[Mission 2023] INSIGHTS DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS + PIB SUMMARY 13 December 2022

GS Paper 2

Syllabus: Statutory Bodies

Source: Business Line

 Context: The department-related Parliamentary Standing Committee on Personnel, Public Grievances, Law and Justice have highlighted that the CBI’s conviction of cases rate has come down while its pendency in courts has escalated

 Key points highlighted by the Panel:

• Decreasing conviction rate: From 743 (2012), the numbers slipped to 169 in 2020 and 202 in 2021
• Pendency: Probe was pending in 1,025 CBI cases as of January 31, 2022, with 66 languishing for more than five years and some cases being pending for over 20 years
• Reducing the number of registered cases: From about 1,000-1,150 cases registered by the agency during 2012-17, the number dipped to 600-900 cases between 2017 and 2021.
• Issues with recruitment: There is a huge manpower shortage and no provision for direct recruitment of candidates above the rank of sub-inspector in CBI.
• Withdrawl of General Consent: Over 9 state governments have withdrawn their general consent to CBI

Recommendations by the Panel:

• Case Management system: CBI should put a case management system in place to track the progress and pursue it to its logical conclusion.
  • This will not only expedite the disposal of cases but will also enhance transparency and promote accountability in the functioning of the agency
• Direct recruitment: CBI should have a provision for direct recruitment for the posts of inspector or deputy superintendent of police.
  • Currently, the CBI’s sanctioned strength of 480 posts of sub-inspectors is filled through direct recruitment, promotions and departmental examinations in the ratio of 70:15:15.
• Politics should not override the practical nature of crime: CBI deals with complex nature crimes involving various states and agencies. Therefore, before withdrawing consent, states should consider these practicalities so that seamless investigation is not hampered.

Other issues with CBI:

• The politicisation of the CBI has been a work in progress for years.
• Corruption and Politically biased:This was highlighted in Supreme Court criticism for being a caged parrot speaking in its master’s voice.
• CBI has been accused of becoming a ‘handmaiden’ to the party in power, as a result, high-profile cases are not treated seriously.
• Since CBI is run by central police officials on deputation hence chances of getting influenced by the government were visible in the hope of better future postings.

What other reforms are needed for CBI?

• The Second Administrative Reforms Commission (2007)suggested that a new law should be enacted to govern the working of the CBI.
• Parliamentary standing committee (2007) recommended that a separate act should be promulgated in tune with requirements with time to ensure credibility and impartiality.
  • The new Act must specify criminal culpability for government interference
• Financial and administrative Autonomy: The government must ensure financial and administrative autonomy for the CBI similar to CAG.
• CBI to develop its own dedicated cadre of officers who are not bothered about deputation and abrupt transfers.
• A more efficient parliamentary oversightover the federal criminal and intelligence agencies to ensure better accountability, despite concerns regarding political misuse of the oversight

InstaLinks:

Prelims Link:

1. About CBI, ED, SFO and its establishment.
2. Provisions of the DSPE Act and other laws backing investigating agencies.

Mains Link:

Q. Discuss the need for an independent umbrella body to regulate various central investigating agencies in India. Suggest reforms in this regard. (15M)

GS Paper 2

Syllabus: Government policies and interventions for development in various sectors and issues arising out of their design and implementation.

Source: Indian Express

 Context: World Bank launched a “Toolkit on Enabling Gender Responsive Urban Mobility and Public Spaces in India” with the aim of suggesting ways to make public transport in Indian cities more inclusive of women’s travelling requirements.

 WHY URBAN PUBLIC SPACES AND MOBILITY SERVICES SHOULD BE VIEWED THROUGH A GENDER LENS?

• Women are amongst the biggest users of public transport across Indian cities.
• Lack of safety deters women from stepping out; creating a vicious cycle that lowers their presence in public spaces.
• Women face barriers in using public transport owing to gender-blind design elements during access and egress, waiting at stops and transfers, boarding and alighting, and inside the vehicle.
• Barriers to women’s mobility actively restrict their choices around education and employment.
• Deep-rooted gender-based social norms actively restrict women’s movement outside their homes.
• Women bear a disproportionate burden of unpaid care work in India necessitating public transport solutions for the mobility of care
• Women’s ‘time poverty’ constrains time available for commuting.

The World Bank suggests a four-pillared approach to help address prevailing issues in urban transport for women.

Recommendations given in the new toolkit:

• Integrating gender elements when developing comprehensive mobility plans at the city level.
• Developing Gender Action Plans as an integral part of plans at the city level.
• Incentive-based policies may be brought in by state governments to enable women’s workforce participation in the mobility sector
• Establish a Gender Advisory Committee to monitor GAP implementation.
• Strengthen grievance redressal cells to fast-track sexual harassment complaints by commuters and users of public spaces, ensuring representation of women and persons of minority genders.
• Establish one-stop centres at public transport facilities.
• Implementing agencies can consider digitizing ticketing systems and adopting a common mobility card through an integrated mobility system.

Insta Links:

Is Access to Transport Slowing Participation of Women in India’s Workforce? 

Mains Link:

Q. The Delhi government’s decision to make public transport free for women has opened a debate about the ways in which women access to transport and the barriers they face, in such a context analyze how reforms in public transport affect women. (250 words)

GS Paper 2

Syllabus: Structure, Organization and Functioning of the Executive and the Judiciary

Source: IE

 Direction: The article highlights the recently introduced National Judicial Commission Bill, 2022, its criticism and its way ahead. The earlier article will help to understand the issue of NJAC and why it was declared unconstitutional.

 Context: A private member bill – the National Judicial Commission Bill, 2022, to regulate the appointment of judges through the National Judicial Commission was introduced in RS.

Background:

• This comes amid an ongoing confrontation between the Union government and the SC over the government’s resentment towards the Collegium system as “opaque”.
• Both have pointed fingers at each other for delaying judicial appointments.
• The government has also started voicing its grievance against the invalidation of the National Judicial Appointments Commission (NJAC) by the court in 2015.

Key features of the Bill:

• The bill provides for the establishment of the National Judicial Commission, to regulate –
  • the procedure for appointment of the CJI and other judges of the SC and Chief Justices and other judges of HCs.
  • transfer of HC judges
  • to lay down judicial standards
  • provide for accountability of judges.
• To establish a credible and expedient mechanism for investigating individual complaints for misbehaviour or incapacity of a judge of the higher judiciary.
• It also proposes the presentation of an address by Parliament to the President in relation to the proceeding for the removal of a judge.

Criticism of the move:

• The concept of NJAC has come under the consideration of the SC 3 times – 1993, 1998 and 2015.
• All 3 times, while giving importance to the independence of the judiciary, the SC dismissed the framework of the NJAC.
• In its 2015 ruling, the SC declared the 99th Constitutional Amendment and NJAC unconstitutional, violating the basic structure of the constitution. However, the SC admitted that all is not well even with the collegium system.

Way ahead:

• Both the judiciary and the government need to do some “out-of-the-box” thinking to deal with the “perennial” judicial vacancies in HCs.
• Both institutions need to adhere to the timeline given in the 2nd Judges case and the Memorandum of Procedure (MoP).
• Until consensus is built on a mechanism, the need is to improve the collegium system through conversation with the judiciary.

Insta Links:

The impasse over the appointment of judges

Mains Links:

Q. Critically examine the Supreme Court’s judgement on ‘The National Judicial Appointments Commission Act, 2014’ with reference to the appointment of judges of higher judiciary in India. (UPSC 2017)

Prelims Links:

GS Paper 2

Syllabus: Social Justice (Issues related to women)

Source: TH

 Direction: The article throws light on how female leadership in government helps in achieving good governance and gender equality and what is the scenario in India.

 Context: The important takeaway from recent experience and studies is the necessity of overcoming inherent biases and perceptions about female effectiveness in leadership roles.

Background:

• Germany, Taiwan and New Zealand which had women heading their governments, seem to have managed the pandemic much better than their neighbours.
• The States in the US which have female governors had fewer COVID-19-related deaths because female governors acted more decisively by issuing earlier stay-at-home orders.
• The above concludes that women leaders are more effective than their male counterparts in times of crisis

Case of India:

• Women were allowed to vote from 1950 onwards, which is in striking contrast to the experience in the so-called “mature democracies” of the west. For example, women were allowed to vote in the US in 1920, after years of protest.
• Some charismatic female leaders were/are Indira Gandhi, Jayalalitha, Mayawati, Sushma Swaraj, Mamata Banerjee, and Draupadi Murmu among several others. However, overall figures are depressing.

Reasons are:

• Poor representation in legislatures: For instance, women constitute just over 14% of the total strength of the 17th Lok Sabha.
  • Best practice: Tiny Rwanda is on the top with a staggering 60% of seats, when it comes to women’s representation in its lower house.
• The Women’s Reservation Bill is dead: The Bill, first presented to the Lok Sabha in 1996, provided quotas for women in the Lok Sabha and State Assemblies.
  • Although the Rajya Sabha did pass the bill in 2010, the Lok Sabha and the State legislatures are yet to give their approval.

Importance of female leadership in government:

• This can be understood by the example of Gram panchayats in India.
• A study conducted by Nobel Laureate Esther Duflo used the system of mandated reservations (73rd Constitutional Amendment, 1992, reserves 1/3rd of all positions of pradhan for women) to test the effectiveness of female leadership.
• The study concluded that women pradhans are more likely to invest in women-friendly infrastructure. For example, providing easy access to drinking water.

Way forward for India:

• Building consensus on women reservation bill.
• Such quotas have both a short-term (increased female representation in policy making) and long-term (improves perceptions about female effectiveness in leadership roles) impact.
• This decreases the bias and results in a subsequent increase in the percentage of female politicians contesting and winning elections.

Conclusion: The instrumental importance of promoting more space for women in public policy is an important goal from the perspective of gender equality.

Insta Links:

Women in the Indian political system

Mains Links:

Q. “Though women in post-Independent India have excelled in various fields, the social attitude towards women and the feminist movement has been patriarchal.” Apart from women’s education and women empowerment schemes, what interventions can help change this milieu? (UPSC 2021)

GS Paper 2

Syllabus: Indian Constitution—historical underpinnings, evolution, features, amendments, significant provisions and basic structure.

Source: TH 

Direction: The article discusses the issue of religious conversion in India and its constitutional-legal-judicial interpretation.

 Context: The SC’s recent remarks on religious conversions have brought into the spotlight the long-standing debate about what the fundamental right to propagate one’s religious faith implies.

Background:

• Recently, the SC stated that acts of charity to benefit a community or the poor should not be followed by a desire to religiously convert them as payback.
• The SC has been hearing a plea seeking a special law against forced conversions, alleging that mass conversions of underprivileged people are being carried out.
• Earlier, the SC stated that religious conversions by means of force, allurement or fraud may ultimately affect the security of the nation and the freedom of religion and conscience of citizens.
• The SC asked the Centre to clarify what it was doing to curb such conversions.

Freedom of Religion in India:

• Constituent Assembly debates: It discussed the inclusion of the “right to propagate” as a fundamental right and considered replacing the word “propagate” with “practise privately”, fearing forceful conversions.
• Constitutional provisions: Article 25(1) equally entitles all persons to the freedom of conscience and the right to profess, practise and propagate religion freely.
• Judicial interpretation:
  • In 1950, the SC held (in Arun Ghosh vs. State of West Bengal) that attempts to raise communal passions through forcible conversions would be considered a breach of public order.
    • It is within the power of States under the State List (Entry 1) of the 7th Schedule of the Constitution to enact Freedom of Religion laws.
  • The SC (in Rev. Stainislaus vs. State of Madhya Pradesh, 1977), dissected Article 25 to hold that the Article does not grant the right to convert other persons to one’s own religion.
    • The court upheld the validity of two regional anti-conversion laws – the Madhya Pradesh Dharma Swatantraya Adhiniyam (1968) and the Orissa Freedom of Religion Act (1967).

Anti-conversions laws enacted by the States in India:

• Before independence, princely States had Acts such as the Raigarh State Conversion Act of 1936, which were mainly against conversion to Christianity.
• In post-independence India, more than ten Indian States have passed laws prohibiting certain means of religious conversion.
  • Odisha became the first State to enact a law restricting forceful religious conversions, which later became a model framework for other states.
  • The MP Dharma Swatantraya Adhiniyam (1968), required whoever converted any person to intimate the District Magistrate that such a conversion had taken place.
  • The UP Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2021, declares marriages “null and void” if the conversion is solely for that purpose and provides for imprisonment up to 10 years and a fine.

Why have these laws been challenged? Several HC verdicts and SC’s views (in the same petition which is mentioned in the ‘Background’ above), invoked the Puttaswamy judgement (2018) to hold that religious faith was a part of the fundamental right to privacy.

The Centre’s stand:

• The right to religion did not include the right to convert other people through fraud, deception, coercion, allurement and other means.
• According to the SC, fraudulent or induced conversion impinged upon the right to freedom of conscience apart from hampering public order.
• Therefore, the state is well within its power to regulate/restrict forceful conversion.

Conclusion: “What is freedom for one is freedom for all, and hence there can be no such thing as a fundamental right to convert others to one’s own religion” – SC

Insta Links:

Do we need a Central law against forced conversion?

Mains Links:

Q. Examine the various issues in India’s fundamental right to religion. How can the issue of “forced” or “deceitful” conversions be addressed? (250 words)

GS Paper 3

Syllabus: Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment.

Source: REUTERS

 Direction: Also read related Links Niti Aayog proposes decarbonizing industrial emissions

Context: Sectors such as mining, agriculture, oil, and fashion are under scrutiny at the COP15 talks, due to their heavy impact on nature with activities that can contaminate soil, foul waterways, or pollute the air.

 Status of biodiversity loss (see Infographic)

How key sectors could be affected by the COP15 talks:

Fashion:

• Fashion and retail are facing pressure from consumers and governments to reduce waste and emissions throughout their operations.
• More than 330 companies came out in support of a COP15 deal that includes mandatory disclosure of companies’ environmental impacts by 2030.
• Smaller companies with limited resources for monitoring and accounting could find a disclosure requirement more challenging.

Mining:

• For companies mining metals and coal, an environmental disclosure requirement could force companies to reveal the impacts not just from the blasting and drilling they do on-site, but also from the logging and deforestation carried out in creating access roads.
• Mining companies are also concerned about the central goal of the COP15 talks – to set aside 30% of Earth’s land and ocean areas for conservation by 2030

Agriculture:

• With new disclosure rules, the farming sector would face an increased burden of reporting on activities like land clearing and pesticide use.

Oil Exploration:

• Oil companies are expected to ramp up their internal resources for reporting on and disclosing how oil drilling and exploration activities impact nature.

Insta Link:

Economic Growth and its Impact on the Environment

Mains Link:

Q. Coastal sand mining, whether legal or illegal, poses one of the biggest threats to our environment. Analyze the impact of sand mining along the Indian coasts, citing specific examples. (UPSC – 2019)