16th May’18 – The Hindu Editorial Complete Analysis

Table of Contents

A triple blow to job guarantee scheme

 A lack of sufficient funds, rampant payment delays and abysmal wage rates are to blame
 ₹11•,000 crore fraud that diamond merchant Nirav Modi is said to have created
is a figure that needs to be put in perspective.
 The total amount of wages pending under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment
Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) scheme for the whole country (2016-17) was around ₹11•,000
crore too.
 National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 is an Indian labour law and social
security measure that aims to guarantee the ‘right to work’.
 The act was first proposed in 1991 by P.V. Narasimha Rao.
 The government is mandated to provide work within 15 days of a worker seeking work.
 Otherwise the worker is entitled to an unemployment allowance.
 Second key provision of the Act pertains to payment of wages within 15 days.
 Entitled to a delay compensation of 0.05% per day.
 However, both these provisions have been routinely violated.

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 There is an ongoing Public Interest Litigation in the Supreme Court (Swaraj Abhiyan v.
the Union of India) concerning these violations.
 Three ways in which a lack of funds
 1st budget allocation over the years has been insufficient
 The real budget of 2018-19 is much lower than that of 2010-11.
 2nd even this low budget allocation has undergone various kinds of curtailment.
 3rd point is about stagnating MGNREGA wages
 MGNREGA wages are a less lucrative option for the marginalised, being lower
than the minimum agricultural wages in most States
 As primary beneficiaries of the Act, women, Dalits and Adivasis could be the most affected
and pushed to choose more vulnerable and hazardous employment opportunities.

At last, a scheme
 Draft, which gives no name for the authority
 Authority‟s decisions final and binding
 Cauvery basin States must quickly agree on an authority to apply the water -sharing award
 Most welcome feature of such a mechanism is that an issue concerning the livelihood
of thousands of farmers will be taken out of the political domain and entrusted to experts.

WEDNESDAY INTERVIEW | MAHESH SENANAYAKE

 „Sri Lanka is the only country that has eradicated terrorism‟
 The Sri Lankan Army Chief on the army‟s role and challenges in the post-war context, efforts towards resettlement, and international scrutiny.
 Lieutenant General Mahesh Senanayake took over as the 22nd Commander of the Sri Lankan Army in June 2017.
 The conduct of the army in the past, during the island‟s civil war that it ended by defeating the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 2009, and its contentious presence and role in the country‟s Tamil-majority north.
 Tamil political leadership and the people for demilitarization of the war scarred areas, what is the army‟s role and vision as Sri Lanka tries transitioning into peace?

Prelims Focus Facts-News Analysis

 Six tigers from M.P. to be relocated to Odisha
 Six tigers will be relocated to the Satkosia Tiger Reserve in Odisha‟s Angul district from
Madhya Pradesh as part of the State government‟s plan to revive big cat population in
the protected forest.
 According to the 2016 tiger census, Odisha had 40 Royal Bengal Tigers – 13 males, 24
females and three calves.
If this relocation scheme is successful, the State government may undertake similar
efforts in other forests, he said.

Prelims Focus Facts-News Analysis

 Rohatgi joins Lokpal selection panel
 The former Attorney-General has been appointed „eminent jurist‟
 Former Attorney-General Mukul Rohatgi has been appointed “eminent jurist” in
the high-profile Lokpal selection committee led by the Prime Minister, which will
shortlist candidates for appointment as the anti-corruption ombudsman.
 Though passed in 2014, the Lokpal and Lokayukta Act of 2013 was not implemented
all these years because there was no Leader of the Opposition in the 16th Lok Sabha.
 The 2013 statute includes the Leader of the Opposition as a member of the selection committee.
 However, on April 27 last year, the Supreme Court, in a judgment, clarified that the
Lokpal appointment process need not be stalled merely due to the absence of the
Leader of the Opposition.

Prelims Focus Facts-News Analysis

 The Lingayat gamble fails
 The Karnataka Cabinet’s decision to recommend religious minority status to Lingayats, a
numerically significant community and a traditional BJP vote bank, seems to have failed to bring votes to the Congress.
 In fact, it might have even backfired
 North Korea says it is ready to join global disarmament efforts
 North Korea will join international efforts to ban nuclear tests, its Ambassador
to the United Nations in Geneva, Han Tae-song, told the Conference on Disarmament
 Chinese county bans India educated monks
 ‘They may spread separatist content’
 Oil widens trade deficit to $13.7 billion