We, at Humans for Change, constantly strive for becoming well-informed citizens. With tremendous amounts of misinformation, comes uncertainty and lack of awareness. However, we also understand that not everybody has the time or disposition to go through well-researched and articulately written articles in order to understand the various controversies that surround us today. Therefore, with the goal of conscious awareness and rational discussion in mind, we are hereby launching our new campaign: Decoded!
What is this? This is a series of brief and informative articles on various issues, ideologies, and perceptions, to be written in simple layman language for the benefit of our diverse readers.
What is the purpose of this? We wish to promote knowledge, awareness and rational thinking as well as discussion and debate on the various topics that we write on.
When will this be published? The articles will be published once a week, every Tuesday, 5PM IST.
How can we add to the conversation? We actively encourage your feedback and views, and hence appeal to you to engage in discussions in the comments section. We also invite original articles from you, to be emailed at humansforchange@outlook.com.
We are looking forward to your active participation!
In recent years, carbon dioxide emissions have nearly doubled, sea
levels are rising, ice sheets are shrinking and the planet is getting hotter.
Whether certain leaders of the world believe in climate change or not, it is
something which is undeniably taking place because we can all feel the effects
and repercussions of it, be it the shrinking island of Japan or the ever
reducing number of animal species. Majority of scientists around the globe have
confirmed that human activity is not only an aggravating factor but is also the
cause of most of the climate change. In the present times, a situation of
urgency has arisen after predictions that the Arctic cover will melt in a few
decades. Therefore, it is a vital responsibility for governments as well as the
legal systems to ensure prevention and mitigation by all means.
Unfortunately, in India, environmental laws and rules governing
climate change are not only decades old and outdated but they also fail to
address the urgency of the situation in which we are today. While there is no
scarcity of legislations, ranging from the Environmental (Protection) Act, 1986
to the Water and Air Acts, these rules and regulations majorly fail to be
effective. A major reason for their failure is that the boards and authorities
established under these acts to work as enforcement agencies lack
accountability and implementation. Many a times, giant corporations get away
with causing pollution and offences listed in these acts by paying a few fines
which are only worth a penny for them. Even though India is a signatory to
various environmental resolutions and has also ratified the UN framework
convention on Climate Change in 1993 and the Kyoto Protocol in 2002, there has
still been very less enforcement considering that it’s a dualist nation.
Another major reason is the lack of political will and lack of awareness among
the citizens, which in turn fails to create the much needed political pressure.
The country’s climate policy is also outdated, as the last one was formulated
in 2008, a decade back. The ‘National Action Plan on Climate Change’ which was
then formulated has evidently not been successful as most of the goals listed
therein have not been achieved, such as the integration of climate laws and
reporting of greenhouse gases (GHGs).
Hence, now the need arises for the courts and tribunals to take
all measures for prevention and mitigation, so as to ensure the safety and
well-being of citizens. As Justice D.Y. Chandrachud mentioned in his recent
speech, there is a need for the courts to devise solutions instead of waiting
for the parliament and this is exactly what India needs. It has unquestionably
become an issue of fundamental rights of the people and the right to life
guaranteed by Article 21 of the constitution, so the tribunals must seek to
protect the same. Therefore, in order for the judiciary to eliminate the causes
of climate change, there is a requirement of creative interpretation of laws as
against a strict and literal interpretation which hinders progress and
advancement. Doing this would not only benefit the community but also reiterate
the essence and objective behind the legislation. Therefore, there is a dire
need to interpret all legislation in an environmentally friendly way while
keeping in mind the long-term consequences of such judgments, since it is a
common law jurisdiction and precedents also play an important role.
In order to truly achieve environmental justice, the courts will
have to take up an active role in creative interpretation so as to restrain
harmful corporate projects and practices and also formulate guidelines through
judicial activism. The ‘precautionary’ and ‘polluter pays’ principle along with
the ideals of sustainability must always be kept in mind, so as to protect the
right to life of future generations as well. It is unfortunate that in the case
of Ridhima Pandey v. Union of India [O.A. No. 187/2017], the petition filed in
the National Green Tribunal by a nine year old girl alleging inaction on
climate change by the government based on the doctrine of public trust on
behalf of all children and future generations was recently disposed of as the
court believed that “climate change is covered” in existing laws. It must be
remembered that based on the doctrine of public trust, the state is the trustee
of all natural resources for the benefit of citizens. Furthermore, a severe
adoption of absolute and strict liability principles along with correlating the
measure of compensation to the size of the enterprise will also have to be
adhered to. It is also vital that environmental justice can no longer be
limited to environmental cases and tribunals, and must extend to every decision
ranging from matters of land like the Aarey forests of Maharashtra to
commercial development matters.
Another aspect which affects interpretation is the polarity
between economy and the climate, as unfortunately economic agendas act as
powerful hindering forces for environmentally sound decisions. However, it is
now high time to think about the future stakeholders considering the fact that
a good economy will do no good if most of the population is unable to afford
even clean air.
In conclusion, in order to give way to creative interpretation,
there is a need to learn new meanings of old concepts, take up a proactive role
with a liberal approach for suo-motu powers and also move towards
scientifically driven and sustainable decisions and judgments. If the same does
not materialize, then the citizens of this country would not have a future, let
alone the future generations to come.
In the present times, there is a lot of controversy with regards to the religious rights of women, with special reference to the Sabarimala temple case. As should happen with every controversy, this issue needs to be talked about and discussed in detail in order to formulate a holistic policy on the same, which is beneficial to every stakeholder.
In order to hold successful deliberations on the issue of women’s religious rights, there is a need to focus on numerous aspects apart from the right to enter places of worship and entering temples during the period of menstruation. Since India is indeed a country of diverse religions, the rights thereby originating from these religions are also diverse and manifold. A very important area of focus relates to inheritance and succession rights since they are closely intertwined with religion. The nature of religious freedom that women enjoy, not only on paper but also in practice also needs to be considered. This includes the right to follow, convert as well as not to follow a particular religion. Hence, the laws in relation to conversion also need to be referred for this discussion.
Another very important area that requires focus is exploring women’s right of religion with relation to marriage. While some religious rules prohibit women to practice a different religion than that of the husband, others rules necessitate the conversion of women to the religion of that of the husband in order to hold a successful marriage. This in turn raises a question about the religious identity of a woman in a marriage and the level of independence that she has to choose and practice her choice of customs and celebrations as different from her husband. Interestingly, conversion of a spouse to another religion is also a valid ground for divorce in many cases and what happens is that the woman is left with little or no maintenance just because she chose to follow a different religion or not to practice the religion followed by her husband in the case. Another interesting but disturbing element is that according to certain laws, the religion of a child is always assumed to be of his/her father and not of the mother. Therefore, such aspects are reflective of the patriarchal nature of the institution of religious marriage in India and how it favours the husband over the wife.
Furthermore, there is also a need to focus on the balance between religious rules as well as decisions taken by religious councils and laws and regulations that are not necessarily backed by religion but are nevertheless good for society and good for the cause of promoting religious rights of women. Hence, this involves the much dreaded question of moving forward and distinct from strict religious interpretations of religious rights for the empowerment and advancement of women.
In conclusion, in order to materialize the aforementioned discussion, politicians and other organisations need to build a base for tolerance in the nation and they need to figure out how to do that. There is also a need to eliminate the causes and practices which hinder the religious freedom of women in the country, so that we can truly achieve gender equality in the sphere of religion. Also, as it has repeatedly been suggested by courts, tribunals and law commissions along with the international community itself, the nation also needs to work on the integration and promotion of uniformity in religious laws for the benefit of women and children.
In future, the true ideals of women’s religious rights and freedoms can only be achieved if political parties and leaders come together with other organisations and institutions working for the advancement of women’s rights in order to reach a consensus for the benefit of all women who are the stakeholders in this case.
It was in 1891, during the times of immense struggle and hardship, when for the first time an Indian subject was charged with the draconian law of sedition. Jogendra Chandra Bose, the editor of a newspaper was pulled up by the then colonial government for criticising a bill introduced by the British Crown. Undeniably, this authoritarian law was used as an instrument to ingrain fear and terror in the minds of subjects and keep a tight rein on the activities of freedom fighters in order to further the British dominance agenda.
It is pertinent to note that the persons who were charged with this law during the pre-independence era are still remembered and celebrated today as the spirited freedom fighters who were not afraid of rising against injustice and dominance. In fact, Bal Gangadhar Tilak was charged by the offence twice and spent a total of six years of imprisonment for his articles in the Kesari. Believe it or not, but Mahatma Gandhi himself was also charged with this tyrannical crime. In 1922, Gandhi was taken to court for his articles of criticism in Young India magazine where he was extremely aversive to the idea of this law, and strongly denounced it by observing the following: “Section 124A under which I am happily charged, is perhaps the prince among the political sections of the IPC designed to suppress the liberty of the citizen.”
It is quite unfortunate that even decades after India gained independence, this illiberal law not only continues to exist but also thrives. In the recent times, we have seen some of the most absurd cases of sedition. The owner of a school got arrested for displaying a wrong map of Jammu and Kashmir, Divya Ramya got charged for it for tweeting that “Pakistan is not hell. People there are like us,” while the JNU row is a whole other story. Surprisingly, ABVP (Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad), the student wing of the BJP, even went ahead and filed an FIR for sedition against Amnesty International, a world renowned human rights organisation which has done immense work to promote the rights of the Indian citizens.
Another term which is doing the rounds is ‘anti-national’ which is repeatedly used to describe the persons charged with this law. Unfortunately, what the many users of this term are forgetting is the fact that there is a clear difference between being critical of the government and being against the nation. There is a dire need to understand that criticism is the biggest virtue which leads the nation into progress and advancement. Perhaps the remedy for the excessive and unrestrained usage of this expression may be another term called ‘tolerance’ and the much useful practice of ‘agreeing to disagree.’
An extremely important question that now arises, nearly a century and a few decades after the introduction of this law, is that what is the need of this law in the present times and why has it still not been repealed? Ironically, recent actions of the government with regards to Article 370 of the constitution indicate that the Modi regime is much keen on repealing ages old laws which seemingly have no requirement in today’s “new” India. It is indeed a perplexing situation in which one wonders why the statistics suggest a rampant increase in cases of sedition in the last few years. The joke that is going around is that in India, you can get arrested for liking a facebook post and even writing a blog (Hey there, CBI).
Interestingly, the makers of the constitution of India discussed the issue of sedition at length and various debates were carried out after which the word was dropped. However, it still remained a part of the Indian Penal Code which was originally drafted by the British. The law was opposed by the majority of the leaders of the newly independent Indian state as also many of them had suffered imprisonment under the same law by the British. Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister, went on to say the following: “Take again Section 124-A of the Indian Penal Code. Now so far as I am concerned that particular Section is highly objectionable and obnoxious and it should have no place both for practical and historical reasons, if you like, in any body of laws that we might pass. The sooner we get rid of it the better.” However, unfortunately, it still remains as a tool in the hands of the government which is repeatedly used to shut down voices of criticism and freedom while various other countries including the United Kingdom have already done away with it.
Today, the law is misused to exercise blatant abuse of power and is a bane for the freedom of expression of the citizens. Once charged with it, the accused loses his passport, is labelled and mocked by society and has to bear the high cost of litigation to defend himself.
I consider it a privilege, therefore, to be charged under that section.
MAHATMA GANDHI
We, at Humans for Change, would very much like to know your opinion on this matter, so go ahead and leave a comment so that we can discuss this with you!
The new Motor Vehicles act is finally here and we are all for it. The amended bill which was tabled in 2016 has finally been given assent by the President and was brought in force earlier this month. The amendments to this bill have been well written and are quite progressive in nature.
The policy makers have been diligent to keep in check the amount of penalties in consonance with the current time which was not the case a decade ago, for example, a violation of not wearing a seat belt or of not wearing a helmet on a two wheeler resulted in a penalty of 100 rupees before but now the penalty has been bumped up to a 1000 rupees. Other stricter violations such as driving without a license or driving despite disqualification whose penalty had needed to be amended severely have also been raised to 5,000 and 10,000 rupees respectively.
The bill has seen to do justice to grave offences under certain provisions like drinking and driving which now has a penalty of 10,000 rupees and/or imprisonment upto 6 months for first time offenders but for second time offenders the fine goes to 15,000 rupees and/or imprisonment up to 2 years.
One of the primary areas where the bill is said to concentrate on is for developing stricter laws especially for the underage demographic i.e juvenile offences such as driving or drinking and driving which has held the guardian to be liable for a fine of 25,000 rupees with a 3 year jail time and simultaneously leads to cancellation of the Motor Vehicle’s Registration.
It is seen that new expressions and terms have also been included in the amendment,like,terms such as the “golden hour.”
Golden hour has been designated as that one hour right after the accident takes place which is said to be very critical for the life of the victim.
The act has also encouraged the citizens to give a helping hand to victims of road accidents by providing for the rules of Good Samaritan in the bill which certainly has helped the bill to be protective about the people who volunteer to get involved in the process.
Another expression which has been and was needed to be incorporated is the “aggregator” which is a digital intermediary or marketplace for a passenger to connect with a driver for the purpose of transportation. The set principles of such intermediaries by which they needed to be governed are also included in the bill.
The bill has tried to draw attention to the hazards of climate change thereby also reducing corruption in the transport department by providing for automated fitness testing of the vehicles.The testing agencies issuing automobile approvals have been brought under the ambit of the Act and standards will be set for motor vehicle testing institutes.
Therefore,it can be concluded that the bill has been amended with a comprehensive approach and to all its entirety. The significant bumps which were needed to be made in the penalties/fines are believed to encourage people to become less reckless and rather alert while travelling on the road.
The new definitions and terms which have been introduced are well put but lack a bit of clarity which might hinder the implementation of the amended act,like,the bill has provided for a National Road Safety Board which has to be created by a notification by the central government but it is yet to clarify its functions and its functioning.
But something which needs to be put under heavy observation is that implementation of such fines come through and should not result in people merely bypassing them by paying a meagre amount to the cops which would impede the growth that has been intended with this bill and would defeat the purpose of the amendment.
Humans for Change 