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Table of Contents

Himalayan divide

- Ties between India and Nepal continue to be a cause for concern.
- MILEX 2018 of BIMSTEC
- Prime Minister K.P. Oli’s office: not happy with unilateral decision of India to declare MILEX
- Same goes for Thailand
- Sep 2018: Nepal + China, 12-day Mt Everest Friendship Exercise in Sichuan province
- India + Nepal: deepest military links
- Such unique ties must not be undermined due to lack of communication.
- The larger geopolitical context of the discord over the military exercises must not be ignored.
- Kathmandu to Shigatse by rail

General Bipin Rawat’s statement on BIMSTEC, that “geography” will ensure that countries like Bhutan and Nepal “cannot delink themselves” from India, could have been avoided.
Modern technology and connectivity projects could well take away geography’s role as a guarantor of good relations

Saving rivers

Central Pollution Control Board: number of critically polluted segments of India’s rivers has risen to 351 from 302 two years ago.
Plethora of laws not working.
Maharashtra, Gujarat and Assam, which account for a 3rd of the degraded river segments.
Managing sewage requires steady funding of treatment plants for all urban agglomerations that discharge their waste into rivers, and also reliable power supply.
A 2013 World Bank study estimated that environmental degradation is costing India at least $80 billion a year, of which losses to rivers form a significant part.

2+2 is less than the sum of its parts?

- 2+2 is a familiar tactic employed by the U.S., intended to align the military, strategic and diplomatic policies of the involved countries.
- It is often intended to signify a ‘special relationship’ between the U.S. and the concerned nation, even as it seeks to underscore the U.S. dictated ‘rules-based global order’.
- U.S. has been the main beneficiary: aimed at the containment of China
- Principal takeaway: Communications, Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA)
- General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) was signed in 2002
- Logistic Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA) was signed in 2016
- Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement for Geo-Spatial Cooperation (BECA): not yet
- It is not clear at this time whether all this would earn India a reprieve from U.S. sanctions directed at countries trading with Russia and Iran.
- Russia and Iran: there are even less signs of a ‘give’ in the U.S. stance.
- Russia + Pakistan is not in India’s benefit.
- Our tilt towards the U.S. is also taking place at a time when the world sees the U.S. as a ‘declining power’.
- Pakistan is the more immediate threat for India, and not solely on account of incubating terrorism.

We have real concerns about Pakistan’s emergence as a nuclear threat, engaged in increasing the numbers of its nuclear warheads, developing several new delivery systems, creating new plutonium production and uranium enrichment facilities, etc.
Pakistan’s threat to build new short-range nuclear capable weapon systems is again a real danger.
None of this seems to fall within U.S. purview at present.
In any case, there can never be any compromise with our strategic autonomy or the strategic direction that we have chosen to follow all these years.

The progressive way

In a consultation paper released recently, the Law Commission of India has boldly said that a uniform civil code (UCC) is neither feasible nor necessary at this stage.
Law Commission has rightly recognised the plurality of diverse personal laws and proposed internal reforms in personal laws to make them compatible with the constitutional provisions of equality and non-discrimination.
B.R. Ambedkar explicitly said in the Assembly, “No government can use its provisions in a way that would force the Muslims to revolt. If a government acts thus [imposing a common civil code], such a government would be insane in my opinion.”
We need to appreciate that in Article 44, the framers of the Constitution have used the term ‘uniform’ and not ‘common’ because ‘common’ means one and same in all circumstances whatsoever and ‘uniform’ means ‘same in similar conditions’.
It is an erroneous perception that we have different personal laws because of religious diversity.
Preservation of legal diversity seems to be the reason of inclusion of Personal Law in the Concurrent list.
It is a myth that we have uniform criminal laws. States have made amendments to the Indian Penal Code (IPC), 1860, and the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973. For example, Punjab recently introduced Section 295AA to the IPC — life term in all sacrilege cases.
Another myth is that Hindus are governed by one homogenous law after the enactment of the Hindu Code Bill. It is also true of Muslims and Christians.
The Constitution itself protects the local customs of Nagaland. It is repeatedly mentioned that Goa already has a uniform code.
But Hindus there are still governed by the Portuguese Family and Succession Laws. The reformed Hindu Law of 1955-56 is still not applicable to them.
In the case of Muslims, the Shariat Act 1937 has not been extended to Goa.
Thus they are governed by Portuguese and Shastric Hindu law, and not by Muslim personal law.
The Special Marriage Act (a progressive civil code) has not been extended to Goa.
Even in Jammu and Kashmir, local Hindu law statutes do differ with the Central enactments.
The Shariat Act is also not applicable and Muslims continue to be governed by customary law which is at variance with the Muslim personal law in the rest of the country. -Forgotten issues
It is distressing that no one talks about the non-implementation of other Directive Principles which are far more important than the enactment of a uniform code. What about the right to work, living wages, distribution of community resources to sub-serve the common good, avoidance of concentration of wealth in few hands and the protection of monuments?

Important News

Activists’ arrest: CJI warns against ‘cooked-up’ proof
Supreme Court will set up a Special Investigation Team (SIT) if the material relied on by the Maharashtra government to raid and arrest five activists on August 28 in the Bhima-Koregaon violence case is found to be “cooked up”.
‘Machines will rule workplace by 2025’
More than 54% of India’s employees in 12 sectors need reskilling by 2022, says WEF • In 2018, humans performed an average of 71% of total task hours across the 12 industries spanning manufacturing, services and high tech. By 2025, that will drop to just 48%, according to the WEF. Machines will perform the remaining 52%.
Pak. urged to create milieu for talks
India on Monday urged Pakistan to create a ‘conducive’ environment for restarting dialogue.
The Indian response came from the Minister of State for External Affairs V. K. Singh, days after Pakistan’s new Foreign Minister spoke about holding talks with India.
“Our policy is very clear that dialogue will happen provided the environment is made conducive,” Mr. Singh said while speaking to the media here on the sidelines of an event.
Modi-Ghani talks to focus on security
Afghan President will arrive tomorrow
NITI Aayog for clear policy on ‘jhum’ cultivation
Proposes that land for shifting cultivation be recognised as agricultural land under agro-forestry
Locally referred to as jhum cultivation, this practice is considered as an important mainstay of food production for a considerable population in northeast India in States like Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Tripura and Manipur.