📰 Environmental governance at centre stage
Indira Gandhi’s insights have shaped global institutional response to climate change
•It was the noted Pakistani economist, Tariq Banuri, who, in the run-up to the ill-fated Copenhagen Conference on Climate Change in December 2009, first pointed to me that the global environmental discourse has been shaped by four events. The first three were the publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring in 1962, Paul Ehrlich’s The Population Bomb in 1968, and the Club of Rome’s The Limits to Growth in early 1972. The fourth was Indira Gandhi’s speech at the first-ever United Nations Conference on the Human Environment at Stockholm 50 years ago today. She was the only head of government to speak at that conclave (other than the host, Olof Palme). Her address, which looked at environmental issues from a development perspective and at developmental challenges from an ecological standpoint, has gone into history as a milestone.
A naturalist
•Indira Gandhi had already established her credentials as a naturalist when she spoke at Stockholm. She had reactivated the Indian Board of Wildlife in July 1969 and had hosted the Tenth General Assembly of the International Union for Conservation of Nature five months later. She had started paying attention to protecting sanctuaries and in 1971, had deputed the famed ornithologist Salim Ali to Ramsar, the Caspian Sea site in Iran where the convention to protect wetlands was finalised. The National Committee on Environmental Planning and Coordination had been established under the stewardship of the redoubtable Pitambar Pant. She had launched India’s first species conservation programme at Gir for the Asiatic Lion in January 1972 and had started preparations for Project Tiger, which came into being in April 1973. The Wildlife Protection Bill was ready to be enacted by Parliament and it became law in September 1972. Discussions with States to bring legislation to deal with water pollution had been initiated and this would materialise two years later when pollution control boards would also come into being.
A speech for all times
•One line in that historic speech — perhaps her greatest and most quoted — continues to get attention. One version has her saying “Poverty is the greatest polluter”. In another version, she is recalled as declaring “Poverty is the worst form of pollution”. Actually, she said no such thing. The line in her speech added at the last minute reads, “Are not poverty and need the greatest polluters?” She said this to bring home to the West that developing countries like India have their own pressing challenges to raise the standard of living of millions of their citizens. She underscored the injustice and inequity in the fact that countries with a small fraction of the world’s population consumed the bulk of the natural resources causing far greater environmental degradation than what countries like India were doing. Her speech was wide-ranging and dealt with the environmental effects of war as well, the ongoing conflict in Vietnam being uppermost in people’s minds especially with the use of horrific chemical weapons. Quoting from the Atharva Veda, she ended by drawing attention to how ancient Indians had recognised the need for ecological balance: What of thee I dig out/Let that quickly grow over/Let me not hit thy vitals/Or thy heart.
•The many themes covered in Indira Gandhi’s speech, including the need for international cooperation, became very much part of the Stockholm Declaration issued two days later. They were also to provide intellectual ammunition for developing countries during the discussions and negotiations at the famed Rio Earth Summit in 1992 that resulted in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. Thus, while many speeches of political leaders are of the times in which they live and work, Indira Gandhi’s Stockholm speech has continued to resonate across the globe. For instance, it was widely commented upon in the months prior to the Paris Summit of December 2015.
•Immediately following her speech, Indira Gandhi and Norman Borlaug, the Nobel Laureate and widely considered to be the scientific guru of the Green Revolution, exchanged letters. Borlaug applauded the speech and her firm emphasis on developmental needs, especially the rapid increase in the production of foodgrains. But he wanted her to raise her voice against what he called “eco-maniacs” who were against the use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides and against the use of modern science. Indira Gandhi, who knew and admired Borlaug, acknowledged that the Green Revolution in India depended crucially on expanding the application of “fertilisers, insecticides and weed-killers”. But she also expressed concern on the “adverse side effects and the long-term disadvantages of the indiscriminate use of some of these chemicals”’. She advised Borlaug (and this was 50 years ago) that “the scientific community, of which you are a leader, [should] develop integrated methods combining biological and agronomic controls with the judicious use of chemicals to raise crop yields and fight insect and pest menaces with minimum damage to nature’s balance… with the aim to maintain a higher environmental quality along with a decent material standard of living”.
•Had Indira Gandhi shown any interest, the UN Environment Programme that was established following the Stockholm Conference may well have been headquartered in New Delhi. The momentum generated by her speech would have ensured that. The choice was, in fact, between New Delhi and Nairobi. India did not press its case; Kenya did. Kenyan President Jomo Kenyatta was a good friend of India’s Prime Minister and had been a classmate of her top aide P.N. Haksar at the London School of Economics. In early November 1972, India gracefully withdrew citing its fraternal links with Kenya. Nine years later, Indira Gandhi was in Nairobi as one of the five heads of government to address the first UN Conference on New and Renewable Sources of Energy. Her speech there brought renewables into the mainstream of the environmental debate.
A sense of discomfort
•Over the last half a century since the Stockholm speech, India has put in place laws, regulations and standards, established institutions and announced numerous polices, programmes and projects to ensure ecological balance as it pursues high economic growth. Nothing can and should remain frozen. Even so, while the rhetoric in international forums has stressed India’s environmental commitment and while dramatic declines in costs have enabled a huge expansion in renewable energy capacity, a sense of discomfort on the current regime’s actions at home will not be unjustified. In the name of ease of doing business, the regulatory edifice is under systematic assault and enforcement, always weak, has further slackened. When Indira Gandhi spoke at Stockholm, the public health consequences of environmental (mis)governance did not occupy centre stage. They do today. It is because of this that the domestic walk of the Narendra Modi government and not its global talk should be cause for anguish and worry.
Food Secretary says the nutritional benefits in consuming the grain far outweighs the risk
•Union Food and Public Distribution Secretary Sudhanshu Pandey said here on Monday that the Centre had started the second phase of distribution of fortified rice from April 1. A total of 90 districts have been covered, and the Centre is targeting 291 districts, he added.
•The pet scheme of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, started in October 2021, aims to supply fortified rice to beneficiaries of the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) and the Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman, or PM-POSHAN, scheme.
•Asked about the health risks involved in the consumption of fortified rice, which has added nutrients, and the warnings experts had given to the Centre against such a scheme, Mr. Pandey said the benefits far outweighed the harmful effects. He added that a comprehensive concurrent evaluation mechanism had been put in place.
•“All States have set up a steering committee headed by the Chief Secretary that will review the whole distribution. The State medical departments and ground functionaries are generally aware of pockets of diseases,” he said.
•Mr. Pandey said the Food Corporation of India (FCI) had procured about 90 lakh tonnes of fortified rice and about 2.2 lakh tonnes had been supplied to 90 districts in 16 States. He was confident that the entire quantity would be procured before the end of the year. “It is a continuous and complex process. About 90 lakh tonnes is available with the FCI and lifting is done by the States,” he said. “We are hopeful that we will be able to cover the requirement of the Phase-2 target for high-burden districts.”
•Joint Secretary in the Ministry S. Jagannathan said the cost of fortification was getting reduced as the programme expanded its ambit. He said malnutrition cost the country at least ₹77,000 crore annually in terms of lost productivity, illness and death. The country lost about 1% of GDP from anaemia.
•“One rupee spent on nutritional interventions in India could generate ₹34.1-₹38.6 in public economic returns,” he said.
•Kapil Yadav, Additional Professor at Centre for Community Medicine, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi, said in his presentation that though there were some rare risks involved in fortified rice, the benefits were far more. “A disclaimer of rice fortification has been put in India unlike in other countries so that people are aware of what they are consuming,” he said.
📰 Centre to boost supply of fortified rice
Food Secretary says the nutritional benefits in consuming the grain far outweighs the risk
•Union Food and Public Distribution Secretary Sudhanshu Pandey said here on Monday that the Centre had started the second phase of distribution of fortified rice from April 1. A total of 90 districts have been covered, and the Centre is targeting 291 districts, he added.
•The pet scheme of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, started in October 2021, aims to supply fortified rice to beneficiaries of the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) and the Pradhan Mantri Poshan Shakti Nirman, or PM-POSHAN, scheme.
•Asked about the health risks involved in the consumption of fortified rice, which has added nutrients, and the warnings experts had given to the Centre against such a scheme, Mr. Pandey said the benefits far outweighed the harmful effects. He added that a comprehensive concurrent evaluation mechanism had been put in place.
•“All States have set up a steering committee headed by the Chief Secretary that will review the whole distribution. The State medical departments and ground functionaries are generally aware of pockets of diseases,” he said.
•Mr. Pandey said the Food Corporation of India (FCI) had procured about 90 lakh tonnes of fortified rice and about 2.2 lakh tonnes had been supplied to 90 districts in 16 States. He was confident that the entire quantity would be procured before the end of the year. “It is a continuous and complex process. About 90 lakh tonnes is available with the FCI and lifting is done by the States,” he said. “We are hopeful that we will be able to cover the requirement of the Phase-2 target for high-burden districts.”
•Joint Secretary in the Ministry S. Jagannathan said the cost of fortification was getting reduced as the programme expanded its ambit. He said malnutrition cost the country at least ₹77,000 crore annually in terms of lost productivity, illness and death. The country lost about 1% of GDP from anaemia.
•“One rupee spent on nutritional interventions in India could generate ₹34.1-₹38.6 in public economic returns,” he said.
•Kapil Yadav, Additional Professor at Centre for Community Medicine, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi, said in his presentation that though there were some rare risks involved in fortified rice, the benefits were far more. “A disclaimer of rice fortification has been put in India unlike in other countries so that people are aware of what they are consuming,” he said.
📰 Tackling the crisis of rising global food prices
Analysis shows factors outside agriculture to be responsible, with lessons for the world and in food system management
•Global food prices are characterised by year-to-year volatility and periodic sharp spikes. While year-to-year volatility is easily managed by most countries through changes in their trade and domestic policies, it is steep and severe periodic price shocks that can lead to some sort of a crisis at the global and national levels. The crisis can emerge in the form of food shortages, trade disruptions, a rise and spread in hunger and poverty levels, a depletion of foreign exchange reserves for net food importing countries, a strain on a nation’s fiscal resources due to an increase in spending on food safety nets, a threat to peace, and even social unrest in some places. Because of these widespread ramifications of food price shocks, it becomes imperative to understand the real causes of such shocks and devise effective mechanisms to deal with them.
Crises and history
•Historical data on food prices compiled by international agencies such as the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, the World Bank/International Monetary Fund show that since the onset and the adoption of Green Revolution technology in the early 1960s, the world has been struck thrice by food price crises. The first shock was experienced during 1973-76 when the food price index (based on prices in U.S. dollars) doubled in nominal terms and increased by one third in real terms compared to the pre-shock average of four years. This shock moved up the nominal prices of commodities (including food) into a new trajectory. However, for the next two decades, food prices in real terms followed a declining trend and were at their lowest around 2002. After this, nominal as well as the real prices of food began rising; this momentum built up to culminate in the next food price crisis of 2008, which was further intensified by 2011. While the price shock began softening after 2014, food prices did not move back to their pre-2006 level. The lull in global food prices stayed for a short duration, from 2015 to 2019, and food prices again began moving above the trend by the third quarter of 2020. This time the increase in the food price index happened very quickly and it turned out to be very big - it has taken the food price index to its historically highest level.
•This increase in global food prices which manifested itself in the three food price crises since the 1960s offers some pertinent lessons for global food systems and the international community. All the three food price crises during 1973-1976, 2007-12, and the recent one which began towards the end of 2020 have one thing in common — they were triggered by factors outside agriculture. They were not caused by any serious shortfall in agriculture production. Second, the interval between two consecutive price shocks has narrowed down considerably and the severity of shock is turning stronger.
The recent spike
•Let us return to the recent spike in food prices which has been triggered by supply disruptions due to COVID-19 and further aggravated by the Russia-Ukraine war. Some other important factors that have also contributed to a rise in food prices and the build-up of price shocks can be discerned from the trade patterns and composition of the usage of food commodities.
•The current food price spike first began in vegetable oils and then expanded to cereals. The trade patterns of these commodities show that around 38% of the vegetable oil produced and consumed is globally traded. In the case of wheat, dependence on trade to meet global demand forms 25%, while only one tenth of rice output or consumption is traded. Trade dependence for maize is 16%. It is evident then that the effect of global trade disruption will be higher for commodities that are traded more and vice-versa.
•Another factor underlying the rising trend and spikes in food prices is the diversion of food for biofuel needs. The proportion of vegetable oil used for biodiesel increased from 1% in 2003 to 11% in 2011; it went up to more than 15% in 2021. This is further related to energy prices. When crude prices increase beyond a certain level it becomes economical to use oilseeds and grains for biodiesel and ethanol, respectively. The second reason for the use of food crops for biofuel is the mandates to increase the share of renewable energy resources.
•Food prices are also expected to go up in the current and next harvest season because of an increase in the prices of fertilizer and other agrochemicals. The international price of fertilizer has increased by 150% between April 2021 and April 2022. The international price of a bag of urea (50 kg) has increased from less than ₹1,000 to more than ₹3,000 in the last 15 months.
Implications for India
•Export and import in the agriculture sector constituted 13% of gross value added in agriculture during 2020-21. Therefore, some transmission of an increase in global prices on domestic prices is inevitable. (Transmission of international prices to domestic prices can be prevented only if there is no trade.) This transmission of global prices to the domestic market can be moderated through trade policy and other instruments. This is precisely what India has been doing to balance the interests of producers and consumers and in protecting the economy against excessive volatility in international prices. When international prices go too low, India has checks on cheap imports to protect the interests of producers; and when international prices go too high, the country liberalises imports and imposes checks on exports to ensure adequate availability and reasonable food prices for domestic consumers. The policy of having a buffer stock of food staples has also been very helpful in maintaining price stability especially in the wake of global food crises.
•The importance of agriculture exports to mop up food and agriculture surplus from the country is increasing. Ongoing trends in domestic demand and supply imply that India will be required to dispose of 15% of its domestic food output in the overseas market by 2030. This is more than double the current ratio of export to output. This underscores the need to maintain India’s image as a reliable and credible exporter. However, it is important to differentiate between the two situations: disturbing normal export and regulating exports exceeding the normal level.
Wheat export restrictions
•The recent ban on wheat exports and restrictions on the export of other food commodities by India need to be seen in the light of an abnormal situation created by spikes in international prices. Some experts see it as a setback to India’s image as a reliable exporter as this move is seen to disrupt (regular) export channels. A closer examination of data reveals that India’s action to ban or restrict food exports is not disrupting its normal exports. India was a very small exporter of wheat, with its share in global wheat trade ranging between 0.1% to 1% during 2015-16 to 2020-21. Despite the ban, the export of wheat this year will be much higher than the average wheat export from India in recent years.
•The international market is looking for around 50 million tonnes of wheat to compensate for the disruption in wheat exports from Russia and Ukraine. This is close to half the wheat production in the country and more than two-thirds of the wheat that comes to the market. If India had not imposed a ban on wheat export, it would have resulted in a severe shortage of wheat within the country. No responsible country would jeopardise its own food security by allowing excess exports.
•India should continue with a policy of strategic liberalisation, as followed in the past, to balance the interests of producers and consumers. The policy of buffer stock has also been very helpful in maintaining price stability in the face of global price shocks.
Global impact
•The Green Revolution technology which spread in developing countries from the 1970s to the 1990s helped in keeping food prices low and relatively stable. As the steam of Green Revolution technology slowed down with the start of the 21st century, food prices began increasing in real terms. At the same time, the resilience of the food sector against price shocks has also weakened.
•The world requires new breakthroughs such as Green Revolution technology, for large-scale adoption in order to enable checks on food prices rising at a faster rate. This in turn requires increased spending on agriculture research and development (especially by the public sector and multilateral development agencies). There is a need to strengthen and rejuvenate the global agri-research system under the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) which is heading towards disarray.
•Biofuel protocols have contributed to the global food crisis for the second time in the last 15 years. Diversion of land under food crops and food output for biofuel should be carefully calibrated with implications for food availability. In most cases it requires serious rethink.
•The last three food price crises were primarily caused due to an increase in energy prices and disruptions in the movement of food across borders. Factors related to climate change are going to be an additional source of supply shocks in the years ahead. Therefore, the global community must plan to have a global buffer stock of food in order to ensure reasonable stability in food prices and supply.
📰 The influenza pandemic and ‘nations within a nation’
Disease outbreaks can cause unanticipated and disruptive changes, affecting the business environment and policy
•Few questions in business and public policy are as complex as the question of how to save lives. Lives matter, not only of those who are fortunate to live in more developed regions, but also of those who live in less developed regions. Many governments around the world struggle to address the problem of inequity in access to life-saving products such as vaccines. The struggle becomes even more complex when there is a sudden increase in demand for such life-saving products, for example, during a pandemic. When there is a sudden increase in demand for life-saving products (e.g., flu vaccines during the 2009-10 H1N1 pandemic), how do firms respond across the more versus less developed regions within a nation? Why might foreign incumbents and rival domestic firms respond differently?
•To answer such intricate questions, it is crucial to first understand the sources of competitive advantage under normal conditions, i.e., in the absence of the pandemic. Product demand is central to the development of capabilities and the resources of firms as it incentivises their engagement in the high-fixed-cost research and development activities required to produce life-saving products such as vaccines. Typically, in developing economies, relatively muted demand for prophylactic products (i.e., products for which consumer pays now for some uncertain benefits in future) due to lower disposable income and present bias serves as a disincentive for domestic firms as they fear they may not sell enough vaccines at a price sufficient to recover their costs. In contrast, large foreign multinationals (henceforth MNEs) originating from developed economies can still generate additional economic returns by selling their products in developing economies so long as they can recover the variable costs of their products. Therefore, ceteris paribus, greater demand for prophylactic products in developed economies relative to developing economies enable MNEs from developed economies to become dominant incumbents in prophylactic product markets in developing economies.
Outbreaks and impact
•However, sudden disease outbreaks can bring unanticipated changes in the business environment that could give rise to within-country spatial heterogeneity in business opportunities and challenges for MNEs and domestic firms. It is not straightforward to predict how these different kinds of firms will strategically respond to such changes. On the one hand, incumbent MNEs may be in a better position to leverage their global scale and reinforce their market dominance across regions within a nation.
•On the other hand, however, MNEs may face greater opportunity costs in serving the underdeveloped regions under a condition when there is a spike in global demand. Not only capacity constraints but also opportunity costs of different kinds of firms may limit the extent to which additional product supplies can be distributed across various regions in response to the sudden increase in pandemic-induced demand. Therefore, in a recent paper (Adbi, Chatterjee, Mishra, 2022; https://bit.ly/39rIhPF) published in Management Science, we carefully investigate how MNEs and domestic firms respond in different local markets to a global demand shock.
Vaccine market
•Our research analytically leverages the 2009-10 H1N1 influenza pandemic as a source of a sudden increase in global demand for flu vaccines. In the wake of this demand increase, we examine how subnational heterogeneity in health-care infrastructure and political alignment between the federal/ central and regional governments in India influence the market share and revenues of MNEs and domestic firms in the influenza vaccine market relative to non-influenza vaccine markets.
•We find strong evidence of a decline in the market share of MNEs in regions on an average. Intriguingly, however, the market share of MNEs fell much more in regions low in per capita public health expenditures and a lack of political alignment between federal-regional governments. It was not as if the revenues of MNEs decreased. The revenues of MNEs increased post pandemic, as one would expect should happen in the wake of a pandemic-induced sudden demand increase. The market entry of de alio domestic firms (that were selling other vaccines) was the core driver of the erosion of the market share of MNEs following the pandemic. Unlike domestic firms, foreign firms did not enter the influenza vaccine market or expand in underdeveloped regions.
The defining factors
•In sum, our findings demonstrate that direct costs and opportunity costs are two defining features that can lead to heterogeneity across regions within a nation in the choice sets of foreign and domestic firms. Our findings directly speak to the tensions, which policymakers across several developing economies face; that is, the complex challenge of attracting foreign firms to supply vaccines while also seeking self-sufficiency in domestic vaccine production. The findings of our research enable identifying what type of regions within a nation may require additional policy support to attract different kinds of firms to deliver life-saving products. To encourage the capability development of domestic firms in markets with positive externalities (such as vaccines), policymakers can award advance market commitments to reduce demand uncertainty for firms.
•We propose that making such awards contingent on distribution to underdeveloped regions could be a vital step toward incentivising managers of both foreign and domestic firms in considering the dual imperatives of innovation and inclusion.
•Our findings also bring useful insights for transnational organisations (e.g., the World Health Organization, the Gates Foundation, GAVI). Typically, transnational organisations use the country’s per capita income as the cut-off line to determine a country’s eligibility to receive vaccine donations. While this criterion is a less controversial heuristic, an underdeveloped region within a nation, made worse by the lack of health infrastructure and the lack of political alignment between federal and regional governments, may deserve additional attention during pandemics. Given the subnational heterogeneity within large developing economies, rather than classifying an entire nation as ineligible for vaccine donations, recognising how different subnational regions may fare in health infrastructure and political alignment may lead to a more equitable allocation of supplies for managing the challenges stemming from competitive dynamics in the wake of a pandemic.
📰 Demolition drives violate international law
The bulldozing of houses was to impose collective punishment on the alleged rioters
•The right to housing is not only a fundamental right recognised under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution, it is also a well-documented right under the international human rights law framework, which is binding on India.
•International law also prohibits arbitrary interference in an individual’s right to property. For instance, Article 12 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that “no one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation”.
•The above identified international human rights law has been judicially incorporated by the Supreme Court of India into the Indian legal system. Therefore, the bulldozing of houses of the alleged rioters amounts to forced eviction and arbitrary interference with an individual’s home which is a breach of national as well as international law.
•In the context of the Uttar Pradesh government bulldozing ‘illegal properties’ of protestors who took to the streets to condemn the comments made by erstwhile BJP spokespersons, this article dated April 20, 2022 by Prabhash Ranjan and Aman Kumar explains how arbitrary destruction and eviction of houses are against international laws.
•Communal clashes broke out during Ram Navami processions in several parts of the country including at Khargone in Madhya Pradesh. Subsequently, the Madhya Pradesh government bulldozed the houses of those who were allegedly involved in rioting. The State government claims that these demolitions are in response to illegal encroachments. However, the fact that these arbitrary demolitions are being carried out against the alleged rioters of one particular community and in the immediate aftermath of the riots shows that their purpose seems to be to impose collective punishment.
•The bulldozing machines— the new symbols of brute state power — are not just demolishing houses and shops but also bulldozing rule of law and our constitutional order. This idea of serving ‘justice’, quick and cold, through bulldozers emanated in Uttar Pradesh. In the wake of protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 the Uttar Pradesh government passed orders to recover damages from those who were allegedly involved in destroying public property. This process has been further institutionalised through the enactment of the Uttar Pradesh Recovery of Damages to Public and Private Property Act, 2020.
•Several commentators have already pointed out that the use of such brute state power violates various domestic legal provisions. Our purpose is to illustrate that the act of bulldozing houses without due process and legal sanction also amounts to a breach of India’s international law obligations.
Right to adequate housing
•The right to housing is not only a fundamental right recognised under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution, it is also a well-documented right under the international human rights law framework, which is binding on India. For instance, Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) states that “everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care…”.
•Likewise, Article 11.1 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) recognises “the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including adequate food, clothing and housing, and to the continuous improvement of living conditions”. Furthermore, under Article 11.1, countries are under an obligation to take “appropriate steps” to ensure the realisation of these rights such as the right to adequate housing.
•The rights recognised under ICESCR, according to Article 4, can be restricted by States only if the limitations are determined by law in a manner compatible with the nature of these rights and solely to promote society’s general welfare. However, any limitation imposed on the rights given in the Covenant such as the right to adequate housing cannot lead to the destruction of these rights. This is categorically recognised in Article 5 of ICESCR.
•Besides, international law also prohibits arbitrary interference in an individual’s right to property. For instance, Article 12 of the UDHR states that “no one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation”. Article 12 also stipulates that “everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks”. This same right is also provided under Article 17 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). Article 17 further provides that everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others and that no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property. Thus, arbitrary interference with an individual’s property is a gross violation of the ICCPR.
Forced evictions
•The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) commonly known as the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Office — whose mandate is to promote and protect human rights guaranteed under international law — has elaborated on the content of the right to adequate housing.
•According to the UN Human Rights Office, an integral element of the right to adequate housing is ‘protection against forced evictions’. Building on the right to adequate housing, given in Article 11.1 of ICESCR, the UN Human Rights Office defines ‘forced evictions’ as ‘permanent or temporary removal against the will of individuals, families and/or communities from the homes and/or land which they occupy, without the provision of, and access to, appropriate forms of legal or other protection’. The right to adequate housing also entails freedom from arbitrary interference with one’s home, privacy, and family.
•The bulldozing of the houses by the Madhya Pradesh government of the alleged rioters amounts to forced eviction and arbitrary interference with an individual’s home, thus a breach of Article 11.1 of the ICESCR. This action can be defended under international law only if it can be shown that the forced eviction is as per the law and in conformity with the provisions of the human rights covenants. Also, other requirements such as whether the state action was necessary and proportionate will have to be examined. It is unlikely that these forced evictions can be lawfully defended given the timing of the eviction.
•One wonders that if these demolitions were against illegal encroachments, then did the authorities get the eviction order on the day of the riots, or did they have an eviction order earlier, but decided to act only after the riots? Also, were the eviction orders limited to the Muslim locality?
Judicial incorporation
•Moreover, the international human rights law identified above has been judicially incorporated by the Supreme Court of India into the Indian legal system. The apex court in cases like Bachan Singh vs State of Punjab, Vishaka vs State of Rajasthan, and recently in the famous Puttaswamy vs Union of India has laid down the principle that the fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution must be read and interpreted in a manner which would enhance their conformity with international human rights law.
•As the custodian of India’s constitutional order, it is high time that the judiciary acted and imposed necessary checks on the unbridled exercise of power by the executive. Courts should use international law to counter the nationalist-populist discourse.
