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In an order that paves the way for BCCI president SouravGanguly and secretary Jay Shah to continue for another term in office, the Supreme Court allowed the cricket board’s request to permit amendments to its constitution so as to modify the requirement of a mandatory three-year cooling-off period for its officials.
“Bearing in mind the purpose for which the cooling-off period was introduced, we are of the considered view that the proposed amendment would not dilute the object and purpose of introducing a cooling-off period with the result that the cooling-off period would come into effect once a candidate has completed two consecutive terms either in the BCCI and the state associations. We therefore accept the proposed amendment,” a bench of Justices D Y Chandrachud and HimaKohli said in its order.
This means that those who have been part of a state association for two consecutive three-year terms will not have to undergo a cooling-off period if they are contesting for a BCCI post — and, if elected, they can continue in the BCCI for six years (two terms).
However, if a person has been a member of a state association for two terms and wants to contest again for a state association post, he/she will have to undergo a cooling-off for three years.
In effect, an individual can continue to remain in a state body and the BCCI together for an unbroken period of 12 years.
The court also granted the request to allow amendments to do away with restrictions on those holding “public office” from contesting BCCI elections. The bar would now only apply to a minister or government servant.
On the cooling-off period, the apex court pointed out that it had “adopted the rationale that after an individual holds two successive terms in office, either in the BCCI or in any state association or a combination of two, the cooling-off period would begin”.
The consequence therefore is even though a person has held office as an elected office bearer for only one term in the BCCI, such an individual would have to undergo a cooling-off period.
The bench said the BCCI had submitted that “the application of a cooling-off period to an individual who has undergone only one term at a particular level (BCCI or state association as the case may be) is unduly stringent and needs to be modified having regard to the purpose for which the cooling-off period was introduced.
Congress cracks in Goa, 8 of its 11 MLAs join BJP (Page no. 1)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
As Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra entered its seventh day, the Congress, on an electoral decline for years now, was dealt another body blow Wednesday when eight of its 11 MLAs in Goa, including former Chief Minister DigambarKamat and former Leader of Opposition Michael Lobo, quit the party and joined the BJP.
While the BJP called the high-profile exits as the beginning of the “Congress chhoroyatra”, the Congress hit back, saying a “nervous” BJP had “fast tracked” its “Operation Kichad” in Goa because of the “visible success” of Rahul’s yatra.
The defection of the MLAs in Goa did not surprise many in the Congress because talk of a possible switch to the BJP by Kamat, Lobo and some of the party MLAs had been doing the rounds since July.
Yet the Congress, which claimed to have averted a bid to split its legislature party in July, either did not do or could not do much to prevent the defection.
In fact, what happened in Goa was pretty much a repeat of the events that unfolded in the state three years ago.
But unlike in 2019 when two-thirds (then 10 out of 15) of the Congress MLAs defected to the BJP in a post-midnight visit to the Speaker’s office, the defection Wednesday took place in broad daylight.The eight Congress MLAs crossed over to the BJP in a “merger” of the two legislature parties.
Along with Kamat and Lobo, the MLAs – Lobo’s wife Delilah, AleixoSequeira, SankalpAmonkar, KedarNaik, Rajesh Phal Dessai and RudolfoFernandes – were welcomed into the BJP by Chief Minister PramodSawant and state BJP president SadanandTanavade.
“The Congress has started a Bharat Jodo Yatra but in Goa the Congress ChhoroYatra has begun. I welcome the new MLAs into the BJP wholeheartedly… Before the election, we had resolved ‘BavisaantBaavis plus (22 plus MLAs in 2022)’ and before 2022 comes to an end, the BJP has 28 MLAs and the BJP’s foundation in Goa has been strengthened. In the Lok Sabha elections of 2024, we will definitely win both the Parliamentary seats,” Sawant said.
With the Congress ChhoroYatra beginning in Goa, leaders of the Congress from across the country will come to the BJP in the interest of the nation and give more strength to Modiji. AndModiji will be back as Prime Minister in 2024 with over 400 (Lok Sabha) seats.
The Congress leaders, he said, were leaving the party in a piecemeal manner earlier, but now they are leaving “in lump sum”.
Jairam Ramesh, AICC general secretary in charge of the communication department, hit back: “Operation Kichad of BJP in Goa has been fast tracked because of the visible success of the Bharat Jodo Yatra. BJP is nervous.
A daily dose of diversion and disinformation is handed out to undermine the yatra. We remain undeterred. We will overcome these dirty tricks of the BJP.”
Govt. and Politics
Centre accords ST status to Himachal’s Hattee community (Page no. 7)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
Ahead of the crucial Assembly elections in Himachal Pradesh, the Union Cabinet chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday approved a Constitution amendment Bill that seeks to grant tribal status to the Hattee community living in the Trans-Giri region of Sirmaur district in the hill state.
Announcing this in New Delhi on Wednesday, Union Tribal Affairs Minister Arjun Munda said, “The Union Cabinet approved a proposal to add the Hattee community in the Trans-Giri area of Himachal Pradesh’s Sirmaur to the list of notified Scheduled Tribes.”
Munda said the move will benefit around 1.60-lakh people of the community, adding that “a proposal to add the Brijia community in Chhattisgarh to the ST list has also been approved”.
The Cabinet also approved the proposal to add Narikuravar, one of the most deprived and vulnerable communities living in the hills of Tamil Nadu, to the ST list, Munda said.
The Hattees are a close-knit community that take their name from their traditional occupation of selling home-grown crops, vegetables, meat, and wool at small-town markets known as ‘haats’. Their native area straddles the Himachal-Uttarakhand border, and the Hattees have been demanding ST status since 1967, when the same was accorded to people living in JaunsarBawar area in Uttarakhand, which shares a border with Sirmaur district.
In March, the Jai Ram Thakur government had sent a detailed proposal to the Centre, seeking the inclusion of the Hattees in the ST list of Himachal Pradesh.
Some changes/inclusions will also be made in the list of Scheduled Tribes of Chhattisgarh, as per the proposals okayed in the Cabinet meet on Wednesday. For instances, Bhuinya, Bhuiyan and Bhuyan have been added as synonyms of BhariaBhumia; while Dhanuhar and Dhanuwar have been added as synonyms of Dhanwar in the list, to extend the benefits to various phonetic usages of the same term, the minister added.
The move will enable members of the communities newly listed in the revised list of Scheduled Tribes to derive benefits meant for STs under the existing schemes of the government.
Some of the major benefits include post-matric scholarship, overseas scholarship and the national fellowship, besides education, concessional loans from the National Scheduled Tribes Finance and Development Corporation, and hostels for students. In addition, they will also be entitled to benefits of reservation in services and admission to educational institutions as per the government policy.
Express Network
Relying on IPC, RP Act in absence of law on hate speech: EC to SC(Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Election Commission told the Supreme Court that there is no law on “hate speech” in India and that it has therefore been relying on provisions of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Representation of the People Act-1951.
Hate speech has not been defined under any existing law in India…In the absence of any specific law governing ‘hate speech’ and ‘rumour mongering’ during elections, the Election Commission of India employs various provisions of the IPC and the RP Act-1951 to ensure that members of the political parties or even other persons do not make statements to the effect of creating disharmony between different sections of society.
The affidavit was filed in response to a plea by Advocate Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay, seeking directions to curb “hate speech”.
The EC pointed out that the issue of “hate speech” during elections was dealt with by the SC in the 2014 case, ‘PravasiBhalaiSangathan vs Union of India’, where the petitioner prayed that the state should take peremptory action against those who indulge in it. The affidavit said that the SC had then observed that the implementation of existing laws would solve the problem to a great extent.
The matter was ultimately referred to the Law Commission “to examine ‘if it deems proper’ to define the expression hate speech” and make recommendations to Parliament to strengthen the EC “to correct the menace of hate speeches irrespective of whenever made”, the affidavit added.
However, the Law Commission report “neither made any recommendation with regard to the specific query…whether the Election Commission of India should be conferred with the power to derecognise a political party, disqualifying it or its members…for the offence of hate speech… nor made any recommendations to Parliament to strengthen the EC to curb the menace.
Tale of women workers: Rapid exit from workforce, sliding earnings(Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 1, Social Issues)
Labour Force Participation Rate (LFPR), or the proportion of working-age population that engages actively in labour market, either by working or looking for work, for women in India declined from 42.7% in 2004-05 to 25.1% in 2021, “showing withdrawal of women from the workforce despite rapid economic growth during the same period”.
In 2019-20, 60% of all males aged 15 and above had regular salaried or self-employed jobs; the rate for females was 19%.
For regular, self-employment in urban areas, the average earning for males was Rs 15,996. It was less than half of that — Rs 6,626 — for women.
Mean income for people from SC or ST communities with regular employment in urban areas was Rs 15,312 in 2019-20, against Rs 20,346 for those from ‘general’ category.
68.3% Muslims in urban areas faced discrimination in 2019-20 — up from 59.3% in 2004-05.
These are among the findings based on government data on employment and labour from 2004-05 to 2019-20 in the ‘India Discrimination Report’, compiled by the NGO Oxfam India and released.
The figures, according to the report, are based on data from the Union Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation.
The report refers to unit level data from the 61st round of National Sample Survey on employment-unemployment (2004-05), the Periodic Labour Force Survey in 2018-19 and 2019-20, and the All-India Debt and Investment Survey by the Centre.
The report noted that discrimination against women is so high that there is hardly any difference across religion or caste-based sub-groups, or the rural-urban divide. It said all women, regardless of their socioeconomic location, are “highly discriminated”.
The report noted that while overall discrimination in wages for people from SC, ST and Muslims communities declined in regular/salaried jobs, it increased for women in this period — from 67.2% in 2004-05 to 75.7% in 2019-20.
As for prejudice faced by other segments of the population, discrimination in employment for the Muslim community dropped from 31.5% in 2004-5 to 21.9% in 2018-19 to 3.7% in 2019-2020.
For SC/ST employees, discrimination declined from 69.1% in 2004-5 to 34.6% in 2018-19 but increased to 39.3% in 2019-2020.
Explained
What health account show (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
Government spending on health as a proportion of the total health expenditure in the country has been rising in recent years, even as the overall expenditure on health has declined, official data released this week show.
According to the National Health Accounts Estimates 2018-19, government spending as percentage of total health expenditure increased by more than 11 percentage points over the previous five years, from 23.2% in 2013-14 to 34.5% in 2018-19.
The National Health Accounts (NHA) Estimates describe the country’s total expenditure on healthcare — whether by the government, the private sector, individuals, or NGOs — and the flow of these funds. It answers questions such as what are the sources of healthcare spending, who manages this spending, who provides healthcare services, and which services are utilised.
One of the most important findings of the 2018-19 report is that government spending as proportion of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) went down to 1.28% from 1.35% in the previous year’s(2017-18) report.
The total health spending — which includes spending by both government and non-government agents — declined from 3.9% of the GDP to 3.2% in the five years up to 2018-19.
“The decrease in the government spending as percentage of GDP was bound to happen because we are using a wrong indicator that is internationally not comparable.
The comparable indicator would be the current health expenditure, which does not include the capital spending on, say, building or equipment that will be used over multiple years till they last, Dr IndranilMukhopadhyay, health economist and professor at the School of Government and Public Policy at O P Jindal University, said.
Since we consider the total expenditure, what happened is the previous report also considers the large spending by the Defence Ministry on equipment. But that was a one-time spending, hence the total public spending has reduced.
More importantly though, the 2018-19 report shows that the massive fall in out-of-pocket expenditure by patients at the point of care recorded in the previous report, has sustained.
With healthcare services in the country being largely provided by private players, one of the most important health accounts measures is the out-of-pocket spending.
And here, the figures have been moving in the right direction. People paying for healthcare expenses out-of-pocket made up for 48.2% of the total health expenses in the year 2018-19, down from 48.8% in the previous year (2017-18). The out-of-pocket expense has decreased substantially from the 62.6% recorded in 2014-15.
Covid-19 increases Alzheimer’s risk in older adults(Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 2, Health)
Older adults who were once infected with Covid-19 are at a much higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease within a year, with women above the age of 85 occupying the highest risk group, a new study of more than 6 million patients has found.
The researchers, who published their findings in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease on Tuesday (September 13), found that people aged 65 and above who developed Covid-19 were at a 50-80% higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s, expanding upon the little we currently know about the long-term consequences of the pandemic.
However, the researchers have maintained that it is unclear “whether Covid-19 might trigger new onset of Alzheimer’s disease or accelerate its emergence.”
The research team analysed the anonymous electronic health records of 6.2 million people who were 65 and older in the US, and who had visited healthcare organisations between February 2020 and May 2021. Those studied had not been previously diagnosed with Alzhiemer’s.
They were then divided into two groups: one composed of people who had contracted Covid-19 during the period of study, and another group which had no documented cases of the infectious disease.
There were more than 400,000 people enrolled in the Covid-19 study group, while the non-infected group contained 5.8 million people.
The findings indicated that over the one-year period following the infection, older adults in the Covid-19 cohort faced a risk of 0.68%, nearly double that of the non-Covid-19 cohort, which faced a risk of 0.35%.
The factors that play into the development of Alzheimer’s disease have been poorly understood, but two pieces considered important are prior infections, especially viral infections, and inflammation.
Lying-in-state(Page no. 11)
(Miscellaneous)
Thousands of mourners will be allowed to pay their last respects to Queen Elizabeth II beginning Wednesday till the day of her funeral next Monday.
During this period, the Queen’s coffin will lie in state in Westminster Hall. Those wanting to visit have been warned of mile-long queues and airport-like stringent security arrangements. Visitors, meanwhile, will be allowed round-the-clock.
Lying-in-state is a term used to describe a formal, solemn occasion during which a deceased person’s coffin is placed on view at a primary government building for the public to pay their respects before the last rites. The body, as per local customs, can be placed inside or outside the coffin.
According to the UK Parliament website, lying-in-state in the UK is given to “the Sovereign, as Head of State, the current or past Queen Consort and sometimes former Prime Ministers”.
After her death in 2002, the Queen Mother lay in state for three days. The lying-in-state tradition in the UK can be traced back to the Stuart dynasty that reigned in England and Scotland in the 17th century.
In the US, lying-in-state is accorded to the president or, occasionally, another high-ranking official or military leader. The coffin bearing the deceased’s body is placed inside the US Capitol or a state capitol.
About lying-in-state at the US Capitol, the decision is made by a concurrent resolution of the US House of Representatives and the US Senate. The states in the US have their own customs and rules to make that decision.
According to The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL), a bipartisan US outfit that servers members and staff of the country’s state legislatures, “(In the US) the practice of lying-in-state began in 1852 when Henry Clay, a US
India accords ‘state funerals’ to departed dignitaries like the sitting president, prime minister, a former prime minister, president or governor among others, with the Centre having the power to announce it for any individuals it deems fit for the honour.
Lying-in-state is observed during the time leading up to the state funeral, which also has protocols that involve observing ‘days of mourning’ with the flag flying at half mast and no official entertainment.
Guidelines by the Ministry of Home Affairs say that a state funeral will be accorded to any dignitary when ordered by the Government of India.
Before the arrangements are made for the funeral, and after the customary/religious rituals have been performed, the body will lie in state to enable last homage being paid to the deceased.
In the case of the death of the President a vigil party from the senior officers of the three services down to the rank of Brigadier and equivalent will be on vigil duty while the body is lying-in-state.
The lying-in-state general instructions state that the body should be placed in an open ground or large verandah on a raised mound or a platform; the path for mourners should be broad enough to enable 4-5 persons to walk abreast.
How Russia inspired the ballads Annabhau(Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 1, History)
Maharashtra’s Deputy Chief Minister DevendraFadnavis unveiled a statue of LokShahir (balladeer) AnnabhauSathe at the All-Russia State Library for Foreign Literature in Moscow.
An oil painting of Sathe, who passed away in 1969, was also unveiled at Moscow’s Indian consulate. The programme is part of events being held to mark 75 years of Indian Independence, and to also celebrate India-Russia relationship.
Sathe’s work was immensely inspired by the Russian revolution and the Communist ideology. He was a member of the Communist Party of India (CPI), and featured among the selected authors from India whose work was translated in Russian.
Tukaram BhauraoSathe, who later came to be known as AnnabhauSathe, was born in a Dalit family on August 1, 1920 in Maharashtra’s Wategaon village in Satara district.
In 1930, his family left the village and came to Mumbai. Here, he worked as a porter, a hawker and even a cotton mill helper.
In 1934, Mumbai witnessed a workers’ strike under the leadership of Lal Bawta Mill Workers Union in which he participated. During his days at the Matunga Labour Camp, he got to know R B More, an associate of Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar in the famous ‘Chavdar Lake’ satyagraha at Mahad, and joined the labour study circle. Being a Dalit, he was denied schooling in his village. It was during these study circles that he learned to read and write.
Sathe wrote his first poem on the menace of mosquitoes in the labour camp. He formed Dalit YuvakSangh, a cultural group and started writing poems on workers’ protests, agitations.
The group used to perform in front of the mill gates. Progressive Writers Association was formed at the national level at the same time with the likes of Premchand, Faiz Ahmad Faiz, Manto, IsmatChugtai, Rahul Sankrutyayan, MulkrajAnand as its members.
The group would translate the Russian work of Maxim Gorky, Anton Chekhov, Leo Tolstoy, Ivan Turgenev into Marathi, which Sathegot hooked on. It not only had an ideological impact on him, but inspired him to write street plays, stories, novels etc. In 1939, he wrote his first ballad ‘Spanish Povada’.
Sathe and his group travelled across Mumbai campaigning for workers’ rights. Out of the 49 years that he lived, Sathe, who began writing only after the age of 20, churned out 32 novels, 13 collections of short stories, four plays, a travelogue and 11 povadas (ballads).
Several of his works like ‘AklechiGoshta,’ ‘StalingradachaPovada,’ ‘MaziMainaGavavarRahili,’ ‘Jag BadalGhaluniGhav’ were popular across the state.
Editorial Page
Labouring under illusion (Page no.12)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
To increase employment, one needs growth. There cannot be growthless jobs. Simultaneously, down the years, the employment elasticity of growth has declined.
Without burdening a column with unnecessary numbers, employment elasticity is roughly half of what it used to be two decades ago.
This isn’t quite jobless growth. If an economy grows at 7 per cent, unless productivity grows at 7 per cent, there will be some employment growth, though it might not be as much as one wishes for.
In assessing this, one shouldn’t get bogged down in transient dislocations caused by Covid-19. Why isn’t employment elasticity of growth higher? Why aren’t labour force participation rates higher?
Theses have been written, and will be written, on this. One part of the puzzle is rigid labour laws. Labour is in the Concurrent List. Until recently, there were 50-55 Union-level labour laws, of which, the labour ministry administered around 40.
Enacted at different periods of time, these needed to be rationalised and harmonised. Definitions differed, increasing litigation and complicating case law, making it inconsistent. They made labour markets in the organised sector rigid while imparting less-than-desired protection in the unorganised sector.
Contrary to some perceptions, this wasn’t only about an exit policy for labour, that is, offending sections of the Industrial Disputes Act (IDA), relating to lay-offs, retrenchment and closure.
The inspector raj associated with labour laws affected an enterprise in all three stages of its life cycle – entry, functioning and exit.
All this has been discussed threadbare in the literature. Since non-wage transaction costs associated with hiring labour were high, and not just wage costs, production became excessively capital-intensive.
In 2021, Teamlease documented 30,000 compliances and 3,000 filings associated with labour laws. That apart, production was fragmented, to bypass coverage of organised sector labour laws.
Since labour is in the Concurrent List, some states introduced reforms. These include Andhra Pradesh/Telangana, Delhi, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand depending on how one interprets labour market reform.
The Economic Survey 2018-19 classified states into those with flexible labour laws and those without, and the list above is that of those with flexible labour laws.
Idea Page
River without borders (Page no. 13)
(GS Paper 2, International Relations)
One of the claimed achievements of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s visit to India last week – and the only one in the contentious area of the equitable water-sharing of common rivers — was a memorandum of understanding on the withdrawal of water from the Kushiyara river, a branch of the Barak on the border between Assam’s Karimganj and Bangladesh’s Sylhet district.
The agreement will enable the operation of the Rahimpur canal, which is expected to irrigate significant farmland areas in Bangladesh.
But even before Prime Minister Hasina arrived in Delhi there was scepticism in some Bangladeshi quarters about this agreement’s timing.
The International Farakka Committee (IFC) — a non-governmental body consisting of native and overseas Bangladeshis — issued a statement saying that water-sharing of the Kushiyara was not a priority for Bangladesh.
The sudden move to have an agreement on the Kushiyara issue only serves to divert attention from the impasse on the far more urgent and consequential issue of sharing the waters of the river Teesta.
Questions have already been raised in the Bangladeshi media on whether the prime minister’s visit to India has yielded any substantive gains for Bangladesh.
The IFC’s name bears testimony to the long history of water disputes in the country’s relations with India. The Farakka dispute precedes the founding of Bangladesh.
The Farakka barrage across the river Ganga was commissioned in 1975, but its planning began soon after the Partition. By the time of the start of its construction in 1962, the barrage’s potential adverse effects on what was then East Pakistan had become a contentious issue in the relations between India and Pakistan.
The IFC’s name also evokes the May 1975 Long March led by the “Red Maulana”, Abdul Hamid Khan Bhashani, from Rajshahi in Bangladesh — near the Indian border — to the Farakka barrage in West Bengal.
Bhashani’s goal was to focus attention on the supposed desertification of large areas in Bangladesh allegedly caused by the substantial reduction of the flow of water as the result of the Farakka barrage.
Bhashani’sFarakkamarch, the IFC believes, has lessons for today since instances of unilateral diversion of water by constructing dams on shared rivers have only increased since then.
PM Hasina is often criticised by political opponents for her pro-India stance. Her failure to return home with an agreement on the Teesta issue makes her vulnerable to political attacks in the country’s general elections next year.