Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday said if India had followed the path shown by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, then it would have reached new heights and asserted that Rajpath, a symbol of “slavery” during the British Raj has now been consigned to history.
Speaking after unveiling a 28-feet statue of Netaji and inaugurating Kartavya Path, the stretch of road from Rashtrapati Bhavan to India Gate earlier known as Rajpath, Modi said the renaming has given the country a new energy and inspiration.
He said that Kingsway or Rajpath, a symbol of slavery, has now been consigned to history and has been erased forever.
“If India had followed path shown by Subhas Chandra Bose, then country would have reached a new high; sadly he was forgotten,” he said.
Netaji’s statue at India Gate will now inspire and guide us, Modi said.
The revamped stretch is part of the Modi government’s ambitious Central Vista redevelopment project.
“We took many decisions in the last eight years which have imprints of Netaji’s ideals and dreams,” said Modi.
He also said that the changes undertaken by the government are not just limited to symbols but are now part of policies.
He thanked workers involved in the development of Kartavya Path and said that they not only built it but also showed others way of ‘kartavya’ (duty).
Supreme Court finalises three cardinal issues to examine whether EWS quota violates Basic Structure
A Constitution Bench led by Chief Justice of India U.U. Lalit on Thursday finalised three cardinal issues for examining whether the 103rd Constitutional Amendment, which provides 10% quota to economically weaker sections (EWS) of the society in government jobs and educational institutions, violates the Basic Structure of the Constitution.
The three issues include whether the amendment breaches the Basic Structure by permitting the State to make special provisions, including reservation, based on economic criteria; Whether the amendment violates the Basic Structure by allowing the State to make special provisions in relation to admissions to private unaided institutions;
and if the Basic Structure is trampled upon by the constitutional amendment by excluding SEBCs/OBCs/SCs/STs from the scope of the EWS quota.
The five-judge Bench, also comprising Justices S. Ravindra Bhat, Dinesh Maheshwari, S.B. Pardiwala and Bela Trivedi, said it would start hearing the arguments from September 13.
The three issues for the court's examination were forwarded by Attorney General of India K.K. Venugopal.
Chief Justice Lalit said the three questions of law would form the foundation of the court's examination and lawyers could expand on them while arguing. Legal scholar and advocate, Dr. G. Mohan Gopal, compared the case to a watershed moment similar to the ADM Jabalpur (habeas corpus) case.
“We are crossing a Rubicon and it is the ADM Jabalpur of social justice as it reverses the theory that one is privileged by being born in upper class and that being born in the lower classes is a disability,” Dr. Gopal submitted.
Senior advocate P. Wilson pointed out that the court ought to examine whether the EWS quota was in violation of the rule of equality and non-discrimination and if the move to grant reservation to forward castes (EWS or otherwise) was simply impermissible.
Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, who had prepared the draft issues for the court which were circulated among the lawyers in the previous hearing, said nearly 55 issues were suggested by various parties, but an effort was made to trim the questions of law for consideration.
Attorney General Venugopal said the question of creamy layer does not come in the EWS quota as it was meant to give quota benefits to the poorest of the poor. The CJI, in the court's order, said the issues suggested by the Attorney General encapsulated the matter under consideration.
“We shall go ahead with the hearing apropos the first three issues suggested by the Attorney General,” the Bench said.
The challenge to the 103rd Constitutional Amendment was referred to a five-judge Bench in August 2020. The three-judge Bench, which had referred the case to the larger Bench, had refused to stay the implementation of the amendment.
Economic reservation was introduced in the Constitution by amending Articles 15 and 16 and adding clauses empowering the State governments to provide reservation on the basis of economic backwardness.
“It is the case of the petitioners that the very amendment runs contrary to the Constitutional scheme and no segment of available seats/posts can be reserved, only on the basis of economic criterion. As such, we are of the view that such questions do constitute substantial questions of law to be considered by a Bench of five judges,” the three-judge Bench had concluded.
The Centre had argued that it was every State’s prerogative to provide 10% economic reservation in State government jobs and admissions in State-run educational institutions.
“Whether or not to provide reservation to the economically weaker section (EWS) of the society for appointment in State government jobs and for admission to State government educational institutions, as per provisions of the newly inserted Articles 15(6) and 16(6) of the Constitution is to be decided by the State government concerned,” a seven-page affidavit of the Union had said.
India ranks 132 out of 191 in UNDP’s human development index
India ranked 132 out of 191 countries in the 2021 human development index, according to a report released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
India’s HDI value of 0.633 places the country in the medium human development category, lower than its value of 0.645 in the 2020 report. India ranked 131 among 189 countries in the 2020 human development index.
“Like global trends, in India’s case, the drop in HDI from 0.645 in 2019 to 0.633 in 2021 can be attributed to falling life expectancy -- 69.7 to 67.2 years. India’s expected years of schooling stand at 11.9 years, and the mean years of schooling are at 6.7 years,” the report said.
Human Development — a measure of a nation’s health, education, and average income — has declined for two years in a row, 2020 and 2021, reversing five years of progress, the report said.
This is in line with the global decline, indicating that human development across the world has stalled for the first time in 32 years, the report said.
The report said a large contributor to the Human Development Index’s recent decline is a global drop in life expectancy, down from 72.8 years in 2019 to 71.4 years in 2021.
The latest Human Development Report — Uncertain Times, Unsettled Lives: Shaping our Future in a Transforming World — launched by UNDP argues that layers of uncertainty are stacking up and interacting to unsettle life in unprecedented ways.
“The world is scrambling to respond to back-to-back crises. We have seen with the cost of living and energy crises that, while it is tempting to focus on quick fixes like subsidizing fossil fuels, immediate relief tactics are delaying the long-term systemic changes we must make,” said Achim Steiner, administrator, UNDP.
“We are collectively paralyzed in making these changes. In a world defined by uncertainty, we need a renewed sense of global solidarity to tackle our interconnected, common challenges,” Steiner said. These intersecting crises have impacted India’s development trajectory just as they have in much of the world.
The HDI measures progress on three key dimensions of human development — a long and healthy life, access to education, and a decent standard of living. It is calculated using four indicators — life expectancy at birth, mean years of schooling, expected years of schooling, and the Gross National Income (GNI) per capita.
South Asian economies like Bangladesh and Bhutan bucked the trend and registered an improvement, the report pointed out. The report also suggested that stress, sadness, anger, and worry have been increasing over the last decade, now reaching record levels.
On average, countries spend less than 2% of their healthcare budgets on mental health, which limits access to mental health services for citizens globally. Uncertainty, inequality, and insecurity go hand in hand with polarisation and lack of trust. Polarisation and mistrust shrink our capacity for social dialogue and stifle collective action, it said.
India, China announce disengagement from PP-15 in Gogra-Hotsprings area
India and China, on Thursday, announced that their armies have begun to disengage from Patrolling Point-15 in the Gogra-Hotsprings area of Eastern Ladakh, marking a step forward to end the standoff ongoing since May 2020.
The move comes ahead of next week’s Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in Uzbekistan, which both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping are attending.
Neither side has so far confirmed if the two leaders would hold bilateral talks on the sidelines of the summit. They haven’t met since a November 2019 meeting during the BRICS Summit in Brasilia and the beginning of the standoff in April 2020.
“On September 08, 2022, according to the consensus reached in the 16th round of India China Corps Commander Level Meeting, the Indian and Chinese troops in the area of Gogra-Hotsprings (PP-15) have begun to disengage in a coordinated and planned way, which is conducive to the peace and tranquility in the border areas,” the two sides said in a joint statement issued on Thursday.
The 16th round of talks was held on July 17, 2022, at the Chushul border personnel meeting point on the Indian side.
Since the stand-off began in May 2020, the two sides have so far held 16 rounds of talks with disengagement undertaken from both sides of Pangong Tso in February 2021, and from PP-17 in the Gogra-Hotsprings area in August, in addition to Galwan in 2020 after the violent clash. The friction points that remain now are Demchok and Depsang, which China has constantly refused to accept, maintaining that they are not a part of the current stand-off.
Shortly after the 15th round of talks in March, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi visited India, while he and Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar met in July on the sidelines of the G20 foreign ministers meeting in Bali, where they discussed the situation along the Line of Actual Control (LAC).
India has constantly stated that the relationship cannot go back to normal as long as the situation along the standoff continues and has repeatedly called for the restoration of the status quo along the LAC.
Over 50,000 troops and heavy equipment continue to be deployed on both sides close to the LAC. In the last two years, China has also undertaken massive construction of infrastructure, habitat, and support structures to maintain the troops close to the LAC, altering the ground status.
Can government restrict choices merely on possibility of violent reaction by hecklers, asks hijab case petitioner
Wearing a hijab in the street does not offend public order, but can schools not intervene to maintain public order if a student wears it to school, the Supreme Court asked on Thursday.
To this, senior advocate Devadautt Kamat, appearing for Aishat Shifa, a student from Karnataka who was banned from entering her classroom wearing a hijab, said schools have no say in deciding public order.
Maintaining public order is the responsibility of the State, Kamat contended. “If I wear a headscarf and someone is offended and shouts slogans, the police cannot turn to me and say not to wear hijab. That will be the heckler’s veto,” the senior lawyer argued.
Kamat asked whether the government can restrict speech and expression of honest beliefs and choices merely on the possibility of a violent reaction by hecklers. “The State, instead of prohibiting me, must ensure conditions in which freedoms must flourish… Last day the State Advocate General said the government order on hijabs was issued after some students demanded to wear orange shawls… Is heckler’s veto permitted?” he asked.
Kamat said the argument of Karnataka was “look here, if we allow you to wear hijab, some will want to wear orange shawls”.
“Wearing of orange shawls is a belligerent display of religious jingoism… ‘You are wearing a headscarf, I will wear something to show my identity. That Article 25 does not protect. It protects an innocent display of faith. Naamam, yes. Tilakam, yes. A rudraksham, yes… Bonafide and innocent display of faith is protected,” the senior advocate argued.
He said it may also be a person’s honest belief that wearing a kada or naamam may make him a better person. “It is the State’s obligation to protect my belief as long as it does not violate public order, health or morality,” Kamat said, asking how a display of “honest belief” by wearing hijab affects any of the three criteria.
Kamat said every practice may not be an essential or core religious practice. “But that does not mean the state can restrict it… I can wear whatever I want, even though it may not be part of my essential religious practice, as long as I do not hamper public order, health or morality,” he submitted.
“Just because other people can get offended is not a ground for prohibiting me from wearing a hijab,” he said.
Advocate Nizam Pasha, who argued next for the petitioner students, said to make a Muslim student choose between education and the hijab was a violation of Article 19 (freedom of expression).
The Bench asked whether “all religions accept the same God”.
To this Pasha replied that the Quran mandated respect towards other religions. He quoted the verse “O you disbelievers, I do not worship what you worship, nor do you worship what I worship. I will never worship what you worship nor will you ever worship what I worship. You have your way, I have my way”.
The court adjourned the hearing to continue on Monday at 2 p.m.
In Brief:
Britain’s Queen Elizabeth at the Balmoral Castle, Scotland on September 6, 2022. | Photo Credit: Reuters
Fears grew on Thursday for Queen Elizabeth II after Buckingham Palace said her doctors were “concerned” for her health and recommended that she remain under medical supervision. The 96-year-old monarch has been dogged by health problems since October last year that left her with difficulties walking and standing. On Wednesday, she pulled out of a planned meeting with her senior political advisors, after being told to rest. “Following further evaluation this morning, the Queen’s doctors are concerned for Her Majesty’s health and have recommended she remain under medical supervision,” Buckingham Palace said in a statement.
Evening Wrap will return tomorrow.
