Daily Editorial Analysis for 20th January 2020

CAA and States Obligation to implement the Union List Matters

Paper: II

For Prelims: Article 131 – Special Powers of Supreme Court.

For Mains: Functions and Responsibilities of the Union and the States, Issues and Challenges Pertaining to the Federal Structure.

Context of News:

• Law Minister recently said state governments have a Constitutional duty to implement laws passed by Parliament and those vowing not to implement the Citizenship Amendment Act should seek appropriate legal opinion.
• Law Ministers statement came a day after the Kerala assembly passed a resolution urging the Centre to withdraw the amended citizenship law.

Article 131 – Special Powers of Supreme Court:

• Article 131, which deals with the original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court.
• Original jurisdiction of a court refers to its power to hear a case first.
• In criminal matters, offences under the Indian Penal Code are triable by the courts specified in the First Schedule of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC).
• A high court exercises its original criminal jurisdiction only if the subordinate courts are not authorised by law to try such matters for lack of jurisdiction.
• What are the matters where the original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court is provisioned?
• Any dispute involving a question of law or fact on which existence of legal right depends comes under original jurisdiction of the SC. The disputes may be:

1. between the government of India and one or more states;
2. between the government of India and any state/states on one side and one or more states on the other;
3. between two or more states

• What is the need for original jurisdiction in such matters?
• The Indian constitution divides power between the central government and the state governments. However, there may be differences over the interpretation of the federal structure. In order to settle such issues, the Supreme Court of India acts as an arbitrator.

Post CAA becomes Law:

• Kerala recently became the first state to challenge the amended act after the state moved the Supreme Court to declare the law “violative of the principles of equality, freedom and secularism enshrined in the Constitution.
• The Opposition claims the law is unconstitutional because it makes religion a test of citizenship. Adding to the voice of Kerala, West Bengal and state of Bihar, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh also expressed their willingness not to implement CAA in their states.

Understanding States obligation to implement laws in context of CAA:

• The Seventh Schedule of the Constitution divides the subjects on which the Centre and states can make laws under the Union, State and Concurrent lists. The subject of citizenship, naturalisation and aliens (foreigners) finds mention exclusively in the Union List which contains a total of 97 subjects.
• Citizenship and the laws related to it are exclusively in the domain of the central government and the refusal by states to implement NRC or NPR has no legal ground.
• It is the constitutional duty of the states to implement laws passed by Parliament.
• Article 245 (clause 2) states that no law made by Parliament shall be deemed to be invalid on the ground that it would have extra-territorial operation.
• In India’s federal structure, states have a constitutional obligation to implement the Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 as passed by Parliament. As per Article 246 of the Constitution, the 17th entry under the Union List of the Seventh Schedule provides exclusive powers to Parliament to legislate on matters related to “citizenship, naturalisation and aliens”.
• The state governments can move the courts to challenge the central government but a refusal to implement is not within their powers. Article 365 of the Constitution makes it mandatory for the state governments to follow and implement the directions of the Central government, failing which the President can hold that the state government cannot carry on.
• Articles 245 and 256 of the Constitution also oblige states to ensure compliance with the laws made by Parliament. The declaration by the governments of Kerala, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Maharashtra that these states will not implement the CAA is, therefore, unconstitutional.

Way Forward:

• The Citizenship (Amendment) Bill was passed by both houses of Parliament last week and has received the presidential assent. So, in this case states can’t refuse to implement the laws which may lead to constitutional machinery breakdown.
• Only thing, these states opposing CAA can do is wait for supreme court order to declare this law as unconstitutional and in case CAA pass the test of scrutiny of supreme court, then state will have to implement the CAA.
• Every State Assembly has the constitutional right to pass a resolution and seek it’s withdrawal. When and if the law is declared to be constitutional by the Supreme Court then it will be problematic to oppose it.

A farm wish list for the budget

Paper: III

For Prelims:

For Mains: Major Crops – Cropping Patterns in various parts of the country, – Different Types of Irrigation and Irrigation Systems; Storage, Transport and Marketing of Agricultural Produce and Issues and Related Constraints; E-technology in the aid of farmers.

Context of News:

• As the Budget is round the corner amid economic slowdown of Indian Economy; there are high expectations from the budget for the farming community.
• Finance Minister is all set to table budget. As representatives of various sectors put forward their expectations, the farming community is also hoping to get their dilemma heard. So what can government do for its farmlands?

Expectations from Budget of Farming community:

• Poultry Problems:
• The Karnataka Poultry Farmers and Breeders Association (KPFBA) has urged the Government of India to consider all poultry farming activities as ‘Agriculture’ under the Income Tax Act. Apparently, the poultry sector is exposed to all types of natural vagaries like agricultural crops and is rural-based, giving employment mostly to the unskilled and rural population.
• Poultry farmers should be able to avail the tax benefits as other agri-farmers. “Poultry will play a key role in inclusive growth of the rural economy and thereby help to achieve Government’s ambitious plan of doubling farmers’ income.
• Some of the problems that poultry sector facing are :

1. Lack of Technical Knowledge.
2. High cost of Inputs.
3. Deficiency of improved Breeds.
4. Quality Poultry Feed.
5. Loss by Predators:-Picking of chicks and birds by its natural enemies like crow, kite, mongoose and snake is a common event of poultry farming.

• Dairy Potential:
• The dairy industry is an important vertical of agriculture and so are the related entities, all of which should be considered during the budget. Considering the potential dairy has in providing good nutrition in an affordable manner. Government should incentivize the sector for promoting higher consumption.
• Tax reductions in value-added dairy products would accelerate higher adoption thereby encouraging more investment into product’s research and development that can further help dairy consumption. Incentives to SMEs in building cold chain infrastructure, that is critical for the sector, would help reduce wastage and improve the quality of the products.
• Job Crisis:
• The farming community is currently facing a crisis of appropriate job creation. “It is becoming amply clear that agriculture cannot support the existing workforce dependent on it, leave alone create new jobs. A lot of the surplus agricultural workforce is being absorbed directly into services, but largely in unskilled jobs.
• Diversification of Procurement of Crops:
• A section of agri experts say that a lack of procurement of crops other than paddy, wheat and, to some extent, cotton, is skewed against much-hyped boost to nutri-cereals like sorghum and millets (which saw the highest-ever increase in MSP). The government also needs to work on this front so as to ensure that all farmers are adequately compensated.
• The direct sale of agri produce, bypassing mandis, will also provide much needed boost to the farmers. The direct sale of farmer produce without going through mandis is something that will help food processing a lot.
• It is also the time to revise the central issue of price and link it to the procurement price — say at half the procurement price. And if he can limit this highly subsidised food of Rs 3/kg for rice and Rs 2/kg of wheat to say 40 per cent of the population, he can certainly rationalise the food subsidy to a large extent.
• Fertiliser subsidy:
• Fertiliser subsidy is again a sector that has been crying out for reforms for a long time. The fertiliser industry today is demoralised and even the best of the private sector players (like the Tatas), with the most technically efficient plants, have quit this sector.
• All this is nothing short of cruelty to our natural resources, and farmers, especially those who want to pursue natural farming as they don’t get subsidy anywhere near the amount chemical-based fertilisers do. The solution to this is either bring nitrogenous fertilisers also under Nutrient Based Subsidy (NBS) scheme or better, to move towards direct cash transfers for fertilisers on a per hectare basis, with some adjustment for irrigated tracts (for instance, irrigated land could get 1.5 times the subsidy amount for unirrigated land due to the higher cropping intensity on the former).

Way Forward:

• There could be some provisions of direct investment support to the farmers. This can help reach out the farmers with an efficient, corrupt free and prompt assistance.
• Across the nation, there is a common consensus that state support is the need of the hour to help farmers survive. There are strong hopes that the budget 2020 will pave way for the same.
• The roots of the rural crisis lie in structural problems fragmentation of land holdings and the lack of land-leasing laws, market imperfections and lack of access to markets, lack of adequate risk-mitigation mechanisms in farming all of which require structural solutions. The budget is unlikely to be able to fix these problems since they require institutional reforms beyond budgetary allocations.
• While the budget can make provisions for farm waivers or higher farm subsidies, such policies may not be fiscally sustainable, and may even be counter-productive.