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Subject: Polity

  • PAC pulls up Railways over gaps in amenities despite promises

    Why in the News

    The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has recorded concern over persistent deficiencies in passenger amenities and sanitation across railway stations, after a Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) audit found that bio toilets were deficient or non functional at 491 of the 512 stations inspected. The Committee was examining the CAG’s Report No. 31 of 2026 on passenger amenities and sanitation at stations. The finding is not new to the Committee. Four PAC reports on the same subject have been presented since 2007, each flagging key deficiencies, and the Ministry of Railways has continued to file action taken reports without producing significant improvement on the ground. The tension is therefore not about what is wrong at stations but about what an accountability mechanism can do when its findings are answered on paper and left unimplemented for close to two decades.

    What is the Public Accounts Committee?

    1. About: The Public Accounts Committee is a parliamentary financial committee that examines the accounts showing the appropriation of sums granted by Parliament and the audit reports of the Comptroller and Auditor General laid before the House.
    2. Composition and tenure: It has 22 members, 15 elected from the Lok Sabha and 7 from the Rajya Sabha, elected annually by proportional representation through the single transferable vote.
    3. Chairmanship: By convention followed since 1967, the Chairperson is drawn from the Opposition, which is what gives the Committee’s scrutiny of the executive its independent character.
    4. Follow up instrument: A ministry responds to the Committee’s recommendations through an action taken report, which is the formal record of what the executive says it has done.

    What did the audit find on station amenities?

    1. Bio toilets, presented as the fix, failed at scale: A facility the Indian Railways projected as a game changer was found deficient or non functional at the overwhelming majority of stations inspected.
    2. Water vending machines: Audit teams found deficiencies at 29 of 77 stations where these machines were checked.
    3. Wi-Fi facilities: Deficiencies were recorded at 65 of 380 stations checked.
    4. The assurance being tested: The audit measured these findings against what the Ministry had told the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Railways in the 2020 to 2021 year, that bio toilets, water vending machines and Wi-Fi facilities had been introduced.

    Why did the Committee call the Railways’ response inadequate?

    1. A record of repeated findings: Four Committee reports on passenger amenities and sanitation have been presented since 2007, each identifying key deficiencies.
    2. Findings acknowledged and not acted on: The Chairperson noted that the Railways ignored those findings while continuing to submit action taken reports.
    3. Scale is not an excuse: The Chairperson accepted the scale and complexity of managing the Indian Railways, and held that this should not hamper basic services for citizens.
    4. The deficiencies are elementary: The services named as carrying serious discrepancies are drinking water, seating arrangements, fans and roofing on platforms, none of which is a technically difficult provision.

    What has the Committee directed now?

    1. A backward looking review: The Ministry has been directed to review the Committee’s observations made since its 2007 report, rather than only the latest audit.
    2. A dated response: The Ministry must submit a response within a month, detailing the measures it will take to address the deficiencies.
    3. A follow up sitting: The Committee will call another meeting with Railway officials after that month to discuss the response.

    Challenges to the Public Accounts Committee

    1. Recommendations carry no enforcement: The Committee can record a finding, but no rule compels the executive to implement it, and the House does not vote on its recommendations. Eg. Four reports on the same subject since 2007 have each been answered without a corresponding change at stations.
      The Fix: Require the ministry concerned to lay a compliance statement against every recommendation, naming the responsible department and a date, so non implementation becomes a recorded decision.
    2. Scrutiny is entirely after the fact: The Committee examines accounts of money already appropriated and spent, so it cannot stop an outlay that is going wrong while it is going wrong. Eg. An audit report on amenities reaches the Committee years after the facilities it examines were installed.
      The Fix: Pair the post audit examination with a mid year review of the schemes flagged adversely in the previous year’s audit, before the next tranche is released.
    3. Policy is outside its remit: The Committee may ask whether money was spent as voted, not whether the policy behind the spending was sound. Eg. A finding that bio toilets are non functional does not allow the Committee to examine whether that technology should have been selected.
      The Fix: Refer the design question to the departmentally related standing committee at the same sitting, so the audit finding and the policy review proceed together.
    4. Annual reconstitution breaks continuity: Members are elected for a one year term, so an examination running across sessions is inherited by a differently composed Committee. Eg. An inquiry opened in one Committee’s year is concluded by members who did not hear the original evidence.
      The Fix: Carry an unfinished examination forward to the succeeding Committee with the same member acting as rapporteur on that subject.

    Conclusion

    The Committee has not discovered a new problem. It has recorded that an accountability loop has been running for close to two decades without closing: the audit finds, the Committee recommends, the Ministry responds, and the station stays as it was. The Chairperson’s direction converts that pattern into a dated test, a written response on measures within a month and a sitting with Railway officials after it. Whether that response names specific works against specific stations, or restates the assurances the audit has already found unfulfilled, is the thing to watch.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    “[2017, GS2, 10] Discuss the role of Public Accounts Committee in establishing accountability of the government to the people.”

  • Missing in EC affidavit on SIR in Bengal: Break-up of appeals for name inclusion

    Why in the News

    The Election Commission of India (EC) has told the Supreme Court that only 1,02,231 of the 38,20,683 appeals filed against deletions and inclusions in the West Bengal Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls have been disposed of, leaving 37,18,452 pending five months after the Court ordered appellate tribunals began working. The affidavit did not carry the one thing the Court had asked for, a break up of the appeals by ground, meaning how many were filed by the 27.16 lakh deleted electors seeking to get back on the rolls and how many were filed by the poll panel against inclusion of names. That break up is not a formality. A Bench hearing the West Bengal petitions had said in August that an exclusion denudes a voting right while an inclusion does not affect an individual right, so the two categories should be prioritised differently and the tribunals’ burden reduced accordingly. Without the break up, the Court cannot order that prioritisation, and the pending stock stays undifferentiated.

    What is the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls?

    1. About: An intensive revision rebuilds the electoral roll by requiring electors to establish eligibility afresh, rather than only adding and deleting names against the existing roll.
    2. How a name moves: Enrolment is sought through Form 6, the statutory form for voter registration, and deletion is sought through Form 7.
    3. Scale of the current exercise: The revision was under way in nine States and three Union Territories from October 2025.
    4. What makes West Bengal different: Noting the trust deficit between the Commission and the then State government, the Supreme Court took the unprecedented step of ordering that the eligibility of electors in the State be adjudicated by judicial officers rather than by electoral registration machinery alone.

    How was the West Bengal appellate mechanism built?

    1. Judicial adjudication first: Around 700 judicial officers decided the eligibility of the 60.06 lakh electors the Commission had marked “under adjudication”.
    2. The outcome of that adjudication: The officers ordered the deletion of 27.16 lakh names and the inclusion of 32.9 lakh.
    3. An appeal layer was then ordered: The Supreme Court directed on 10 March that an appellate mechanism be set up so that anyone aggrieved by a judicial officer’s order had a route to challenge it.
    4. The tribunals themselves: The Commission notified 19 appellate tribunals on 20 March, each consisting of a single retired High Court judge, and they began functioning on 13 April.

    What do the appeal numbers show?

    1. The stock is close to untouched: Disposal stands at a fraction of the appeals filed, and the overwhelming majority remain pending after five months of working tribunals.
    2. Capacity against volume: Nineteen tribunals, each a single judge, carry the entire appellate load of a State wide revision.
    3. The proceeding that produced the figures: The Commission filed the counter affidavit in answer to a July notice on a petition by a West Bengal Congress leader seeking details of pending appeals and of additions and deletions to the rolls.

    Why does the missing break up matter to the Court?

    1. The two categories are not equivalent: An exclusion takes away an existing voting right, while an inclusion does not take away anything from an individual, which is why the Court wanted them separated.
    2. Prioritisation is the practical remedy the Court was examining: Separating the categories would let exclusion appeals be heard first and would bring down the tribunals’ burden to some extent.
    3. The Commission was asked directly: The Bench told counsel for the Commission in August to get the data on the nature of the appeals filed, whether for inclusion or for exclusion, before it took a call.
    4. What the affidavit supplied instead: The affidavit gave totals filed, disposed of and pending, with no split by ground of appeal.

    What does the rest of the Commission’s data say about the roll?

    1. Enrolment applications: From the publication of the SIR draft roll on 17 December 2025 until 7 August, 34.13 lakh Form 6 applications were filed, covering both first time applicants and those among the 58.20 lakh electors deleted at the draft stage.
    2. Disposal of those applications: 4.86 lakh forms were unprocessed, 7.26 lakh enrolment forms were rejected and 14,079 were accepted.
    3. Deletion applications: 6.39 lakh Form 7 applications were filed, of which 14,506 were rejected and 3,355 were accepted.

    What do the gender ratio and the elector population ratio indicate?

    1. Gender ratio before the revision: The number of female electors per 1,000 male electors stood at 969 on 1 January 2025 and rose to 970 by 27 October 2025, the day the revision was announced in the State.
    2. Gender ratio during the revision: The ratio fell to 956 in the draft roll of 16 December 2025, and recovered only partly to 964 in the final SIR roll published on 28 February.
    3. Elector population ratio, and what it measures: The elector population ratio (EP ratio) is the number of electors per 100 people, and it is used as a check on the health of a roll, since the elector count should sit close to the population above 18 years.
    4. Where West Bengal now stands: Against a projected population of 10.40 crore, the State has 6.44 crore electors, giving an EP ratio of 62 electors per 100 population, below the 66.76 recorded for the country at the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

    Challenges to the SIR appellate process

    1. Capacity was fixed before the volume was known: The number of tribunals was notified in March, before the scale of appeals emerged, and it has not moved since. Eg. Each tribunal is a single retired High Court judge covering several districts of the State.
      The Fix: Tie the number of tribunals to the district wise stock of pending appeals, with a per tribunal monthly disposal norm reviewed each quarter.
    2. The burden of proof sits on the deleted elector: The appellate route opens only after a judicial officer has already ruled against the person, so the elector must produce documents the revision itself found insufficient. Eg. The statutory route back on to the roll is a fresh Form 6, and rejections of such forms in the State run into lakhs.
      The Fix: Allow a tribunal to call for the electoral registration record of the previous roll on its own motion, so an old entry is evidence the elector does not have to reproduce.
    3. An appeal decided after a poll restores nothing: A vote missed because a name was wrongly deleted cannot be returned by a later favourable order. Eg. Bypolls in the State are due on 6 October while the pending stock runs into tens of lakhs.
      The Fix: Require appeals from any constituency going to poll to be decided before the last date for nominations in that constituency.

    Conclusion

    The appellate mechanism was created to give a wrongly deleted elector a way back, and its output so far is a small fraction of its intake. The Court’s proposed remedy was not more tribunals but a triage that puts exclusions first, and that remedy is blocked by the absence of a single dataset the Commission has not filed. Until the break up by ground of appeal is placed on record, the Court cannot order prioritisation and the pending stock stays undifferentiated. The next hearing, and whether the Commission files that break up before it, is the point to watch.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    “[2017, GS2, 15] To enhance the quality of democracy in India the Election Commission of India has proposed electoral reforms in 2016. What are the suggested reforms and how far are they significant to make democracy successful?”

  • Ahead of Bengal bypolls, TMC name, symbol are frozen by EC

    Why in the News

    The Election Commission of India (EC) has ordered an interim freeze on the name and the election symbol of the All India Trinamool Congress, and directed the two rival factions to select new names and new symbols until the dispute is resolved. The order records that two rival groups exist inside the party, one led by Mamata Banerjee and the other led by Arup Roy, and that each group now claims to be the party. The Commission held that this requires a substantive determination under Para 15 of the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968, and that there is not enough time to make that determination before the polls. The freeze comes ten days after the Commission announced bypolls in the Nandigram and Rejinagar Assembly constituencies of West Bengal for 6 October, for which both factions have already nominated candidates. The contest is therefore fought without the label and the symbol that identify the party to the voter, and the question of who the party actually is remains open.

    What is Para 15 of the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order, 1968?

    1. About: Para 15 is the provision under which the Election Commission decides a dispute between rival sections of a registered political party, each claiming to be that party.
    2. What it settles: The determination decides which group is entitled to the party’s name and its reserved symbol, and that decision binds all the rival sections.
    3. Interim power: Where the Commission cannot decide the claim in time, it may freeze the disputed name and symbol and allot the rival groups substitute names and symbols for the election at hand.
    4. Free symbols: A substitute symbol is drawn from the list of free symbols the Commission notifies for an election, which are symbols not reserved to any recognised party.

    What did the Election Commission actually order?

    1. Neither group keeps the label: Neither faction may use the name All India Trinamool Congress or the party’s “flowers and grass” symbol until the dispute is decided.
    2. New names, with a permitted link: Each group may be known by a name of its own choosing, and may include a linkage with the parent party’s name in that choice.
    3. New symbols from the free list: Each group is to be allotted a different symbol chosen from the list of free symbols notified for the current bypolls.
    4. A one day window: Both sides were asked to submit their preferences for names and symbols by 11 am on Friday, which places the choice days before the poll.
    5. The stated rationale: The Commission recorded that the freeze places both rival groups on an even keel, protects their rights and interests, and follows past precedence.

    How did the split inside the party arise?

    1. Trigger, an electoral defeat: The split emerged soon after the Bharatiya Janata Party won the West Bengal Assembly elections in May.
    2. A legislature party revolt: On 3 June, around 60 of the party’s 80 MLAs rebelled against the party leadership.
    3. Recognition inside the House: The rebels chose Ritabrata Banerjee as Leader of Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly and secured recognition for that choice from the Assembly Speaker.
    4. A rival organisational claim: The rebel faction later declared Arup Roy the party chairperson, which converted a legislature party revolt into a claim over the party itself.
    5. The counter claim on record: The Commission’s order notes that Mamata Banerjee informed it on 23 June that the party’s national working committee had met on 20 June and that office bearers and committee members had been declared.

    Why did the poll calendar force an interim order rather than a decision?

    1. Both factions are already contestants: Each group has nominated candidates for Nandigram and Rejinagar, so the Commission had to allot each of them something to contest under.
    2. Time, not merits, decided the form of the order: The Commission held that the dispute could not be substantively resolved before the bypolls, so it chose a freeze over an award.
    3. The objection on record: The Mamata Banerjee faction told the Commission at a meeting the same day that no interim order should be passed.
    4. Representation at the hearing: The Arup Roy faction was represented before the Commission by the Leader of Opposition in the West Bengal Assembly.

    Challenges to symbol dispute adjudication under the Symbols Order

    1. No outer time limit: Para 15 fixes no deadline for deciding a claim, so a freeze can run across an entire election cycle. Eg. The Shiv Sena dispute that began in mid 2022 was decided by a final Commission order only in February 2023.
      The Fix: Insert an outer time limit in the Symbols Order for deciding a Para 15 reference, with an interim freeze lapsing if it is crossed.
    2. The majority test favours the legislature wing: The test applied since Sadiq Ali v. Election Commission of India (1971) turns on numerical majority in the organisational and legislature wings, and the side holding the legislators usually prevails. Eg. The Nationalist Congress Party name and its clock symbol went in February 2024 to the faction holding the larger number of legislators.
      The Fix: Anchor the organisational wing test in audited membership and internal election records rather than in affidavits of support collected after the split.
    3. Party internal records are self reported: The Commission decides who the party is largely from lists of office bearers the party itself files, which no external authority audits. Eg. The present order rests in part on an intimation of national working committee appointments filed by one faction.
      The Fix: Require every registered party to file audited internal election records annually as a condition of retaining registration.
    4. The voter bears the cost of a freeze: A freeze removes the name and symbol a voter recognises at the exact moment the voter has to identify a candidate. Eg. Both factions here must pick substitute symbols within a day of the order and campaign on them.
      The Fix: Where a freeze falls inside a notified poll, allow each group to carry a printed reference to the parent party name on the ballot alongside the new symbol.

    Conclusion

    An interim freeze decides nothing about ownership of a party. It only removes the disputed asset from both claimants so that neither gains an advantage at a poll the Commission could not decide in time for. The substantive question, which group is the All India Trinamool Congress for the purposes of the Symbols Order, is still to be determined. The marker to watch is the Commission’s Para 15 determination after the bypolls, and whether the organisational records filed by each side or the strength of the legislature party decides it.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    “[2022, GS2, 15] While the national political parties in India favour centralisation, the regional parties are in favour of State autonomy. Comment.”

  • Supreme Court asks Tamil Nadu to comply with order to identify land for Navodaya schools

    Why in the News

    The Supreme Court has asked the Tamil Nadu government to comply with its order to identify land for establishing Navodaya schools in every district of the State, and has given it three months to do so. A two judge Bench framed the direction around the need to strengthen cooperative federalism, and asked the Centre and the State to settle their differences on language policy and funding through dialogue. The direction continues a chain that began with a Madras High Court order of 11 September 2017, which asked the State to identify an appropriate place and building for the school and thereafter to allocate suitable land in every district. The Supreme Court had itself asked the State to identify the land in December 2025, and the State came back seeking a recall of that order rather than compliance. The contest is over what a national residential school brings with it: the State’s stated objection is not to Hindi being taught but to Hindi being taught as the predominant language in higher classes, while the Court’s position is that an additional school network cannot lower the State’s own standards.

    What is the Navodaya Vidyalaya Scheme?

    1. About: Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas are fully residential, co educational schools funded by the Union government to give talented rural children access to quality schooling without paying for it.
    2. Administration: The schools are run by the Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti, an autonomous body under the Ministry of Education, and are affiliated to the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE).
    3. Coverage design: The scheme provides for one school in each district of the country, with the State supplying the land and the Centre funding construction and running costs.
    4. Entry: Admission is at Class 6 through the Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya Selection Test, with a majority of seats in each district reserved for rural candidates.

    What did the Court direct, and what was it responding to?

    1. Compliance, not recall: The State asked the Court to recall its earlier direction to identify land, and the Court refused, giving the State three months to identify the land instead.
    2. Scope of the direction: The obligation is to identify land in all districts, which is the same two step sequence the Madras High Court laid down: fix a place and a building first, then allot suitable land.
    3. Dialogue as the route: The Bench asked the State’s Secretary to speak with Central officials, and directed that differences on language policy and funding be resolved through discussion rather than through further litigation.

    Why has Tamil Nadu resisted the schools?

    1. Language policy, not Hindi teaching: Counsel for the State told the Court that the objection is not to Hindi being taught, but to Hindi being taught as the predominant language in higher classes.
    2. The Court’s factual answer: The Bench pointed out that Hindi is already taught in many schools in the State, and said the State should change its mindset on the question.
    3. A middle position was offered: The Bench indicated that a demand for Tamil as a second language inside the school is a matter that can be considered.
    4. Beyond language: The Court grouped funding alongside language as a live Centre State difference to be settled by discussion, so the dispute is not confined to the medium of instruction.

    How did the Court frame this as a federal question?

    1. Cooperative federalism as the stated ground: The Court underlined the need to strengthen cooperative federalism as the reason for asking the State to comply, rather than treating the matter as a bare question of executing a High Court order.
    2. Addition, not substitution: The Bench held that more schools of another type in the State would only enhance its education network and expand opportunity for students, and would not lower the standard of education there.
    3. Neither side is being displaced: The Bench recorded that the order alienates neither the State nor the Centre, adding that people in Chennai should not alienate Delhi and the reverse should not happen either, and that everybody must ultimately work together.

    Challenges to the Navodaya Vidyalaya Scheme

    1. Dependence on State land allotment: The Centre funds and runs the school but cannot open one until the State allots land, so a State that withholds land blocks the scheme completely. Eg. Tamil Nadu has no Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya despite the scheme having run since 1986.
      The Fix: Write a land allotment timeline into the scheme guidelines against a named nodal secretary in each State, so the step produces a dated decision rather than an open file.
    2. A single entry point: General admission happens only at Class 6 through one selection test, so a child who misses that year has no ordinary route in later. Eg. Entry at Class 9 is confined to seats left vacant in a school.
      The Fix: Reserve a fixed share of Class 9 seats in every school for lateral entry, advertised on the same calendar as the Class 6 test.
    3. Scale against district demand: One school per district cannot absorb the demand for free residential schooling in a populous district. Eg. A standard Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya admits about 80 students a year at Class 6.
      The Fix: Sanction a second school in districts where applications exceed a set multiple of the sanctioned intake.

    Conclusion

    The dispute is no longer about whether the schools are good for students. It is about whether a State can decline a centrally funded institution because of the language package attached to it. The Court has converted that into a procedural question with a deadline: identify the land in three months, and take the language and funding disagreement to the officials rather than back to the Bench. What to watch is whether the State’s Secretary and the Central officials produce a settled position on the second language inside these schools before the three months run out.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    “[2024, GS2, 15] What changes has the Union Government recently introduced in the domain of Centre-State relations? Suggest measures to be adopted to build the trust between the Centre and the States and for strengthening federalism.”

  • What is the Uniform Civil Code debate?

    Why in the News

    The Union Home Minister has indicated that the Uniform Civil Code (UCC) would be implemented in all 21 States ruled by the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) by 2029. The statement builds on enactment that has already begun. Uttarakhand has had a UCC in force since January 2025, and UCC bills passed by the legislatures of Assam, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh are awaiting Presidential assent. The tension the debate turns on is between two constitutional claims. Article 44 directs the State to endeavour to secure a UCC, while Article 25 guarantees the right to practise a religion of one’s choice and Article 29 protects the right of any section of citizens to conserve its distinct culture.

    What is a Uniform Civil Code?

    1. What it does: A UCC would apply the same set of secular personal laws to all people, irrespective of religion, caste or tribe.
    2. Its constitutional basis: Article 44 provides that the State shall endeavour to secure a UCC for citizens throughout India.
    3. What is already uniform: India already has uniform criminal laws, and common civil laws covering matters such as taxation, contracts and negotiable instruments.
    4. What is not: Marriage, divorce and inheritance of property remain governed by personal laws based on religious doctrines.

    How are personal matters governed today?

    1. Hindus: Governed by laws such as the Hindu Marriage Act (1955) and the Hindu Succession Act (1956).
    2. Tribals within the Hindu religion: Many may follow customary family laws under constitutional exceptions rather than the codified Hindu statutes.
    3. Jains, Buddhists and Sikhs: Covered by Hindu laws, with Sikh marriages also registrable under the Anand Marriage Act (2012).
    4. Christians and Parsis: Each community has its own personal laws.
    5. Muslims: Governed by the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Application Act (1937).

    Why did the Constituent Assembly place the UCC in Part IV?

    1. The Assembly was divided: The framers did not reach agreement on whether a UCC belonged in the Constitution at all.
    2. The case for a Fundamental Right: Some members wanted it made a Fundamental Right, to ensure uniformity in civil laws and secure equal rights for women.
    3. The objection raised: Many members of the Muslim community opposed its inclusion, on the ground that a uniform civil code would violate the fundamental right to religion guaranteed in Part III.
    4. The settlement reached: The provision was placed in the non justiciable Part IV, the Directive Principles of State Policy, so it directs the State without being enforceable in a court.

    What are the arguments in favour of a UCC?

    1. Secularism in substance: Subjecting all citizens to the same personal laws would make India secular in the true sense, rather than leaving the State to administer a different law for each community.
    2. Gender justice: A UCC would ensure equal rights for women across religions in the matters governed by personal laws, which is described as the most vital argument for it.

    What are the arguments against a UCC?

    1. Conflict with the right to religion: Article 25 guarantees every person a fundamental right to practise a religion of one’s choice, and a UCC’s provisions on personal matters may run contrary to the scriptures of a religion.
    2. Conflict with cultural rights: Article 29 gives any section of citizens a fundamental right to conserve its distinct culture, which the codification of family matters may cut across.
    3. The tribal exemption: All four States that have enacted a UCC have exempted the tribal population from its ambit, on the grounds of constitutional safeguards protecting tribal culture and the belief that many tribal customs already provide adequate rights to women.
    4. Why that exemption is contested: Exempting one section of society while making the code compulsory for all other groups, including religious minorities, is discriminatory on its face.

    How have the courts and the Law Commission framed the way forward?

    1. Article 25 is not unqualified: The right to religion is subject to constitutional morality and to other fundamental rights, including equality.
    2. The Supreme Court on cultural protection: In the Section 6A of the Citizenship Act, 1955 (2024) case, the Court held that practices such as casteism and gender discrimination, which run against the spirit of the Constitution, would not receive protection under Article 29.
    3. Ambedkar’s voluntary route: In the Constituent Assembly, B.R. Ambedkar advocated a UCC but suggested it could remain voluntary, with Parliament providing for it to apply to citizens who declare they are willing to be bound by it.
    4. The Law Commission’s position: Its Consultation Paper on Reform of Family Law (2018) held that a UCC was neither necessary nor desirable at this stage, and argued instead for reforming discriminatory provisions across personal laws.
    5. The standard it proposed: The emphasis should be on achieving “equality within communities” between men and women, rather than “equality between communities”, through legislative reform of marriage, divorce, custody, adoption, maintenance, succession and inheritance.

    Challenges to a Uniform Civil Code

    1. No published draft to debate: The argument runs on positions rather than on text, because no model code has been placed in the public domain for the country as a whole. Eg. The 22nd Law Commission sought public views on the UCC in 2023 without circulating a draft code alongside the notice.
      The Fix: Publish a model draft code for consultation before further State enactments, so objections attach to clauses rather than to the idea.
    2. State by State enactment fragments uniformity: Personal law sits in the Concurrent List, so separate State codes can produce different rules on the same subject and defeat the uniformity the code is named for. Eg. Entry 5 of the Concurrent List covers marriage, divorce, infants and minors, adoption, wills and succession.
      The Fix: Anchor the State codes to a central framework law so the substantive rules converge even where each State enacts its own.
    3. Scope creep beyond family law: A code enacted to equalise rights in marriage and succession can extend into regulating private arrangements that no personal law governed. Eg. Uttarakhand’s code makes registration of a live in relationship compulsory, with a penalty for failure to register.
      The Fix: Confine the code to marriage, divorce, maintenance, adoption and succession, and drop registration duties that create fresh offences.
    4. Adjudication capacity: Codification moves disputes into family courts that already carry long pendency, so a new right delivers slowly in practice. Eg. Family courts constituted under the Family Courts Act, 1984 carry pendency running into lakhs of cases.
      The Fix: Expand family court benches and statutory mediation capacity before any commencement date is notified.

    Conclusion

    The debate is no longer only about Article 44 in the abstract, since four States have already legislated and the stated target is all 21 NDA ruled States by 2029. The unresolved question is whether equality in personal law is better reached by replacing the personal laws or by reforming the discriminatory provisions inside each of them, which is the choice between the State codes and the Law Commission’s 2018 position. The immediate marker is Presidential assent for the codes passed by the legislatures of Assam, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh.

    Back2Basics: Directive Principles of State Policy (DPSP)

    1. Where they sit: Part IV of the Constitution, Articles 36 to 51, setting out goals the State is to pursue in making law and policy.
    2. Their legal force: Article 37 makes them non justiciable, so no court can enforce them, while declaring them fundamental in the governance of the country.
    3. Their source: The idea was drawn from the Irish Constitution, which in turn borrowed it from the Spanish Constitution.
    4. Their relationship with rights: They are read alongside the Fundamental Rights in Part III, and courts use them to interpret the scope of those rights rather than to override them.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    “[2015, GS2, 12] Discuss the possible factors that inhibit India from enacting for its citizens a uniform civil code as provided for in the Directive Principles of State Policy.”

  • Mining amendment is unfair to States

    Mining amendment is unfair to States

    Why in the News

    Section 9D of the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Amendment Act, 2026 restricts State governments from imposing taxes, cesses or other levies on mineral rights or mineral-bearing land, except in accordance with conditions prescribed by the Centre. The provision follows Mineral Area Development Authority vs. Steel Authority of India (2024), in which a nine-judge Bench of the Supreme Court held that royalty payable on minerals is not a tax. The same Bench recognised the States’ legislative power to tax mineral rights and held that mineral-bearing land falls within the States’ taxation power over land. The tension is that Entry 50 of the State List lets Parliament limit State taxation of mineral rights, while the new section extends its restriction to levies on mineral-bearing land, a separate power under Entry 49 of the State List. What is contested is not the revenue States receive today but the levies they may be barred from raising tomorrow.

    What does Section 9D do?

    1. Scope of the restriction: It bars States from imposing taxes, cesses or other levies on mineral rights or on mineral-bearing land except as the Centre prescribes.
    2. Where the discretion sits: The conditions under which a State may levy are set by the Central government, so future State levies depend on a framework the Centre controls.
    3. What it does not touch: Royalty, the auction premium and the other mineral revenues States currently receive are not altered by the section.

    What is the Centre’s case for a uniform levy framework?

    1. Predictability for investors: The stated objective is to create a predictable tax environment, prevent excessive levies and encourage long-term investment in mining.
    2. Project horizons: Mining projects involve enormous investment and operate over decades, so investors need assurance that financial rules will not change unpredictably from one year to the next.
    3. Revenue assurance offered: The Centre’s position is that 90% of mining sector revenue accrues to the States and that this will continue.

    Why do mineral-rich States object?

    1. Uneven distribution of the resource: India’s mineral wealth is concentrated rather than spread evenly. Odisha, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka hold enormous reserves of coal, iron ore and other minerals that feed industries across the country.
    2. Costs land on the host State: The host State handles resettlement of displaced groups, environmental damage, pressure on public infrastructure and the long-term consequences of extracting minerals that can never be replaced.
    3. Budgets tied to mining receipts: NITI Aayog’s Fiscal Health Index has recognised the role mining receipts play in the strong revenue mobilisation performance of Odisha and Chhattisgarh. Mining accounts for a large proportion of Odisha’s non-tax revenue.
    4. Higher spending needs in mineral districts: Mineral producing districts require greater public expenditure precisely because they bear the costs of mining.
    5. Loss of a natural advantage: A mineral-rich State ordinarily expects some ability to convert that advantage into resources for its own development, and the section substantially reduces that freedom.

    What is the constitutional objection to Section 9D?

    1. Entry 50 and its built-in limit: The Constitution gives States the power to tax mineral rights under Entry 50 of the State List, subject to limitations Parliament may impose through laws relating to mineral development.
    2. Entry 49 is a separate power: The power to tax lands and buildings under Entry 49 of the State List is a distinct constitutional head and carries no equivalent parliamentary limitation clause.
    3. Where the section goes further: By extending the restriction to taxes or levies on mineral-bearing land, the section reaches a power Entry 50 does not authorise Parliament to limit.
    4. Risk to the 2024 ruling: The amendment risks rendering the impact of the nine-judge ruling nugatory, since a power the Court affirmed can be neutralised by prescription rather than by overruling.
    5. The question it raises: How far can a Central law dealing with mineral development restrict a State’s exclusive power to tax land is now a live constitutional question rather than a mining policy dispute.

    Challenges to Section 9D

    1. Responsibility without fiscal capacity: A federal system cannot function where States carry obligations they have no independent means to fund. Eg. Mineral districts must fund resettlement and infrastructure repair from receipts the Centre may now condition.
      The Fix: Confine the prescribed conditions to levies on mineral rights under Entry 50 and leave the Entry 49 land taxation power untouched.
    2. Predictability purchased by narrowing State choice: Uniformity makes taxation more predictable for investors and reduces the fiscal options available to States. Eg. A State cannot design a mineral-linked levy to fund a district-specific rehabilitation programme without Central prescription.
      The Fix: Set a ceiling on State mineral levies in the statute itself rather than routing each levy through Central approval, so investors get the certainty without the States losing the power.
    3. Litigation risk over a settled question: A provision that neutralises a nine-judge ruling by executive prescription invites a fresh round of constitutional challenge. Eg. Mineral Area Development Authority vs. Steel Authority of India itself ran for decades before it was settled in 2024.
      The Fix: Refer the scope of Section 9D to the Inter-State Council under Article 263 before conditions are prescribed, so the levy framework is negotiated rather than litigated.
    4. Concentration of the burden on a few States: The section’s cost is borne almost entirely by a handful of mineral-bearing States rather than spread across the Union. Eg. Odisha, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka carry the bulk of the country’s coal and iron ore output.
      The Fix: Weight mineral-bearing districts explicitly in the next Finance Commission’s horizontal devolution formula, so extraction costs are recognised in transfers.

    Conclusion

    The minerals beneath a State’s soil serve the entire country, and the costs of extracting them are felt most directly by the people who live above them. A State that bears the infrastructural and social consequences of extraction must retain a meaningful stake in the economic value its natural resources generate. The unresolved point is whether a Central law on mineral development may condition a State’s power to tax land, a power the Constitution places under a separate entry and does not subject to parliamentary limitation. That question now sits between a statute in force and a nine-judge ruling that has not been overruled.

    What is Fiscal Federalism?

    1. About: It is the division of taxation powers, expenditure responsibilities and transfer arrangements between the levels of government in a federation.
    2. Rationale: It exists because the level of government best placed to raise a tax is often not the level that must spend on the service, so the design has to close that gap without destroying accountability.
    3. Vertical imbalance: The Union raises a larger share of revenue than it spends directly, while States carry the larger share of expenditure obligations, and transfers bridge the difference.
    4. Horizontal imbalance: Revenue capacity differs sharply across States of similar need, which is why devolution formulas weight income distance, area and population rather than collections alone.

    Back2Basics: NITI Aayog’s Fiscal Health Index

    1. What it is: A composite index published by NITI Aayog that ranks States on the quality of their public finances.
    2. What it measures: It scores States on sub-indices covering quality of expenditure, revenue mobilisation, fiscal prudence, debt index and debt sustainability.
    3. First edition: The maiden report was released in January 2025 and covered 18 major States.
    4. Why it matters here: It is the benchmark that records mining receipts as a driver of revenue mobilisation performance in mineral-bearing States.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    [2025] Examine the evolving pattern of Centre-State financial relations in the context of planned development in India. How far have the recent reforms impacted the fiscal federalism in India?

  • SIR deletions: elector numbers in 1/3 of Delhi below poll turnout

    Why in the News

    In 24 of Delhi’s 70 Assembly constituencies, the draft roll produced by the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) now carries fewer electors than the number of people who actually voted in the February 2025 Assembly election. The 2025 election was conducted by the Election Commission of India (ECI) itself on a roll of 1.56 crore electors, of whom 94.9 lakh voted. Roughly 58.5 lakh names have been removed since, leaving 97.5 lakh electors in the draft roll. The tension is arithmetical before it is legal: an electoral roll smaller than the last verified turnout implies either migration on an implausible scale or deletions that have removed electors who remain ordinarily resident.

    What is the Special Intensive Revision?

    1. What it is: It is a house-to-house re-verification of the electoral roll, conducted in phases across States and Union Territories, that rebuilds the roll rather than amending it at the margins.
    2. What an elector must do: The draft enumeration process requires electors to list their Electoral Photo Identity Card (EPIC) numbers and their eligibility to vote.
    3. Status of the output: What is published at the end of enumeration is a draft roll, not the final roll, so time remains for additions.
    4. Two routes to addition: Freshly eligible electors may be added, and electors erroneously deleted may seek restoration through claims and objections.

    What do the Delhi numbers show, and how thin is the buffer?

    1. The starting roll: The rolls carried 1.56 crore electors before the Delhi Assembly polls of February 2025, of whom 94.9 lakh voted.
    2. Two rounds of culling: Close to 11 lakh electors were deleted before the SIR, and nearly 47.6 lakh more during the draft SIR phase, a total of over 58.5 lakh names.
    3. What is left: The draft roll carries 97.5 lakh electors for the Union Territory.
    4. The buffer that remains: The 94.9 lakh who voted are 97% of the draft roll, leaving a “buffer” of only about 2.6 lakh electors, or 2.6%, to account for every ordinary resident who did not vote.
    5. The implied turnout: If every deletion since the Assembly polls is legitimate, the hypothetical turnout percentage on the draft roll works out to an implausible 97%.

    Which constituencies were cut deepest?

    1. The worst case: Tughlakabad’s draft roll carries 1,00,386 electors against 1,14,961 who actually voted in 2025, a shortfall of 14,575.
    2. How many seats are affected: 24 constituencies show fewer electors than 2025 turnout, and 15 of them carry the largest shortfalls. Eg. Sangam Vihar with 1,25,723 actual voters, Badli with 1,50,889 and Dwarka with 1,39,564.
    3. Where they cluster: The pattern is most pronounced in the eastern, central and southern parts of Delhi, and is highest in the seats beyond the Yamuna on the east.

    What would have to be true for the deletions to hold?

    1. Universal turnout among residents: Everyone deemed an “ordinary resident” in these 24 constituencies would have to have voted in 2025.
    2. Mass departure of voters: A significant share of those who did vote would have to have left the constituency since.
    3. Non-voters never resident: Those who did not vote in 2025 would have to have been non-resident then, or to have ceased to be resident since.
    4. Migration on an implausible scale: Taken together, these constituencies would have to have seen inward and outward migration of enormous scale in the 17 months between the polls and the start of the SIR, and there are no signs any of that happened.
    5. Self-declared ineligibility: Since enumeration requires electors to state their EPIC number and their eligibility, it stretches reason to assume recent voters declared themselves ineligible.

    Does the pattern extend beyond Delhi?

    1. Buffer shrinks by phase: The practice of leaving a small buffer of electors is more marked for States and Union Territories revised in Phase 3 of the SIR than in the earlier phases.
    2. Phase 3 figures: Andhra Pradesh retains a buffer of 8.8%, Karnataka 13.1% and Maharashtra 16.2%.
    3. Delhi as the outlier: Delhi’s 2.6% buffer is the narrowest recorded, making it the worst case of the phase.
    4. What a narrow buffer indicates: A thin buffer points to aggressive deletion and to the potential disenfranchisement of eligible electors, since it leaves almost no room for residents who simply did not vote.

    Challenges to the Special Intensive Revision

    1. Burden of proof shifted to the elector: A citizen already on a roll used for a completed election must re-establish eligibility or lose the vote. Eg. Delhi’s draft roll dropped 58.5 lakh names from a roll the Commission itself used in February 2025.
      The Fix: Require a recorded, individually served reason for every deletion, with the elector’s response window running from the date of service rather than from publication of the draft.
    2. Compressed timelines: Phase-wise revision on short schedules leaves little time for claims and objections to be heard on their merits. Eg. The buffer narrowed steadily from Phase 1 to Phase 3, with Delhi the narrowest at 2.6%.
      The Fix: Fix a minimum claims-and-objections period proportionate to the number of deletions in a constituency rather than a uniform calendar window.
    3. No published audit of deletion grounds: Aggregate deletion counts are released without a category-wise break-up of death, shifting or duplication. Eg. Delhi’s 58.5 lakh removals are reported as a pre-SIR figure and an SIR-phase figure with no stated ground-wise split.
      The Fix: Publish constituency-level deletion data disaggregated by statutory ground, so the roll can be audited against civil registration and migration records.
    4. Weak field verification capacity: Booth level officers handle large workloads within short revision cycles, so verification quality varies across constituencies. Eg. Deletions clustered in the eastern, central and southern parts of Delhi rather than spreading evenly.
      The Fix: Mandate supervisory re-verification of a random sample of deletions in every constituency before the draft roll is published.
    5. Contested scope of the exercise: Whether the revision may examine questions beyond ordinary residence is disputed and unsettled. Eg. The enumeration form requires electors to state both their EPIC number and their eligibility.
      The Fix: Issue a public instruction confining the Commission’s enquiry to the statutory grounds for inclusion and deletion under the Representation of the People Act, 1950.

    Conclusion

    A roll smaller than the last verified turnout is not evidence of one wrong deletion; it is evidence that the method that produced it needs auditing. The draft stage still allows both freshly eligible electors and wrongly deleted ones to be added, so the number that matters is the final roll and not this one. The measure to watch is the size of the buffer in Delhi’s final roll against the 2.6% the draft leaves, and whether the Phase 3 States now revising show the same narrowing.

    Back2Basics: Electoral Photo Identity Card

    1. What it is: A photo identity document issued by the Election Commission of India to a registered elector, carrying a unique EPIC number.
    2. When it began: Issue of the card started in 1993 to reduce impersonation and duplicate entries in electoral rolls.
    3. What it does not prove: It is proof of enrolment on a roll and is not proof of citizenship or of residence in itself.
    4. Use in this revision: The SIR enumeration form is keyed to the EPIC number, which is how an existing elector is matched to the rebuilt roll.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    “Is the right to vote a fundamental right? Discuss the position of the Election Commission of India while undertaking the revision of electoral rolls. Can it also examine the question of citizenship of voters?”

  • Let’s curb misuse of a legal relic that elevates the mob over the individual

    Why in the News

    Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, re-codified as Section 299 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), is under fresh criticism for converting subjective offence into a cognisable, non-bailable criminal charge. The provision was introduced by the British in 1927 during the “Rangeela Rasool” controversy, after a provocative Urdu pamphlet satirising the Prophet Muhammad’s personal life sparked widespread communal riots. It survives in independent India under Article 19(2) of the Constitution, which permits speech restrictions in the interests of public order. The tension is between a criminal provision built to preserve public order and a constitutional guarantee of expression that the provision’s procedure defeats before any court examines malice.

    What does Section 299 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita cover?

    1. The offence: It penalises deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings, which was the stated purpose when Section 295A was enacted in 1927.
    2. Colonial rationale: It was born of a colonial urge to police Indian subjects deemed too volatile to handle the friction of free and provocative speech.
    3. Procedural character: The offence is cognisable and non-bailable, so the police may register a case and arrest without a magistrate’s prior direction and bail is not a matter of right.
    4. Constitutional validity: Ramji Lal Modi vs State of Uttar Pradesh (1957) upheld Section 295A, reading the words “deliberate and malicious” as the narrowing element that keeps it within Article 19(2).

    How does the provision create a heckler’s veto?

    1. Offence converted into an offence in law: Translating the subjective and volatile idea of “emotional hurt” into a criminal charge hands a permanent “heckler’s veto” to the most intolerant segments of society.
    2. Inverted hierarchy of rights: It creates a perverse incentive for outrage by elevating “the right to be offended” above the right to free speech.
    3. Low threshold to trigger the state: One aggrieved individual filing a First Information Report (FIR) in a remote corner of the country instantly triggers the machinery of the state.
    4. Who it is triggered against: Writers, filmmakers, stand-up comedians and publishers face it for speech that a court often finds, years later, was never malicious at all.
    5. Incentive for entrepreneurs of grievance: Political entrepreneurs, religious zealots and competitive vigilante groups find that claiming wounded sentiment is the easiest path to public relevance.

    What does the resulting self-censorship look like?

    1. Withdrawal of a published work: Penguin Books India withdrew distribution of Joe Sacco’s graphic novel on the Muzaffarnagar riots.
    2. Pulping of an academic work: The same publisher had earlier pulped copies of Wendy Doniger’s *The Hindus*.
    3. Pre-emptive editing: Cuts were sought to Sonia Gandhi’s memoirs that the publisher’s global arm had not considered necessary for the international edition.
    4. None of it was legally required: None of these texts was legally proscribed, so each was a pre-emptive surrender in which commercial risk aversion replaced constitutional principle.
    5. Spread beyond publishing: Galleries pull provocative paintings, studios quietly cancel scripts and academics choose safer research topics, leaving a public square reduced to bland conformity.

    Why is the process itself the punishment?

    1. Arrest precedes any finding: The law allows arrest before a trial can establish whether malice existed, so the element that makes the act criminal is tested last.
    2. Cost of defending the case: Multi-city court appearances, jail time and financial ruin break the spirit of an artist or author irrespective of the eventual verdict.
    3. Behavioural consequence: When the cost of creative expression is the potential loss of personal liberty, most creators choose to pull their punches.

    What did the 2008 Delhi High Court ruling on M F Husain establish?

    1. What the judgment did: It quashed criminal proceedings against the self-exiled painter M F Husain and set out a defence of artistic liberty against intolerance.
    2. How the charges were answered: The ruling dismantled the obscenity and blasphemy charges by placing Husain’s abstract nude depiction of Bharat Mata within India’s four-millennia-old heritage of sacred, pluralistic and erotic iconography, from Khajuraho to Konark.
    3. The warning it recorded: It critiqued the “new puritanism” pursued by self-appointed guardians of cultural purity and warned that such a society would push India backward.
    4. The principle it fixed: One disapproving viewer cannot hold the right to restrict free expression, which is the constitutional shield the ruling established for creative dissent.

    What reforms would reverse the incentive structure?

    1. Prior sanction before the FIR: Government sanction should be required before an FIR under BNS 299 is registered, rather than after the accused has already endured an investigation and a chargesheet.
    2. Consolidation of parallel FIRs: Multiple FIRs on the same subject lodged in different States should be consolidated immediately into a single proceeding.
    3. Fast-tracking of quashing petitions: BNS 299 cases should be fast-tracked so that frivolous proceedings are quashed early rather than after years.
    4. Costs on vexatious complainants: Vexatious complainants should face costs or other punitive consequences, so the incentive structure of the provision is reversed rather than reinforced.

    Conclusion

    Scrutiny of intent currently arrives at the end of the process, by which point the prosecution has already imposed the cost the provision was never meant to impose. Moving that scrutiny to the point before registration is what separates a public order safeguard from a licence for organised offence-taking. The unresolved conflict is between a constitutional test that turns on deliberate malice and a procedure that reaches arrest before malice is examined at all. Until the procedure is changed, the outcome of a case will continue to matter less than the fact of one.

    What is freedom of speech and expression under the Constitution?

    1. About: Article 19(1)(a) guarantees every citizen the right to freedom of speech and expression, read to include the right to receive and circulate information.
    2. Rationale: The guarantee protects the process by which citizens form and contest opinions, so it exists to shield unpopular expression rather than agreeable expression.
    3. The restriction clause: Article 19(2) permits reasonable restrictions on eight grounds, the sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, decency or morality, contempt of court, defamation and incitement to an offence.
    4. The reasonableness test: A restriction must fall within one of those eight grounds and must be reasonable, which is why Shreya Singhal vs Union of India (2015) struck down Section 66A of the Information Technology Act, 2000 as vague and overbroad.

    Back2Basics: Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023

    1. What it is: The statute that replaced the Indian Penal Code, 1860 as India’s principal criminal law.
    2. When it took effect: It came into force on 1 July 2024, alongside the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023.
    3. Structure: It carries 358 sections against the 511 of the Code it replaced, with several offences merged or renumbered.
    4. Relevance here: Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code is carried forward as Section 299, so the offence survives the recodification substantially unchanged.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    “What do you understand by the concept “freedom of speech and expression”? Does it cover hate speech also? Why do the films in India stand on a slightly different plane from other forms of expression? Discuss.”

  • SIR: deletions have increased in Phase 3 States/UT

    Why in the News

    Phase 3 of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls has removed 6.15 crore names, or 17.1 percent, from the draft rolls of 17 States and Union Territories. The first two phases, covering 13 States and Union Territories, removed 12.3 percent at the same stage, so the current phase runs 4.8 percentage points higher. The Election Commission has offered no reason for the increase. Deletions recorded as Permanently Shifted or Untraceable and Absent have risen as a share of the total, while those recorded as Deceased or Duplicate have fallen. The contested point is whether a process applied uniformly across States can produce this spread of outcomes between phases.

    What is a Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls?

    1. Special Intensive Revision: It is a house to house re verification of electors in which a fresh roll is prepared, rather than the existing roll being amended entry by entry.
    2. Statutory basis: Section 21(3) of the Representation of the People Act, 1950 lets the Election Commission direct a special revision of the roll for any constituency at any time, for reasons it records in writing.
    3. The sequence: Enumeration produces the draft roll. A period for claims and objections then runs before the final roll is published.
    4. The phases so far: Bihar was the only State in Phase 1, 12 more States and Union Territories followed in Phase 2, and 19 are in the Phase 3 schedule.

    How much larger are the Phase 3 deletions?

    1. Phase 3 totals: The rolls of 17 States and Union Territories held 36.1 crore voters before the revision and 29.9 crore in the draft rolls.
    2. The earlier phases: The 13 States and Union Territories of Phases 1 and 2 went from 58.9 crore voters to 51.7 crore, a deletion of 7.22 crore names.
    3. Phase 1 alone: Bihar’s roll fell from 7.9 crore to 7.2 crore, a deletion of 0.65 crore names or 8.28 percent, and its final roll stood at 7.4 crore.
    4. Coverage of the figures: Two of the 19 Phase 3 States and Union Territories, Nagaland and Tripura, have not completed enumeration, so the totals cover 17.
    5. The draft is close to the final: Net deletions across the first two phases moved only from 12.3 percent in the draft rolls to 10.5 percent in the final rolls, so the Phase 3 figure is unlikely to fall far.
    6. States above the earlier range: Among States and Union Territories holding at least one crore voters before the revision, only Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh crossed 15 percent in the first two phases. Six crossed it in Phase 3, and four of them, Delhi, Maharashtra, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, deleted 20 percent or more.

    Why does urbanisation not explain the jump?

    1. The urbanisation reading: Phase 3 covers several heavily urbanised States, and high urban mobility is the explanation that would account for more entries marked absent or shifted.
    2. Urbanised States in the earlier phase: Tamil Nadu, Keralam and Gujarat are also heavily urbanised and recorded no comparable rise when they were revised in Phase 2.
    3. City level comparison: Deletions in Hyderabad, Mumbai and Bengaluru were of a higher magnitude than those in Chennai or Ahmedabad.
    4. The rural comparison: Jharkhand, which is not urbanised, deleted 16.5 percent in Phase 3, against 12.9 percent in Chhattisgarh in Phase 2.

    What has changed in the reasons recorded against each deletion?

    1. The four recorded reasons: A deletion is entered as Absent or Shifted, Deceased, Duplicate, or Others.
    2. The shift between categories: The share recorded as Permanently Shifted or Untraceable and Absent has risen across the phases, and the share recorded as Deceased or Duplicate has fallen correspondingly.
    3. Why the category matters: A death or a duplicate entry is checkable against a record that exists independently of the enumerator. Absence is an inference drawn at the door and leaves no document behind it.
    4. The Others category: Press statements by Chief Electoral Officers account for about 9.73 lakh names under Others, and more States are using the category in Phase 3.
    5. The category is missing from the lists: The full deletion lists for Delhi, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Telangana carry not one person marked Others, indicating those names were clubbed under Absent instead.
    6. What uniform application would imply: A process defined and applied identically across States would not produce this divergence in the reasons recorded against deleted names.

    Challenges to the Special Intensive Revision

    1. Absence is recorded without a verifiable record: A deletion marked Untraceable or Absent rests on an enumerator not finding the elector at the address, which no document either proves or disproves. Eg. Seasonal migration from Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh to construction sites in Delhi and Mumbai keeps workers away from their registered address for months at a stretch.
      The Fix: Require a second visit on a different date and a signed attestation from the local body before an absence deletion is entered.
    2. No published account of what changed between phases: The Election Commission has recorded a sharp jump in the deletion rate and in the reasons used without stating what changed in the instructions or the procedure. Eg. The phase wise data itself had to be assembled from Commission and State Chief Electoral Officer websites rather than from any explanatory note.
      The Fix: Publish the enumerator instructions issued for each phase, with any mid process revision to them dated and recorded.
    3. The correction mechanism depends on the elector noticing: A deletion is reversed through claims and objections, which requires the affected person to learn that the name is gone. Eg. An elector who has migrated is the least likely to see a draft roll published at the address they left.
      The Fix: Serve an individual notice by post and to the registered mobile number for every proposed deletion, carrying the reason recorded against the name.
    4. A citizenship question rides on an administrative exercise: An intensive revision asks an existing elector to establish eligibility afresh, and eligibility includes citizenship, which the electoral machinery is not equipped to adjudicate. Eg. Section 16 of the Representation of the People Act, 1950 disqualifies a non citizen from registration, while determination of citizenship itself sits under the Citizenship Act, 1955.
      The Fix: Confine the enumerator to recording documents and refer any citizenship doubt to the authority designated under the Citizenship Act, 1955.
    5. Timing against the election calendar: A revision concluded close to a poll leaves an excluded elector little room to be restored before voting. Eg. Bihar’s revision ran through the months immediately preceding its Assembly election.
      The Fix: Fix a minimum interval between publication of the final roll and the last date for nominations, so restoration remains possible.

    Conclusion

    A roll revision is judged by whether the people removed from it had genuinely ceased to be entitled to be on it, and that judgement rests entirely on the reason recorded against each name. The unresolved tension is between a process described as uniformly applied and outcomes that differ sharply between phases, with no published account of what changed in between. The marker to watch is the Phase 3 final roll, since the movement between draft and final is the only available measure of how many of these removals survive scrutiny.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    “Is the right to vote a fundamental right? Discuss the position of the Election Commission of India while undertaking the revision of electoral rolls. Can it also examine the question of citizenship of voters?”

  • Public trust & public approval not same; trust demands fairness: CJI

    Why in the News

    The Chief Justice of India has said that public trust in the judiciary is not the same thing as public approval, because trust is not earned by giving people the outcomes they want but by ensuring fairness of process. The remarks answered concerns raised at the same event by senior counsel about the administrative reforms the judiciary needs in order to deal with challenges such as the appointment of judges. The stated position was that reform must be the rule, and that no institution can survive or take pride in remaining static. The tension is that the same address defended two internal mechanisms, judicial appointments through the Collegium and the handling of complaints against judges, while grounding institutional confidence in a court’s willingness to be examined, questioned and, where necessary, criticised.

    What is the Collegium system?

    1. What it is: The Collegium is the mechanism by which judges of the Supreme Court and the High Courts are selected by judges themselves rather than by the executive.
    2. Where it comes from: It has no textual basis in the Constitution, and was created by judicial interpretation of Articles 124 and 217 across the three judges cases of 1981, 1993 and 1998.
    3. Composition: For a Supreme Court appointment it comprises the Chief Justice of India and the four senior most judges of the Court, whose recommendation then goes to the Union government for the warrant of appointment.
    4. The failed alternative: The National Judicial Appointments Commission, created by the Ninety ninth Constitutional Amendment Act, 2014, was struck down by a five judge Constitution Bench in 2015, which restored the Collegium.

    What does transparency mean for a court?

    1. Not only open doors: Transparency is not simply a matter of open doors and public hearings, though it certainly includes those things.
    2. The reasoning, not the result: It means the reasoning behind a decision, and not merely its result, can be examined by anyone who cares to look, including the very people the decision goes against.
    3. A verdict without reasoning is not transparency: A court that announces its verdicts but keeps its reasoning to itself has not really been transparent, whatever else it may have done.
    4. What the phrase demands: “Seen to be done” means a fair hearing conducted honestly in the open, and a system that remains willing to be examined on whether it has kept its own word.

    How is public trust different from public approval?

    1. The difference matters a great deal: A court does not earn trust by being liked, or by handing out the outcomes people wanted.
    2. The test is the losing party: Trust is earned when the people who lost, who wanted an entirely different result, still walk away believing that the process which decided against them was fair.
    3. Harder and more valuable: That is a far harder thing to earn than approval, and far more valuable than it.
    4. What trust is for: Public trust is not decoration for the judiciary, and is the only currency in which authority is ever paid.

    What was said on judicial appointments?

    1. Reform as the standing rule: No institution can survive or take pride in remaining static, so reform is treated as a welcome step rather than a concession.
    2. Limits of a public answer: Some questions may not be prudent to respond to from a public platform, and the answers to them are legal answers set in the historical background of how the Collegium developed and how successfully it has worked.
    3. The record of appointments: There is hardly any impediment between the appointments by the Union of India and the recommendations of the Collegium, which itself indicates the kind of deliberation that goes into a final recommendation.

    How are complaints against judges handled?

    1. The internal mechanism: The mechanism the Supreme Court and the High Courts have developed for complaints against judges is described as robust, responsive and very timely.
    2. The misuse risk: Given a choice, a judicial officer will invite a complaint at every stage, whether passing an interlocutory order, adjourning a case or passing a final decree.
    3. The open question: Whether every such complaint should be brought onto a public platform or a website, or whether a strong internal mechanism should deal with it with complete objectivity and a dispassionate approach, is treated as a seriously debatable issue.
    4. Not treated as settled: The mechanism is described as well established, and as always subject to reforms and qualitative improvements.

    Why is criticism treated as compatible with institutional confidence?

    1. Exposure keeps institutions clean: Recalling Justice Krishna Iyer, institutions do not stay clean by being shielded from scrutiny, and stay clean by being repeatedly exposed to it and repeatedly surviving that exposure.
    2. The textbook proceedings: Suo motu proceedings concerning a National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) textbook, which carried a chapter on corruption in the judiciary, became an occasion to consider the relationship between legitimate criticism and public confidence in the institution.
    3. What the order said: The order reiterated that the judiciary, as an institution, is not and cannot be averse to criticism.
    4. Why that follows: A court cannot seek the confidence of the public by placing itself beyond scrutiny, and must remain willing to be examined, questioned and, where necessary, criticised.

    Challenges to public trust in the judiciary

    1. Opacity of the appointment process: The Collegium publishes its resolutions but not the material or the comparative assessment behind a name, so the standard of examinable reasoning is weaker for appointments than for judgments. Eg. Reiterated recommendations have been left unacted by the government, with no published reason recorded on either side.
      The Fix: Publish an anonymised assessment memorandum with every recommendation, recording seniority, disposal record and the ground for any supersession.
    2. The internal complaints procedure has no statutory footing: Complaints against judges are handled under a procedure the judiciary framed for itself, so its outcome rests on institutional discipline rather than on law. Eg. Removal remains the only statutory route, under the Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968, and no Supreme Court judge has ever been removed through it.
      The Fix: Give the internal procedure statutory backing with defined timelines and a published outcome summary that names no complainant.
    3. Pendency erodes trust faster than any single verdict: A litigant who waits years for a hearing experiences the process as unfair regardless of how the case is eventually reasoned. Eg. Cases pending before the district judiciary are counted in crores on the National Judicial Data Grid.
      The Fix: Publish court wise disposal and case ageing data against listed targets, so delay is attributable to a court rather than to the system in general.
    4. Vacancies outrun appointments: A sanctioned strength that is never filled turns an appointment mechanism into a bottleneck whatever its design. Eg. High Court vacancies have run into hundreds of posts for years together.
      The Fix: Fix a time limit for each stage from High Court proposal to warrant of appointment, with any delay recorded against the stage that caused it.

    Conclusion

    The address settles nothing about how judges are appointed or how complaints against them are decided, and it was not meant to. What it does is state the standard the institution asks to be judged by, which is the fairness of the process rather than the popularity of the result. That standard is testable only against the things the judiciary itself controls and publishes. The concrete thing to watch is whether the two mechanisms defended here acquire published reasons and fixed timelines, since a standard of examinable reasoning applied everywhere except to the institution’s own administration is precisely the gap the criticism turns on.

    Matching Previous Year Question

    “[2025, GS2, 15 marks] “Constitutional morality is the fulcrum which acts as an essential check upon the high functionaries and citizens alike…” In view of the above observation of the Supreme Court, explain the concept of constitutional morality and its application to ensure balance between judicial independence and judicial accountability in India.”