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Pairs of Olive Ridley sea turtles have begun emerging on the sea waters off Gahirmatha along the Odisha coast, marking the commencement of the annual mass nesting of these endangered marine species.
Gahirmatha in Kendrapara district, 150 km from the State capital Bhubaneswar, is the world’s largest rookery for Olive Ridley sea turtles.
States
ISRO to attempt 200th successful launch of RH-200 sounding rocket in a row (Page no. 5)
(GS Paper 3, Science and Tech)
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will attempt the 200th consecutively successful launch of the Rohini RH-200 sounding rocket from Thumba.
Former President Ram Nath Kovind will be present at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC) - ISRO’s lead unit on launch vehicles - to witness the launch.
Mr. Kovind will address the VSSC community and release a coffee-table book on the RH-200 rocket. ISRO chairman S. Somanath and VSSC director S. Unnikrishnan Nair will be present.
RH-200 is a solid motor-powered, expendable rocket capable of climbing up to a height of 70 km bearing payloads designed to study the upper atmosphere.
An RH-200 had lifted off successfully from Thumba for the 199th time in a row during the World Space Week celebrations in October this year.
Editorial
The dissenting judgment versus the razing of equality (Page no. 6)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
It is after many years that we have a judgment which elaborates on the meaning of equality under India’s Constitution in its true and expansive spirit.
Here I am not referring to the majority judgment in the Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) case, but the minority opinion of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) U.U. Lalit (now former CJI) and Justice Ravindra Bhat.
It may be a dissenting judgment but it gives us strength to fight for the promise of equality which forms the core of the Constitution.
The 103rd Amendment inserting Articles 15 (6) and 16(6) to the Constitution, permits 10% reservation in educational institutions and public employment for those from the EWS.
This reservation explicitly excludes persons from the Scheduled Castes (SC), Scheduled Tribes (ST) and the Other Backward Classes (OBC) categories.
The majority judgment of Justices Dinesh Maheshwari, Bela M. Trivedi and J.B. Pardiwala upheld the constitutionality of the amendment and held that such exclusion was justified because the SC, ST and OBC categories had reservations under Articles 15(4), 15(5) and 16(4).
They held that a ‘mere violation of the rule of equality does not violate the basic structure of the Constitution unless the violation is shocking, an unconscionable or unscrupulous travesty of the quintessence of equal justice’ and that ‘if any constitutional amendment moderately abridges or alters the equality principles, it cannot be said to be a violation of the basic structure’.
Opinion
The geoheritage value of Ram Setu (Page no. 7)
(GS Paper 1, Art and Culture)
On November 10, the Supreme Court gave the Centre four weeks’ time to file a response clarifying its stand on a plea by former Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy seeking national heritage status for the ‘Ram Setu’.
While the story of the controversial Sethusamudram Ship Channel Project (SSCP) can be traced back to the British, who proposed creating a channel to link the Palk Strait with the Gulf of Mannar, it was only in 2005 that the project was inaugurated.
Separating the shallow sea consisting of the Gulf of Mannar in the south and Palk Bay in the north is a somewhat linear coral ridge called Adam’s Bridge or Ram Setu.
This runs between Rameswaram in Tamil Nadu and Thalaimannar in Sri Lanka. The SSCP, if completed, is expected to considerably reduce the navigation time between the east and west coasts of India.
Though the CSIR-National Environmental Engineering Research Institute ruled out any serious environmental risk and certified the feasibility of the project, concerns have been raised on the stability of the proposed channel and its environmental impact. Computer models suggest that the central, eastern and north-eastern parts of the Palk Bay may be impacted by waves of higher energy. This means that these areas also receive more sediment, rendering them more turbid.
The models also indicate that waves enter the Bay from its north and south, corresponding to how the channel is aligned.
The area is also vulnerable to cyclonic storms. A cyclone in 1964 was so powerful that it wiped out the town of Dhanushkodi. Such storms can cause the local sedimentary dynamics to go haywire.
Finding safe places for dumping dredged material without harming terrestrial or marine ecosystems is therefore a big challenge. Emissions from ships traversing the narrow channel will pollute the air and water.
And if a rogue ship carrying oil or coal is grounded or strays from its course within the canal, it could cause an ecological disaster. While environmental groups have been protesting against the project for the huge environmental cost it would entail, religious groups have been opposing it as they believe that the structure, which is mentioned in the Ramayana, is of religious significance.
In 2003, space-based investigations, using satellite remote sensing imagery, by researchers at the Space Applications Centre in Ahmedabad concluded that Ram Setu is not man-made, “but comprises 103 small patch reefs lying in a linear pattern with reef crest, sand cays and intermittent deep channels”.
Explainer
How different is the new data protection bill (Page no. 8)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The latest draft of the data protection law — the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill, 2022 (DPDP Bill, 2022) — has now been made open for public comments.
This article deals with various themes within the Bill including data localisation requirements, whether children are considered as data principals, the regulatory framework of the Bill and the penalties it imposes.
The DPDP Bill, 2022 misses out on two main rights for data principals. The first is the right of data portability. The right to data portability allowed the data principal to receive in a structured format all the personal data they had provided to the data fiduciary and data that the data fiduciary generated on the data principal while processing for provisioning of its services.
This empowered data principals by allowing them to choose between different platforms and enhanced competition between data fiduciaries to increase consumer welfare.
For example, if the data principal was not satisfied with the social media platform they were currently using, they could request for porting of their data to another social media platform and avail of its services without having to provide all their personal data again. The DPDP Bill, 2022 does not provide for this right.
The second right foregone is the right to be forgotten. While not a right per se, the right to be forgotten allows the data principal to ask the data fiduciary to stop the continuing disclosure of their personal data.
This has to be balanced with the right to freedom of speech and expression and the right to information for all other individuals. The DPDP Bill, 2022 subsumes this right under the right to erasure.
This conflation between the general right to erasure with the right to be forgotten which is specific to disclosure of personal data compromises on the right to freedom of speech and expression of other individuals.
With regard to the personal data processing of children, the DPDP Bill, 2022 carries forward the approach of its previous iterations.
A major issue that remains is that the age of digital consent, which is the age at which an individual can consent to their personal data being processed, continues to be 18.
Text & Context
Need to have full disclosure on electoral bonds and Political funding (Page no. 9)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
According to an RTI reply, electoral bonds worth ₹10,246 crore have been sold by the State Bank of India (SBI) since the instrument was launched in March 2018. In this article dated June 16, 2021, Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu elaborates how electoral bonds have further obscured political party funding.
In 2014, the Delhi High Court held that both the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were guilty of illegally accepting donations from two companies registered in India but whose controlling shareholder was Vedanta, a foreign company.
The court held that this was in contravention of the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act (FCRA), 1976, as the donations accrued from “foreign sources” within the meaning of law.
Following this indictment, the two parties came together in the last memorable bipartisan move. In 2016 and 2018, the government amended the FCRA through the annual Finance Bills, to retrospectively legalise the violations.
The amendments and subsequent changes brought in by the current government enabled new and regressive pathways that afford full anonymity to corporate and foreign political donors.
While recently hearing a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) by the Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR), the Supreme Court downplayed the concerns of the corrupting influence of anonymous corporate and foreign money. It offered us voters the suggestion of “match the following”.
Earlier, only profit-making domestic companies could contribute to political parties; now loss-making companies can too.
Earlier, foreign companies or companies where the controlling stake was held by a foreign company couldn’t contribute; now they can. India’s political parties could theoretically be fully funded by a foreign company operating in India or by a foreign entity through a shell company.
In 2017, the then Finance Minister said anonymous cash donations to political parties would be reduced from ₹20,000 to ₹2,000 to ensure greater transparency in political funding.
News
Army to procure ballistic shields and body-worn cameras (Page no. 10)
(GS Paper 3, Defence)
The Army issued two Request For Proposals (RFP) for procurement of 7,000 body-worn camera systems and 1,612 ballistic shields to be procured under Emergency Procurement (EP) through the fast-track procurement (FTP) route. The last date for bid submission for both the RFPs is December 20, 2022.
“The body cameras are for both the military police as well as Rashtriya Rifles engaged in counter-terrorist operations in Kashmir valley. The ballistic shields are meant for counter-terrorism operations.
The ballistic shields would be very helpful in preventing casualties in room interventions during anti-terror operations.Emergency financial powers were granted to the armed forces by the Defence Ministry in the past on three occasions, post the Uri surgical strikes in 2016, the Balakot air strike in 2019 and the 2020 standoff with China in eastern Ladakh.
Under the FTP route, the forces can procure weapons systems upto ₹300 crores on an “urgent basis without any further clearances to cut short the procurement cycle.”
Three tranches of EPs were executed under which 68 contracts worth ₹6,000 crores were placed and the fourth EP for indigenous equipment is underway, Army chief General Manoj Pande had said at DefExpo-2022.
The ballistic shields should have a minimum indigenous content of 50% and the manufacturer should provide a 60 months warranty for the ballistic shield and 24 months for the harness, the RFP said.
The shield should have a service life of five years.
The shield should be of ambidextrous design with height not less than 860 mm and width not less than 520 mm. The weight should not be more than 20 kg plus 5%, including ballistic view port and accessories attached to the shield.
It should be provided with support harness to enable hands-free carriage of ballistic shield while ensuring unhindered usage of personal weapon and balanced weight distribution once fully worn.
Union Health Ministry launches India’s first suicide prevention policy (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare announced a National Suicide Prevention Strategy, the first of its kind in the country, with time-bound action plans and multi-sectoral collaborations to achieve reduction in suicide mortality by 10% by 2030.
The strategy broadly seeks to establish effective surveillance mechanisms for suicide within the next three years, establish psychiatric outpatient departments that will provide suicide prevention services through the District Mental Health Programme in all districts within the next five years, and to integrate a mental well-being curriculum in all educational institutions within the next eight years. It envisages developing guidelines for responsible media reporting of suicides, and restricting access to means of suicide.
The stress is on developing community resilience and societal support for suicide prevention. While the strategy is in line with the WHO’s South East-Asia Region Strategy for suicide prevention, it says it will remain true to India’s cultural and social milieu.
In a note, Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya said: “Further efforts are now required to prevent suicides as a public health priority.
Suicides impact all sections of the society and thus require concerted and collaborative efforts from individuals and the community at large.”
In India, more than one lakh lives are lost every year to suicide, and it is the top killer in the 15-29 years category. In the past three years, the suicide rate has increased from 10.2 to 11.3 per 1,00,000 population, the document records.
The most common reasons for suicide include family problems and illnesses, which account for 34% and 18% of all suicide-related deaths.
Centre sets ‘standard’ for e-commerce reviews (Page no. 12)
(GS Paper 2, Polity and Governance)
The Centre is bringing out a standard for publishing product reviews for e-commerce platforms from November 25. To start with voluntary, the standard could become mandatory after observing compliance to the standards by such platforms. The framework for the standard was prepared by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS).
Talking to reporters here on Monday, Secretary of the Department of Consumer Affairs, Rohit Kumar Singh, said the framework was meant to safeguard and protect consumer interest from fake and deceptive reviews on e-commerce platforms.
If made mandatory, the violation of the standard, titled Indian Standard (IS) 19000:2022 ‘Online Consumer Reviews — Principles and Requirements for their Collection, Moderation and Publication’, can invite punishment for unfair trade practice or violation of consumer rights. Once made mandatory, a consumer may submit grievances to the National Consumer Helpline, Consumer Commissions, or the CCPA, against misleading reviews. “The standards will be applicable to every online platform which publishes consumer reviews.
The guiding principles of the standard are integrity, accuracy, privacy, security, transparency, accessibility and responsiveness, he said.
The standard prescribes specific responsibilities for the review author and the review administrator. For the review author, these include confirming acceptance of terms and conditions, providing contact information, and for review administrator, these include safeguarding personal information and training of staff.