The Hindu Newspaper Analysis 28 June 2023

The Hindu Newspaper Analysis for UPSC

The Hindu Newspaper Analysis 27 June 2023

• Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday said India needed a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) as the country could not run with the dual system of “separate laws for separate communities”.
• It provides for one law for the entire country, applicable to all religious communities in their personal matters such as marriage, divorce, inheritance, adoption etc.
• Article 44: It lays down that the state shall endeavor to secure a UCC for the citizens throughout the territory of India.

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Arguments in favour of UCC:

• Uniformity in cases: India does have uniformity in most criminal and civil matters like the Criminal Procedure Code, Civil Procedure Code etc
• Gender Justice:If a UCC is enacted, all personal laws will cease to exist. It will do away with gender biases in existing laws.
• Secularism: A secular nation needs a common law for all citizens rather than differentiated rules based on religious practices.
• Various communities in India: Example: All Hindus are not governed by a homogenous personal law even after the enactment of the Hindu Code Bill.

Arguments against UCC:

• Plurality in already codified civil and criminal laws: So concept of ‘one nation, one law’ cannot be applied to diverse personal laws of various communities.
• Constitutional law experts: Framers did not intend total uniformity.
• Example: Personal laws were placed in Concurrent List(power to legislate being given to Parliament and State Assemblies).
• Customary laws: Many tribal groups in the country, regardless of their religion, follow their own customary laws.
• Communal Politics: The demand for a uniform civil code is considered to be framed in the context of communal politics.
• Article 25: It seeks to preserve the freedom to practice and propagate any religion.

• The Union Rural Development Ministry has extended the deadline for mandatory payments of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) via the Aadhaar-based Payments System (ABPS) to August 31.

• The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), also known as Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS) is Indian legislation enacted on August 25, 2005.
• The MGNREGA provides a legal guarantee for one hundred days of employment in every financial year to adult members of any rural household willing to do public work-related unskilled manual work at the statutory minimum wage.
• It attempts to bridge the gap between the rich and poor in the country.
• Roughly one-third of the stipulated work force must be women.

National Mobile Monitoring Software (NMMS)

• The NMMS App permits taking real time attendance of workers at Mahatma Gandhi NREGS worksites along with geotagged photograph.
• This will increase citizen oversight of the programme besides potentially enabling processing payments faster
• Area Officer Monitoring App facilitates them to record their findings online along with time stamped and go-coordinate tagged photograph for all the schemes of Deptt of Rural Development.

• Over the past decade, the U.S.’s waivers have been on regulations dealing with Russia, such as the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) of 2017.
• The Trump administration avoided sanctioning India for the (Russian S-400 missile system, but sanctioned Turkey and China for the same purchases.
• The first reason is obviously the promise of ties with India: the world’s most populous nation, that has been an inclusive, pluralistic democracy for most of its history as a republic with a record in non-proliferation.
• Second, there is India’s attractiveness as an economic market and a military buyer.
• Third, there is India’s geography in Asia, and its boundary problems from Beijing, that could make it a more dependable partner than European allies in providing a counter to China.
• Fourth, both Mr. Biden and Mr. Modi acknowledged the Indian-American diaspora, that has distinguished itself as a professional, law-abiding, prosperous and unproblematic community, and is the biggest votary of better India-U.S. ties.

• The National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF), adopted by the Ministry of Education to rank institutions of higher education in India, shows a noteworthy feature of Tamil Nadu.
• The NIRF employs a ranking metric comprising five parameters with varying weightage to assess the quality of colleges: Teaching, Learning and Resources (40%), Graduation Outcome (25%), Research and Professional Practices (15%), Outreach and Inclusivity (10%) and Perception (10%).
• The number of colleges participating in the NIRF ranking has grown from 535 in 2017 to 1,659 in 2020, and 2,746 in 2023.
• Of the top 100 NIRF-ranked colleges in 2023, Tamil Nadu has the largest share (35). Delhi (32) comes next, followed by Kerala (14) and West Bengal (8)
• National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF)
• It was launched by the Ministry for Human Resource Development (MHRD) [now Ministry of Education (MoE)] in September 2015.
• This framework outlines a methodology to rank institutions across the country.

• Amid a clamour for the colonial-era sedition law to be repealed, Law Commission Chairman Justice Ritu Raj Awasthi (retd) said on Tuesday that it was an important tool to safeguard the “safety and integrity of India” given the situation in many parts of the country, from Kashmir to Kerala and Punjab to the Northeast.
• Defending the panel’s recommendation to retain the law, which is at present under abeyance following directions of the Supreme Court issued in May last year, he said enough safeguards had been proposed to prevent its misuse.
• He said that special laws such as the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and the National Security Act (NSA) operated in different fields and did not cover the offence of sedition and therefore, the specific law on sedition needed to be there too.
• Section 124A of the IPC:
• It deals with Sedition – a non-bailable offence and was drafted by TB Macaulay and included in the IPC in 1870.
• Whoever (by words/signs/visible representation) brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards the Government established by law in India shall be punished.
• Punishment under Section 124A: Punishment under the law varies from imprisonment up to three years to a life term and fine.
• Need of Section 124A: To effectively combat anti-national, secessionist and terrorist elements.
• In the landmark Kedar Nath versus Union of India case (1962), the SC upheld the constitutional validity of the sedition law while trying to curtail its misuse.
• The Court upheld the law on the basis that this power was required by the state to protect itself.
• However, it had added a vital caveat that “a person could be prosecuted for sedition only if his acts caused incitement to violence or intention or tendency to create public disorder or cause disturbance of public peace”.
• It also added that unless accompanied by an incitement or call for violence, criticism of the government cannot be labelled sedition.
• The Law Commission of India is a non-statutory body constituted by the Government of India from time to time.
• The first Law Commission of independent India was established in 1955 for a three-year term.
• The first Law Commission was established during the British Raj era in 1834 by the Charter Act of 1833 and was chaired by Lord Macaulay.
• It works as an advisory body to the Ministry of Law and Justice.
• A retired Supreme Court judge or Chief Justice of a High Court will head the Commission.

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