Context: a petition  filed by the Enforcement Directorate in the Supreme Court. against the criminal prosecution launched by the Tamil Nadu Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) against an ED officer.

Court Observations:

• The Supreme Court called for judicial oversight in conflicts between Central and State agencies to prevent unjust prosecution.
• It questioned which agency should investigate if a Central employee commits an offense in a State’s jurisdiction.

Central Agencies vs State Governments:

Consent of the states is required under Section 6 of the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act, either general (for seamless investigations) or specific (on a case-by-case basis).

Conclusion:

The situation underscores the lack of clarity regarding the CBI’s role as a federal investigative agency.

+Prelims Connect:

·        The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is the primary investigative agency of the Central Government.

·         empowered by the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act, of 1946.

·        The Enforcement Directorate (ED) is the premier financial investigation agency of the Indian government.

·         It operates under the Department of Revenue, Ministry of Finance.

Source: The Hindu

 Context: The Supreme Court panel, led by Justice Gita Mittal, raised concerns over recent events in Manipur.

Justice Gita Mittal Committee:

• Appointed by the Supreme Court in August 2023.
• The committee, consisting of three former women high court judges, focuses on humanitarian aspects of ethnic violence in Manipur.

Major findings:

• halted relief activities,
• escalated protests, and
• burnt government offices in Manipur.

Source: The Hindu

Context: President Emmanuel Macron said that he backed new end-of-life legislation.

• He said he did not want to call the new legislation euthanasia or assisted suicide, but rather “help to die”.

Euthanasia:

• Euthanasia is the practice of intentionally ending a life to relieve pain and suffering.

There are two main types of euthanasia:

• Active euthanasia is when a doctor or other medical professional takes steps to deliberately end a patient’s life, such as by lethal injection.
• Passive euthanasia is when a doctor allows a patient to die by withholding or withdrawing treatment, such as stopping life support.

Euthanasia in India:

• Aruna Shanbaug case(2011):
  • The Supreme Court recognized passive euthanasia and allowed withdrawal of life support for terminally ill patients who cannot make informed decisions.
• Common Cause v Union of India(2018):
  • The Supreme Court recognised the right to die with dignity as a fundamental right and prescribed guidelines for terminally ill patients to enforce the right.
  • In 2023 the Supreme Court modified the guidelines to make the right to die with dignity more accessible.

Source: The Hindu

Context: Election Commission of India to compile and put out data on electoral bonds provided to it by the State Bank of India by March 15.

Details:

• The data will be available in public domain in two separate lists.
• One list will have the date of purchase of bonds, name of purchaser, and the denomination for each bond.
• The other will provide the details of every bond encashed by political parties, the date of encashment, and the denomination of the bond.

Electoral bonds Scheme:

• Introduced in 2018 for political donations.
• They are bearer instruments like promissory notes, payable to the bearer on demand.
• Eligibility: Political Parties registered under Section 29A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, and securing at least 1% of votes in recent elections.
• Denominations :From Rs. 1,000 to Rs. 1 crore.
• Authorised bank: State Bank of India (SBI)
• Citizens or Indian-incorporated bodies can purchase bonds.

+1 Advantage for Mains (Important Judgements):

Source: The Hindu

Context: The three-member committee headed by the Prime Minister to select candidates for the two vacant posts of Election Commissioners.

Appointment of Chief Election Commissioner(CEC) and Election Commissioners(ECs):

• Article 324: The Election Commission shall consist of the Chief Election Commissioner and such number of other Election Commissioners as the President may fix.
• Their appointment shall be made by the President subject to any law made by Parliament.

Appointment Procedure:

• Regulated by the CEC and Other ECs (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act, 2023.
• The CEC and ECs will be appointed by the President upon the recommendation of a Selection Committee consisting of the
  • Prime Minister,
  • a Union Cabinet Minister, and
  • Leader of Opposition/leader of the largest opposition party in the Lok Sabha.
• The salary and conditions of service of the CEC and ECs will be equivalent to that of Cabinet Secretary.

+1 Advantage for Mains:

Source: The Hindu

Context: India announced that it had successfully tested a new Agni-V missile called Mission Divyastra.

Agni V missile: Intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) developed by Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).

• Range: Over 5000 kilometres
• Mobility: Land-based and road-mobile allowing for launch from various locations on land.
• Fuel: Solid-fuelled
• Warhead: Designed to carry nuclear weapons.
• MIRV Technology: Can carry multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicles (MIRVs).

MIRV Technology:

• Capability that allows multiple warheads to be loaded on a single missile delivery system and programmed to hit different targets.
• Complicated technology: The warheads have to be
  • Miniaturised,
  • equipped with independent guidance and navigation controls
  • released sequentially from the delivery system.

●       Advantages

• Inflicting multiple damages with a single strike.
• Ability to penetrate missile defence systems.

Capability to cause crippling damage in a response strike, especially for countries with no-first use policy like India.

Source: The Hindu

Context: Union Home Ministry notified the Citizenship (Amendment) Rules, 2024, enabling the implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) 2019.

Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), 2019:

• The act amended the Citizenship Act, 1955.
• Objective: To provide Indian citizenship for persecuted religious minorities from three specific neighbouring countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan.
• Allows migrants from these three countries to apply for Indian citizenship through the naturalisation
• Cut-off date of entering India: before December 31, 2014.

Citizenship (Amendment) Rules, 2024:

• Applicants can seek Indian citizenship without producing a valid passport of these countries or a valid visa from India.
• Provide six types of documents and specify the “date of entry” into India.
• Produce an “eligibility certificate” issued by a “locally reputed community institution” confirming that he/she belongs to “Hindu/ Sikh/ Buddhist/ Jain/ Parsi/Christian community.
• An empowered committee, headed by the Director (Census Operations) will scrutinise all applications.

Criticisms:

• Violates Article 14 (equality): For discriminating based on religion as it excludes Muslims.
• Difficult to differentiate between illegal migrants and those persecuted.
• Other refugees, that include Tamils from Sri Lanka not covered under the Act.

Source: The Hindu

Context: The government abolished wireless operating licence system. It launched a regulatory sandbox for quick and online approval of product testing.

Regulatory sandbox:

• It’s a controlled environment to experiment/test with new technologies or business models in a safe space (some relaxation of existing regulations.)
• Allows to verify feasibility of ideas and work out any potential tweaks before a full launch.
• Now, the Department of Telecommunications, through the regulatory sandbox will provide online approval for product testing at minimal charge.

Wireless operating licence system: This is the primary license required to operate any wireless product in India.

Source: The Hindu

Syllabus: GS-III, Subject: Internal Security, Topic: North -East regional issues, Issue: Tripura Accord

Context: Centre recently signed a tripartite agreement with the Tripura government and the state’s main opposition party, the TIPRA Motha,

Demand of TIPRA Motha:

• Creation of “Greater Tipraland,” a separate state for Tripura’s tribals, encompassing areas outside the TTAADC (Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council).
• Increased powers for the TTAADC, including:
  • direct funding from the Centre,
  • a separate police force, and
  • a share of revenue from gas exploration.
• The Roman script declared as the official script for the Kokborok language.

Details of Accord:

• Aims to resolve issues related to history, land, political rights, economic development, identity, culture, and language of Tripura’s indigenous people.
• A joint working group/committee will be formed to implement agreed-upon points in a time-bound manner.

Conclusion:

• Union Home Minister hailed the accord as “historic,” emphasizing that it rectifies past mistakes and acknowledges present realities.

Source: Indian Express

Syllabus: GS-II, Subject: Polity, Topic: legal issues, Issue: Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), 2019.

Context: Ministry of Home Affairs notified the Rules to implement the Citizenship Amendment Act-2019

The Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), 2019,

• Granting citizenship to migrants belonging to the Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, or Christian communities who entered India before December 31, 2014 from Pakistan, Afghanistan, or Bangladesh.
• Certain areas, including tribal areas and those protected by the Inner Line system, exempted from the CAA.

It has been challenged in Supreme Court based on:

1. A) violation of Article 14, which guarantees equality before the law.

• Using religion as a criterion for citizenship violates the fundamental right to equality.
• Government argues that excluding Muslims is justified because Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh are Islamic countries.

1. B) Compatibility with the Assam Accord.

• Clause 5 of the Assam Accord sets the base cut-off date for detecting “foreigners” as January 1, 1966, with provisions for regularization until March 24, 1971.
• Section 6A of The Citizenship Act allows migrants arriving in Assam between January 1, 1966, and March 25, 1971, to seek citizenship.
• A Constitution Bench has reserved its verdict on the validity of Section 6A.
• Upholding March 24, 1971, as the effective cut-off could challenge the compatibility of the CAA with the Assam Accord.

Related Concepts:

The Assam Accord was an agreement between India’s government and Assam Movement leaders. Aimed to address the issue of illegal migrants in Assam.

Source: Indian Express

Syllabus: GS-III, Subject: Economy, Topic: Growth and Development, Inclusion

Issue: Analysis of Household Consumption Expenditure Survey (HCES), 2022-23,

Context: Recently released HCES-2022-23

1. A) Analyzing the changes in poverty line as per HCES using different methodology

• Tendulkar methodology: decline in poverty ratios from 2011-12 to 2022-23.( total poverty 6.3% in 2022-23)
• State Bank of India report: Rural poverty declines from more than 25% to nearly 7% and urban poverty from around 14% to around 4%%.
• Rangarajan Method: Overall poverty ratio (2022-23) is estimated at around 10%.
• B) Implications of the HCES 2022-23 for the Consumer Price Index (CPI)

• Decline in monthly per capita expenditure on food items and increase in non-food items has an implication for CPI index weightage.
• Monetary policy committee may need to work with a new price index reflecting changing consumption patterns.

Source: Indian Express

Syllabus: GS-II, Subject: Polity, Topic: Elections and RPA, Issue: Independence of institutions

Context: Recent resignation of an election commissioner.

• The Election Commission of India (ECI) guarantees free and fair elections, accountable only to voters and committed to protecting their rights.
• Thus, the independence of ECI is of prime concern.

Issues in the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act 2023:

• Exclusion of Chief Justice of India from the selection committee.
• Disparity in the removal process of CEC and EC.
• Replacement of the Cabinet Secretary by the Law Minister as the chair of the Search Committee.

Source: Indian Express

Syllabus: GS-III, Subject: Science and Technology, Topic: Emerging technologies, Issue: Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence

• Intelligence is the application of knowledge to solve problems, while artificial intelligence (AI) refers to intelligence in machines.
• AI lacks a single definition but can be understood through its materiality as a machine-software combination.
• Linear separability is a basic AI problem where machines separate data into distinct groups based on specified criteria.
• Decision-making in AI varies in complexity, from simple tasks like marble sorting to nuanced scenarios like autonomous car braking decisions.
• Generative AI models like ChatGPT learn from vast training datasets to generate text responses without classification.
• Machine learning encompasses supervised, unsupervised, and reinforcement learning methods.
• Artificial neural networks (ANNs) mimic animal brains, comprising nodes and connections with activation functions and weights.

Transformers are a specialized ANN architecture designed for parallel training and enhanced attention to input data.

Source: The Hindu

Syllabus: GS-II, Subject: Polity, Topic: Judiciary and tribunals, Issue: Appointment and Removal of Judges

 Checks on the conduct of Judges:

• Judges take an oath to perform their duties without fear or favor, emphasizing the need for impartiality and integrity.
• The Bangalore Principles of Judicial Conduct highlight values like independence, impartiality, and dignity in judicial behavior.

Concerns:

• The Constitution Assembly rejected the idea of legally barring judges from occupying executive posts to maintain judicial independence.
• There are past instances where judges resigning to pursue political roles ( Chief Justice Koka Subba Rao(1967), Baharul Islam(1983))

The way ahead:

• Need to investigate and address judicial aberrations.
• The Supreme Court should prohibit judges from entering politics after resignation, considering it a breach of their oath and accepted norms of judicial conduct.

Source: The Hindu

Syllabus: GS- II, Subject: Polity, Topic: Federalism, Issue: Fiscal Federalism

Context: Southern Indian states worry about getting less money from successive Finance Commissions devolutions.

Reason for decline:

• The income distance criterion, which assigns higher shares to states farther from the highest income state,
• The shift from using 1971 population data to 2011 data by the Fifteenth Finance Commission

The way ahead:

• Consider reducing the weight of the income distance criterion
• Limit cesses and surcharges to 10% of the Centre’s gross tax revenues to prevent reduction in the size of the divisible pool.

Source: The Hindu

Context: Centre recently signed a tripartite agreement with the Tripura government and the state’s main opposition party, the TIPRA Motha,

Demand of TIPRA Motha:

• Creation of “Greater Tipraland,” a separate state for Tripura’s tribals, encompassing areas outside the TTAADC (Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council).
• Increased powers for the TTAADC, including:
  • direct funding from the Centre,
  • a separate police force, and
  • a share of revenue from gas exploration.
• The Roman script declared as the official script for the Kokborok language.

Details of Accord:

• Aims to resolve issues related to history, land, political rights, economic development, identity, culture, and language of Tripura’s indigenous people.
• A joint working group/committee will be formed to implement agreed-upon points in a time-bound manner.

Conclusion:

Union Home Minister hailed the accord as “historic,” emphasizing that it rectifies past mistakes and acknowledges present realities.

Source: Indian Express

Context- Ministry of Home Affairs notified the Rules to implement the Citizenship Amendment Act-2019.

The Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA), 2019,

• Granting citizenship to migrants belonging to the Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, or Christian communities who entered India before December 31, 2014 from Pakistan, Afghanistan, or Bangladesh.
• Certain areas, including tribal areas and those protected by the Inner Line system, exempted from the CAA.

It has been challenged in Supreme Court based on:

A) violation of Article 14, which guarantees equality before the law.

• Using religion as a criterion for citizenship violates the fundamental right to equality.
• Government argues that excluding Muslims is justified because Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh are Islamic countries.
• B) Compatibility with the Assam Accord.

• Clause 5 of the Assam Accord sets the base cut-off date for detecting “foreigners” as January 1, 1966, with provisions for regularization until March 24, 1971.
• Section 6A of The Citizenship Act allows migrants arriving in Assam between January 1, 1966, and March 25, 1971, to seek citizenship.
• A Constitution Bench has reserved its verdict on the validity of Section 6A.
• Upholding March 24, 1971, as the effective cut-off could challenge the compatibility of the CAA with the Assam Accord.

Related Concepts: The Assam Accord was an agreement between India’s government and Assam Movement leaders. Aimed to address the issue of illegal migrants in Assam.

Source: Indian Express

Context: Recently released HCES-2022-23

1. A) Analyzing the changes in poverty line as per HCES using different methodology

• Tendulkar methodology: decline in poverty ratios from 2011-12 to 2022-23.( total poverty 6.3% in 2022-23)
• State Bank of India report: Rural poverty declines from more than 25% to nearly 7% and urban poverty from around 14% to around 4%%.
• Rangarajan Method: Overall poverty ratio (2022-23) is estimated at around 10%.

1. B) Implications of the HCES 2022-23 for the Consumer Price Index (CPI)

• Decline in monthly per capita expenditure on food items and increase in non-food items has an implication for CPI index weightage.
• Monetary policy committee may need to work with a new price index reflecting changing consumption patterns.

Source: Indian Express