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The Group of Seven (G7) economic powers called on Sunday for the "extension, full implementation and expansion" of a critical deal to export Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea, the group's agriculture ministers said in a communique.
Brokered by the United Nations and Turkey, the deal was signed in Istanbul last July, allowing Ukraine to export more than 27 million tonnes of grain from several of its Black Sea ports.
Russia, which invaded its neighbour in February 2022, has strongly signalled that it will not allow the deal to continue beyond May 18 because a list of demands to facilitate its own grain and fertilizer exports has not been met.
In the communique after a two-day meeting in Miyazaki, Japan, the G7 agriculture ministers "recognised the importance" of the deal, saying:
We strongly support the extension, full implementation and expansion of (the Black Sea Grain Initiative) BSGI.
We condemn Russia's attempts to use food as a means of destabilisation and as tool of geopolitical coercion and reiterate our commitment to acting in solidarity and supporting those most affected by Russia's weaponisation of food.
Editorial
Safeguarding constitution (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
We, the people of India, today begin celebrating the golden jubilee of Kesavananda Bharati (KB) prescribing the doctrine of basic structure (BS). I described KB, in 1974, as the Constitution of the future.
That prophecy has come true as we have witnessed further inaugural discourses on the limits or thresholds of power. A highly controversial pluralist judicial creation, the basic structure doctrine has been accepted now by legislatures, executive, and people of India.
India’s very own astonishing judicial invention, now is spread across the Global South as a thriving aspect of constitutional judicial review (CJR).
The people repudiated unlimited parliamentary sovereignty in the making of the Constitution and the Supreme Court has ceaselessly developed the supreme power of each organ of the State acting within its own jurisdiction. Golaknath (1967) began setting limits to political extravaganza — the ousting of CJR by subjecting Article 368’s amending power to the discipline of fundamental rights.
But basic structure started a new interpretive enterprise by recognising the basic identity of the Constitution, which may not be destroyed by any amendment.
The basic structure discredits the repeal of the Constitution; Article 368 authorises a constitutional amendment, not constitutional desecration or dismemberment.
Explained
Keshvananda: Case and its legacy (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
Fifty years ago, on April 24, 1973, the Supreme Court delivered its judgment in Kesavananda Bharati Sripadagalvaru and Ors vs State of Kerala and Anr, the landmark case that redefined the relationship between Parliament and the Constitution.
By the narrowest possible margin — 7-6 — a 13-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court ruled that the “basic structure” of the Constitution is inviolable, and cannot be amended by Parliament.
The extent of Parliament’s power to amend the Constitution was the backdrop of the tussle between the executive and the judiciary in the first two decades of the republic.
In its judgments in the first string of cases, the Supreme Court viewed the power to amend the Constitution as unfettered, but that view changed subsequently.
In I C Golaknath & Ors vs State Of Punjab & Anrs (Feb 27, 1967), the Supreme Court reversed its earlier verdicts and ruled that Parliament cannot amend the fundamental rights guaranteed by the Constitution.
Parliament responded by amending the Constitution to give itself the power to amend any part of the Constitution — and passed a law that it cannot be reviewed by the courts.
This scope of the power to amend — especially when the right to property (which was a fundamental right at the time) was impacted by the land ceiling laws — was the central challenge in the Kesavananda case.
In its majority ruling, the court held that fundamental rights cannot be taken away by amending them. It said that Parliament had vast powers to amend the Constitution, and upheld the land ceiling laws — but it drew the line by observing that certain parts are so inherent and intrinsic to the Constitution that even Parliament cannot touch it. The court ruled that in spirit, the amendment would not violate the “basic structure” of the Constitution.
Economy
Start-up funding: Lenders looking for separate liquidity window from RBI (Page no. 15)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
Lenders are looking for a separate liquidity window from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to get funds for on-lending to start-ups.
A dedicated window will help in mobilising the much-needed capital for start-ups that are experiencing a liquidity squeeze since the last year.
Banks want a dedicated liquidity window which can provide cheaper funds to them for lending to start-ups. If banks are getting money at 6.5 per cent through the window and are lending to start-ups at 12-13 per cent, there will be some cushion for them. Even if there is NPA (in the start-up segment) of 3-4 per cent, lenders will still be comfortable in lending. Lenders may soon approach the regulator with their request for the liquidity window.
It must be noted that during the Covid pandemic in 2020, the RBI had come out with special windows such as targeted long term repos operations (TLTROs), TLTROs 2.0 and on tap TLTROs to inject liquidity into stressed sectors such as agriculture, agri infrastructure, MSMEs, MFIs, NBFCs and healthcare.
Banks are looking at a similar arrangement which will help them meet the requirements of start-ups. India’s start-ups, that rely majorly on private equity/venture capital funds for money, have been facing funding slowdown over the last one year amid uncertain macro-economic conditions and concerns over their profitability and steep valuations. A funding squeeze has resulted in many start-ups resorting to massive layoffs.
Indian start-ups raised just $2 billion in the first quarter of 2023, 75 per cent lower than the same period last year, and the smallest quarterly number in nearly three years, a Reuters report said, quoting data from CB Insights.
Machine learning: As AI tools gain heft, the jobs that could be at stake (Page no. 15)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
Scottish revival singer-songwriter Ewan MacColl’s 1986 track ‘My Old Man’ was an ode to his father, an iron-moulder who faced an existential threat to his job because of the advent of technology.
The lyrics could finds some resonance nearly four decades on, as industry leaders and tech stalwarts predict the advancement in large language models such as OpenAI’s GPT-4 and their ability to write essays, code, and do maths with greater accuracy and consistency, heralding a fundamental tech shift; almost as significant as the creation of the integrated circuit, the personal computer, the web browser or the smartphone.
But there still are question marks over how advanced chatbots could impact the job market. And if the blue collar work was the focus of MacColl’s ballad, artificial intelligence (AI) models of the generative pretrained transformer type signify a greater threat for white collar workers, as more powerful word-predicting neural networks that manage to carry out a series of operations on arrays of inputs end up producing output that is significantly humanlike.