Daily Hindu Editorials

👉Indebtedness shows no signs of abating as a result of the government’s flagship schem👈 The Pradhan Mantri Jan-Dhan Yojana (PMJDY), one of the flagship schemes of the present government, was launched in August 2014. The ‘J’ in JDY is the ‘J’ in ‘JAM’ (Jan Dhan-Aadhaar-Mobile) through which the Economic Survey of 2015 claimed that “every tear from every eye” could be wiped. As the Narendra Modi government enters its fifth year, a critical evaluation of the scheme is in order, especially since this is one of the schemes through which the government is trying to battle its anti-poor image. The recently released World Bank Global Findex data show that 80% of Indian adults now have a bank account, which is being celebrated as the success of the JDY. While the increase in the proportion of adults having bank accounts is indeed impressive (80% in 2017 from 53% in 2014), 48% of those who have an account in a financial institution made no withdrawal or deposit in the past one year. ...

👉A year after the real estate legislation came into effect, the follow-up in many States has been dismal 👈 It is a year since the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016 (RERA) came into effect (May 1). But stocktaking presents a dismal picture as far as its implementation and expected benefits are concerned. There is still a long way to go before the real estate sector operates in an “efficient and transparent manner and protect the interest of consumers”, as set forth in the statute’s preamble 👉A record of extremes Only 20 of the 28 States (the Act is not applicable in Jammu and Kashmir) have framed the rules stipulated under RERA to carry out its legal mandate. In some States such as Uttar Pradesh, the Act’s provisions have been watered down in favour of builders by altering the definition of “on-going projects” which need registration under RERA. There is also a dilution on the penalties for non-compliance. Similarly, the speedy dispute redress mechani...

👉India must be careful in picking up best practices from elsewhere in drafting a data protection law While the Americans and Europeans both call a sport football, they play a very different game. This difference is rooted not only in culture but in the rules of the game that provide rewards for goals, and penalties for breaching allowances. In the case of privacy regulations too, such a marked distinction is visible. With the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) coming into effect on May 25, 2018, the absence of a comparable regulation across the Atlantic poses a question for India: What path should it take? Should it follow the U.S. or Europe? Or, in fact, should India take the lead in this regard? 👉American exceptionalism Last year, in November, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in Carpenter v. United States, which many commentators termed as one of the most critical electronic surveillance case in decades. Among other finely threaded legal arguments ...

👉A lack of sufficient funds, rampant payment delays and abysmal wage rates are to blame👈 The ₹11,000 crore fraud that diamond merchant Nirav Modi is said to have created is a figure that needs to be put in perspective. The total amount of wages pending under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) scheme for the whole country (2016-17) was around ₹11,000 crore too. This sum is a fifth of the MGNREGA budget announced for financial year 2018-19. MGNREGA stands out in its worker-centric legislation and stated emphasis on transparency and accountability. Several potentially progressive measures such as a real-time management information system have been put in place. The scheme is meant to be demand-driven in the sense that the government is mandated to provide work within 15 days of a worker seeking work. Otherwise the worker is entitled to an unemployment allowance. A second key provision of the Act pertains to payment of wages within 15 days of com...

👉A bill seeks to make it easier to resolve commercial disputes👈 The Commercial Courts, Commercial Division and Commercial Appellate Division of High Courts (Amendment) Bill of 2018 is pending in Parliament. The Bill intends to jump-start India as a sought-out business destination in the world. Its objective is to set India at the top of the ‘Ease of Doing Business’ index of the World Bank. It aims to create a conducive regulatory environment for investors to set up and operate businesses. India recently jumped 30 positions and reached the 100th rank in terms of ‘Ease of Doing Business’ among 190 countries. The urgency is apparent, with the government also promulgating an ordinance. The Bill proposes to lower the specified value of a commercial dispute to ₹3 lakh from the present ₹1 crore so that commercial disputes of a reasonable value can be decided by commercial courts. This would bring down the time taken (at present, 1,445 days) in resolving commercial disputes of le...

👉The recent deaths of schoolchildren at an unmanned rail crossing highlight why the Railways Act must be amended👈 In late April, a bus with schoolchildren collided with a train at an unmanned railway level crossing, near Kushinagar in Uttar Pradesh. Thirteen of them died. This is not the first time that an incident of this nature has occurred, so some questions need to be asked. Is there any mandate for manning all level crossings? In an incident such as this, where the bus driver was reportedly negligent, is the railway administration liable even if the train engine driver cannot be faulted? 👉Legal issues We can look for some answers in a 1997 Supreme Court judgment (Union of India v. United India Insurance). In May 1979, at Akaparampa in Kerala, 40 passengers and the driver of a passenger bus that had been hired were killed when the vehicle was hit by a train at an unmanned level crossing. Cases were filed before the Motor Accidents Claims Tribunal, Ernakulam, claimi...

👉The new compliance system and a proposal for cess on sugar send the wrong signals👈 With collections from the goods and services tax peaking at over ₹1 lakh crore in April, industry hoped the GST Council would make life simpler for an increasingly compliant tax-payer base. Indeed, at its meeting last week the Council decided to introduce a new compliance system under which a single monthly GST return will have to be submitted by firms, barring a few exceptions. However, this will only be done in a phased manner — with the first of three transition stages to begin six months from now. Discussions over simplifying GST returns have been under way for months and considered by the Council, a committee of officers and a Group of Ministers. Nandan Nilekani, chairman of Infosys Technologies, the firm in charge of the GST Network’s IT system, has been consulted. Yet, the solution offered has gaps. For instance, in the second stage of the transition to simpler returns, buyers will get prov...

👉Getting affordable electricity to every household needs sustained policy support👈 Access to electricity drives the productivity of households, empowers women and enables education and communication. Millions of homes still lack this vital resource in India. And as of April 1, 2015, the official count of unelectrified villages was 18,452. So when Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently announced that all inhabited villages now enjoy electrification, it signalled a significant milestone in the country’s development. It is an achievement that will raise aspirations in the remotest districts. Yet, broad-brush statistics conceal severe disparities, including the actual number of households in villages that have power connections, the number of hours they get reliable power, and the per capita power that rural and urban Indians consume. For one, the existing definition to declare a village electrified is coverage of a mere 10% of households and common facilities such as schools, panchay...

👉Its revocation in some areas is welcome, but should it be on the statute books at all?👈 The Centre’s decision to revoke the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act in Meghalaya and reduce its ambit in Arunachal Pradesh is welcome insofar as it signifies a willingness to reconsider the use of the special law as and when the ground situation improves. The extent of ‘disturbed areas’ in Meghalaya was earlier limited to within 20 km of its border with Assam. The whole of Nagaland, most of Assam, and Manipur excluding the areas falling under seven Assembly constituencies in Imphal, continue to be under the law, which provides protection to the point of total immunity from prosecution for the security forces operating in the notified areas. In Arunachal, the areas under AFSPA have been reduced to the limits of eight police stations, instead of the previous 16, in three districts bordering Assam. It was only last month that the Act was extended for six months in Assam, even though the Union ...

💥The Centre has tied itself up in knots over its policy on oil pricing After a sharp fall at the beginning of the year, oil prices have risen dramatically in recent weeks. The price of Brent crude has risen by around $10 since it touched a short-term low of around $62 in early February, hitting its highest mark since late 2014. Tensions in West Asia after U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to strike Syria helped push up prices. But it is important to separate short-term volatility in oil prices owing to geopolitical tensions from longer-term trends in the oil market. In its latest market report, the International Energy Association (IEA) noted that with oil prices ruling over $70, the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) has “accomplished” its goal of ending the glut in global oil supply. Notably, OPEC cut production by around 201,000 barrels a day in March compared to February. Yet, total world oil supply actually rose by 180,000 barrels a day in March, as...

👉There is no way the country can reap its demographic dividend without fixing vocational education Salvaging the Indian demographic dividend must be a key part of India’s growth story. In 2016, the Government of India formed the Sharada Prasad Committee to rationalise the Sector Skill Councils (SSCs), which are employer bodies mostly promoted by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, the Confederation of Indian Industry and other industry associations, and improve ‘Skill India’. The committee submitted its report in 2016. Now over a year later, it may be prudent to look at the reforms it suggested and action taken in the vocational education/training (VET) system. The two goals in ‘Skill India’ are, first, to meet employers’ needs of skills and, second, to prepare workers (young and old) for a decent livelihood. The recurring theme in the report is its focus on youth. Each recommendation underlines that the VET is not just for underprivileged commu...

💥The National Health Protection Mission requires a bold, holistic approach The NDA government’s scheme to provide health cover of ₹5 lakh per year to 10 crore poor and vulnerable families through the Ayushman Bharat-National Health Protection Mission has taken a step forward with the Union Cabinet approving the modalities of its implementation. Considering the small window, just over a year, available before the term of the present government ends, urgent action is needed to roll out such an ambitious scheme. For a start, the apex council that will steer the programme and the governing board to operationalise it in partnership with the States need to be set up. The States, which have a statutory responsibility for provision of health care, have to act quickly and form dedicated agencies to run the scheme. Since the NHPM represents the foundation for a universal health coverage system that should eventually cover all Indians, it needs to be given a sound legal basis, ideally thro...

🏥The National Medical Commission Bill seeks to make structural changes in an exploitative health-care system Even as the spotlight shifts to a “maha-panchayat” of doctors under the Indian Medical Association getting ready later this month to challenge the National Medical Commission (NMC) Bill, 2017 (now before a parliamentary standing committee), it is pertinent to look at the Bill’s highlights. Article 47 of the Constitution makes it clear that the state is duty-bound to improve public health, but India continues to face a health crisis, with an absolute shortage of and an inequitable presence of doctors and over-burdened hospitals. Although India has 10 lakh medical doctors, it needs 3,00,000 more in order to meet the World Health Organisation standard of the ideal doctor-population ratio. There is an 81% shortage of specialists in community health centres (CHC), the first point of contact for a patient with a specialist doctor. Those most affected by this are poor and ru...

💥The National Medical Commission Bill seeks to make structural changes in an exploitative health-care system Even as the spotlight shifts to a “maha-panchayat” of doctors under the Indian Medical Association getting ready later this month to challenge the National Medical Commission (NMC) Bill, 2017 (now before a parliamentary standing committee), it is pertinent to look at the Bill’s highlights. Article 47 of the Constitution makes it clear that the state is duty-bound to improve public health, but India continues to face a health crisis, with an absolute shortage of and an inequitable presence of doctors and over-burdened hospitals. Although India has 10 lakh medical doctors, it needs 3,00,000 more in order to meet the World Health Organisation standard of the ideal doctor-population ratio. There is an 81% shortage of specialists in community health centres (CHC), the first point of contact for a patient with a specialist doctor. Those most affected by this are poor and ru...

💢Finance Minister Arun Jaitley announces at a press conference on Thursday, March 1 that the Cabinet had approved the Fugitive Economic Offenders Bill, 2017. 👉Taking on fugitive economic offenders The Fugitive Economic Offenders Bill, 2018, which was introduced in the Lok Sabha this week, aims to provide for measures to deter fugitive economic offenders from evading the process of law in India. It is a deterrent for those offenders who continue to stay outside the jurisdiction of Indian courts. The larger objective of the proposed legislation is to “preserve the sanctity of the rule of law”. In its statement of objectives and reasons, the government refers to the “several instances of economic offenders fleeing the jurisdiction of Indian courts anticipating the commencement of criminal proceedings or sometimes during the pendency of such proceedings”. Fugitive businesspersons Vijay Mallya and Nirav Modi have resisted the jurisdiction of Indian courts. The absence of...

It is only logical that the sources of income of candidates be disclosed Adding to the growing body of judicially inspired electoral reforms, the Supreme Court has imposed an additional disclosure norm for candidates contesting elections. It has asked the Centre to amend the rules as well as the disclosure form filed by candidates along with their nomination papers, to include the sources of their income, and those of their spouses and dependants. The court has also asked for the establishment of a permanent mechanism to investigate any unexplained or disproportionate increase in the assets of legislators during their tenure. The verdict of the two-judge Bench on a petition from the NGO, Lok Prahari, is one more in a long line of significant verdicts aimed at preserving the purity of the electoral process. These include the direction to provide the ‘NOTA’ option in voting machines, and another striking down a clause that saved sitting legislators from immediate disqualifica...

The National Health Protection Scheme (NHPS) is being hailed as the biggest takeaway for the aam aadmi in this year’s Budget. Given the noise that is being made around it, one is led into believing that the government has brought the nation into the next generation of health security. Quite expectedly, the Opposition, led by the Congress, has dubbed it “as nothing but a pack of lies”. As there are a few elections this year before the big and major one, the battle lines are being drawn. So, given this impasse in public discourse, how will anyone be able to judge it accurately? The only real way to judge the potential of the NHPS is to review the empirical evidence pertaining to some of the existing publicly-funded health insurance schemes, particularly the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY). 🔹Old scheme At the outset, it should be pointed out that the RSBY was rechristened the NHPS in 2016. The Budget promised to provide insurance coverage to an estimated 5...

It is unusual for a health programme to become the most prominent feature of a Union Budget. The previous government missed the bus when it failed to implement the recommendations of the High-Level Expert Group on Universal Health Coverage (2011). Yet, those recommendations resonate in the Budget of 2018, with commitment to universal health coverage, strengthening of primary health care (especially at the sub-centre level), linking new medical colleges to upgraded district hospitals, provision of free drugs and diagnostics at public health facilities, and stepping up financial protection for health care through a government-funded programme that merges Central and State health insurance schemes. Whatever be the time and resources needed to fully implement these initiatives, the Budget sends a strong message that health is now in the spotlight of politically attractive policy pronouncements. From now on, no government can ignore people’s legitimate aspiration to get the health ser...