CURRENT AFFAIRS
21 January 2021
NATIONAL NEWS:
A) Won’t disallow farmers’ tractor rally, says SC.
Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sharad A. Bobde on Wednesday told the government that it was both improper and irregular for the Supreme Court to disallow any rally by protesting farmers on Republic Day. It is irregular and improper for this court to disable any rally. It is for the police to decide. They will allow them to withdraw. They are the executive of the country. They decide, said Chief Justice Bobde, heading a three-judge Bench. He was addressing Attorney General K.K. Venugopal and Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who were appearing for the government. The CJI’s remarks were in response to a submission by Mehta to adjourn the hearing on a government plea to bar farmers from holding rallies to disrupt Republic Day celebration. Mehta submitted consider hearing it on January 25. Let us see how the situation develops. Farm unions welcomed the Supreme Court’s decision. This is a win for the farmers said Rashtriya Kisan Mahasangh spokesperson Abhimanyu Kohar. In this decision, by asking the Delhi Police to withdraw their application for an injunction against the parade, he think that in one way, the Supreme Court is saying that this is the fundamental and constitutional right of the farmers to stage a peaceful protest, and it is now up to the government to decide. He was speaking just before entering Vigyan Bhavan for the 10th round of talks. Meanwhile, at the end of the 10 round of talks, early reports indicate that the Centre has offered to submit an affidavit in the Supreme Court that it will suspend the laws for a mutually-agreed period of up to 1.5 years, and in the interim, have a committee look into the farmers’ demands. The unions have said they want a full repeal, but will discuss the government’s proposal among themselves tomorrow before responding.
B) CJI lashes out at media coverage of SC-appointed committee.
Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sharad (CJI) A. Bobde said it had become almost a cultural thing to brand people as he lashed out at articles suggesting bias on the part of members of an expert committee constituted by the Supreme Court to intercede between the protesting farmers and the government. The committee members are brilliant minds in the field of agriculture. Branding of people whom you do not want, this has become almost like a cultural thing. You malign people’s reputation and then you say the court is interested in these people . He is sorry that these kinds of opinions are appearing in the press, he said. There was criticism in social media and articles in newspapers over the court’s choice of members for the committee constituted on January 12. The court said the reputation of the members have been torn to shreds. The committee had been given no power to decide on the farm laws. They have been constituted only to hear out the farmers. They formed the committee only to hear the farmers’ grievances and submit a report to the court. They were given no adjudicatory powers. So, where is the question of bias here? If they don’t want to appear before the committee, don’t. But why cast aspersions on the court and brand people? They did not want to intervene, but they did so only for the sake of the common people and the farmers, Chief Justice of India Bobde said. Newspaper reports do not decide disputes in court, he pointed out. They are adjudicating the dispute. Are they going to read newspapers and decide disputes? Public opinions cannot be used to determine court proceedings, he said.
C) Supreme Court dismisses Aadhaar review petitions.
The Supreme Court, in a majority view, dismissed a series of petitions seeking a review of its 2018 judgment upholding the Lok Sabha Speaker’s certification of Aadhaar law as a Money Bill and its subsequent passage in Parliament. However, Justice D.Y. Chandrachud dissented with the majority, saying the Aadhaar review petitions should be kept pending. The Bench sat in review on January 11 in their chambers. The decision, however, was published on Wednesday. Two questions had come up for review regarding the five-judge Aadhaar Bench’s judgment in 2018. One, whether the Speaker’s decision to declare a proposed law as Money Bill was final and cannot be challenged in court. The second, whether the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016, was correctly certified as a ‘Money Bill’ under Article 110(1) of the Constitution. On the first question, the majority judgment in 2018 said the Speaker’s decision could be challenged in court only under certain circumstances. On the second, it concluded that the Aadhaar Act was rightly called a Money Bill. Justice Chandrachud, who was on the Bench, had dissented on the second conclusion in 2018. Two years later, marking his dissent again on January 11, Justice Chandrachud differed with the four other judges on the Bench led by Justice A.M. Khanwilkar. This time, he said that another five-judge Bench in a separate case, Rojer Mathew vs South Indian Bank Ltd., in November 2019, had questioned the conclusions arrived at by the Aadhaar Bench and referred the issues to a seven-judge Bench for an authoritative take. He said the Review Bench should hence wait for the seven-judge Bench, which has not yet been constituted, to take a call. The review petitions should be kept pending for the time being. Dismissing the Aadhaar review even before the seven-judge Bench got a chance to apply its mind and arrive at a verdict would amount to judicial indiscipline and have adverse consequences, Justice Chandrachud noted in his dissent. However, the majority on the Review Bench refused to budge and dismissed the review pleas, arguing that a change in the law or subsequent decision/judgment of a coordinate or larger Bench by itself cannot be regarded as a ground for review.
D) PM to chair all-party meeting of floor leaders ahead of Budget session.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will chair an all-party meeting of floor leaders in Parliament on January 30, a day after the Budget session of Parliament commences. While it is customary for such a meeting to be held before the session begins, with the government putting forward its legislative agenda for the session and holding a discussion with the Opposition on the issues to be taken up, this time around it will be held a day after the session commences. The meeting will be held on January 30 where the government will present its legislative agenda for the session and also listen to what the Opposition leaders would like to discuss, said Parliamentary Affairs Minister Pralhad Joshi. He said invitations were being sent out for the virtual meet. The first part of the session will commence on January 29 and end on February 15, with the second part commencing on March 8 to continue till April 8. The Budget will be presented on February 1.
E) HC grants transit anticipatory bail to ‘Tandav’ director, Amazon content head and others.
The Bombay High Court on Wednesday granted a transit pre-arrest bail to Ali Abbas Zafar, director of the web series Tandav, Amazon Prime India content head Aparna Purohit, producer Himanshu Mehra, and the show’s writer Gaurav Solanki, PTI reported. All four of them have a case registered against them in Lucknow for allegedly hurting religious sentiments through the web series. Justice P D Naik granted the relief to the four for a period of three weeks to enable them to approach the concerned court at Lucknow where the FIR against them is registered. Earlier in the day, a four-member team of the Uttar Pradesh Police arrived in Mumbai to conduct a probe into the case registered in Lucknow, an official said. The UP Police team is likely to record statements of the makers and cast and crew of the show.
INTERNATIONAL NEWS
A) Biden plans to issue 15 executive orders on Day 1.
As Joe Biden is sworn in as the 46th President of the United States of America, and Kamala Harris as the country’s first woman Vice-President, he plans to immediately begin undoing President Donald Trump’s policies on immigration, climate change, and other issues on Wednesday with at least 15 executive actions, including moves to reverse U.S. withdrawals from the Paris Agreement and the World Health Organisation, and stop the construction of a border wall. Biden will also sign orders revoking a permit for the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, imposing a mask mandate on federal property to combat the coronavirus pandemic, and ending Trump’s travel ban against some predominantly Muslim and African countries. Biden’s aides said he’ll sign more Day One executive actions than any of his predecessors, to be followed by additional regulatory and policy changes over the coming weeks.
B) Israel rights group breaks taboo with ‘apartheid’ tag.
An Israeli non-governmental organisation has accused the Jewish state of apartheid in its treatment of Palestinians a taboo breaking move that has seen its representatives banned from speaking in schools. B’Tselem said it carefully weighed its decision to use the hugely emotive phrase but concluded that it was an accurate description of Israel’s attitude both to residents of the occupied Palestinian territories and to its own Arab citizens. They cannot avoid the conclusion that it is a regime that is working to advance and cement the supremacy of one group of people Jews over Palestinians, B’Tselem chief Hagai el-Ad said. That is the textbook definition of an apartheid regime, he added. He agree that it is a strong word but they are not using it lightly. Israel occupied the West Bank, including Arab east Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip in the Six-Day War of 1967. Now, it is home to at least five million Palestinians defined by the United Nations as living under Israeli occupation. Arab Israelis Palestinians who stayed on their land following the Jewish state’s creation in 1948 and their descendants make up about 20% of Israel’s roughly nine million people. By law they have rights equal to those of Jewish citizens, but they say that in practice they suffer discrimination in employment, housing, policing and other essentials.
