THE HINDU Editorial explained 30 August

UPSC current affairs-

THE HINDU Editorial explained

August 30,2019

1) On dilution,bifurcation and 'special status ' -Faizan Mustafa

• The article tries to objectively assess the recent decision with respect to article 370
•  The Centre's tacit move of revoking article 370 using provisions in the same article by modified interpretation is yet to pass the constitutionality test
• Article 367 of the Indian constitution provides for Interpretation of terms in constitution ,while Article 370 1(d) empowers the President to introduce features of constitution with exceptions and modifications,using these powers the President inserted a new clause to interpret the terms in article 370  "Constituent assembly of J&K " as Legislative assembly and that "state government "shall mean "Governor acting on the advice of council of ministers"
• J & K was under president rule since December 19,2018  ,so the powers of legislative assembly will be subsumed by Parliament and that of State government will be carried out by Governor who is in turn appointed by Union
• The Centre by tweaking the terms has made it look legally correct ,but the democratic consent of J&K state assembly being subverted by a nominated Governor doesnot augur well for democracy
• 
• Similarly the bifurcation of state into two Union territories of J&K and Ladakh ,even when article 370 exclusively mentioned concurrence of J&K state assembly ,the Parliament disguising itself as J&K assembly and approving the bifurcation is Anti-Federal in nature
• Although erstwhile J&K state had special status and separate constitution ,most of the articles  of the Indian constitution were nevertheless inserted using clauses of article 370 ,this selective application of article provided union government an opportunity to retain clauses such as internal emergency in J&K which is prohibited elsewhere.
• Thus there is no clear winner or loser out of the decision to remove the special status of J&K,despite popular excitement.
• The author hopes that Constitution bench of Supreme court which is hearing petitions challenging recent move will provide a fair reasonable judgement  

2) Law and Opinion

       

• This article is again related to petitions challenging withdrawal of special status to J&K under article 370  
• The previous article  has already elaborated the basics, hence we need not repeat
• The author basically wants the Supreme court not to be swayed by popular aspiration and excitement for the government's move and hopes the Supreme court will guard the human rights and constitutional provisions

3)Tinkering for Optics :

         

• The government recently introduced some changes related to FDI to attract Investments
• 100% FDI for commercial mining and selling of coal instead of earlier status of  Captive mining,ie.,only for Own consumption and not for commercial selling.However the economies of scale related to coal mining,ie., size and productivity of mines and the delays involved in license approval may still act as a deterrent for FDI in coal mining
• Easing Local sourcing norms for Single brand retail,earlier it was set 30% of resources annually now its relaxed to a cumulative  5 year period
• Inclusion of Contract manufacturing under 100% automatic route .,ie. without any government intervention
• The government hopes such measures will revive the economy and will help attain the goal of 5 trillion economy by 2024 

4) Government needs to be prudent in using RBI'S transfer -M. Govinda Rao

• The recent transfer of surplus from RBI to Government treasury needs to be used prudently
• The RBI gains surplus when there is an  increase in Exchange rate of dollars it holds/price hike of its Gold bullion assets ,also through an increase in interest rates of government bond it had acquired through Open Market Operation carried out as a means to infuse liquidity
• The RBI appointed a committee under Bimal Jalan  for a revised economic capital framework to assess the necessary surplus that RBI needs to hold in order to meet emergency situations and to transfer the remaining to the government
•  The committee recommended economic capital to be in the range of 20.5-24%  of the balance sheet
• Hence after accounting to its emergency needs, the RBI transferred sum of 1.76 lakh crore to the government treasury
• This has come as a boon to the government which has been facing fall in indirect tax collection post GST
• This huge transfer may alleviate centre's fiscal deficit worries for current year ,but the state government budget which estimated accounting for centres's tax allocation is yet to receive any assurance
• The author hopes that the government will use this surplus to revive the economy from impending slowdown