The Hindu Editorials Notes 8th July 2019 for UPSC CSE IAS Exam
GS-1 or GS-4
Question- Does India’s silence at ILC (International Law Commission) on CAH reflect poorly on its status as a democracy? Explain ( 250 words)
Context- Delhi High Court’s judgement in State v. Sajjan Kumar’s case.
● There are many crimes that our criminal law fails to address. Two among which are ‘Crimes against humanity CAH’ and ‘genocide’.
● This was pointed by Justice S. Muralidhar of the Delhi HC, while pronouncing judgement in State v. Sajjan Kumar case.
● The case concerned are the mass killings of Sikhs during anti-Sikh riots in 1984 in Delhi- and throughout the country.
● The court categorically stated that these kind of mass crimes fit into the category of crimes against humanity (CAH).
So what are CAH?
● It is defined as a deliberate act, typically as a part of a systematic campaign, that causes human suffering or death on a large scale.
How are CAH dealt with internationally?
●Internationally it is the Rome Statute of International Criminal Court (ICC) which deals with CAH.
● They are defined as offences such as murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, torture, imprisonment and rape committed as a part of ” widespread or systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of the attack”.
● India is not a party to the Rome Statute, so it is under no obligation at present to enact a separate legislation dealing with CAH.
● India has also not enacted any law regarding genocide, even though it has ratified the Genocide Convention.
Probable reasons why India has not joined the Roman Statue-
1. The definition of CAH- India was not in favour of using ‘widespread or systematic’ as one of the conditions, as preferring ‘widespread and systematic’ would require a higher threshold of proof.
2. India also wanted distinction to be made between international and internal armed conflicts. This is because the internal conflicts with Naxals and other non-state actors in Kashmir and Northeast could fall under the scope of CAH.
3. Their objection was also related to the inclusion of enforced disappearances of persons under CAH. Enforced disappearance is the same as forced disappearance It is when a person is secretly abducted or imprisoned by the State, political organisation or a third party with the authorization, support or acquiescence of a state or a political organization, followed by a refusal to acknowledge the person’s whereabouts outside the protection of law.
● India has signed but not yet ratified the UN International Convention for the Protection of all persons from Enforced Disappearances because it would put the country under an obligation to criminalise it through domestic legislation.
But can these obligations be seen as providing basis for India’s silence to ILC (International Law Commission’s) ongoing work?/
Need-
●The Delhi HC while hearing the State v. Sajjan Kumar case also said that “familiar pattern of mass killings” were seen in Mumbai in 1993, in Gujarat in 2002, in Odisha in 2008 and Muzaffarnagar in UP in 2013.
● The criminals ” have enjoyed political patronage and managed to evade prosecution”.
● India’s silence at the ILC doesn’t go well with its claim of respect for international rules-based order.
● Turning a blind eye at mass killings and shielding the perpetrators reflects poorly on India’s status as a democracy.
● It would be advisable for India to show political will and engage constructively with the ILC, which would also be helpful in rethinking domestic criminal laws.
GS-3
Question-Is the government focusing too much on maintaining its fiscal deficit target in the midst of an economic downslide? Analyse (200 Words)
Context- Governments resolve to maintain fiscal deficit target.
● The Economic Survey clearly states that private investment is the key driver of growth in an economy.
● And it also suggests that the government should borrow less from public savings so that more amount is left for private investors.
● In the budget this has been reflected where the government has indicated that it will borrow more from the foreign markets so that more cash is available for private investment.
● The government has set a present fiscal deficit target of 3.3% of GDP, 3.1% for 2019-20 and 3% for 2020-21.
● But the budget shows that revised targets have been missed so far.
Why is it so?
● The reason was that, that the government has reduced its expenditure on major subsidies (i.e. food, fertiliser and petroleum) from 2% of GDP spent on these to 1.4% but, new items have emerged which were not there before like PM-Kisan scheme will which will cost the government 75,000 crores in 2019-20.
● Also, tax to GDP ratio has been a big disappointment i.e. GDP is growing but comparatively the tax collection/ revenue of the government is not growing.
● There was an expectation that following demonetisation and GST, both direct and indirect taxes would rise but this did not happen.
● The 2018-19 had projected the tax to GDP ratio to rise from 11.6% in 2017-18 and 12.1% in 2018-19 and further to 12.4% in 2019-20. But the present budget of 2019-20 has dashed these hopes.
● The shortfall in GST collections in 2018-19 seems to have set the clock back for fiscal consolidation.
So how does the government to balance the fiscal numbers/ maintain the fixed deficit target?
1. Disinvestment and sale of land belonging to the government including public sector enterprises (PSEs). But then it has to be kept in that selling assets to balance the budget is not the solution. It merely defers the problem to the future. This must be addressed to achieve fiscal sustainability.
2. The government had set up the Bimal Jalan committee on economic capital framework for the RBI. But this has not been made public yet.
3. Raising public investment. This the economic survey says declined due to twin-balance sheet problem i.e. high level of debt in companies and high NPAs of banks.
4. Also to resolve the twin deficit problem the government needs to provide adequate capital to Public Sector Banks (PSBs). In this case the budget’s biggest positive is the allotment of 70,000 crores towards capital for PSBs.
5. Also the government in the budget provides adequate cover for loans up to 10% on purchase of pooled assets of NBFCs of a total value of 100,000 crore during current financial year. Many see it as a government bailout of private NBFCs.
Need-
● The government expects that boosting the flow of credit and by recapitalisation of PSBs there will be a boost to private investment in the economy.
● It is mainly doing so to maintain its fiscal deficit targets.
● But it should also keep in mind other steps if this plan doesn’t work out well.
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