The Hindu Editorial Analysis | 12th Nov ’19 | PDF Download

IIP shrinks by 4.3% to the lowest in 8 years

• All 3 major sectors saw contraction
• Industrial activity in September contracted sharply by 4.3%, driven by major slowdowns in the capital goods, mining, and manufacturing sectors, according to official data released on Monday.
• The contraction in the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) in September is compared with the contraction of 1.1% in August. The Index had grown 4.3% in September of the previous year.
• “This is the first time after November 2012 that all three broad-based sectors have contracted and the lowest monthly growth in the 2011-12 base year series,” Devendra Kumar Pant, Chief Economist and Senior Director, Public Finance, India Ratings & Research, said. “In the old (2004-05) base, IIP in October 2011 contracted by 5%.”
• Within the Index, the capital goods sector saw a contraction of 20.7%, compared with shrinkage of 21% in August.
• The mining sector contracted by 8.5%, compared with an anaemic growth of 0.1% in August. The manufacturing sector contracted 3.9% in September, compared with a contraction of 1.2% in the previous month. The electricity sector, too, saw a continued contraction, shrinking 2.6%, compared with a contraction of 0.9% in August.
• The consumer durables sector continued to shrink in September, by 9.9%, compared with a contraction of 9.1% in August.
• The Ayodhya judgment has raised several questions for jurists to answer. Prominent among these is whether the Supreme Court’s direction to the Central government to formulate a scheme and set up a trust to facilitate the construction of a temple on the disputed land would amount to a breach of the secular character of the state.
• Can a secular state be ordered to facilitate the construction of a temple, which is an essential part of the Hindu belief? Does this not amount to a secular state fostering a particular religion?
• Justice K. Chandru, former Madras High Court judge, referred to the nine-judge Bench judgment in the S.R. Bommai case of 1994 in this regard. “The Bommai decision clearly said the state should be divorced from religion,” he said. The Bommai judgment said the concept of a secular state was essential in a democracy. “State is neither proparticular religion nor anti-particular religion. It stands aloof, in other words maintains neutrality in matters of religion and provides equal protection to all religions,” it observed.

‘No breach’

• Eminent jurist Upendra Baxi, however, said there was no breach of constitutional secularism involved in the Centre being given the responsibility.Agreeing with him, R. Venkata Rao, eminent constitutional expert and former Vice-Chancellor of National Law School India University, Bengaluru, said, “The inscription of the Supreme Court is yato dharma tato jaya [where there is dharma there is victory]. It is taken from the Bhagavad Gita. Now, it defies logic to say the Supreme Court is a religious institution.”
• Mr. Baxi said the Centre was already empowered under Section 6 of the Acquisition of Certain Area at Ayodhya Act, 1993 to vest the disputed land in a trust or authority. He pointed out that Section 7(1) of the 1993 Act allowed the disputed property to be “maintained by the government or by any person or trustees of any trust, authorities”. The validity of the 1993 Act was also upheld by the Supreme Court.
• But Justice Chandru argued that the Ayodhya Act was upheld only as an “interim measure so that land was not tampered with or frittered away when the case of its title and possession was still under litigation”.He questioned why the apex court directed the Centre — which was not a party to the Ayodhya title suits or appeals — to formulate a scheme for the land. The court could have very well asked the local civil court under Section 92 (g) of the Code of Civil Procedure to settle a scheme for the land
• Karnataka Labour Minister S. Suresh Kumar announced on October 21 that the State government will work towards framing guidelines for workers of digital platforms like Uber, Ola, Zomato, Swiggy and UrbanClap, to ensure all relevant labour benefits for those working in the ‘gig economy’. Details of implementation are awaited but the Karnataka government is following the tone set by the Centre, which proposed a new draft code on social security this year. Active moves to bring digital labour platforms within the purview of new or existing employment and labour regulations in India have been sorely missing. The Karnataka government’s move to add benefits is welcome and can provide a degree of public welfare assistance to a significant and growing workforce in India.
• Mr. Kumar said, “The government has the responsibility of ensuring social stability… while not creating hurdles for the businesses”. This move could possibly sidestep a question that remains open — i.e., whether Uber drivers, for example, are full-time employees of Uber or freelancers. It appears that this will be resolved in the courts or neglected entirely.
• The Ministry’s bid to provide insurance and job security can emerge only with direct acknowledgement of the role played by platforms in city job markets, and not by curbing asset light models or by regulating labour.

 Creating jobs

• Governments now actively acknowledge that platforms provide work to the growing demographic of youth in the country. At the moment, the manufacturing sector in India is unable to provide employment opportunities to the youth. There is thus a mismatch between education and job skills in the market.
• Governments have also been unable to create viable public work schemes in urban areas for those continuously migrating into cities and towns. Private tech, however, has been able to do this, and the government seems to be aware of its potential.
• Why don’t platform companies have to assume responsibility for providing employment and job security? The story goes back to four years ago. MoUs signed between platform companies and various State and Central Ministries over the years show that governments have actively invited companies to create work, entrepreneurial opportunities and skill development.
•  For example, Uber partnered with Ayushman Bharat to facilitate free healthcare for drivers and delivery partners.
• UrbanClap partnered with the National Urban Livelihoods Mission to generate jobs with minimum assured monthly wages for the urban poor.
• In cases of informal jobs where it was difficult to identify workers for whom protection was to be given, platforms became vehicles to serve this purpose.

Creating public utlities

• The ecosystem of public policy, platform work, and the government together can suggest an urban ‘Jobs for All’, a financialised employment guarantee scheme.
• The work created by these companies could easily be regulated as public goods in the coming years because it creates mobility and facilitates the movement of goods.
• An increasing number of these jobs has been created through incentivised demand using cashbacks, coupons, low fares, and even free services rather than through natural demand. Platforms have created public utilities that may not have been needed before via what is often low-skilled and poor quality work, but it is work that brings in some earnings. They have given urban workers a financialised, self-driven, optional economic safety net of ‘having a job, having a gig’.
• Since investment around new technology is especially attractive for developing economies, what does this mean for the state of employment in Indian cities? The strength or ability of labour regulation to push companies to deliver full formal employment in a financialised world of work seems poor.
• If the relationship between platform companies and national and State government continues this way, where do labour institutions and workers unions stand?
• Platform companies rely on city markets for their workers to populate the platform and to hopefully eventually turn a profit just as much as governments look to platforms to generate work opportunities. The Karnataka Social Welfare Department signed an MoU with Uber last year to create work opportunities for Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe youth.
• As we see the platform ecosystem mature and contend with having to turn a profit as demand dips and stabilizes, where does this mutual dependency take the urban resident who uses these platforms to earn a living?
• Does it imply an even further reduced importance of ‘employment’ as a way for social security to be delivered?
• It could also herald a time where platforms can be asked to perform more public functions like implementing a minimum wage.

 Revoking citizenship

• The Aatish Taseer case brings to focus an outdated provision in the Citizenship (Amendment) Act
• The BJP said in its 2014 manifesto that “NRIs, PIOs and professionals settled abroad [need to be harnessed] for strengthening Brand India”. However, by revoking the Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) card of writer Aatish Taseer, the BJPled government has shown that the promise was not serious. Mr. Taseer’s card was cancelled, the government claimed, as he had attempted to “conceal information” that his father, Salman Taseer, was of Pakistani origin. The spokesperson of the External Affairs Ministry said that if any OCI holder was “no longer eligible and if it fits into a certain criterion of that cancellation of an OCI card then the OCI card will be cancelled”. The government used Section 7D of the Citizenship (Amendment) Act of 2005 to cancel Mr. Taseer’s card. The rules prohibit any person with Pakistani or Bangladeshi lineage from obtaining this status. Launched in 2005, the OCI card was conceptualised to give a foreign citizen of Indian origin almost a citizen-like status.
• It enables the OCI card holder to visit India multiple times for multiple purposes.
• He or she is exempted from reporting to police authorities for any length of stay in India and enjoys all financial, recreational and other facilities that are available to NRIs. The card is particularly useful for professionals, businesspersons, and even politicians of Indian origin who live in the U.S., the Caribbeans, Europe, Southeast Asia, Africa, Canada, Latin America and the Pacific Islands.
• Except for acquisition of agricultural and plantation properties, the OCI card helps the owner in most day-to-day economic and social activities while in India. The card strengthens the bond that the holder feels for India.
• A problematic decision
• Mr. Taseer responded to the government’s move in an article. He wrote that he is a British citizen; was not in contact with his father, who was born in British India and became Pakistani only when the country was created, till he was 21 years old; and was brought up by his mother in India.
• To deny Mr. Taseer the OCI card using Section 7D of the Citizenship Act is problematic. One, it opens up the possibility of similar treatment being meted out to orphans, adopted children, and children born to single mothers. The same clause of the Act could also be used against a OCI card holder who might have a child out of wedlock with a partner from a country that the Indian state does not have good relations with. Will the state then punish the infant too? And what if the OCI card holder has a parent or grandparent or some ancestry in Pakistan or Bangladesh or a country that the government suddenly decides to add to the list? Would his or her status also be in jeopardy?
• Two, the government could have chosen to examine Mr. Taseer’s maternal links instead of accusing him of wilfully hiding the identity of his father, especially as former External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj had argued in 2016 that the consular process should be made favourable for single mothers. Mr. Taseer pointed out that he was given only a day to respond to the notice informing him that the government was revoking his card. But there was sufficient ground to avoid even that. Swaraj had said in 2018, “As per amended rules, a single parent can apply for a Passport for the child”. If the state can grant a passport to a child based on a single mother’s application, why were Mr. Taseer’s maternal links with India not taken into consideration?

Burden of proof

• In the case of the National Register of Citizens too, the burden was on the people to prove their citizenship. Neither the OCI card nor citizenship status, premised on entitlement of individuals from their states, can be so easily revoked especially when provisions exist to help them. It would be wise for the government to consider changing the rules of the antiquated law and also not attract attention to itself in such an unfavourable manner given the odd timing of the case — just months after Mr. Taseer wrote a critical article about the Modi regime in TIME magazine.

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