📰 ‘U.S. foolishly gave money to Pakistan’
President Trump threatens to stop aid
•Pakistan was U.S. President Donald Trump’s target of ire on January 1 as he threatened to stop U.S. aid to Islamabad.
•“The United States has foolishly given Pakistan more than 33 billion dollars in aid over the last 15 years, and they have given us nothing but lies & deceit, thinking of our leaders as fools. They give safe haven to the terrorists we hunt in Afghanistan, with little help. No more!,” he tweeted on Monday morning.
•In recent years, Washington has tightened the purse strings on aid, demanding more action against terror networks operating from Pakistan.
•In August 2017, the Trump administration kept $255 million in military assistance in suspension even as it demanded specific action against terrorists.
•Mr. Trump’s tweet followed a New York Times report last week that the administration was planning to deny aid under the State Department’s assistance programme, known as Foreign Military Financing.
Pak. calls meeting
•Pakistan PM Shahid Khaqan Abbasi met Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif and called a special meeting of the Cabinet on Tuesday. Speaking to Geo TV, Mr. Asif said: “We have already told the U.S. that we cannot do more.... We are willing to give account for every penny the U.S. has given us in the war against terrorism. President Trump is making Pakistan a scapegoat for its own failures in Afghanistan.”
📰 Seize the Asian century: why India and China must take the lead
The old economic order is dead, but India and China must take the lead to preserve its successes
•Eighteen years ago, as the millennium drew to a close, the annual ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organisation in Seattle in the U.S. was derailed by the fury of thousands of street protestors denouncing the forces of globalisation and the governments which represented them. Last month, at the dusk of 2017, a ministerial meeting of the WTO in Buenos Aires, Argentina ended in a whimper with the U.S. leading a general apathy towards free trade and globalisation. Perhaps 2017 will be remembered as the year when the liberal economic consensus on free markets and globalisation was finally buried in its homelands, the U.S. and U.K. One wonders though what the street protesters of Seattle make of the cast of characters administering the last rites to the “Washington Consensus”. Not Fidel Castro or Hugo Chavez or even Lula da Silva but instead a Republican President of the U.S., who also happens to be a billionaire, and a powerful faction of the Conservative Party of the U.K. For the global Left, the “victory” must be bittersweet.
Three decades of success
•For ordinary citizens of the world, the ideological and policy shifts in the advanced economies, particularly post-Trump America and post-Brexit Britain, are likely to be more bitter than sweet. Consider the view from emerging economies. No other period in human history has seen as many people lifted out of absolute poverty as in the three decades since the mid-1980s. That is largely because the world’s two most populous nations, China and India, made rapid strides in terms of economic growth in this period.
•China, which embraced openness and internal reform more vigorously than India, has been the bigger beneficiary. India, with its limited openness and gradual internal reform process, registered lower growth than China but higher growth rates than any other point in its history. It would be cynical to say that the forces of globalisation and free markets have only enriched a minority in these countries. The fact is that more than half a billion people have been lifted out of poverty in a single generation by the very forces that are now being buried in the countries of their origin.
•This is not to argue that there were no flaws in the system. The role of Wall Street and global finance in bringing disrepute to the system is well known. That is what precipitated the 2008 financial crisis which sowed the seeds for a backlash. But curiously, politics has chosen to target free trade and free (only relatively) movement of labour, soft targets compared to the powerful world of finance. There is a grave danger for both emerging economies and advanced economies with this form of backlash.
•In the advanced economies, it is convenient to blame free trade for job losses in manufacturing, without commenting on the huge benefits such trade has brought for consumers who are clearly better off as a result of cheaper products and services. It is easy to target immigrants without acknowledging the huge value-add they bring to the host economies. Think of the number of foreign-born persons in top positions in American or British academia or in Silicon Valley. Without them, the U.S. (even the U.K.) would not be so wealthy. Any sustained backlash against free trade and immigration will ultimately hurt the economic and geo-political interests of the U.S. and the U.K.
•Still, the advanced economies may be wealthy enough to delay the day of reckoning. For countries like India and several other emerging and developing economies, a closed world means missed opportunities and a longer journey out of poverty for those who continue to remain poor. They have the most important stake in ensuring that the world doesn’t return to wealth-destroying autarky.
Pegged to reforms
•However, before batting for openness abroad, emerging economies need to put their houses in order. For many emerging economies, particularly China and India, the backlash against free markets isn’t likely to stem from external considerations (free trade or free movement of labour), but from a free market system at home that has been vitiated by crony capitalism. It isn’t surprising that the leaders of both China and India, President Xi Jinping and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, have devoted a considerable amount of political capital to combat corruption and root out entrenched vested interests. It isn’t an easy task and it won’t happen overnight but the battle against corruption and cronyism is a critical element in retaining the legitimacy of an open market economy which has delivered more prosperity than any alternative system in the last hundred years. In India, the battle against graft has to be accompanied by an attempt to improve state capacity, because there are certain critical functions which only the state can perform.
•Reform at home must be accompanied by a willingness to open up to the rest of the world. China has been aggressive about exports and about attracting foreign investment but has been more protectionist about imports (particularly services and agricultural goods) and its state-owned enterprises. India has never quite embraced an export-oriented development strategy. Somehow the point that the domestic market is large enough has won the argument even when it is apparent that the global market is several times that size. Just the global market for merchandise trade is $18 trillion, almost nine times the size of India’s total GDP. India needs to capture a much larger share of that market than its present 1.6% share. India also needs to capture a greater share of foreign investment. But for that to happen, it needs to give up its traditionally defensive posture on trade in particular. The opportunity has never been better as China’s wages rise and it reorients its economic strategy from primarily an export-led growth to a more consumption-driven economy.
•India and China hold the key to the emerging global political economy. Joining the U.S. and other advanced economies in closing up will only lead to slower growth. The challenge for India and China, as the two fastest growing major economies, is to engage with each other and with other willing partner nations, particularly in the East Asia and the Pacific region (including advanced economies like Japan and Australia), to maintain openness and embrace globalisation. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) is one forum where this engagement can happen. India can engage on free trade and free investment in other groups like the BBIN (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal) and BIMSTEC (Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Thailand, Bhutan) and via these groups with the entire ASEAN region.
•The scenario is set for an Asian century. But for it to materialise India, China and the rest of the region need to look beyond rivalry and defensiveness to explore the possibilities of economic integration as the West, so dominant for the last two hundred years, marginalises and isolates itself. That is the promise of 2018 and beyond.
📰 U.S. has drastically cut aid to Pakistan
From $2.177 billion in 2014, it came down to $526 million last year
•U.S. President Donald Trump’s New Year tweet is indicative that his administration is not satisfied by Pakistan’s response on terror. A month ago, U.S. Secretary of Defence James Mattis had told Pakistan during a visit that it “must redouble its efforts to confront militants and terrorists operating within the country”, according to a Pentagon statement.
•There was significant scaling down of U.S. assistance to Pakistan in the later years of the Barack Obama administration. From $2.177 billion in 2014, it came down to $1.604 in 2015 and $1.118 billion in 2016. In 2017, it was $526 million.
•The U.S. has also made disbursement of Pentagon’s Coalition Support Funds (CSF) conditional.
•CSF pertains to reimbursement to Pakistan for its logistical and operational support for U.S.-led military operations.
•In 2015, $300 million of the CSF was tied to a certification requirement that Pakistan was taking adequate action against the Haqqani network. That component increased in the following years — in 2016 it was $350 million out of $900 million and, in 2017, it was $400 million out of $900 million.
•The Obama administration did not certify in Pakistan’s favour in 2015 and 2016. A decision by the Trump administration for 2017 is pending.
•The defence budget for 2018 reduced the CSF allocation to $700 million and tied half of it to action against the Haqqani Network. A recent congressional move to include Lashkar-e-Taiba also in the same category of certification requirement was dropped after the Pentagon resisted it.
•Unveiling his strategy for Afghanistan in August 2018, Mr. Trump had censured Pakistan and named India as a partner. “We can no longer be silent about Pakistan’s safe havens for terrorist organisations, the Taliban, and other groups that pose a threat to the region and beyond,” he had said.
📰 Unseemly haste
The triple talaq Bill and the fantasy of legislative-judicial collaboration
•On December 28, the Lok Sabha passed the ‘triple talaq’ Bill — the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Marriage) Bill — following a day of engaging discussion. It will soon be tabled in the Rajya Sabha. The legislation was mooted in the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s judgment in August declaring that the practice of instant triple talaq was not constitutionally protected and would have no legal effect. At first glance, these developments come across as a classic example of collaboration the between the branches of government. The Supreme Court made a decision, the government conceptualised a Bill to reinforce the court’s decision, and Parliament is now in the process of enacting that Bill into law. However, this narrative collapses when the issue is considered more closely, as the Bill is at odds with the very judgment that it purports to reinforce.
Many contradictions
•The statement of objects and reasons accompanying the Bill indicates that it is meant to give effect to the court’s judgment, which it claims had failed to produce any deterrent effect in reducing the practice of triple talaq across the country. The purpose of the court’s judgment was disarmingly simple: to deprive talaq-e-biddat of recognition in the eyes of the law. That remains the case irrespective of the frequency with which it is exercised. To speak of “illegal divorce”, as the statement does, is therefore a contradiction in terms – triple talaq is simply not a divorce in the first place.
•The Bill then proceeds based on this mistaken premise. Although it confirms that pronouncements of triple talaq are void, it goes further by criminalising the utterance of triple talaq. A victim of triple talaq, the Bill says, is entitled to a subsistence allowance and custody of minor children. These provisions belong to a Bill that regulates divorce, not marriage. A victim of triple talaq remains married to her husband. As a wife (rather than an ex-wife), she should be entitled to far more than mere subsistence. The question of custody does not arise where the couple remains married.
•The linchpin of the Bill is the criminalisation of triple talaq with a penalty of imprisonment of up to three years. This also undercuts one of the important effects of the Supreme Court’s judgment. Until the judgment, there was an asymmetry between the authority conferred upon the words of a Muslim man as opposed to a Muslim woman. By indicating that Muslim men lacked the power to divorce their wives through triple talaq, the Court diminished that asymmetry. This Bill accentuates it once again and puts men at the centre of legislative policy, by triggering a number of legal consequences upon the utterance of those words.
•The alacrity and speed of Parliament’s response to the Supreme Court’s judgment is remarkable. One of the significant questions that arose before the Court was whether it would be appropriate to defer to Parliament on this issue. While the two judges in the minority favoured imposing a six-month injunction to enable Parliament to enact legislation on the subject, the judges in the majority specifically chose not to do so. As one of the judges in the majority noted, “it is not for the courts to direct” the enactment of any legislation.
Telling comparisons
•The fact that the Supreme Court did not direct Parliament to enact legislation does not preclude it from doing so. However, it is interesting that Parliament and the government have responded in a matter of months in the context of a conscious decision not to direct any legislative response. A similarly swift response followed the Supreme Court’s judgment in the Shah Bano case over 30 years ago. In contrast, governments have failed to respond — or have taken an agonisingly long period of time to respond — to judgments recommending legislative action. The best example is the Vishakha case, where legislation on sexual harassment at the workplace was enacted no less than 16 years after the Court’s advice to Parliament. A recommendation from the Court in 1995 to amend the rules of evidence to better address cases involving custodial deaths has still to be implemented.
•Overall, the attempt to ride on the coattails of the Supreme Court’s judgment is misplaced. A further round of litigation seems inevitable if this Bill were to be enacted, and there is an even chance that the court may decide that a law criminalising the use of three words violates the right to equality under the Constitution. The moral of the story is not dissimilar to the 2G case. Not everything that is arbitrary or unlawful is, or in this case should be, criminal.
📰 IPFT delegation to meet Rajnath Singh, BJP top brass over Tipraland demand
•A 10-member delegation of Indigenous Peoples Front of Tripura (IPFT) would leave for New Delhi on Tuesday to hold talks with Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh and the top brass of BJP over its contentious separate state demand.
•Sources in BJP and IPFT said meetings would help them forge an electoral alliance in ensuing Assembly election slated for next month.
•N.C. Debbarma, president of IPFT, last week led a delegation to Guwahati to hold dialogue with BJP’s Tripura poll in-charge and Assam Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma. The meeting, however, was inconclusive as the BJP reiterated its stand against separate State demand though a decision was taken to hold further discussions in New Delhi.
•“Meetings will take place on Wednesday. Leaders of all fronts of IPFT are in the delegation for Delhi,” Mr. Debbarma told The Hindu on Monday.
•Twenty seats in 60-member Tripura Assembly are reserved for tribals and the BJP is trying to work out coalition with a common tribal platform consisting of IPFT, Indigenous Nationalist Party of Twipra (INPT), National Conference of Tripura (NCT), and an IPFT faction led by former MLA Rajeshwar Debbarma to take on the CPI(M) in Assembly polls. Of them IPFT visibly stands strongest as it gained support of a large number of tribals with its separate state or ‘Tipraland’ plank.
•The IPFT mooted vision to convert the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TTAADC) into Tipraland – a separate State for indigenous people. One third population in Tripura is tribal and the TTAADC consists of three-fourth geographical area of the State.
•Mr. Debbarma conceded that Tipraland issue has been the bone of contention in way of electoral understanding with BJP as the latter categorically opposed any move to divide Tripura on basis of ethnic identity. “However we are open to discussions with BJP leadership on every issue and we are responding to their calls”, he added.
•The IPFT chief, who retired as Station Director of All India Radio Agartala a decade ago, said his party will contest Assembly elections with or without BJP. “If we have to fight alone, we would put up candidates in more than 50 seats and we are confident of winning a number of seats”, he stated.
📰 One register to count them all — how the NRC fares
Assam is the only state to have its own register of citiznes
•Millions of people in Assam on Sunday lived through the “the stroke of midnight”, to use Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru’s immortal words, as the Assam government published the first draft of an updated National Register of Citizens (NRC) of the State. While the document is meant to establish the credentials of a bona fide citizen, there are several questions surrounding the NRC. Here is a brief list of FAQs on the NRC.
Why was it necessary to bring out an NRC in Assam?
•The NRC is being updated in Assam to detect Bangladeshi nationals, who may have illegally entered the State after the midnight of March 24, 1971, the cut-off date. This date was originally agreed to in the 1985 Assam Accord, signed between the then Rajiv Gandhi government and the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU).
•However, successive State governments failed to achieve much progress in detecting and deporting foreigners as set out in the Assam Accord. In 2005, another agreement was signed between the Centre, the then Tarun Gogoi government in Assam and the AASU where it was decided to update the NRC that was first published after the Census data of 1951 in post-Partition India.
•Though the Gogoi government had started the NRC update as a pilot project in some districts, it was stopped after violence broke out in some parts of the State.
•In July 2009, Assam Public Works (APW), an NGO, petitioned the Supreme Court for identification of Bangladeshi foreigners in the State and deletion of their names from the voters’ list.
What will happen to those persons who don’t find their names in the draft register published on Monday?
•The list published on Monday is the first draft of the updated NRC. Another list is expected by February-end or early March, with more names and details.
•However, if a citizen’s name is missing, he or she can file an objection and request that the name be included after submitting the requisite documents to the NRC centre or online on the website www.nrcassam. nic.in
Is there a possibility of violence in the State if a large number of people don’t find their names in the register?
•The Assam government did fear violence and hence requisitioned over 20,000 paramilitary personnel and requested the Army to be on standby to deal with any law-and-order issue.
•However, Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal said people, irrespective of their caste or religion, had taken part in the process and expressed confidence that the NRC update will not result in violence.
•The security challenge, however, will emerge only when the process of updating the NRC gets completed and a large number of people are left out.
Is the NRC a court-mandated exercise?
•Yes, the publication of the first draft of the NRC by December 31, 2017 was ordered by the Supreme Court.
•The top court has been hearing this case since July 2009 when Assam Public Works moved court to intervene in detecting and deporting Bangladeshis.
Should persons of Assam living in other parts of the country also have their names in the register?
•NRC is a process by which a bona fide Indian citizen can be distinguished from a foreigner.
•If a person from Assam is living or working in another part of the country, it is advisable to get oneself registered and establish one’s legacy as an “inhabitant” of Assam.
📰 NRC wins consensus, but not Citizenship Bill
AGP has threatened to snap ties with BJP if the Centre grants citizenship to Hindu Bangladeshis who have entered Assam illegally post-1971
•There has been political consensus in Assam that an updated National Register of Citizens, as mandated by the Supreme Court, will help identification of Bangladeshi migrants, who are staying illegally in Assam after the midnight of March 24, 1971, and their expulsion in accordance with the Assam Accord. However, the actual number of illegal migrants in the State will not be known till the claims and objections of all those excluded in the final draft are settled by the NRC authorities.
Migration after marriage
•The verification of the NRC for the subsequent draft will also decide on the applications from 29 lakh women, who have submitted certificates issued by Gaon (gram panchayat) secretaries and executive magistrates to support their claim of residency after migration post-marriage. The Supreme Court allowed these documents after setting aside an order of the Gauhati High Court which declared these documents “invalid” and “ineffective in the process of the verification of claims for inclusion in NRC”.
•The Supreme court, however, clarified: “The certificate issued by the G.P. secretary, by no means, is proof of citizenship. Such proof will come only if the link between the claimant and the legacy person (who has to be a citizen) is established. The certificate has to be verified at two stages. The first is the authenticity of the certificate itself; and the second is the authenticity of the contents thereof. The latter process of verification is bound to be an exhaustive process in the course of which the source of information of the facts and all other details recorded in the certificate will be ascertained after giving an opportunity to the holder of the certificate.”
•The publication of the first draft of the NRC came close on the heels of ruling coalition partner Asom Gana Parishad threatening to snap ties with the ruling BJP if the Centre pushed for passage of the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, 2016 that seeks to grant citizenship to Hindu Bangladeshis, who have entered Assam illegally post-1971.
•All Opposition parties, including the Congress and the All India United Democratic Front, and student and youth organisations have opposed identification of illegal migrants on the basis of religion. They have demanded withdrawal of the Bill on the ground that if made into an Act, it would render the updated NRC and the entire process of updating the citizenship register infructuous.
•With the BJP pushing for passage of the Bill,the question of identification of foreigners in accordance with the Assam Accord may not be answered even after the final draft is published.
📰 Clash mars bicentenary of Bhima-Koregaon battle
Arguments over hoardings snowball into stone-pelting; over 10 vehicles torched
•Pune: The bicentenary celebrations of the 1818 battle of Bhima-Koregaon were marred by a clash between two groups on Monday. The incident occurred at around 11.30 a.m. when people were heading towards Koregaon Ranstambh (victory pillar) in the village.
•The police said altercations over some hoardings resulted in stone-pelting, and torching of over 10 vehicles. “The situation was immediately brought under control. Measures have been taken to prevent the spread of rumours on social media, and a number of villages like Sanawadi, Vadhu-Budruk and Shikrapur along the highway have been sealed,” said a police officer.
•The police blocked the traffic on the Pune-Ahmbednagar highway for sometime following the incident. The traffic was resumed in evening. “More police personnel, including companies of the SRPF, have been deployed to avoid any untoward incident,” the officer said.
•Some members of Bhima-Koregaon Shauryadin Prerana Abhiyan, a committee that conducted Elgaar Parishad on Sunday, in which Gujarat MLA Jignesh Mewani and Radhika Vemula participated, alleged that the clash was provoked by right-wing outfits.
•“The successful conclusion of Elgaar Parishad at Shaniwar Wada Fort has irked several Hindutva outfits. We have strong reasons to believe that almost 3,000 right-wing activists were behind the clash to disrupt the Koregaon-Bhima celebrations,” alleged Santosh Shinde of Sambhaji Brigade, one of the members.
•Lakhs from the Dalit community visited Koregaon Ranstambh (victory pillar) in the village on Monday. The memorial is dedicated to the battle of January 1, 1818, where 500 soldiers of the untouchable Mahar community fought alongside the English to defeat the 28,000-strong army of Peshwa Bajirao II, thus ending the Peshwai domination.
📰 Understanding secularism in the Indian context
Our Constitution doesn’t acquire its secular character merely from the words in the Preamble, but from a collective reading of many of its provisions, particularly the various fundamental rights that it guarantees.
•There was a point of time, perhaps, when we might have taken the idea of a secular, pluralistic India, tolerant of all sects and religions, as a position set in stone. But, incidents, especially since the early 1990s, have radically altered both reality and our imagination. That certain groups, including many within the political party presently in power at the Centre and in many States, actively believe in a different kind of India is today intensely palpable. Against this backdrop, statements made on December 24, in a public address, by the Minister of State for Employment and Skill Development, Anantkumar Hegde, scarcely come as a surprise.
Secularism and us
•“Secular people,” he declared, “do not have an identity of their parental blood.” “We (the BJP),” he added, “are here to change the Constitution,” making it quite clear that in his, and his party’s, belief secularism was a model unworthy of constitutional status. Since then, the ruling government has sought to distance itself from these comments, and Mr. Hegde himself has, without explicitly retracting his statements, pledged his allegiance to the Constitution and its superiority. But the message, as it were, is already out, and its discourse is anything but opposed to the present regime’s larger ideology. Indeed, Mr. Hegde’s comments even mirror those made on several occasions by people belonging to the top brass of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, who have repeatedly stressed on what they view as their ultimate aim: the recognition of India as a Hindu state, in which secularism lies not at the Constitution’s bedrock, but entirely outside the document’s aims and purposes.
•The reactions to Mr. Hegde’s speech have been manifold. Some have welcomed it, as a call for debate, while others have viewed it as the ringing of a veritable alarm bell. Those on the far right in particular, though, have embraced the message, and have gone as far as to suggest that India has never been a secular state, that the Constitution, as it was originally adopted, did not contain the word “secular”, which was inserted into the Preamble only through the 42nd amendment introduced by Indira Gandhi’s government during the height of Emergency rule. They also point to B.R. Ambedkar’s pointed rejection of proposals during the Constitution’s drafting to have the word “secular” included in the Preamble. Given that the Constitution is mutable, these facts, in their belief, only buttress arguments against the inclusion of secularism as a constitutional ideal.
•But what statements such as those made by Mr. Hegde don’t quite grasp is that our Constitution doesn’t acquire its secular character merely from the words in the Preamble, but from a collective reading of many of its provisions, particularly the various fundamental rights that it guarantees. Any move, therefore, to amend the Constitution, to remove the word “secular” from the Preamble, before we consider whether such a change will survive judicial review, will have to remain purely symbolic. Yet, Mr. Hegde’s statements nonetheless bear significance, for they exemplify the confidence that he has in the broader project that is already underway. The endeavour here is to steadily strike at the secular values that the Constitution espouses, to defeat it not so much from within, but first from outside. Negating this mission requires sustained effort, not only in thwarting any efforts to amend the Constitution, if indeed they do fructify, but, even more critically, by working towards building a contrary public opinion, not through rhetoric, but through facts, by reaffirming our faith in constitutionalism, and in the hallowed values of plurality and tolerance that our democracy must embody.
Inbuilt freedoms
•Now, it is certainly true that the Constituent Assembly explicitly rejected a motion moved by Brajeshwar Prasad from Bihar to have the words “secular” and “socialist” included in the Preamble. But this was not on account of any scepticism that the drafters might have had on the values of secularism. Quite to the contrary, despite what some might want us to believe today, the assembly virtually took for granted India’s secular status. To them, any republic that purports to grant equality before the law to all its citizens, that purports to recognise people’s rights to free speech, to a freedom of religion and conscience simply cannot be un-secular. To be so would be an incongruity. Secularism, as would be clear on any morally reasonable analysis, is inbuilt in the foundations of constitutionalism, in the idea of a democracy properly understood. In the case of our Constitution, it flows from the series of fundamental rights guaranteed in Part III. How can a person be guaranteed a right to freedom of religion without a concomitant guarantee that people of all religions will be treated with equal concern?
•To fully understand what secularism in the Indian context means, therefore, we must read the Constitution in its entirely. There is no doubt that within the Assembly, there existed a conflict between two differing visions of secularism: one that called for a complete wall of separation between state and religion, and another that demanded that the state treat every religion with equal respect. A study of the Constitution and the debates that went into its framing reveals that ultimately it was the latter vision that prevailed.
•As the political scientist Shefali Jha has pointed out, this constitutional dream can be best comprehended from K.M. Munshi’s words. “The non-establishment clause (of the U.S. Constitution),” Munshi wrote, “was inappropriate to Indian conditions and we had to evolve a characteristically Indian secularism… We are a people with deeply religious moorings. At the same time, we have a living tradition of religious tolerance — the results of the broad outlook of Hinduism that all religions lead to the same god… In view of this situation, our state could not possibly have a state religion, nor could a rigid line be drawn between the state and the church as in the U.S..” Or, as Rajeev Bhargava has explained, what secularism in the Indian setting calls for is the maintenance of a “principled distance” between state and religion. This does not mean that the state cannot intervene in religion and its affairs, but that any intervention should be within the limitations prescribed by the Constitution. Sometimes this might even call for differential treatment across religions, which would be valid so long as such differentiation, as Mr. Bhargava explains, can be justified on the grounds that it “promotes freedom, equality, or any other value integral to secularism.”
•We can certainly debate the extent to which the state intervenes in religious matters, and whether that falls foul of the Constitution’s guarantees. We can also debate whether an enactment of a Uniform Civil Code would be in keeping with Indian secularism or not. But what’s clear is that a diverse, plural society such as India’s cannot thrive without following the sui generis form of secularism that our founders put in place.
•It might well yet be inconceivable that the government chooses to amend the Constitution by destroying its basic structure. But these are not the only efforts we must guard against. We must equally oppose every move, every action, with or without the state’s sanction, that promotes tyrannical majoritarianism, that imposes an unreasonable burden on the simple freedoms of the minority. We can only do this by recognising what constitutes the essence and soul of the Constitution: a trust in the promise of equality. What, we might want to keeping asking ourselves, does equality really entail? What does it truly demand?
📰 Tourist entry banned at National Park
•The Bhitarkanika National Park in Odisha’s Kendrapara district will be out of bounds for tourists for a week in view of for the annual census of estuarine crocodiles.
•The forest department has imposed a seven-day ban, starting January 3, to prevent noise pollution during the headcount operation of the reptiles, Divisional Forest Officer, Rajnagar Mangrove (wildlife) division, B.P. Acharya, said.
Free head count
•“There will be a prohibition on the entry of visitors to the national park area during this period to ensure smooth and disturbance-free head count operation of saltwater crocodiles,” Mr. Acharya said.
•The objective is to keep the place free from human interference when the meticulous exercise is underway, officials said.
Ideal picnic spot
•The 145-sqkm Bhitarkanika National Park, located in the delta of rivers Brahmani, Baitarani and Dhamara, is an ideal spot for camping, trekking and picnic.
📰 The money trail: on the need for investor awarenesss on cryptocurrencies
•The Finance Ministry’s warning to potential investors in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies has come at a time when a new, seemingly attractive investment area has opened up that few have enough information about. The price of bitcoin, the most popular of all cryptocurrencies, not only shot up by well over 1000% over the course of the last year but also fluctuated wildly. One of the main reasons for this volatility is speculation and the entry into the market of a large number of people lured by the prospect of quick and easy profits. The government’s caution comes on top of three warnings issued by the Reserve Bank of India since 2013. Investment in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies increased tremendously in India over the past year, but most new users know close to nothing of the technology, or how to verify the genuineness of a particular cryptocurrency. A number of investors, daunted by the high price of bitcoin, have put their money into less well-established and often spurious cryptocurrencies, only to lose it all. Even some private cryptocurrency operators in India have gone on record saying that as many as 90% of the currencies are scams.
•The use value of cryptocurrencies — both as a medium of exchange and as a store of value — is still being explored. Global tech firms such as IBM are developing their own cryptocurrency platforms to speed up cross-border transactions in a secure and transparent manner. At the same time, countries like South Korea and the U.S. are intensifying regulatory scrutiny of the market. South Korea, where bitcoin became something of a craze, recently proposed legislation to either heavily regulate exchanges or ban them. In the U.S., in November, a court ordered a popular cryptocurrency platform to hand over information related to 14,000 accounts to the Internal Revenue Service, undermining the anonymity the digital currencies offer. In all this, India must be careful to differentiate between cryptocurrencies and the blockchain technology they are based on. Cryptocurrencies may or may not emerge as a useful tool, especially since the government may not want to encourage the proliferation of anonymous, non-fiat currencies as its anti-black money fight intensifies. But blockchains, basically digital ledgers of financial transactions that are immutable and instantly updated across the world, are worth looking at as aids to ease doing business. They have the potential to greatly streamline payment mechanisms and make them transparent. As Ajay Tyagi, Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Board of India, said, blockchain technology is useful and should not as yet have regulatory oversight. The inter-ministerial panel on cryptocurrencies will take a call on their future. Meanwhile, the government is correct in underscoring the ‘caveat’ in caveat emptor.
📰 Real Estate Act yet to show teeth
Only 20,000 projects registered; only six States have permanent authorities
•Only 20,000 housing projects have been registered under the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016, six months after the legislation seeking to protect the interests of homebuyers came into force last May. This is just a fraction of the under-construction and proposed housing projects promoted by private developers.
Six months on
•The Act was initiated by the previous United Progressive Alliance government and passed by Parliament in 2016 and notified in May 2017. The developer has to declare to buyers detailed information such as dates on which various government clearances are secured, floor plans, carpet area, progress in construction, and so on.
•All real estate projects have to be registered with the Real Estate Regulatory Authority (RERA). However, the Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry says only six States have set up permanent authorities, while 23 have set up an interim ones.
•The low registration of projects can be explained by the fact that many States have rules that favour private developers. For example, Gujarat, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh have exempted ongoing projects from RERA. Similarly, in Karnataka, projects that are 60% complete have been kept out of RERA. In Maharashtra, the rules say that if any building in a project is completed, then it need not be registered.
•“The real estate market is in a slump. The low registration of the projects can be partially explained by the twin factors,” an official said.
📰 ‘IBBI registration must for asset valuation’
Norms for professionals from April 1
•Professionals carrying out asset valuations under Companies Act and Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code will have to get themselves registered with Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (IBBI) from April to conduct such activities, an official statement said on Monday.
•“With effect from April 1, 2018, for conducting valuations required under the Companies Act, 2013 and the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code, 2016, a person is to be registered with the IBBI as a registered valuer,” the Ministry of Corporate Affairs said in a statement.
•A government notification in October had delegated powers and functions to the IBBI under Companies Act and designated it as the authority under the Companies (Registered Valuers and Valuation) Rules, 2017.
Necessary qualification
•As per the notification, a valuer needs to have necessary qualification and experience, be a member of a recognised valuer organisation and should be registered with IBBI to carry out such activities.
📰 Ancient jumping genes may give corals new lease of life
Retrotransposons could help the algae adapt more rapidly to heat stress
•Scientists have identified a gene that improves the heat tolerance of the algae that live symbiotically with coral species, and could potentially help the corals adapt to some warming.
•Symbiodinium is a unicellular algae that provides its coral host with photosynthetic products in return for nutrients and shelter.
•However, high sea temperatures can cause the breakdown of this symbiotic relationship and lead to the widespread expulsion of Symbiodinium from host tissues, an event known as coral beaching. If bleached corals do not recover, they starve to death, leaving only their white, calcium-carbonate exoskeleton.
•Now, researchers from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Saudi Arabia have identified special genes, called retrotransposons, which could help the algae adapt more rapidly to heat stress.
•During their study, most genes commonly associated with heat stress were turned off, while a small number of retrotransposons were turned on.
•The team suggests that the activation and replication of Symbiodinium’s retrotransposons in response to heat stress could lead to a faster evolutionary response, “since producing more mutations increases the chance of generating a beneficial one that allows the symbionts to cope better with this specific stress,” Aranda said.
📰 ‘Alternative drugs for mild infection the way’
Study suggests non-antibiotic therapies
•Developing alternatives to antibiotics for small infections could prevent bacteria from developing drug-resistance and help humans win the battle against superbugs, scientists say.
•It has been widely reported that bacteria will evolve to render antibiotics mostly ineffective by mid-century, and current strategies to make up for the projected shortfalls have not worked.
•Doctors are often quick to prescribe strong antibiotics for mild infections, helping bacteria evolve resistance to even the most potent drugs.
•One possible problem is that drug development strategies have focused on replacing antibiotics in extreme infections, such as sepsis, where every minute without an effective drug increases the risk of death.
•However, the evolutionary process that brings forth antibiotic resistance does not happen nearly as often in those big infections as it does in the multitude of small ones like sinusitis, tonsillitis, bronchitis, and bladder infections, according to researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology in the U.S.
Antibiotic prescriptions
•“Antibiotic prescriptions against those smaller ailments account for about 90 percent of antibiotic use, and so are likely to be the major driver of resistance evolution,” said Sam Brown, an associate professor at Georgia Tech.
•Bacteria that survive these many small battles against antibiotics grow in strength and numbers to become formidable armies in big infections, like those that strike after surgery.
•For example, E coli is widespread in the human gut. While some strains secrete enzymes that thwart antibiotics, others do not.
•A broad-spectrum antibiotic can kill off more of the vulnerable, less dangerous bacteria, leaving the more dangerous and robust bacteria to propagate.
•Often, superbugs have made their way into hospitals in someone’s intestines, where they had evolved high resistance through years of occasional treatment with antibiotics for small infections. Then bacteria have infected patients with weak immune systems.
•Furious infections have ensued, essentially invulnerable to antibiotics, followed by sepsis and death.The researchers proposed a different approach. Developing non-antibiotic therapies for strep throat, bladder infections, and bronchitis could prove easier, thus encouraging pharmaceutical research.
📰 Google’s new AI system can articulate like humans
‘Tacotron 2’ delivers speech that matches human voice
•In a major step towards its “AI first” dream, Google has developed a text-to-speech artificial intelligence (AI) system that will confuse you with its human-like articulation.
•The tech giant’s text-to-speech system called “Tacotron 2” delivers an AI-generated computer speech that almost matches with the voice of humans, technology news website Inc.com reported.
•At Google I/O 2017 developers conference, the company’s CEO Sundar Pichai announced that the internet giant was shifting its focus from mobile-first to “AI first” and launched several products and features, including Google Lens, Smart Reply for Gmail and Google Assistant for iPhone.
•According to a paper published in arXiv.org, the system first creates a spectrogram of the text, a visual representation of how the speech should sound.
•That image is put through Google’s WaveNet algorithm, which uses the image and brings AI closer than ever to mimicking human speech. It can easily learn different voices and even generates artificial breaths. “Our model achieves a mean opinion score (MOS) of 4.53 comparable to a MOS of 4.58 for professionally recorded speech,” the researchers were quoted as saying.
