The Hindu Editorial Analysis | 25th February ’21

Table of Contents

Ans

Paramount Group
Sinosoar-Etechwin Joint Venture
Amazon
Italy
Pravind Kumar Jugnauth

Q. ) Who won National Table Tennis Championship?

G. Sathiyan
Sharath Kamal
Manav Thakkar
Soumiyajit Ghosh

Q.) What is the new name of the world’s biggest cricket stadium at Motera, Ahmedabad?

Sardar Patel Stadium
Sushma Swaraj Stadium
Narendra Modi Stadium
Arun Jaitley Stadium

Q.) Name the scheme launched by Health Ministry to cover women & children to fill gap in immunisation due to COVID

Suraksha Mission
PM Raksha
Intensified Mission Indradhanush (IMI) 3.0
Mission Covid Immunisation

Q. ) To accelerate rollout of 5G in India, Airtel has tied up with which US based chipmaker?

Intel
Qualcomm Technologies
Texas Instruments
Broadcon

Q.) Which political party swept the urban local body polls in Gujarat

Congress
BJP
AAP
CPI (M)

Trouble next door | Pioneer

December 2020 – Oli dissolved Nepal’s Parliament
Supreme Court of Nepal has ruled that the parliament must be reconvened
Court has given Oli 2 weeks time
PM had overstepped his powers and the dissolution of the House was an unconstitutional act
The apex court’s verdict means that Oli will face a no-confidence motion
As of now, all indications are that Oli will respect the court’s verdict.
Oli issued many unsavoury and unwarranted remarks against India.
A new political map in May 2020 claiming several areas in Uttarakhand to be part of its territory
India kept its cool – very good thing
India and China – both jockeying for influence in Nepal

Beyond bail for Disha Ravi | ToI

Additional sessions judge Dharmender Rana said that not even an iota of evidence had been brought to his notice connecting the perpetrators of the violence on January 26 with the accused or with the Poetic Justice Foundation.
The court noted both the “blemish free” antecedents of the 22-year-old young woman and that PJF was not a banned organisation, nor was any criminal action pending against its founders.
In short, Ravi had been accused of sedition and arrested without it actually being established that her actions had fomented violence.
And in court the prosecution was seeking to further restrict her liberty “on the basis of propitious anticipations”.
While Ravi has now got bail, the larger picture is that citizens will continue to be accused of sedition on flimsy grounds and deprived of their liberty.
The only solution is to scrap the sedition law.
That’s the only way to stop different governments from exploiting it at the expense of citizens.
Governments must also remember, even if this needs reminding again and again, that the right to dissent is firmly enshrined under Article 19 of the Constitution of India.
Further, as the court said, freedom of speech and expression includes the right to seek a global audience.

Thank You | Indian Express

Judge Dharmender Rana’s verdict granting bail to Disha Ravi underscores what judiciary can — and should — do today.
In the process, the Delhi trial court judge underscored the judiciary’s special responsibility, including and especially in cases involving the protection of the citizen’s freedom of expression against arbitrary state action.
The evidence on offer against the activist arrested by Delhi Police, did not amount to sedition under Section 124A — exciting or the attempt to excite disaffection towards a government established by law.
Nor the offence defined by Section 153A — promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race etc.
Supreme Court: direct incitement or link to violence is necessary for the sedition charge
Delhi trial court ruling raises the bar, or rather, restates the bar, for the state to move against the citizen’s freedom to disagree.
The SC in Kedar Nath v State of Bihar 1962, and the Punjab and Haryana High Court in Balbir Singh Saina v State of Haryana 1989, laid down the centrality of violence in sedition.
The Mumbai High Court in the matter of Arun G Gowli v State of Maharashtra 1998, observed that conspiracy cannot be proved merely on the basis of inferences that are not backed by evidence.

Battling Loneliness | Fin Exp

The pandemic, associated lockdowns and distancing requirements, and the isolation that these bring, did ensure focus on mental health issues—the WHO has also issued guidelines on handling these.
Japan, therefore, has done well to appoint a loneliness minister, to tackle rising suicides in the country.
Britain did it in 2018
In India, despite government efforts, mental health issues remain a stigma.
It also seems like attention on mental health in the country has not expanded beyond an academic focus, outside government and marginal non-governmental efforts.
NCRB data shows that in 2019, a person died of suicide every four minutes in the country.
One in every three took the step due to family problems.

Scientific disinterest

The presence of Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan at a press conference to promote Coronil, an Ayurvedic pill promoted by Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali Ayurved, is objectionable on more than one count.

Doctors — Harsh Vardhan is an ENT surgeon — are explicitly barred from promoting drugs of any sort.
Though Dr Vardhan didn’t explicitly mention Coronil in his address at the function, what public functionaries are seen to be doing speaks louder than what they say.
Baba Ramdev first claimed that his product was endorsed by the WHO.
Following media reports, WHO South-East Asia tweeted that it hadn’t reviewed or certified the effectiveness of any traditional medicine for the treatment of COVID-19.
What transpired was that India’s apex drug regulator had certified Coronil as a pharmaceutical product in “supporting COVID treatment and an immunity booster” and cleared it for export.
It hasn’t recommended it as treatment for COVID-19.
The report reveals that the medicine was only tested on 95 of those asymptomatic and “mildly symptomatic” but confirmed as RT-PCR positive.
The 45 patients who got the actual treatment (and not a dummy pill) tested COVID-19 negative significantly quicker.
A large proportion of those with mild or no symptoms are expected to clear out the infection without any external intervention.
Processes are imperfect, but the government must demonstrate its scientific disinterest when evidence is wanting.

Adultery as ‘misconduct’

Every civil servant, whether a member of the All India Services (AIS), State Service or Central Service, is governed by a moral code of conduct.
Similarly, the conduct of army officers and jawans is administered under the Army Act.
While the AIS conduct rules require its members to “maintain absolute integrity and devotion to duty” and do “nothing which is unbecoming of a member of the service”, the Army Act contains penal provisions for displaying “unbecoming conduct” or “disgraceful conduct”.
Surprisingly, what exactly constitutes an “unbecoming conduct” or “unbecoming of a member of a service” is nowhere defined.
It, therefore, leaves ample scope for the employer or disciplinary authority to use this leverage and set up parameters of misconduct for its subordinates.
One such conduct, which has been a subject of debate for long, is whether illicit or adulterous relations with another woman or man amounts to misconduct under service rules, particularly after the Supreme Court’s verdict in Joseph Shine vs Union of India (2018).
Though the matter has been referred to a Constitution Bench, Justice Rohinton Nariman while issuing notice made an observation that “something which is not adultery because the section [497 IPC] has been struck down will still be ‘unbecoming conduct’”.
In 1985, the Calcutta High Court in Rabindra Nath Ghosh (In re) held that a head constable who was living with another woman ignoring his married wife was not guilty of any misconduct in the performance of his duties as a policeman.
Justice M. Katju, in Pravina Solanki vs State of U.P. (2001) held that “unless an employee does some act which interferes with his/her official function then ordinarily whatever he/she does in his/her private life cannot be regarded as misconduct”.
More importantly, after the Joseph Shine case, the Rajasthan High Court in Mahesh Chand Sharma vs State of Rajasthan (2019) held that “no employer can be allowed to do moral policing on its employees which go beyond the domain of his public life”.
Any government or public authority would want its employees to maintain integrity not only during the discharge of their official duties, but also in the public domain.
With such a public policy in place, whether adulterous conduct is sufficient to initiate departmental action is a million-dollar question that the Supreme Court must answer.

NEWS

PM Modi to launch several development projects in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry
People above 60 years to get COVID-19 vaccine from March 1
Foodgrain production in country to touch all time high of over 303 million tonnes during current fiscal
Centre lifts embargo on private banks to undertake govt related banking transactions
PM reviews Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana; asks officials to focus on quality of roads
India kicks off BRICS chairship with inaugural three-day long Sherpas’ meeting
Higher fares for short distance trains to discourage people from avoidable travels: Railways
ED conducts raids in connection with ongoing investigation related Shree Bankey Bihari Exports Limited
Country’s cumulative number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered to healthcare, frontline workers crosses 1.23 crore
FATF to decide today on Pakistan’s grey list status
Senior officials of India, France & Australia discuss further cooperation in Indo-Pacific region
German Court sentences former Syrian Intelligence Officer to 4.5 years in jail for crimes against humanity
Army Chief General MM Naravane terms disengagement with China at LAC as ‘win-win situation’
At least 75 inmates killed in simultaneous fights in 3 jails.