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Front Page / NATIONAL(The Hindu)
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Allahabad High Court: triple talaq is ‘cruel’, ‘most demeaning’ to women
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Centre unveils discounts to fuel switch to digital mode
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A more muscular rice variety takes on wheat
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International (The Hindu)
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Editorial/OPINION(The Hindu)
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Economy (The Hindu)
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Indian Express
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Front Page / NATIONAL(The Hindu)
[1] Allahabad High Court: triple talaq is ‘cruel’, ‘most demeaning’ to women
Context– Allahabad High Court has held that triple talaq is “cruel” and raised a question whether the Muslim Personal law could be amended to alleviate the sufferings of Muslim women.
The court made the observations while dismissing the petition of Hina, a 23-year-old woman, and her husband who was 30 years her senior and had married her “after effecting triple talaq to his wife”
Court’s views
- Muslim law, as applied in India, has taken a course contrary to the spirit of what the Prophet or the Holy Quran laid down.
- The same misconception vitiates the law dealing with the wife’s right to divorce.
- Purpose of the law should be to bring the social change.
- As the Muslims forms a significant part of the population, and of them women are almost half of the population, they cannot be left to govern by an archaic law.
- Personal laws that perpetuate the gender inequality and injustice cannot be in the interest of society.
Court’s view on personal law
- Divorce is permissible in Islam only in case of extreme emergency.
- When all efforts for effecting a reconciliation have failed, the parties may proceed to a dissolution of marriage by Talaq or by Khola.
- The view that the Muslim husband enjoys an arbitrary, unilateral power to inflict instant divorce does not accord with Islamic injunctions.
- The whole Quran expressly forbids a man to seek pretexts for divorcing his wife, so long as she remains faithful and obedient to him.
- In the absence of serious reasons, no man can justify a divorce, either in the eye of religion or the law
- Women cannot remain at the mercy of the patriarchal set up held under the clutches of sundry clerics having their own interpretation of the holy Quran.
- Personal laws, of any community, cannot claim supremacy over the rights granted to the individuals by the Constitution.
[2] Centre unveils discounts to fuel switch to digital mode
Context – Finance Minister ArunJaitley on Thursday announced a raft of incentives to accelerate the switch from cash to digital payments.
In one month, the national average of digital payments among these has risen to 40 per cent from 20 per cent.
Announcements
- Announcement includes discounts for payments made digitally for:-
- Petrol pumps,
- Suburban railway services,
- Insurance premiums,
- And for use of RFID at toll plazas on national highways.
- Service tax, on digital transactions of up to Rs. 2,000, would also be waived.
- Digital payments for petrol and diesel at government-run petrol pumps will get a discount of 0.75 per cent.
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The cost of the discounts will be borne by each relevant organization.
[3] A more muscular rice variety takes on wheat
Context–Bengaluru researchers raise a high-protein strain that could help diabetics.
Invention
- A rice variety that packs more protein to match wheat has been released by Karnataka’s University of Agricultural Sciences – Bengaluru (UAS-B).
- The high-protein variety has been under development at UAS-B for nearly 10 years,
- The development got the funding of Rs. 92 lakh in funding from the Union Department of Biotechnology.
- Using conventional breeding, researchers raised the amount of lysine, an amino acid that helps synthesize proteins, by about 20 per cent
Benefits
- Suitable for those who are not comfortable with switching over to wheat for their protein requirement.
- Strain has 12 to13 per cent protein content, which is higher than the 6 to 7.5 per cent in normal rice.
- Wheat has about 14 per cent of protein.
- The higher protein leads to a decrease in starch, benefiting diabetics
- The rice protein is easier to digest compared to what comes from non-vegetarian sources.
- For the farmer, the new entrant is a lucrative option that can be grown like any other cereal, without extra costs.
International (The Hindu)
[1] India, U.S. talk defence partnership
Context: India and the U.S. on Thursday finalized the specifications for designating India a ‘Major Defense Partner’ of the U.S.
DTTI is tended to promote opportunities for co-production and co-development of weapon systems and platforms.
Importance of this partnership
- This status puts India on a par with the closest allies and partners of the U.S..
- This status is bestowed upon the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) countries and the U.S. treaty allies such as Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Japan and South Korea.
- DTTI will strengthen India’s ‘Make in India’ initiative.
Other initiatives
- In 2015 other agreement was also signed, i.e. Defense Framework Agreement.
- This agreement laid the foundation for the collaboration between the defense establishments and the logistics support agreement Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA).
Editorial/OPINION(The Hindu)
[2] Accounting for natural capital
Context – Recently, Prime Minister Narendra Modi made his environmental concerns clear when he asked people to use Ganesha and Durga idols made of clay instead of plaster of Paris.
His appeal is bound to stimulate our environmental consciousness and encourage the preservation of precious natural resources.
What is biodiversity?
Biodiversity means the variability among living organisms from all sources including terrestrial, marine and other aquatic ecosystems.
The diversity includes variability within species (genetic diversity) as well as between species (species diversity) and ecosystems (ecosystem diversity).
Importance of biodiversity:-
Natural benefits
- Water purification and supply,
- Waste assimilation and the cleaning of air and water,
- Regulation of pests and diseases, and
- Soil nutrient cycling and fertility
- Biodiversity helps mitigate unpredictable global changes and natural disasters.
Social benefits
- It is important for good health, food security, economic growth, livelihood security and moderation of climatic conditions.
- It acts as a safety net to indigenous peoples, poor and vulnerable groups, women and children.
- More than 70 per cent of the world’s poor live in rural areas and are directly dependent on the ecosystem/biodiversity goods and services for their survival.
PresentState of India
India, one of the 17 mega-diverse countries, is rich in biodiversity.
India exhibits a rich variety of ecosystems such as forests, grasslands, deserts, wetlands, mangroves and coral reefs.
8 per cent of recorded species includes over 45,000 species of plants and 91,000 species of animals.
India’s tribal population is also dependent on forests and natural resources to a significant extent.
Biodiversity and development
With 18% of global population and only 2.4 per cent of land and 4.2 per cent of water resources, india needs to attain industrial development
Challenges
Natural resources such as water, forests, fisheries and marine resources are being overexploited.
A recent study shows that India will become water scarce by 2025.
Emissions from industry and the transport sectors are at a high level.
There is also indiscriminate discharge of solid wastes, industrial effluents and domestic sewage.
Steps taken
Measures such as the enforcement of legal decisions, ‘polluters pay principles’
Incorporation of protected areas
What is needed?
Mainstreaming
- More responsible approach towards biodiversity management, by mainstreaming, is needed.
- Mainstreaming means:-
- Integrating/including actions related to conservation
- Promoting the sustainable use of biodiversity in strategies relating to production sectors such as agriculture, fisheries, forestry, tourism, and mining.
- Including biodiversity considerations in poverty reduction
- National sustainable development plans
- Mainstreaming helps to reduce the negative impacts on biodiversity.
Other measures
- Small-scale farming or aquaculture activities undertaken in a sustainable manner
- Community-based joint forest management
- Promotion of traditional multi-species and multi-variety agricultural practices
- Securing access to medicinal resources for local use,
- Strengthening traditional and cultural practices,
- And governing the use of wild resources are examples.
- Further, the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising out of the use of biological resources
Way ahead
Biodiversity integration into developmental sectors is a prerequisite.
Each sector should come up with appropriate mechanisms for conservation and sustainable biodiversity use.
The active involvement of Central/State Ministries and Departments is needed.
Research institutions need to chip in and come up with appropriate management strategies, with budget options.
Public and private entrepreneurs and entities as well as the public need to come forward to mainstream biodiversity.
Economy (The Hindu)
[1] Labour Ministry kept in the dark over made-ups sector labour reform package
Context – Labor Ministry kept in the dark over made-ups sector labor reform package.
Issues
Union cabinet has recently taken a decision to make employee’s contribution to Employees Provident Fund (EPF) optional.
But later it was revealed that Union labor ministry was not consulted on that matter.
What’s the proposal?
- Recently center had proposed making EPF optional for textile and apparels workers earning less than Rs.15,000 a month as a part of a special package for the garments sector.
- Now the proposal has been extended to the made-ups manufacturing sector.
Benefits of the proposal
- Made-up products like towels and bedsheets form the second-largest employer in the textiles sector following apparel.
- Decision will boost employment
- And it will also help in exports promotion.
Need amendments
- At present, EPF contribution is mandatory in all factories employing 20 or more workers.
- Both employer and employee compulsorily contribute 12 per cent each of the latter’s income towards EPF.
- The changes will require amendments to the Employees’ Provident Funds and Miscellaneous Provisions Act of 1952.
Criticisms
- The move is against the much-talked about objective of moving towards a ‘pensionable society’.
- This is an exemption given to one sector to the exclusion of others.
- It defeats the very EPF principle of providing future protection.
Indian Express
[1] Crossing the chasm
Public confidence in the capabilities of RBI is declining.
Most are unconvinced that the RBI board’s recommendation to the government to demonetize was based on independent and technically sound analysis.
As a way out of the shortage of cash, government and the RBI have appealed to the public to adopt electronic payments.
Challenges
- Half the Indian population is unbanked.
- This is an important obstacle in the adoption of electronic payments.
- Most of India lacks bank accounts
- Lack of banking system means banks themselves were not inclined to open rural branches.
- Pushing public sector banks to open rural braches have also been not successful.
- New commercial banks license has been rare.
- Foreign banks are not allowed to open more than 20 branches a year.
Adoption of electronic payment
Success of electronic payment system will depend upon:-
- Ease of payments and
- The charges to be paid for these services
But dilemma here is that payment service providers should be allowed to charge for their services soon otherwise their business will turn unviable.
It has been reported that Visa, Mastercard and RuPay will altogether lose Rs 1,000 crore in November-December.
Inter-operator payments
As of now, payments are not inter-operable. RBI prevents a Paytm customer from paying a MobiKwik customer.
It is unlike the TRAI that pushes telecom companies to accept calls that originate from other telecom providers.
All electronic payments and E-wallets should be inter-operable.
Problems of creating monopoly
Monopoly is likely to emerge if the regulator does not step in.
The problems it could create are:-
- Chances of charging higher charges by the operators
- It would reduce the incentive of the monopolist to constantly innovate as he will not be facing competition.
- It will create systemic risk as it will make the system vulnerable to the health and electronic infrastructure of one provider.
- If the provider fails, the whole system can crash and again the economy can come to a standstill.
What should be done?
- Change in the policy framework from targets to one that works through incentives.
- It has to be about incentives of banks, of payment service providers, of the payments regulator etc.
- The policy framework must be based on competition, interconnection and consumer protection.
[1] A reform at risk
Context – April 1, 2017 is the target date to implement the Goods and Services Tax regime.
The GST Council he heads meets again on December 11-12 to try to reach a consensus on three pieces of legislation that need to be cleared by Parliament in this session for a rollout in April.
Problem
- In its previous three meetings, the Council failed to resolve an impasse between the States and the Centre on:-
- Who would have administrative control over taxpayers in the new tax regime.
- The Finance Ministry has proposed a dual control model where both vertically split the taxpayer base for administrative purposes.
- But States including West Bengal, Kerala and Uttar Pradesh are keen to retain control over all goods and services providers with an annual turnover of less than Rs.1.5 crore.
What should be done?
Centre may have to be more generous in responding to the demands pf the states.
It could also resort to a vote for the first time in the Council instead of seeking to forge unanimous decisions.
Challenge
Although government may pass the 3 GST bills as money bills, but implementing such a big-ticket tax reform without bringing all States on board would inspire less confidence.
It would also be a headache for industry as well as the taxman.
Conclusion
Just as States should compete for investment, businesses should be allowed to compete freely. Suggesting that the profit motive itself is evil would undo the fundamental intent of the GST, which is to remove the space for discretion and rent-seeking.
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