4 June 2024, The Hindu
Poll result today, India set for a new Lok Sabha
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Prelims syllabus: Current events of national and international importance.
Property is real, and so should the ‘compensation
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GS 2: Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources
- An oft-quoted maxim in relation to property rights is that of President John Adams: “Property is surely a right of mankind as real as liberty”.
- The right to property — initially envisaged as a fundamental right and later as a constitutional right — has witnessed an interesting history in the post-colonial era.
- No other right as enshrined in the Constitution has witnessed a tussle as fierce as between courts and the legislature.
- The genesis of this power struggle dates back to the case of Bela Banerjee which involved the interpretation of Articles 19(1)(f) and 31(2) of the Constitution (prior to amendment).
- The Supreme Court of India held that the word compensation in Article 31(2) postulated “a just equivalent of what the owner has been deprived of”.
- To undo this interpretation, the Constitution (Fourth) Amendment was passed in 1955 amending, inter alia, Article 31(2) to expressly state that the courts could not delve into the question of inadequacy of compensation.
The delicate balancing of health-care costs
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GS 2: Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources
- As we navigate the dynamic landscape of Indian health care, cost considerations are increasingly influencing every aspect of service delivery and patient care.
- With rising health disparities and uneven access to medical services, the need for equitable and sustainable health-care policies has never been more urgent than now.
- Ongoing discussions about setting rates for medical services are not just bureaucratic exercises.
- They fundamentally shape how we perceive, access, and deliver health care across India.
- In this globalised era, we see a variety of responses to similar challenges worldwide, shaped by differing cultural, economic, and systemic factors.
- By learning from these international examples, we can refine our strategies to manage health-care costs more effectively.
Missing in manifestos: children’s issues
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GS 2: Welfare schemes for vulnerable sections of the population by the Centre and the States and the performance of these schemes
- Children form about 30% of India’s population, but they are invisibilised during elections.
- India has the largest child population in the world, yet most political parties turn a blind eye to children’s interests.
- What have some of the major political parties promised to shape our children’s and nation’s future, especially in terms of nutrition, education, and health?
- On education, the BJP’s manifesto promises to strengthen the network of PM SHRI Schools, Ekalavya Schools, and other such schools as per the National Education Policy, 2020, to make them “world class.”
- Strengthening a few cost-intensive model schools to provide high quality education to a few children cannot be considered as an alternative to making systemic changes to improve the public education system.
- In fact, recent State-wide reforms to the public education systems in Andhra Pradesh and New Delhi show that India does not need model schools in silos — it needs every government school to be a model school to effectively cater to millions of students.
SC directs Centre to hold Yamuna Board meeting to address Delhi’s water crisis
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GS 3: Environmental pollution and degradation
- The Supreme Court on June 3 directed the Centre to hold an emergency meeting of its Upper Yamuna River Board with the States of Delhi, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh to address water scarcity in the national capital amidst soaring temperatures crossing the 50-degree Celsius mark.
- A Vacation Bench of Justices P.K. Mishra and K.V. Viswanathan ordered the meeting to be held on June 5.
Remove 100% fruit juice claim from label and ads, says FSSAI
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GS 2: Statutory, regulatory and various quasi-judicial bodies.
- The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) has issued a directive mandating all Food Business Operators (FBOs) to remove any claim of ‘100% fruit juice’ from the labels and advertisements of reconstituted fruit juices with immediate effect.
- All the FBOs have also been instructed to exhaust all existing pre-printed packaging materials before September 1.
- “It has come to the attention of FSSAI that several FBOs have been inaccurately marketing various types of reconstituted fruit juices by claiming them to be 100 per cent fruit juices,” the statement said.
ICMR seeks to provide oral formulation of hydroxyurea to treat sickle cell disease
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GS 2: Issues relating to development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, Human Resources
- The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has invited Expressions of Interest (EoI) from eligible organisations for the “joint development and commercialisation” of low dose or paediatric oral formulation of hydroxyurea to treat sickle cell disease in India.
- India has the highest prevalence of sickle cell disease in South Asia, and over 20 million sickle cell affected individuals reside in the country.
- While most pharmaceutical companies in India market 500 mg capsules or 200 mg tablets of hydroxyurea, the biggest challenge in treatment is that it’s not available in the suspension form for effective use in the case of paediatric patients, the ICMR said.
‘Green-beard’ genes could explain how altruism arose in nature
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GS 3: General awareness in the fields of IT, Space, Computers, Robotics, Nanotechnology, bio-technology
- Altruism is widespread in nature. Worker honey bees devote their entire life to foraging and caring for their sister, the queen, and her offspring, but do not themselves reproduce.
- In widow spiders, a male allows a female fertilised by him to eat him, and thus nourish herself and her offspring.
- A meerkat, a mongoose found in Africa, assumes the role of a sentinel, perching itself on a mound or rock, keeping a lookout for predators, instead of foraging for food, while the rest of the clan is feeding. If a predator is sighted, it alerts the others.
- Many humans themselves have agreed that “greater love has no man than he who lays down his life for his friends”.
