
States
Rajasthan’s Annapurna free food packet scheme to benefit 1.10 cr. People (Page no. 4)
(GS Paper 2, Governance)
The Annapurna food packet scheme launched by the Congress government in Rajasthan on Tuesday as part of its public welfare measures is set to benefit about 1.10 crore people, including the poor and destitute families covered in a survey during the COVID pandemic. The scheme is primarily meant for the families covered by the National Food Security Act (NFSA).
Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot inaugurated the scheme at a function marking the 77th Independence Day here, while announcing that free food packets would be supplied to the poor families, which had received an assistance of ₹5,500 each during the pandemic, in addition to the NFSA families.
About 1.05 crore NFSA beneficiaries have got themselves registered for the scheme at the inflation relief camps. The State government will spend ₹4,500 crore annually on the scheme’s implementation.
The Annapurna scheme is the latest among a host of public welfare schemes launched by the Congress government in the State. Mr. Gehlot had announced it in the 2023-24 State budget presented in the Assembly earlier this year.
The eligible beneficiaries will get the Annapurna food packets every month from the fair price shops (FPS) for free, for which the FPS will get a commission of ₹10 per packet.
Each packet will contain one kg each of gram pulses, sugar, and iodised salt, one litre of soybean refined edible oil, 100 grams each of chilli powder and coriander powder, and 50 grams of turmeric powder.
Mr. Gehlot said the Annapurna scheme would help realise his government’s resolution of “no one should sleep hungry in Rajasthan”.
In addition to the main function at B.M. Birla Auditorium in Jaipur, the launch ceremony was organised simultaneously at more than 25,000 FPS at district and block headquarters, including the newly formed districts.
275 bird species counted during survey at Corbett Tiger Reserve (Page no. 4)
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
About 275 bird species, including two critically endangered, four vulnerable ones and two endangered species, were counted during a survey at Corbett Tiger Reserve.
The survey, conducted between June 20 and 23 by a 62-member team consisting of ornithologists, conservationists, volunteers from World Wide Fund (WWF) India, Tiger Conservation Foundation and Village Volunteer Protection Force, covering overall 540 km of 135 forest trails provided insights into the diverse bird species inhabiting at Corbett Tiger Reserve.
As per the report, two species, namely white-rumped vulture and red-headed vulture, considered critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) list, have been documented in the survey, whichcovered the vast range of landscape in the reserve, including grassland, dense forest, rivers and hilly terrains.
Two endangered species — Pallas’s fish-eagle, Egyptian vulture were also counted by the researchers in the survey. Four vulnerable bird species — great hornbill, great slaty woodpecker, grey-crowned prinia and river tern — have also been counted in the survey.
About 10 near-threatened bird species — river lapwing, red-breasted parakeet, oriental darter, lesser fish-eagle, Himalayan griffon, great thick-knee, gray-headed fish-eagle, black-necked stork, Asian woolley-necked stork and Alexandrine parakeet — have also been found at the reserve.
About 256 species documented in the survey are considered to be of least concern by the IUCN. The report was compiled by Oriental Trials, an NGO working for conservation of wildlife.
Editorial
Consumption-based poverty estimates have relevance (Page no. 6)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
A recent report by NITI Aayog on multidimensional poverty shows that the percentage of the poor has gone down from 25% in 2015-16 to 15% in 2019-21 and around 135 million people were lifted out of poverty during this period.
The Global Multidimensional Poverty Index report of 2023 of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Oxford Poverty & Human Development Initiative (OPHI), which was released recently, also shows that the incidence of the multidimensional poverty index declined from 27.5% in 2015-16 to 16.2% in 2019-21.
In this context, we briefly examine the issues, particularly on methodology relating to the multidimensional poverty index, and argue that consumption-based poverty estimates are still very relevant.
Multidimensional poverty estimates are not substitutes for National Sample Survey (NSS) consumption-based poverty ratios. In the end, we also flag some concerns about consumption expenditure surveys and the need to correct them.
The report of the Global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) 2018 says: “India has made momentous progress in reducing multidimensional poverty.
The incidence of multidimensional poverty was almost halved between 2005/06 and 2015/16, climbing down to 27.5 per cent. Thus, within ten years, the number of poor people in India fell by more than 271 million — a truly massive gain”. This is high praise indeed.
Is the conclusion of global MPI a new revelation? No, as far as the 2015-16 estimates are concerned. The estimates of poverty based on consumer expenditure and using the Tendulkar committee methodology show (over a seven-year period between 2004-05 and 2011-12) that the number of poor came down by 137 million despite an increase in population.
According to the Rangarajan Committee methodology, the decline between 2009-10 and 2011-12 is 92 million, which is 46 million per annum. For a decade, it will be larger than that of global MPI.
However, in absolute terms, the poverty ratios based on the Tendulkar and Rangarajan Committee methodologies are lower than as estimated by global MPI.
Opinion
Awaiting the age of moderation (Page no. 7)
(GS Paper 2, International Organisation)
In July, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), a coalition of 57 Muslim countries, suspended the status of Sweden’s special envoy, accusing the Scandinavian nation of enabling “the repeated abuse of the sanctity of the Holy Quran and Islamic symbols”.
One reason for this sort of Islamophobia to rage across the world is the failure of Muslim societies to question clerical interpretations that present Islam as an exclusivist and intolerant religion.
While Muslim supremacism is over a millennium old, its prevalence today owes mainly to the mid-eighteenth century religio-political pact between Muhammad bin Saud (1687-1765), founder of the Saudi kingdom, and Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab (1703–1792), founder of modern Salafism.
The pact sought autarchic assent for imposing the blinkered Wahhabi interpretation across Arabia. In return, Ibn Abd al-Wahhab promised to provide theological underpinning to Saud’s rule over the region.
In an allusive acknowledgement of this fact, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) told The Washington Post in March 2018 that investments in mosques and madrassas overseas were rooted in the Cold War, when allies asked Saudi Arabia to use its resources to prevent inroads in Muslim countries by the Soviet Union.
Nonetheless, MBS’s public recantation of the Wahhabi ideology and his push for moderate interpretations of Islam is an epochal moment in the history of Saudi Arabia which needs to be supported because of the transformative impact it is likely to have on Sunni Islam.
In pursuance of Islamic moderation, Secretary-General of the Mecca-based Muslim World League (MWL), Mr. Mohammed bin Abdul-Karim Al-Issa, was in India last month to talk about the need for an “alliance of civilisations” to counter the fatalistic idea of “clash of civilisations”.
Explainer
Why is the Cauvery water sharing issue flaring up again? (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 2, Governance)
On August 14, the Tamil Nadu government sought the Supreme Court’s intervention to make Karnataka immediately release 24,000 cubic feet per second (cusecs) from its reservoirs and ensure the availability of the specified quantity of water at Biligundlu on the inter-State border for the remainder of the month.
It also urged the Court to direct Karnataka to ensure the release of 36.76 TMC (thousand million cubic feet) stipulated for September 2023 as per the Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal (CWDT)’s final award of February 2007 that was modified by the SC in 2018.
A monthly schedule is in place for Karnataka, the upper riparian State of the Cauvery basin, to release water to Tamil Nadu. As per the schedule, Karnataka is to make available to Tamil Nadu at Biligundlu a total quantity of 177.25 TMC in a “normal” water year (June to May).
Of this quantity, 123.14 TMC is to be given during the period from June to September, also marking the season of the southwest monsoon.
Invariably, it is during this period that the Cauvery issue gets flared up, when the monsoon yields lower rainfall than anticipated. After the SC gave its judgment in February 2018 on the CWDT’s 2007 award, the Cauvery Water Management Authority (CWMA) and Cauvery Water Regulation Committee (CWRC) were established four months later to ensure the implementation of the judgment. Since then, the two bodies have been holding meetings to take stock of the situation.
The CWMA, at its meeting on August 11, wanted Karnataka to manage its releases in such a way that 10,000 cusecs of water was realised at Biligundlu for the next 15 days, starting from August 12.
In other words, Karnataka would have to provide 0.86 TMC a day or 12.9 TMC totally in the 15 days. The Authority also decided that based on future rainfall, there would be a re-evaluation of the quantity to be released.
Text
Analysing the crisis of democracy in post-colonial countries (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 2, International Organisation)
Democracies around the world are in regression mode. Debates on the crisis of democracy typically draw on the experience in OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries.
The focus is on the effects of globalisation and how the economic marginalisation of the lower classes has bolstered support for rightwing populism.
But in this paper, political sociologist Patrick Heller argues that “the sources of rightwing populism in post-colonial democracies are very different” than in the Global North and “the consequences are much more serious”.
According to Heller, reactionary politics in post-colonial democracies are not merely “challenges to the liberal norms and institutions of democracy as in the OECD world, but also concerted efforts to control and even repress civil society and to sustain the power and influence of dominant class-led coalitions.”
He makes his case through a comparative study of three countries — India, South Africa and Brazil — all of which share similar structural and historical characteristics and have experienced major crises in democracy.
What are the reasons for the democratic crises in these post-colonial nations? Heller answers this question with a four-part thesis.
First, he points out that a balance between political and civil society is critical for the sustenance of democratic institutions and practices. Second, democratic crisis is a symptom of the failure to incorporate the “subproletariant” — the masses who remain outside the realm of capitalist accumulation — into the economic and social mainstream.
Third, it is when the subproletariat begin to make some economic and political gains through collective mobilisation that traditionally dominant elites form a reactionary social coalition.
And lastly, democratic backsliding reaches a crisis point when the reactionary social coalition, having consolidated its grip on state power, starts to “subvert democratic institutions and practices in order to preserve or restore their social and economic privileges”.
News
With amended Act kicking in, Odisha has no ‘deemed forest’ (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
The Odisha government has sent a letter to district officials underlining that industry requests to divert forest land for non-forestry purposes now ought to conform with the amended Forest Act and that “deemed forests” as a category will cease to exist.
‘Deemed forest’ is forest land that has not been notified as such by the Centre or States. The 1996 Godavarman verdict by the Supreme Court enjoined States to bring in such unrecorded land that conformed to the ‘dictionary’ meaning of forest.
Nearly half of Odisha’s forest land was “deemed forest”, experts told The Hindu adding that the Odisha government’s interpretation of the Forest Act would end up accelerating the razing of forests.
The Odisha government’s order likely conflicts with the Environment Ministry’s assurances to a parliamentary committee that “deemed forests” would continue to be protected.
Protection under the Forest Act means that land cannot be diverted without the consent of the Centre as well as gram panchayats.
It also puts the onus on those diverting land to grow trees on an equivalent plot of land twice the razed area, along with a significant monetary penalty.
The Forest Act, 1980, now renamed as the Van (Sanrakshan Evam Samvardhan) Adhiniyam — translated as Forest Conservation and Augmentation — only accords protection to a forest that has been declared so in accordance with the provisions of the Forest Act, 1927 and also land that has been specifically notified as forest on or after October 25, 1980. In 1996, the Supreme Court expanded the remit of the Act to areas that were not notified as forest but conformed to the “dictionary” definition of forests.
The States were expected to form expert committees and identify plots of land that were encapsulated under this definition.
However not all States submitted these reports, leaving considerable leeway to States to define, or leave out large parcels of land from the definition of forest.
The Ministry of Environment, which brought in the amendments, said the changes to the 1980 Act were necessary to remove ambiguities and bring clarity to where forest laws could be applied.
SC plans expansion of infra; e-Courts to offer national link (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 2, Judiciary)
Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud announced a plan to expand the Supreme Court with 27 additional courts and 51 judges’ chambers. Currently, the Supreme Court has 17 courtrooms and two registrar courts. Its judicial strength is 32 now.
In his address at the 77th Independence Day celebrations on the Supreme Court lawns, Chief Justice Chandrachud said an “overhaul” of the court infrastructure was necessary on a priority basis to make courts more accessible and inclusive. He said the emphasis of the new project would be on modernising the judicial infrastructure.
“We plan to expand the Supreme Court by constructing a new building to accommodate 27 additional courts, 51 judges’ chambers, four registrar court rooms, 16 registrar chambers, and other requisite facilities for lawyers and litigants.
This expansion is proposed in two phases,” he said. The Chief Justice’s speech did not confine itself to just an announcement of the infrastructure projects.
He spoke on the important role judiciary played in ensuring that “institutions of governance function within the defined constitutional limits”.
He also highlighted that courts provide a “safe democratic space for individuals to seek protection of their rights and liberties”.
The Supreme Court particularly has been the vanguard of institutional governance by enhancing access to justice and promoting constitutional values.
The past 76 years suggest that the history of the Indian judiciary is the history of the daily life struggles of the Indian people. If our history teaches us anything, it is this — that no matter is big or small for the courts.
He said by examining and delivering judgments on disputes and grievances, the courts were merely performing their plain constitutional duty.
He highlighted the importance of technology as the “best tool” courts could wield against the inefficiency and opacity in judicial processes and to overcome the procedural barriers to justice.
Business
June exports tally raised by $1.4 bn (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
India’s goods exports may have slipped for the sixth month in a row in July, but the final tally of outbound shipments in June has turned out to be higher than the eight-month low of $32.97 billion reported earlier.
As per revised trade data, June’s goods exports now stand about $1.4 billion higher at $34.35 billion, driven largely by a $1.11 billion rise in petroleum products’ exports compared with the initial assessment.
The upward revision for June not only means a lower 18.7% dip in shipments than the 22% decline earlier estimated, but also translates into a lower trade deficit of $18.75 billion compared with the initial gap of $20.13 billion. This is because the import figures remained virtually unchanged from the $53.1 billion reported initially.
Goods trade numbers had seen sharp revisions running into billions of dollars through 2022-23, but the first two months of this financial year had seen only minor revisions of a few millions.
While the $1.4 billion uptick in June’s export figures is significant, it is not as sharp as the increases during the five-month period between November 2022 and March 2023 when exports were upgraded by an average of $3.2 billion every month from their initial estimates.
There seemed to be recurrent delays in reporting some petroleum exports, particularly from units located in special economic zones or SEZs.
Between April and July, petroleum exports have declined 32.5% to $23.67 billion, with officials attributing this to the fall in global oil prices rather than lower export volumes.