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GS Paper: GS2

  • Ayushman Bharat for CAPFs

    Union Home Minister has rolled out the ‘Ayushman CAPF’ scheme, extending the benefit of the central health insurance programme to the personnel of all Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) in the country.

    Who are the CAPFs?

    • The CAPFs refers to uniform nomenclature of five security forces in India under the authority of the Ministry of Home Affairs.
    • Their role is to defend the national interest mainly against the internal threats.
    • They are the Border Security Force (BSF), Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB)

    Ayushman CAPF

    • Under this scheme, around 28 lakh personnel of CAPF, Assam Rifles and National Security Guard (NSG) and their families will be covered by ‘Ayushman Bharat: PM Jan Arogya Yojana’ (AB PM-JAY).
    • For the CAPF, the existing health coverage was not comprehensive as compared to other military forces.

    Do you know?

    The goal of universal health coverage (UHC) as stated in the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs no. 3) is one of the most significant commitments to equitable quality healthcare for all.

    About Ayushman Bharat

    • PM-JAY aims to provide free access to healthcare for 40% of people in the country.
    • It is a centrally sponsored scheme and is jointly funded by both the union government and the states.
    • It was launched in September 2018 by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
    • The ministry has later established the National Health Authority as an organization to administer the program.

    Key features:

    • Providing health coverage for 10 crores households or 50 crores Indians.
    • It provides a cover of 5 lakh per family per year for medical treatment in empanelled hospitals, both public and private.
    • Offering cashless payment and paperless recordkeeping through the hospital or doctor’s office.
    • Using criteria from the Socio-Economic and Caste Census 2011 to determine eligibility for benefits.
    • There is no restriction on family size, age or gender.
    • All previous medical conditions are covered under the scheme.
    • It covers 3 days of pre-hospitalization and 15 days of post-hospitalization, including diagnostic care and expenses on medicines.
    • The scheme is portable and a beneficiary can avail medical treatment at any PM-JAY empanelled hospital outside their state and anywhere in the country.

    Note these features. They cannot be memorized all of sudden but can be recognized if a tricky MCQ comes in the prelims.

    Must read:

    [Burning Issue] Ayushmaan Bharat

  • New WhatsApp Privacy Policy

    Privacy policy update by the WhatsApp recently led to widespread protest from the user forcing company to put the update on hold. If India had made Personal Protection Bill into the law, the privacy policy update would have been illegal. The article deals with this issue.

    About WhatsApp

    • WhatsApp’s unique blend of text, audio, and voice messaging and calling platform.
    • In November 2014, WhatsApp adopted the Signal protocol for end-to-end encryption after its acquisition by Facebook.
    • WhatsApp has two billion users worldwide, of which 400 million are in India, the largest in any country.

    What the privacy policy update is about

    • The updated policy seeks consent from users to allow the platform to share their data with Facebook and its companies,
    • It means that WhatsApp would share transaction data, mobile device information, IP addresses, and other metadata on how users interact with businesses on WhatsApp.
    • Such sharing would be done with the user being notified before the start of a chat if the business uses Facebook to store and analyze data and the user would have the option of blocking the business.
    • The update would defy the principle of purpose limitation that has been the yardstick of addressing privacy concerns at a global level.

    What is the principle of purpose limitation

    • The Indian government has also sent a strong note to WhatsApp, seeking the company’s response to 14 queries.
    • This note has sent a clear message to WhatsApp to not subject Indian users to greater information security risks and vulnerabilities with the consolidation of data from WhatsApp and Facebook.
    • In the note, the government referred to the principle of purpose limitation provisions in the Personal Data Protection Bill (PDPB) currently being discussed by a joint select committee.
    • Had the bill been passed by now, WhatsApp’s move would have been illegal.
    • Provisions in the bill required that every data intermediary has to take explicit permission from the user whose data would be harvested.
    • Even the method of data classification into sensitive personal data and critical data has been defined and their processing possibilities mentioned in the bill.

    Way forward

    • The government should make the Personal Data Protection Bill into law so that such restrictive practices can never be introduced in the first place.
    • It is due to such law, WhatsApp did make an exception for its users in the European Union.
    • The Competition Commission of India should take note that this is a classic case of an organization using its near-monopolistic power to push through something that is not in the consumer interest.

    Consider the question “What is the principle of purpose limitation in the Personal Data Protection Bill? How it can help user protect its privacy?”

    Conclusion

    As Digital India expands and brings in more users from the current base of 70 crores, and more take to social media for communications and business, they must be ensured a safer digital space, given that most wouldn’t be aware of the reach of the data being generated.

  • A new framework around caste and the census

    The article suggests the ways to make the most of the data collected through Census and the SECC.

    Census and issues with it

    • The synchronous decennial Census has evolved over time and has been used by the government, policymakers, academics, and others.
    • Though Census is both a data collection effort and a technique of governance, it is criticized for not being useful enough for a detailed and comprehensive understanding of a complex society.
    •  There is a lack of depth in the Census where some issues are concerned.

    The debate around full-scale Caste Census

    • Since Independence, aggregated Census data on the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes on certain parameters such as education have been collected.
    • There is a growing demand for a full-scale caste census to capture contemporary Indian society and to understand and remedy inequalities.
    • While others believe that this large administrative exercise of capturing caste and its complexities is not only difficult but also socially untenable.
    • There have been concerns that counting caste may help solidify or harden identities, or that caste may be context-specific, and thus difficult to measure.
    • The other concern is whether an institution such as a caste can even be captured completely by the Census.

    Socio-Economic Caste Census: how it is different from Census

    • Following debate over full-scale caste census, the Socio-Economic and Caste Census (SECC) was conducted in 2011.
    • The SECC, which collected the first figures on caste in Census operations since 1931, is the largest exercise of the enumeration of caste.
    • Questions remain on whether the SECC is able to cover the effects of caste as an aspect of Indian social structure.
    • This was a distinct exercise from the Census of 2011.
    • The Census and the SECC have different purposes.
    • Since the Census falls under the Census Act of 1948, all data are considered confidential, whereas the SECC data is open for use by Government departments to grant and/or restrict benefits to households.
    • The Census thus provides a portrait of the Indian population, while the SECC is a tool to identify beneficiaries of state support.

    Way forward

    • What is needed is a discussion on the caste data that already exists, how it has been used and understood by the government.
    • Linking and syncing aggregated Census data to other large datasets such as the National Sample Surveys or the National Family Health Surveys that cover issues that the Census exercises do not, such as maternal health, would be significant for a more comprehensive analysis.
    • This linking of the Census with the National Sample Survey data has been suggested in the past by scholars such as Mamta Murthi and colleagues.
    • Census operations across the world are going through significant changes, employing methods that are precise, faster, and cost-effective, involving coordination between different data sources.
    • Care must however be taken to ensure that digital alternatives and linking of data sources involving Census operations are inclusive and non-discriminatory, especially given the sensitive nature of the data being collected.
    • Delay in the release of data needs to be reduced.
    • There needs to be a closer and continuous engagement between functionaries of the Census and SECC, along with academics and other stakeholders concerned.

    Consider the question “How Socio-Economic and Caste Census is different from the Census? How linking and syncing of  these data with other databases could help in the governance?”

    Conclusion

    Data collected through both the exercises serve an important purpose in the governance of the country, however, there is scope to widen the use of data if the steps suggested here are implemented.

  • Making a Law ‘Operational’

    In the ongoing stalemate between protesting farmers and the Centre, the government has repeated its offer of keeping the three contentious farm laws on hold for one to one-and-a-half years.

    Bringing/removing a law

    • Parliament has the power to make a law and to remove it from the statute books (a law can be struck down by the judiciary if it is unconstitutional).
    • But the passing of a Bill does not mean that it will start working from the next day.
    • There are three more steps for it to become a functioning law.

    Try this PYQ:

    Q.Who/Which of the following is the custodian of the Constitution of India?

    (a) The President of India

    (b) The Prime Minister of India

    (c) The Lok Sabha Secretariat

    (d) The Supreme Court of India

    Making a law operational

    • The first step is the President giving his or her assent to the Bill.
    • Then the law comes into effect from a particular date. President Kovind signed the three farm Bills into law within a week of their passing in September 2020.
    • And finally, the government frames the rules and regulations to make the law operational on the ground.
    • The completion of these steps determines when the law becomes functional.

    Presidents’ actions

    • Article 111 of the Constitution specifies that the President can either sign off on the Bill or withhold his consent.
    • The President rarely withholds their assent to a Bill.
    • The last time it happened was in 2006 when President APJ Abdul Kalam refused to sign a Bill protecting MPs from disqualification for holding an office of profit.
    • A Bill is sent to Parliament for reconsideration if the President withholds his or her assent on it.
    • And if Parliament sends it back to the President, he or he has no choice but to approve it.

    A curious case of date of effect

    • The next step is deciding the date on which the law comes into effect.
    • In many cases, Parliament delegates to the government the power to determine this date.
    • The Bill states that the law “shall come into force on such date as the Central Government may, by notification in the Official Gazette, appoint and different dates may be appointed for different provisions of this Act”.

    Example:  Parliament passed the Recycling of Ships Act in December 2019. In October 2020, the government brought Section 3 of the law into force.  This section empowers the government to designate an officer to supervise all ship recycling activities in India.

    Giving effect to the implementation

    • There are also instances when the government does not bring a law into force for many years.
    • Two examples are the National Environment Tribunal Act and the Delhi Rent Control Act, which Parliament passed during PM P V Narasimha Rao’s tenure.
    • The government never brought these laws into force, which were passed in 1995 and cleared by the President.
    • The NGT Act finally repealed the environmental tribunal law in 2010. And a Bill to repeal the Delhi Rent Control Act introduced in 2013 is still pending in Rajya Sabha

    Rules & regulations to be made

    • For the law to start working on the ground, individuals need to be recruited or given the power, to administer it.
    • The implementing ministry also needs to finalise forms to gather information and provide benefits or services.
    • These day-to-day operational details are called rules and regulations. And Parliament gives the government the responsibility of making them. These regulations are critical for the functioning of law.
    • If the government does not make rules and regulations, law or parts of it will not get implemented.

    Example: The Benami Transactions Act of 1988 is an example of a complete law remaining unimplemented. For 25 years, such properties were immune from seizure in the absence of framing relevant government rules. The law was finally repealed in 2016 and replaced with a new one.

    A final word on implementation

    • Parliament has recommended that the government make rules within six months of passing a law.
    • But parliamentary committees have observed that this recommendation is being followed in breach by various ministries.
    • The government not only has the power to make rules but can also suppress rules made by it earlier.

  • [pib] Shramshakti Portal

    The Union Minister of Tribal Affairs has launched the “ShramShakti” Portal.

    Earlier we had ONORC move, now a repository for migrant workers. Keep a tab on all such updates for the welfare of migrant workers.

    Shramshakti Portal

    • It is a National Migration Support Portal.
    • It will record various data including demographic profile, livelihood options, skill mapping, and migration pattern.
    • It would effectively help in the smooth formulation of state and national level programs for migrant workers.

    Why need such a portal?

    • Migrants all over the country had to face after the lockdown was announced due to the pandemic caused by a coronavirus.
    • The migration of the tribal population is distress-driven and the migrants are exposed to difficult and unsafe conditions.
    • Sometimes they face trafficking or wage harassment issues including many occupational hazards at the workplace.
    • The lack of real-time data of migrants was the biggest challenge for governments in formulating effective strategies and policy decisions for the welfare of migrant workers at both source and destination states.

    Benefits of the portal

    • The tribal migration repository would be able to successfully address the data gap and empower migrant workers who generally migrate in search of employment and income generation.
    • It would also help the government for linking the migrant population with the existing Welfare Scheme- under Aatmanirbhar Bharat.

    A move for tribals

    • Tribal migrant workers often have low awareness about their rights and entitlements and ways to access services and social security in source and destination areas.
    • With this, they will be able to demand and access services, rights, and entitlements related to livelihood and social security at their village before migration, as well after migration at destination towns and cities.

  • Mercy petition

    The article highlights the issue of delay in carrying out the dealth penalty and issues associated with it.

    Review of India’s position on the death penalty

    • The delay in carrying out the death penalty is one of the reasons to review India’s position on capital punishment.
    • The debate on the efficacy of the death penalty in reducing crime has been going on for several decades.
    • A few years ago, the issue of abolishing capital punishment was raised in the Rajya Sabha but was rejected by a voice vote.
    • The then Minister of State for Home Affairs stated that the government was not contemplating abolition of the death penalty.
    • In 2015, the Law Commission of India proposed abolishing the death penalty and sought the comments of States and Union Territories on the subject.
    • India figures among the 56 nations in the world that have retained the death penalty.

    Issue of delay in carrying out the punishment

    • The prolonged detention of death row convicts in prison is not just inhuman but also against the canons of justice.
    • The delay coupled with long years of solitary confinement leads to immense psychological trauma.
    • It is small wonder that the courts tend to take a lenient view and reduce the sentence when such cases of prolonged years of detention come before them.
    • A time frame needs to be fixed for the President to dispose of mercy petitions.
    •  Delays in investigations, court hearings, and administrative steps to be taken after the final verdict need to be inquired into, and responsibility fixed.

    Consider the question “Against the backdrop of delay in carrying out the dealth penalty in India, take the review of India’s position on the abolition of death penalty.”

    Conclusion

    With the changing time, we must change and so do the way we punish people. Capital punishment should be abolished in the country and until then, the inordinate delays in carrying out punishment should be avoided.

  • Defending liberty against selective prosecution

    The article examines the issue of selective prosecution and Indian judiciary’s approach toward it. It also highlights the importance of recent Goswami case.

    Selective prosecution: Form of abuse of state power

    • Recently the case involving bail application of a T.V. anchor brought to the fore issue of selective prosecution.
    • The illegal selection of accused based on grounds prohibited by the Constitution is called “selective prosecution”.
    • In case of selective prosecution, the police and enforcement agencies selectively target political and ideological opponents of the ruling dispensation to interrogate, humiliate, harass, arrest, torture and imprison.
    • It is one of the oldest, most pernicious and widespread forms of abuse of state power.

    How it is illegal: Two independent legal issues

    1) Exercise of prosecutorial discretion

    • The applicable legal standard is that while the police and prosecutors in common law jurisdictions enjoy vast discretion in deciding who they may pursue and who they may spare.
    • However, the choice of accused must not be based on grounds that violate Constitutional rights, including the Article 14 right to equal protection of the law.
    • The accused should not be selected, either explicitly or covertly, on constitutionally prohibited grounds.

    2) Merit of the case filed

    • When the choice of accused runs contrary to the Constitution, the entire criminal proceeding is vitiated, irrespective of the determination of the second issue, viz., whether the accused are convicted or acquitted on the charges brought against them.
    • Once the proceedings fail under the first issue, there is no legal basis to proceed to the second issue., i.e., trial on the merits of the case.
    • The theory is that the Constitution cannot be violated to uphold the law — such an approach would spell doom for the Constitution.
    • The selective prosecution claim must be adjudicated as a threshold issue, with the prosecution being quashed at the outset of the criminal case if the claim is justified.
    • In the context of this discussion, the constitutionally prohibited ground we are confronting in India is the political or ideological affiliation of the accused.
    • It is an arbitrary ground that violates the Article 14 guarantee of equal protection of the law.

    Approach of judiciary

    • Our courts have not recognised selective prosecution as an independent claim.
    • This is because courts assume that lawfulness of prosecution can only be taken up after the trial, if the accused is acquitted.
    • The 2018 Report of the Law Commission on ‘Wrongful Prosecution (Miscarriage of Justice): Legal Remedies’ discusses remedies for wrongful prosecution available only if and after the accused is acquitted.
    • Remedy after acquittal comes far too late, well after a brutal and long drawn out criminal justice process that upends the lives of the victims.
    • Also, the right against selective prosecution cannot be extinguished by conviction.
    • Separate from post-acquittal actions for wrongful prosecution (which will still be available), the claim of selective prosecution is a threshold issue that is required to be adjudicated at the outset of criminal proceedings even during the investigation stage irrespective of the merit of the charges.

    Importance of Goswami case

    • The case provides a much needed and long awaited legal opening to strengthen the recognition and use of the selective prosecution claim in India to counter politically coloured prosecution.
    • The judgment says, “Courts should be alive to the needof ensuring that the law does not become a ruse for targeted harassment ”.
    • The Goswami judgment also quotes the 2018 Supreme Court holding in Romila Thapar v. Union of India that, “[T]he basic entitlement of every citizen who is faced with allegations of criminal wrongdoing is that the investigative process should be fair. This is an integral component of the guarantee against arbitrariness under Article 14 and of the right to life and personal liberty under Article 21.”

    Consider the question “How selective prosecution could threten the liberty of person? How Indian judiciary approaches the issue of selective prosecution and what are the issue with the approach adopted by the judiciary?”

    Conclusion

    To strengthen the protection of civil liberty, equality and democracy, it is time our courts — at all levels — recognise selective prosecution as a threshold constitutional defence against the abuse of police and prosecutorial power.

  • TN Governor to decide on Ex-PM assassin Pardon

    Tamil Nadu Governor would take a decision as per the Constitution in the next three or four days on the plea for release filed by A.G. Perarivalan, who is undergoing life imprisonment for the assassination of former PM Rajiv Gandhi in 1991.

    Give your personal views in favour and against Capital Punishment in the comment box.

    What is the news?

    • The court noted in its short order that the Solicitor General submitted that the application filed by the petitioner Perarivalan under Article 161 of the Constitution.
    • The TN State Cabinet had earlier made the recommendation to remit the life sentences of seven convicts, including Perarivalan in September 2018.
    • The new turn of events when the Additional Solicitor General for the Centre, had argued recently that the pleas for pardon and release should go to the President instead of the Governor.

    What does Pardon mean?

    • A pardon is a government/executive decision to allow a person to be absolved of guilt for an alleged crime or other legal offense as if the act never occurred.

    Why need a Pardon?

    • Pardons can be granted when individuals are deemed to have demonstrated that they have “paid their debt to society”, or are otherwise considered to be deserving of them.
    • Pardons are sometimes offered to persons who were either wrongfully convicted or who claim that they were wrongfully convicted.
    • Pardons are sometimes seen as a mechanism for combating corruption, allowing a particular authority to circumvent a flawed judicial process to free someone that is seen as wrongly convicted.

    What does Article 161 say?

    • Article 161 of the Constitution provides the Governor with the power to remit or commute the sentence of any prisoner.
    • The Governor’s decision will be subject to judicial review by the constitutional courts.

    Supreme court’s observations

    • The Constitution Bench in 2015, in a majority decision, had held that the States cannot unilaterally remit the sentences of life convicts in cases investigated by a Central agency under a Central law.
    • The assassination case was probed by the CBI.
    • In compliance with the 2015 verdict, the Tamil Nadu government wrote to the Centre in 2016, proposing the grant of remission to the convicts. The State wanted the Centre to concur.
    • After a wait of over two years, the Centre rejected the State’s proposal, saying this was an unparalleled act in the annals of crimes committed in this country.

    Arguments in Perarivalan’s petition seeking pardon

    • Perarivalan had been pleading for release citing that he was 19 when he was arrested.
    • He was the only male child of his parents, there were no records of criminal antecedents, and that he had excellent conduct in his entire prison life.
    • His petition also cited UG and PG degrees, and that he was the university topper, Gold medalist in diploma in DTP, and that he completed more than eight diploma and certificate courses during his prison term.
    • His probation officer gave a report about lapses in recording his confession statement that handed out maximum punishment in his case.

    Basis of his innocence

    • Perarivalan cannot be called innocent before the law as he continues to be a convicted prisoner serving imprisonment.
    • He was accused of having bought two battery cells for Sivarasan, the LTTE man who masterminded the conspiracy.
    • He was sentenced to death based on this crucial confession statement.

    Significance of the convicts’ release

    • The release of seven convicts is a demand raised by not only the ruling party of TN but the main opposition too.
    • All TN politicians voiced that the judiciary should be able to reform and let them live as good citizens to uphold the high values of reformatory justice and restitution.

  • China builds a new village in Arunachal Pradesh

    Satellite images show that China has constructed a new village in Arunachal Pradesh, around 4.5 kilometres inside of the de facto border on the Indian side.

    Indian and Chinese soldiers have confronted each other in their deadliest clash in decades in Ladakh last year and the earlier one in Doklam. Now another front has been opened up by China in Arunachal.

    This year could face another ugliest standoffs and skirmishes.

    Location of the village

    • The village, located on the banks of the River Tsari Chu, lies in the Upper Subansiri district.
    • It is an area that has been long disputed by India and China and has been marked by armed conflict.
    • Sources in the defense ministry have said that Beijing has, for years, maintained an army post on this territory, and the various constructions by the Chinese have not happened suddenly.

    Background of the story

    • China’s June 1959 operation known as the Longju incident reportedly accused Indian troops of occupying some places in Tibet and colluding with Tibetan rebels.
    • In August same year, the PLA clashed with the Indian personnel of the 9 Assam Rifles.
    • Two Indian soldiers were killed in action and the issue was finally resolved through diplomatic channels. Both sides withdrew from the area on August 20, 1960.
    • And the Assam Rifles then did not re-occupy the post.
    • In the late 1990s however, China established a company level post 3 kilometers inside the Indian Territory. Since then, the area remains contested to this day.

    India and Arunachal

    • Arunachal Pradesh (called South Tibet in China) is a full-fledged state of India.
    • India’s sovereignty over the area is internationally recognized and its residents have not shown any inclination to leave India.
    • The majority of the international maps acknowledge the area to be an Indian Territory.
    • China has some (pre-) historical claims through its ownership of Tibet, but the people and geography primarily favor India.

    Back2Basics: Chinese claim over Arunachal Pradesh

    • When the new Peoples Republic of China was formed in February 1912 after the abdication of the Qing emperor, the Tibetans asserted their independence.
    • They forced the Chinese troops based in Lhasa to return to the mainland-via India. A year later, Tibet declared independence from China.
    • In order to ensure that the unrest did not spread to India and assert their boundaries, the ruling British convened a tripartite meeting at Shimla with Tibetan and Chinese delegates to define the border.
    • The meeting gave China suzerainty over most of Tibet, and the boundary defined in this treaty was later known as the McMohan line.

    Chinese reluctance

    • The essential dispute is over China’s refusal to acknowledge the McMohan Line as the border between the two nations, and staking claim to large tracts of land as a contiguous part of Tibet.
    • However, it laid claim to the entire state of Arunachal Pradesh.
    • In the 16th century, the most important heritage of the state – Tawang Monastery was built. This is one of the most important sites for Tibetan Buddhists.
    • China never recognized Tibet’s independence nor the 1914 Simla convention.
    • In 1950 China completely took over Tibet. Thus, according to their version, the Tawang region belongs to them.
    • It especially wants to hold on to the monastery as that is a leading center of Tibetan Buddhism in India.

  • Supreme Court dismisses Aadhaar Review Petition

    The Supreme Court, in a majority view (4:1), dismissed a series of petitions seeking a review of its 2018 judgment upholding the Lok Sabha Speaker’s certification of Aadhaar law as a Money Bill and its subsequent passage in Parliament.

    Try this PYQ:

    Consider the following statements:

    1. Aadhaar card can be used as a proof of citizenship or domicile.
    2. Once issued, Aadhaar number cannot be deactivated or omitted by the Issuing Authority.

    Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

    (a) 1 only

    (b) 2 only

    (c) Both 1 and 2

    (d) Neither 1 nor 2

    Backgrounder

    • The review petitions had highlighted how the Aadhaar Act was passed as a Money Bill by superseding the Rajya Sabha. It was called a “fraud on the Constitution”.
    • The review petition had argued that the Aadhaar Act clearly did not fall within the ambit of Article 110 (1) of the Constitution, which restricted Money Bills to certain specific fields only.

    What is a Review Petition?

    • Article 137 of the Constitution provides that subject to provisions of any law and rule made under Article 145 the Supreme Court of India has the power to review any judgment pronounced (or order made) by it.
    • Thus the binding decision of the Supreme Court/High Court can be reviewed in the Review Petition.

    Aadhaar Case: Two questions for review

    • Two questions had come up for review regarding the five-judge Aadhaar Bench’s judgment in 2018.
    • One, whether the Speaker’s decision to declare a proposed law as Money Bill was “final” and cannot be challenged in court.
    • The second, whether the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016 was correctly certified as a ‘Money Bill’ under Article 110(1) of the Constitution.

    What is the majority Judgment?

    • On the first question, the majority judgment in 2018 said the Speaker’s decision could be challenged in court only under “certain circumstances”.
    • On the second, it concluded that the Aadhaar Act was rightly called a Money Bill.

    Back2Basics: Money Bill

    • A Bill is said to be a Money Bill if it only contains provisions related to taxation, borrowing of money by the government, expenditure from or receipt to the Consolidated Fund of India.
    • Bills that only contain provisions that are incidental to these matters would also be regarded as Money Bills.
    • A Money Bill may only be introduced in Lok Sabha, on the recommendation of the President as per Article 110 of the Constitution.
    • Then, it is transmitted to the Rajya Sabha for its recommendations. Following this, it may be sent to the Rajya Sabha for its recommendations, which Lok Sabha may reject if it chooses to.
    • If such recommendations are not given within 14 days, it will be deemed to be passed by Parliament.

    How is a Money Bill different from a financial bill?

    • While all Money Bills are Financial Bills, all Financial Bills are not Money Bills.
    • For example, the Finance Bill which only contains provisions related to tax proposals would be a Money Bill.
    • However, a Bill that contains some provisions related to taxation or expenditure, but also covers other matters would be considered as a Financial Bill.