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A Constitution Bench held that a Supreme Court judgment of 2014 which declared invalid a legal provision mandating the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to take prior permission before investigating corruption cases against senior government officials has a retrospective effect.
A five-judge Bench headed by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul said the provision in question, Section 6A of the Delhi Special Police Establishment (DSPE) Act, the statute that governs the CBI, was void from the very day of its insertion on September 11, 2003.
The 106-page judgment held that Section 6A violated fundamental rights, and “once a law is declared to be unconstitutional, being violative of Part-III (fundamental rights) of the Constitution, then it would be held to be void ab initio, still born, unenforceable and non est”.
This means that senior government officials involved in corruption cases even before the date of the Supreme Court judgment invalidating the need for prior sanction would no longer be able to avail the protection of prior approval.
Launch of West Asia economic corridor is a historic step: PM (Page no. 1)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
Two days after the launch of the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday described Saudi Arabia as “one of the most important strategic partners of India”.
The exchange between the two sides took place during the state visit of Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman of Saudi Arabia when they agreed to set up a joint task force to fast-track the West Coast refinery project.
As two of the world’s fastest growing countries, our partnership is important for the stability of the entire region. Yesterday, we took the historic step to connect India, West Asia, and Europe through an economic corridor.
Apart from connecting the two countries, the corridor will help in the increase of economic growth, energy sector and digitisation, conveying India’s gratitude for the Kingdom’s initiatives to ensure welfare of the resident Indian expats.
States
IISc develops novel approach to detect, kill cancer cells (Page no. 5)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
Indian Institute of Science (IISc) scientists have developed a new approach to potentially detect and kill cancer cells, especially those which form a solid tumour mass.
The scientists have created hybrid nanoparticles made of gold and copper sulphide, which can kill cancer cells using heat, and enable their detection using sound waves.
Early detection and treatment are key in the battle against cancer. Copper sulphide nanoparticles have previously received attention for their application in cancer diagnosis, while gold nanoparticles, which can be chemically modified to target cancer cells, have shown anticancer effects. In the current study, the IISc team decided to combine these two into hybrid nanoparticles.
Jaya Prakash, assistant professor at the Department of Instrumentation and Applied Physics (IAP), IISc, said that these particles have photothermal, oxidative stress, and photoacoustic properties.
Editorial
Ridding India of food insecurity (Page no. 6)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
India may be the fastest growing large economy of the world, but it is also facing accelerating food-price inflation. The rise in the price of food first accelerated sharply in 2019, and has climbed in most years thereafter.
In July this year, annual inflation exceeded 11%, the highest in a decade. An implication of continuing high food-price inflation is that a section of the population could be facing hardship in consuming food of adequate nutritional value.
We now have some evidence to this effect.
The ‘State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World’ of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates the proportion of the population across countries unable to afford a healthy diet (reported in this newspaper on August 31, 2023, under a datapoint).
The figure for India in 2021 is devastating to note — an estimated 74% of the population cannot afford a healthy diet. Given a population of 1,400 million, this makes for approximately one billion Indians.
A shrinking ability of households to finance their food requirement is evident also in studies undertaken in India itself.
Opinion
Why simultaneous elections would militate against federalism (Page no. 7)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Union government has constituted a committee headed by former President Ramnath Kovind to explore the possibility of conducting simultaneous elections to the Lok Sabha, the Legislative Assemblies, municipalities, and panchayats.
The idea of simultaneous elections has been discussed in the last five years or so, and is part of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s manifesto.
The next Lok Sabha election is due to be held before June 16, 2024. If the simultaneous elections idea bears fruit and is ratified and implemented, this would curtail the terms of all Legislative Assemblies barring those of four States — Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Odisha, and Sikkim.
The election cycles for these four States have coalesced with elections to the Lok Sabha over time. If simultaneous elections are held in 2029, it would require a similar exercise of curtailment or extension of Assembly terms.
Text & Context
Gresham’s law: what happens when governments fix currency exchange rates (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
Gresham’s law refers to the dictum that “bad money drives out good.” Gresham’s law comes into play when the exchange rate between two moneys or currencies is fixed by the government at a certain ratio that is different from the market exchange rate.
Such price fixing causes the undervalued currency — that is, the currency whose price is fixed at a level below the market rate — to go out of circulation.
The overvalued currency, on the other hand, remains in circulation but it does not find enough buyers.
It should be noted that the market exchange rate is essentially an equilibrium price at which the supply of a currency is equal to the demand for the currency.
Also, the supply of a currency in the market rises as its price rises and falls as its price falls; while, on the other hand, the demand for a currency falls as its price rises and rises as its price falls.
So, when the price of a currency is fixed by the government at a level below the market exchange rate, the currency’s supply drops while demand for the currency rises. Thus a price cap can lead to a currency shortage with demand for the currency outpacing supply.
News
Several hill villages in Manipur added to valley districts: panel (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 2, Governance)
A report by the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes (NCST) has observed that several hill villages in Manipur were wrongly included in the valley districts during the Census 2011 exercise.
It said that in the Booklet of Census of India 2011 and Administrative Atlas, “Manipur has wrongly included several hill villages under valley districts” and that the issue had been flagged to the State government by the office of the Registrar General of India in 2017.
Following this, the Revenue Department of Manipur, in October 2022, asked the deputy commissioners of the districts concerned to rectify the list of hill villages (around 400) overlapping between the districts of Kakching, Tengnoupal, Kangpokpi, Imphal West, and Bishnupur.
The NCST’s report was prepared on a State review of Manipur in December 2022.
During the review, the NCST team met with officials of the Manipur government and also took representations from the All Tribal Students Union Manipur and the Joint Coordination Committee on Tribal Rights in Imphal.
The report had also noted that the withdrawal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), 1958 from the hill areas of Manipur needs to be reviewed taking into account the ground reality of the hill areas as they have become peaceful, as the AFSPA has been withdrawn from 15 police stations of valley districts in the State.
Kashmir Valley’s growers are anxious as import duty is relaxed on American apples (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
The Union government’s decision to relax 20% customs duty on apples imported from the U.S. at the recently concluded G-20 summit left orchardists in the Kashmir Valley jittery.
The announcement has come in the wake of a dip in apple prices this year. Kashmir’s apple industry is battling a number of issues.
Farmers in Kashmir have always sought 100% duty on apple imports to ensure better returns for locals. We will keep demanding an increase in import duties.
Apple growers are in distress. They faced huge losses as their input cost increased and the crop was sold at cheap rates.
Two-thirds of the crop, such as C-grade [fruit], is unworthy of the market and could be diverted for juices. However, the J&K Horticulture Producing and Marketing Corporation in Sopore remains defunct.
Declaration reaffirms G-20 is body for economic issues, ‘not geopolitics’, says China (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
China, in its first official reaction to the G-20 Summit, said it welcomed the New Delhi Declaration which had “reaffirmed” that the G-20 was a forum for “economic cooperation” and “not a platform to resolve geopolitical and security issues.”
Beijing said it also “welcomed” the ambitious new India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) plan unveiled on Saturday — announced by India, the U.S., Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, France, Germany, Italy and the European Union, seen as a counter to China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) — but said it should not become a “geopolitical tool”.
The IMEC comprises an Eastern Corridor connecting India to the Gulf region and a Northern Corridor connecting the Gulf to Europe, and will include a railway and ship-rail transit network and road transport routes.
China welcomes all initiatives that truly help developing countries build infrastructure and sincere efforts to promote connectivity and common development.
At the same time, we advocate that various connectivity initiatives should be open, inclusive, and form synergy, and should not become geopolitical tools.
‘Brazil will focus on inequality during G-20 presidency’ (Page no. 11)
(GS Paper 2, International Organisation)
Brazil President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said that addressing inequality in the world will be at the centre of Brazil’s G-20 presidency.
He was “symbolically” handed the ceremonial gavel by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday. Brazil will formally take over the Presidency in November, after Mr. Modi holds a virtual summit of G-20 leaders to follow up on decisions taken at the Delhi Summit.
Mr. Lula said that among the priorities for his government are the energy transition, especially the development of ethanol-based fuel that Brazil has championed, the reform of multilateral banks and the expansion of the UN Security Council.
As during the Indian Presidency, Mr. Lula said, Brazil will take G-20 meetings to “many Brazilian cities”, “democratise” the G-20 and make it popular among civil society.
“It is a lot of responsibility for Brazil to host the G-20 Summit next year. We will put the inequality issue as the core issue for the next G-20 process, inequalities of gender, race, education.
We have to build an understanding that the world needs more balance in terms of the wealth distribution that is being produced.
After a year’s delay, CSIR’s Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar awards for 2022 announced (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Technology)
After nearly a year’s delay, the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) has publicised the list of winners of the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar (SSB) awards for 2022, considered among the prestigious prizes for science in India. The prizes were not announced last year, without any official reason being ascribed.
Last year, the Union Home Ministry constituted a committee to review all the national awards administered by various Ministries related to science and medicine and whittled down some of them.
The Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar awards were, however, retained. This year’s awardees constitute 12 scientists below the age of 45. They are Ashwani Kumar, CSIR-Institute of Microbial Technology; Maddika Subba Reddy, Centre for DNA Fingerprinting Diagnostics, Hyderabad (Biological Sciences); Akkattu Biju, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru; Debabrata Maiti, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay (Chemical Sciences); Vimal Mishra, Indian Institute of Technology, Gandhinagar (Earth and Atmospheric Sciences); Dipti Ranjan Sahoo, Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi; Rajnish Kumar, Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (Engineering Sciences); Apoorva Khare, Indian Institute of Science; Neeraj Kayal, Microsoft Research Lab India (Mathematical Science); Dipyaman Ganguly, Indian Institute of Chemical Biology, Kolkata (Medical Sciences); Anindya Das, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru; and Basudeb Dasgupta, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (Physical Sciences).
World
U.S., Vietnam warn against ‘threat’ in South China Sea (Page no. 13)
(GS Paper 2, International Relation)
The United States and Vietnam warned against the “threat or use of force” in the disputed South China Sea, days after the latest clash involving Chinese vessels.
U.S. President Joe Biden and Vietnam’s Communist Party chief Nguyen Phu Trong said the competing claims on the strategic waterway must be settled under international norms.
Beijing claims almost the entire sea, through which trillions of dollars in trade passes annually, and has ignored an international court ruling that its assertion has no legal basis.
The leaders underscored their unwavering support for the peaceful resolution of disputes in accordance with international law, without the threat or use of force.
Dystopian future already here, UN official says of climate change (Page no. 13)
(GS Paper 3, Environment)
Climate change is sparking human rights emergencies in numerous countries, the UN rights chief said on Monday, stressing the need to fight the impunity of those who “plunder our environment”.
Speaking before the United Nations Human Rights Council, Volker Turk pointed to recent examples of the “environmental horror that is our global planetary crisis”.
He described visiting Basra, Iraq, where date palms once lined canals, but now “drought, searing heat, extreme pollution and fast-depleting supplies of fresh water are creating barren landscapes of rubble and dust”.
This spiralling damage is a human rights emergency for Iraq, and many other countries,” he said in his address opening the 54th council session in Geneva.
“We do not need more warnings. The dystopian future is already here. We need urgent action now.”
Business
India to explore direct listing of businesses on LSE: Hunt (Page no. 14)
(GS Paper 3, Economy)
India has offered to explore direct listing of its businesses on the London Stock Exchange (LSE), while the pension and insurance industry in Britain is keen to ramp investments into India, U.K. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt said.
Speaking after the 12th India-U.K. Economic and Financial Dialogue steered by him and Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Mr. Hunt said he was “particularly pleased with the first confirmation by India that it will explore the LSE as an international destination for the direct listing of Indian companies.
Ms. Sitharaman signalled that India’s first priority was to commence listing of firms at the International Financial Services Centre (IFSC), GIFT City.
Once that is done, we may look at moving further and that’s what the Chancellor was saying, ‘Soon after that, for Indian businesses to consider listing in London.
The U.K. and India have agreed to deepen their partnership in developing GIFT City, with the joint statement noting that U.K.’s expertise will be tapped to help further its status as a reinsurance hub, and emphasising the scope to increase reinsurance trade between the two markets.