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  • Foreign Policy Watch: India-United States

    7th Fleet’s patrol in India’s EEZ was an act of impropriety

    op-ed snap | International Relations | Mains Paper 2: Bilateral, Regional and Global Groupings and agreements involving India

    The explains the implications of a recent incident in which the US 7th fleet asserted navigation freedom and rights inside India’s Exclusive Economic Zone.

    Freedom of navigation operation in India’s EEZ

    • The US 7th fleet recently declared that on 7th April, 2021 USS John Paul Jones asserted navigational rights and freedom inside India’s EEZ, without requesting India’s prior consent.
    • The statement also said that  “India requires prior consent for military exercises or manoeuvres in its EEZ, a claim inconsistent with international law.

    Which international law the statement referred to

    • The “international law” being cited by Commander 7th Fleet is a UN Convention which resulted from the third UN Conference on Law of the Seas (UNCLOS 1982).
    • India has ratified the Convention, which came into force in 1994.
    • However, amongst the 168 nations who have either acceded to or ratified UNCLOS 1982, the US is conspicuous by its absence.

    Background of the UNCLOS

    • In 1945, the US unilaterally declared its jurisdiction over all natural resources on that nation’s continental shelf. 
    • Taking cue from the US, some states extended their sovereign rights to 200 miles, while others declared territorial limits as they pleased.
    • To bring order to a confusing situation, conferences for codifying laws of the seas were convened by the UN.
    • After negotiations, an agreement was obtained on a set of laws that formalised the following maritime zones:
    • (a) A 12-mile limit on territorial sea;
    • (b) A 24-mile contiguous zone.
    • (c) Amnewly conceived “exclusive economic zone” (EEZ) extending up to 200 miles within which the state would have sole rights over natural resources.
    • The EEZ was said to be unique in that it was neither high seas nor territorial waters.

    Issues with the UNCLOS 1982

    • The signatories UNCLOS 1982 have chosen to remain silent on controversial issues with military or security implications and mandated no process for resolution of ambiguities.
    • Resort to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea or a Court of Arbitration are amongst the options available.
    • However, many states have expressed a preference for “negotiating in good faith”.
    • The time has, perhaps, come for signatories of UNCLOS 1982 to convene another conference to review laws and resolve issues of contention.

    Why US refused to ratify UNCLOS

    • It was accepted that the seabed beyond the limits of national jurisdiction was not subject to national sovereignty but would be “the common heritage of mankind” .
    • This seems to have been at the root of the US opposition to UNCLOS.
    • It was felt in the US that this concept favoured the under-developed countries thereby denying America the fruits of its technological superiority.
    • The US Senate, therefore, refused to ratify UNCLOS.
    • Amongst the areas of major contention or sharp divergence in the interpretation of rules are:
    • 1) Applicability of the EEZ concept to rocks and islets.
    • 2) The right of innocent passage for foreign warships through territorial seas.
    • 3) Conduct of naval activities in the EEZ and the pursuit of marine scientific research in territorial waters and EEZ.

    Containing China

    • China has insulated itself against US intervention, through the progressive development of its “anti-access, area-denial” or A2AD capability.
    • China has accelerated its campaign to achieve control of the South China Sea (SCS).
    • In 2013, China commenced on an intense campaign to build artificial islands in the SCS on top of reefs in the Spratly and Paracel groups.
    • In 2016, China disdainfully rejected the verdict of the UN Court of Arbitration in its dispute with the Philippines.
    • So far, none of the US initiatives including Obama’s abortive US Pivot/Re-balance to Asia, Trump’s Indo-Pacific Strategy and Asia Reassurance Initiative Act, seem to have had the slightest impact on China’s aggressive intent
    • Therefore, it seems pointless for the US Navy to frighten the Maldives or friendly India and it needs to focus on China instead.

    Consider the question “What are the different types of maritime zones under the United Nations Convention for the Law of the Sea 1982? What are the flaws in the convention?

    Conclusion

    In this fraught environment, the ever-expanding, worldwide FONOP campaign needs a careful reappraisal by US policy-makers for effectiveness — lest it alienates friends instead of deterring adversaries.

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  • Modern Indian History-Events and Personalities

    Person in news: Jyotirao Phule (1827 –1890)

    Prelims Only | | Mains Paper 1: Modern Indian History

    The Prime Minister has paid tribute to the great social reformer, thinker, philosopher and writer Mahatma Jyotiba Phule on his birth anniversary.

    Mahatma Phule

    • Jotirao Govindrao Phule was an Indian social activist, thinker, anti-caste social reformer and writer from Maharashtra.
    • His work extended to many fields, including the eradication of untouchability and the caste system and for his efforts in educating women and exploited caste people.
    • He and his wife, Savitribai Phule, were pioneers of women’s education in India. Phule started his first school for girls in 1848 in Pune at Tatyasaheb Bhide’s residence or Bhidewada.
    • He, along with his followers, formed the Satyashodhak Samaj (Society of Truth Seekers) to attain equal rights for people from exploited castes.
    • People from all religions and castes could become a part of this association which worked for the upliftment of the oppressed classes.
    • Phule is regarded as an important figure in the social reform movement in Maharashtra. He was bestowed with an honorific Mahātmā title by Maharashtrian social activist Vithalrao Krishnaji Vandekar in 1888.

    His social work

    Phule’s social activism included many fields, including the eradication of untouchability and the caste system, education of women and the Dalits, and welfare of downtrodden women.

    1. Education
    • In 1848, aged 21, Phule visited a girls’ school in Ahmadnagar, run by Christian missionaries.
    • He realized that exploited castes and women were at a disadvantage in Indian society, and also that education of these sections was vital to their emancipation
    • Phule first taught reading and writing to his wife, Savitribai, and then the couple started the first indigenously run school for girls in Pune.
    • The conservative upper caste society of Pune didn’t approve of his work. But many Indians and Europeans helped him generously.
    1. Women’s welfare
    • Phule watched how untouchables were not permitted to pollute anyone with their shadows and that they had to attach a broom to their backs to wipe the path on which they had travelled.
    • He saw young widows shaving their heads, refraining from any sort of joy in their life. He saw how untouchable women had been forced to dance naked.
    • He made the decision to educate women by witnessing all these social evils that encouraged inequality.
    • He championed widow remarriage and started a home for dominant caste pregnant widows to give birth in a safe and secure place in 1863.
    • His orphanage was established in an attempt to reduce the rate of infanticide.
    • Along with his longtime friend Sadashiv Ballal Govande and Savitribai, he started an infanticide prevention centre.
    • Phule tried to eliminate the stigma of social untouchability surrounding the exploited castes by opening his house and the use of his water-well to the members of the exploited castes.
    1. Views on religion and caste
    • Phule recast Aryan invasion theory, proposing that the Aryan conquerors of India, were in fact barbaric suppressors of the indigenous people.
    • He believed that they had instituted the caste system as a framework for subjugation and social division that ensured the pre-eminence of their Brahmin successors.
    • He saw the subsequent Muslim conquests of the Indian subcontinent as more of the same sort of thing, being a repressive alien regime.
    • But he considered the British to be relatively enlightened and not supportive of the varnashrama dharma system instigated and then perpetuated by those previous invaders.
    • In his book, Gulamgiri, he thanked Christian missionaries and the British colonists for making the exploited castes realise that they are worthy of all human rights.
    • His critique of the caste system began with an attack on the Vedas, the most fundamental texts of Hindus. He considered them to be a form of false consciousness.
    • He is credited with introducing the Marathi word ‘Dalit’ (broken, crushed) as a descriptor for those people who were outside the traditional varna system.
    • He advocated making primary education compulsory in villages. He also asked for special incentives to get more lower-caste people in high schools and colleges.

    Satyashodhak Samaj

    • On 24 September 1873, Phule formed Satyashodhak Samaj to focus on the rights of depressed groups such as women, the Shudra, and the Dalit.
    • Through this the samaj opposed idolatry and denounced the caste system.
    • Satyashodhak Samaj campaigned for the spread of rational thinking and rejected the need for priests.
    • Phule established Satyashodhak Samaj with the ideals of human well-being, happiness, unity, equality, and easy religious principles and rituals.
    • A Pune-based newspaper, Deenbandhu, provided the voice for the views of the Samaj.
    • The membership of the samaj included Muslims, Brahmins and government officials. Phule’s own Mali caste provided the leading members and financial supporters for the organization.

    Published works

    • Tritiya Ratna, 1855
    • Manav Mahammand (Muhammad) (Abhang)
    • Gulamgiri, 1873
    • Sarvajanik Satya Dharma Poostak, April 1889
    • Sarvajanic Satya Dharmapustak, 1891

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  • Climate Change Impact on India and World – International Reports, Key Observations, etc.

    Places in news: Thwaites Glacier

    Prelims Only | Enviro & Biodiversity | Mains Paper 1: Important Geophysical Phenomena

    The melting of Antarctica’s Thwaites Glacier – also called the “Doomsday Glacier”– has long been a cause of concern because of its high potential of speeding up the global sea-level rise happening due to climate change.

    Thwaites Glacier

    • Called the Thwaites Glacier, it is 120 km wide at its broadest, fast-moving, and melting fast over the years.
    • Because of its size (1.9 lakh square km), it contains enough water to raise the world sea level by more than half a meter.
    • Studies have found the amount of ice flowing out of it has nearly doubled over the past 30 years.
    • Thwaites’s melting already contributes 4% to global sea-level rise each year. It is estimated that it would collapse into the sea in 200-900 years.
    • Thwaites is important for Antarctica as it slows the ice behind it from freely flowing into the ocean. Because of the risk it faces — and poses — Thwaites is often called the Doomsday Glacier.

    What have previous studies said?

    • A 2019 study by New York University had discovered a fast-growing cavity in the glacier. Then last year, researchers detected warm water at a vital point below the glacier.
    • The study reported water at just two degrees above freezing point at Thwaites’s “grounding zone” or “grounding line”.
    • The grounding line is the place below a glacier at which the ice transitions between resting fully on bedrock and floating on the ocean as an ice shelf.
    • The location of the line is a pointer to the rate of retreat of a glacier.
    • When glaciers melt and lose weight, they float off the land where they used to be situated. When this happens, the grounding line retreats.
    • That exposes more of a glacier’s underside to seawater, increasing the melting rate resulting in the glacier speeding up, stretching out, and thinning, causing the grounding line to retreat ever further.

    What has the new study revealed?

    • The recent Gothenburg study used an uncrewed submarine to go under the Thwaites glacier front to make observations.
    • The submersible called “Ran” measured among other things the strength, temperature, salinity and oxygen content of the ocean currents that go under the glacier.
    • There is a deep connection to the east through which deepwater flows from Pine Island Bay, a connection that was previously thought to be blocked by an underwater ridge.

    Why this is a cause of worry?

    • The warm water is approaching the pinning points of the glacier from all sides, impacting these locations where the ice is connected to the seabed and where the ice sheet finds stability.
    • This has the potential to make things worse for Thwaites, whose ice shelf is already retreating.

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  • Freedom of Speech – Defamation, Sedition, etc.

    Film Certification Appellate Tribunal (FCAT)

    | Governance | Mains Paper 2: Governance, Transparency & Accountability, Citizens Charters

    The Government of India’s decision to abolish the Film Certification Appellate Tribunal (FCAT), under the Tribunal Reforms Ordinance, 2021, has triggered a wave of criticism with filmmakers.

    The FCAT was the place filmmakers walked into as a penultimate resort to challenging edits suggested to their films by the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC).

    Plunging into crisis

    • FCAT is only one of many tribunals in the country that were either abolished or amalgamated under the Ordinance.
    • Earlier, if a filmmaker fails to clear the Examining Committee (EC) and Revising Committee (RC) hurdles of the CBFC, the FCAT was the next step of recourse, but that is no longer the case.
    • FCAT only charged a nominal fee to hold the screening for its members, and it would pass its judgment immediately.

    Fighting the system

    • FCAT’s panel is predominantly made up of members from industry veterans who arrive at a judgment after balancing both CBFC and the filmmaker’s points of view.
    • Most of CBFC’s decisions were overruled by the Tribunal and that has reassured constitutional rights under Article 19 to filmmakers to express themselves freely.
    • A judge will only look at the issue from a legal perspective, not whether a particular edit will constrict the flow of the movie.

    Re-classifying certification

    • To avoid such issues, the Government constituted the ‘Shyam Benegal Committee’ in January 2016.
    • The committee recommended regulations for film certification — a move away from the current practice adopted by CBFC, and submitted its report in April 2016.
    • According to many, a revamp of the certification system that doesn’t require censoring or cuts is the need of the hour.

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  • Wildlife Conservation Efforts

    Indus and Ganges river dolphins are two different species

    Prelims Only | Enviro & Biodiversity | Mains Paper 3: Conservation, Environmental Pollution & Degradation, Eia

    Detailed analysis of South Asian river dolphins has revealed that the Indus and Ganges River dolphins are not one, but two separate species.

    About Gangetic Dolphin

    • The Gangetic river system is home to a vast variety of aquatic life, including the Gangetic dolphin (Platanista gangetica).
    • It is one of five species of river dolphin found around the world.
    • It is found mainly in the Indian subcontinent, particularly in Ganga-Brahmaputra-Meghna and Karnaphuli-Sangu river systems.
    • An adult dolphin could weigh between 70 kg and 90 kg. The breeding season of the Gangetic dolphin extends from January to June.
    • They feed on several species of fishes, invertebrates etc.

    Indus Dolphin is the divergent specie

    • Currently, they are classified as two subspecies under Platanista gangetica. The study estimates that Indus and Ganges river dolphins may have diverged around 550,000 years ago.
    • The international team studied body growth, skull morphology, tooth counts, colouration and genetic makeup and published the findings last month in Marine Mammal Science.

    Conservation status

    • The Indus and Ganges River dolphins are both classified as ‘Endangered’ species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
    • It is the national aquatic animal and had been granted non-human personhood status by the government in 2017.
    • It is also protected under Schedule I of the Wildlife Protection Act (1972).
    • Vikramshila Gangetic Dolphin Sanctuary (VGDS) in Bihar is India’s only sanctuary for the Gangetic dolphin.
    • It has been categorised as endangered on the Red List of Threatened Species by the IUCN
    • Physical barriers such as dams and barrages created across the river, the declining river flows reduced the gene flow to a great extent making the species vulnerable.

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  • Rohingya Conflict

    India’s refugee Policy & Issues with it

    op-ed snap | International Relations | Mains Paper 2: Effect Of Policies & Politics Of World On India’S Interests,Government Scheme/Policies

    The article highlights the issue of the lack of refugee protection framework in India and suggests enacting domestic law to deal with the issue. 

    India’s record on refugee protection

    • India, for the most part, has had a stellar record on the issue of refugee protection.
    • But this moral tradition has come under great stress of late.
    • New Delhi has been one of the largest recipients of refugees in the world in spite of not being a party to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol.

    Confusion in policies for immigrants and refugees

    • Much of the debate in India is about illegal immigrants, not refugees, the two categories tend to get bunched together.
    • Our policies towards illegal immigrants and refugees is confused is because as per Indian law, both categories of people are viewed as one and the same and are covered under the Foreigners Act, 1946.
    • The act offers a simple definition of a foreigner — “foreigner” means “a person who is not a citizen of India”.
    • There are fundamental differences between illegal immigrants and refugees, but India is legally ill-equipped to deal with them separately due to a lack of legal provisions.
    • Also, India is not a party to the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, the key legal documents pertaining to refugee protection.

    How absence of policy framework creates problems

    • The absence of legal framework for refugees leads to policy ambiguity whereby India’s refugee policy is guided primarily by ad hocism and ‘political utility’.
    • At the same time, the absence of a legal framework increases the possibility of the domestic politicisation of refugee protection and complicates its geopolitical faultlines.
    • The absence of a clearly laid down refugee protection law also opens the door for geopolitical considerations while deciding to admit refugees or not.
    • For example, India’s decision in the recent case of admitting Myanmarese refugees fleeing to India was influence by the possibility of irking the Generals in Naypyitaw.
    • However, hypothetically speaking, if New Delhi had domestic legislation regarding refugees it could have tempered the expectations of the junta to return the fleeing Myanmarese.

    Why India has not signed convention and protocol on refugee protection

    • The definition of refugees in the 1951 convention only pertains to the violation of civil and political rights, but not economic rights, of individuals.
    • If the violation of economic rights were to be included in the definition of a refugee, it would clearly pose a major burden on the developed world.
    • This argument, if used in the South Asian context, could be a problematic proposition for India too.
    • India also need to argue that the North is violating the convention in both letter and spirit, and make its accession conditional on the Western States rolling back the non-entrée (no entry) regime.
    • The non-entrée regime is constituted by a range of legal and administrative measures that include visa restrictions, carrier sanctions, interdictions, third safe-country rule, restrictive interpretations of the definition of ‘refugee’, withdrawal of social welfare benefits to asylum seekers, and widespread practices of detention.”
    • In other words, India must use its exemplary, though less than perfect, history of refugee protection to begin a global conversation on the issue.

    Way forward

    • What other options do we have to respond to the refugee situation we are faced with?
    • The answer perhaps lies in a new domestic law aimed at refugees.
    • The CAA, however, is not the answer to this problem primarily because of its deeply discriminatory nature.
    • What is perhaps equally important is that such a domestic refugee law should allow for temporary shelter and work permit for refugees.
    • India must also make a distinction between temporary migrant workers, illegal immigrants and refugees and deal with each of them differently through proper legal and institutional mechanisms.

    Consider the question “What are the reasons for India’s not singing 1951 Refugee Convention? What are the options India can explore for refugee protection? 

    Conclusion

    Our traditional practice of managing these issues with ambiguity and political expediency has become deeply counterproductive: It neither protects the refugees nor helps stop illegal immigration into the country.

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  • Give small savers what is due to them

    op-ed snap | Economics | Mains Paper 3: Indian Economy

    The article highlights the issues with linking small savings interest rates with the yield on G-sec and its resetting on a quarterly basis.

    Issue of small savings interest rate

    • For decades, small savings have constituted an important source of household savings, funded development programmes of state governments and offered a safe and secure source of income to senior citizens.
    • Recently, a notification on reducing the interest rates on small savings schemes quickly made headlines and was rescinded after 12 hours.
    • For small savers, the pandemic turned into a triple whammy: Battling job losses, higher food prices and a sharp devaluation in the value of their savings and earnings thereof. 
    • Interest on the Senior Citizens’ Saving Scheme was cut to 7.4 per cent, effective from April 2020, from 8.7 per cent before,
    • This was done despite the Gopinath Committee had recommended the rates should never be revised more than 100 basis points in a single year.

    Linking small savings rate to G-sec yields

    • The suggestion to link small savings rates to G-Sec yields was first made in 2001 by Y V Reddy, then deputy governor of RBI.
    • Reddy committee suggested small savings rates should be reset once a year, allowing for a spread of up to 50 basis points.
    • Reddy’s recommendations were reiterated by his successor Rakesh Mohan.
    • The Gopinath Committee,  set up in 2009 gave its report in June 2011 and annual revisions in small savings rates linked to G-sec yields got underway effective April 2012.
    • In 2016, however, the government decided to reset them on a quarterly basis. 

    Why link small savings rate to G-sec yields

    • Such linking is premised on the argument that the money collected through these schemes is invested in central and state government securities. 
    • While the yield on the government securities progressively declined over time, small savings rates remained downwardly rigid.
    • This resulted in an asset-liability mismatch that threatened the viability of the NSSF.
    • It is also argued that people’s dependence on small savings schemes had significantly declined since formal banking had rapidly expanded.
    • Moreover, for those who used small savings as safety nets there were other alternatives such as old-age pension and other similar schemes.

    Issues with resetting rates on quarterly basis

    • All expert committees that examined the issue had strongly argued against resetting the rates on a quarterly basis.
    • The fear was it could result in unfair rewards for small savers in the event the G-sec yields remain artificially low for a certain period of time.
    • It did happen in the pandemic year when small savings rates faced the steepest cut in five years.
    • The changed policy on small savings is also premised on the belief that markets offer fair outcomes.
    • More often than not, that is not true.
    • The experience of the past year bears it out.
    • While retail inflation spiked, the RBI used every trick in its bag to hold G-sec yields down.

    Way forward

    • The government could go back to resetting the rates annually, keeping the revision under 100 basis points and allowing small savings rates a spread of at least 50 basis points, not up to 50 basis points, over and above the G-sec yields.
    • Also, it may revisit the suggestion made by the Rakesh Mohan Committee to use a weighted average of G-sec yields over preceding two years — two-thirds weight for the later year, one-third for the earlier year.

    Consider the question “What was the rationale for linking the interest rates on small savings to yield on G-sec? What are the issues with it?

    Conclusion

    Adopting the changes suggested here may require setting aside a few thousand crores to fill the resultant gap in the NSSF. But it is worth doing.

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  • Foreign Policy Watch: India-United States

    Freedom of Navigation Operations

    IOCR | International Relations | Mains Paper 2: Bilateral, Regional and Global Groupings and agreements involving India

    The US Navy has had “asserted navigational rights and freedoms approximately 130 nautical miles west of Lakshadweep Islands, inside India’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ), without requesting India’s prior consent, consistent with international law”.

    Try this question:

    Q.What do you mean by Freedom of Navigation Operations (FONOPs)? What are its legal backings?  Discuss its significance.

    Freedom of Navigation Operations

    • FONOPs are closely linked to the concept of freedom of navigation, and in particular to the enforcement of relevant international law and customs regarding freedom of navigation.
    • It involves passage conducted by the US Navy through waters claimed by coastal nations as their exclusive territory.
    • It is carried under the US policy of exercising and asserting its navigation and overflight rights and freedoms around the world”.
    • It says these “assertions communicate that the US does not acquiesce to the excessive maritime claims of other nations, and thus prevents those claims from becoming accepted in international law”.

    Significance of FONOPs

    • FONOPs are a method of enforcing UNCLOS (United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea) and avoiding these negative outcomes by reinforcing freedom of navigation through practice.
    • It is exercised by sailing through all areas of the sea permitted under UNCLOS, and particularly those areas that states have attempted to close off to free navigation as defined under UNCLOS.

    What about EEZs?

    • An exclusive economic zone (EEZ) is prescribed by the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.
    • It is an area of the sea in which a sovereign state has special rights regarding the exploration and use of marine resources, including energy production from water and wind.
    • It stretches from the baseline out to 200 nautical miles from the coast of the state in question.
    • It is also referred to as a maritime continental margin and, in colloquial usage, may include the continental shelf.
    • The term does not include either the territorial sea or the continental shelf beyond the 200 nautical mile limit.
    • The difference between the territorial sea and the exclusive economic zone is that the first confers full sovereignty over the waters, whereas the second is merely a “sovereign right” which refers to the coastal state’s rights below the surface of the sea.
    • The surface waters, as can be seen on the map, are international waters.

    Is FONOP violative of India’s EEZ?

    • As per India’s Territorial Waters Act, 1976, the EEZ of India “is an area beyond and adjacent to the territorial waters, and the limit of such zone is two hundred nautical miles from the baseline”.
    • India’s “limit of the territorial waters is the line every point of which is at a distance of twelve nautical miles from the nearest point of the appropriate baseline”.
    • Under the 1976 law, “all foreign ships (other than warships including submarines and other underwater vehicles) shall enjoy the right of innocent passage through the territorial waters”.

    Back2Basics: UNCLOS

    • The Law of the Sea Treaty formally known as the Third United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea was adopted in 1982 at Montego Bay, Jamaica. It entered into force in 1994.
    • The convention establishes a comprehensive set of rules governing the oceans and replaces previous U.N. Conventions on the Law of the Sea
    • The convention defines the distance of 12 nautical miles from the baseline as Territorial Sea limit and a distance of 200 nautical miles distance as Exclusive Economic Zone limit.

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  • Minority Issues – SC, ST, Dalits, OBC, Reservations, etc.

    People are free to choose religion: Supreme Court

    | Indian Society | Mains Paper 1: Communalism, Secularism, Regionalism

    The Supreme Court has said people are free to choose their own religion and lashed out at a PIL claiming that there is mass religious conversion happening across the country.

    Right to freedom of Religion

    Article 25 of the Constitution guarantees freedom of religion to all persons in India. It provides that all persons in India, subject to public order, morality, health, and other provisions:

    • Are equally entitled to freedom of conscience, and
    • Have the right to freely profess, practice and propagate religion.

    It further provides that this article shall not affect any existing law and shall not prevent the state from making any law relating to:

    • Regulation or restriction of any economic, financial, political, or secular activity associated with religious practice.
    • Providing social welfare and reform.
    • Opening of Hindu religious institutions of public character for all the classes and sections of the Hindus.

    What did the Supreme Court say?

    • Instead, a Bench led by Justice Rohinton F. Nariman said people have a right under the Constitution to profess, practise and propagate religion.
    • Justice Nariman said every person is the final judge of their own choice of religion or who their life partner should be. Courts cannot sit in judgment of a person’s choice of religion or a life partner.
    • Religious faith is a part of the fundamental right to privacy.
    • Justice Nariman reminded Mr Upadhyay of the Constitution Bench judgment which upheld inviolability of the right to privacy, equating it with the rights to life, dignity and liberty.

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  • Higher Education – RUSA, NIRF, HEFA, etc.

    SARTHAQ Plan

    | Governance | Mains Paper 2: Health & Education

    Union Education Minister has launched ‘Students’ and Teachers’ Holistic Advancement through Quality Education (SARTHAQ), the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 implementation plan for school education.

    SARTHAQ

    • SARTHAQ keeps in mind the concurrent nature of education and adheres to the spirit of federalism.
    • The plan delineates the roadmap for the implementation of NEP 2020 for the next 10 years.
    • States and Union Territories have been given the flexibility to adapt the plan with “local contextualization”.
    • They have been allowed to modify the plan as per their needs and requirements.

    Envisaged outcomes

    • Increase in Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER), Net Enrolment Ratio (NER), transition rate and retention rate at all levels and reduction in dropouts and out of school children.
    • Access to quality ECCE and Universal Acquisition of Foundational Literacy and Numeracy by Grade 3.
    • Improvement in Learning Outcomes at all stages with an emphasis on teaching and learning through mother tongue/local/regional languages in the early years.
    • Integration of vocational education, sports, arts, knowledge of India, 21st-century skills, values of citizenship, awareness of environment conservation, etc. in the curriculum at all stages.
    • Introduction of Experiential learning at all stages and adoption of innovative pedagogies by teachers in classroom transaction.
    • Integration of technology in educational planning and governance and availability of ICT and quality e-content in classrooms.

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