UPSC Daily Current Affairs- 1st December 2022 | Current Affairs & Hindu Analysis: Daily, Weekly & Monthly PDF Download

GS-I

Context

In Nagaland, the 10-day long Hornbill Festival 2022 will begin on December 1, at Naga heritage village Kisama.

About:

• The first festival was held in 2000. 
• Venue: It is held at Naga Heritage Village, Kisama which is about 12 km from Kohima in Nagaland.
• Organizers:It is organized by the State Tourism and Art & Culture Departments of the Government of Nagaland.
• Objective:To encourage inter-tribal interaction and to promote cultural heritage of Nagaland.

Key highlights of festival:

• Festival highlights include the traditional Naga Morungs exhibition and the sale of arts and crafts, food stalls, song and dance shows, indigenous games etc.
• One of the major highlights of this festival is the Hornbill International Rock Festival where local and international rock bands perform.

Nomenclature:

• The festival is named after the bird “Indian hornbill”, which is displayed in the folklore of most of the state's tribes.
• There are 9 hornbill species in India of which Great Hornbill is the most famous.
• It is also called the 'Festival of Festivals'.

Great Hornbill:

• Scientific name: Buceros bicornis.
• Common name: Great Indian hornbill or great pied hornbill.

Range:

• It is found in the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia.
• The bulk of the population is found in India, where it is restricted to the Himalayan foothills, hill forests in northeast India and, disjunctly, the wet evergreen forests of west India.

Conservation:

• IUCN Status: Near Threatened.
• It is listed in Appendix I of CITES.

Importance:

• Its impressive size and colour have made it important in many tribal cultures and rituals.
• The great hornbill is the state bird of Kerala and Arunachal in India.
• It is not a state bird of Nagaland, although the hornbill festival is celebrated in Nagaland. Nagaland’s state bird is: Blyth's tragopan.

Source: All India Radio

Context

A five-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court is examining a bunch of petitions recommending reforms in the process of appointment of members of the Election Commission.

Electoral reforms and reluctant Governments

• Long pending reforms: A list of over 20 reform proposals was compiled in 2004. More proposals were added to the list over time and are pending with government.
• Ineffective model code of conduct: These range from strengthening the Commission’s inherent structure to handling the misuse of muscle and money power during elections, which violate the Model Code of Conduct.
• Judicial intervention because of reluctant Government: It is hoped that the Bench will also examine electoral reforms suggested to governments by successive Election Commissions over the last two decades or so.

Issue of appointment of election commissioners

• The Dinesh Goswami Committee in 1990: It is suggested that the Chief Election Commissioner be appointed by the President (read: executive) in consultation with the Chief Justice of India and the Leader of the Opposition (and in case the Leader of the Opposition was not available, then consultation be held with the leader the largest opposition group in the Lok Sabha).
• Statutory backing for collegium led appointment: It said this process should have statutory backing. Importantly, it applied the same criteria to the appointments of Election Commissioners, along with consultation with the Chief Election Commissioner.
• The National Commission to Review the Working of the Constitution: The commission under Justice M.N. Venkatachalam, said that the Chief Election Commissioner and other Election Commissioners should be appointed on the recommendation of a body comprising the Prime Minister, the Leaders of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, the Speaker of the Lok Sabha and the Deputy Chairman of the Rajya Sabha.
• The 255th Report of the Law Commission: Chaired by Justice A.P. Shah, said the appointment of all the Election Commissioners should be made by the President in consultation with a three-member collegium consisting of the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition of the Lok Sabha (or the leader of the largest opposition party in the Lok Sabha), and the Chief Justice of India.

What is T.N.Seshan case?

• Conferred equal power on election commissioners: The T.N.Seshan case conferred equal powers on the Election Commissioners as those enjoyed by the Chief Election Commissioner (referring to the Chief Election Commissioner as primus inter pares, or first among equals).
• Equal protection was not conferred: Supreme court offered majority power, whereby any two can overrule even the Chief Election Commissioner. Yet, it did not accord the Election Commissioners the same constitutional protection (of removal by impeachment) as is accorded to the Chief Election Commissioner.

Why security of tenure is important for Election Commissioners?

• Hesitancy to act: Without security of tenure, they may hesitate to act independently, which they otherwise might if they were truly secure.
• Junior to chief election commission: In the absence of full constitutional security, an Election Commissioner could feel they must keep on the right side of the Chief Election Commissioner.
• Remain loyal to government: They might also feel they should remain within the ambit favoured by the government.
• Fear of non-elevation: An Election Commissioner can never be sure whether they will automatically be elevated to the top post because nowhere has elevation been statutorily decreed.

What are the suggested reforms?

• Same procedure for removal of judge: It is suggested measures to safeguard Election Commissioners from arbitrary removal, in a manner similar to what is accorded to the Chief Election Commissioner, who can only be removed by impeachment, which is by no means easy.
• Appointment by collegium: While the Chief Election Commissioner should be appointed by a collegium, this must apply equally to the Election Commissioners.
• Reform by constitutional amendments: The Election Commissioners must now equally be protected from arbitrary removal by a constitutional amendment that would ensure a removal process that currently applies only to the Chief Election Commissioner.

Conclusion

Reforms in election commission is absolutely necessary but manner of reforms is debatable. Judiciary’s role is not to reform the institution but to deliver the justice. This might be another case of judicial overreach in legislative domain any reform. Any reform in election commission has to come from legislature.

Source: The Hindu

Context

The Supreme Court hearing started on the long pending issue of Belagavi between Maharashtra and Karnataka.

About:

• The dispute between Maharashtra and Karnataka over Belgaum and other border areas is a longstanding issue between the two states.

Origin of the dispute:

• The erstwhile Bombay Presidency, a multilingual province, included the present-day Karnataka districts of Bijapur, Belgaum, Dharwar and Uttara-Kannada (previously North Kanara).
• The Belagavi/Belgaum region at the border of Maharashtra and Karnataka comprises both Kannada and Marathi speakers.
• In 1948, the Belgaum municipality requested that the district, having a predominantly Marathi-speaking population, be incorporated into the proposed Maharashtra state.
• However, the States Reorganisation Act of 1956, which divided states on linguistic and administrative lines, made Belgaum a part of the then Mysore State (which was renamed Karnataka in 1973).
• The area has been under dispute since then.
• The Maharashtra Ekikaran Samiti, formed in 1948, has been fighting for a merger of 800-odd villages in Karnataka with Maharashtra.
• From 2006, Karnataka started holding the winter session of the Legislature in Belagavi, building a massive Secretariat building in the district headquarters on the lines of the Vidhana Soudha in Bengaluru to reassert its claim.

Mahajan Commission:

• In 1966, at Maharashtra’s insistence, then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi established a one-man commission led by Mehr Chand Mahajan, third Chief Justice of India.
• The Commission, which submitted its report in 1967, recommended that 264 villages be transferred to Maharashtra and that Belgaum and 247 villages remain with Karnataka.
• The Commission also additionally stated that Sholapur in Maharashtra and Kasaragode, which is in Kerala, be given to Karnataka.

Four-member committee:

• In 1960, a four-member committee was formed by both States, but it couldn’t arrive at a consensus and representatives submitted reports to their respective governments.

Context

Coming to the rescue of the critically endangered Great Indian Bustard (GIB), the Supreme Court has mooted the idea of launching 'Project GIB' on the lines of 'Project Tiger’.

• Project Tiger was started in 1973 to save the big cats.

Great Indian Bustard (GIB)

• GIBs are the largest among the four-bustard species found in India.
  • The other three being MacQueen’s bustard, lesser florican and the Bengal florican.
• Being terrestrial birds, they spend most of their time on the ground with occasional flights to go from one part of their habitat to the other.
• They feed on insects, lizards, grass seeds etc. GIBs are considered the flagship bird species of grassland and hence barometers of the health of grassland ecosystems.

Habitat and Status

• This bird, found mainly in Rajasthan and Gujarat, has been categorized as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
  • As per the 2021 report of the IUCN, they are on the verge of extinction with hardly 50 to 249 of them alive.
• GIBs’ historic range included much of the Indian sub-continent but it has now shrunken to just 10 per cent of it.
• Among the heaviest birds with flight, GIBs prefer grasslands as their habitats.

Threats

• Scientists of Wildlife Institute of India (WII) have been pointing out overhead power transmission lines as the biggest threat to the GIBs.
  • WII research has concluded that in Rajasthan, 18 GIBs die every year after colliding with overhead powerlines.
  • These birds, due to their poor frontal vision, can’t detect powerlines in time and their weight make in-flight quick manoeuvres difficult.
• Kutch and Thar desert are the places which have witnessed creation of huge renewable energy infrastructure over the past two decades.
• This led to installation of windmills and construction of power lines even in core GIB areas.

Conservation measures

• In 2015, the Central government launched the GIB species recovery programme.
• Under the programme, the WII and Rajasthan forest department have jointly set up conservation breeding centres where GIB eggs harvested from the wild are incubated artificially and hatchlings raised in controlled environment.
• The plan is to create a population which can act as insurance against the threat of extinction and release the third generation of these captive-bred birds into the wild.

Supreme Court’s intervention

• The SC in April 2021 ordered that all overhead power transmission lines in core and potential GIB habitats in Rajasthan and Gujarat be made underground.
• The SC also formed a three-member committee, including Devesh Gadhvi, the member of the bustard specialist group of IUCN, to help power companies comply with the order.
• Again, in November 2022, the court sought reports from chief secretaries of the two states in six weeks on installation of bird diverters in priority areas.
• It also asked them to assess the length of transmission lines that need to go underground.

Project Tiger

• The Govt. of India had launched “Project Tiger” on 1st April 1973 to promote conservation of the tiger.
• The Project Tiger Directorate of the Ministry of Environment and Forests was mandated with the task of providing technical guidance and funding support.
• National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA)
  • Project Tiger has been converted into a statutory authority (NTCA) by providing enabling provisions in the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972 through an amendment, viz. Wild Life (Protection) Amendment Act, 2006.
  • The NTCA addresses the ecological as well as administrative concerns for conserving tigers.
  • It provides a statutory basis for protection of tiger reserves, apart from providing strengthened institutional mechanisms for the protection of ecologically sensitive areas and endangered species.

 Source: The Hindu

Context

The Kirit Parikh Committee, which was set up by the government to review the gas pricing formula, has submitted its recommendations to the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MOP&NG).

Gas Pricing in India:

• Much of the natural gas being produced in the country does not command a market-determined price — that is, it is not determined by buyers and sellers based on demand-supply dynamics in the market.
• Rather, a formula is used to fix the price of the fuel every six months.
• As per this formula, the domestic gas price is the weighted average price of four global benchmarks —
  • US-based Henry Hub,
  • Canada-based Alberta gas,
  • UK-based NBP, and
  • Russian gas.
• The domestic price is based on the prices of these international benchmarks in the prior year, and kicks in with a quarter’s lag. It applies for six months.
• So, the price applicable from April 1 to September 30, 2022 is based on benchmark prices from January to December 2021.

Evaluation of this Formula:

• This formula-based pricing has some interesting features and outcomes.
• One, the formula has no mention about gas actually imported into India. Typically, gas imported in Asian markets is costlier than many international benchmarks.
  • In effect, the price of domestic gas is lower than that of gas imports.
• Second, the averaging of benchmark prices over the past year and then the time lag of a quarter mean that the domestic gas price movement is often out of sync with what’s really happening on the ground.

Criticism of this Formula:

• Domestic gas prices have been rising in the past couple of years but thanks to the formula, they are still cheaper than imported gas.
• Now, this acts as disincentive to local producers such as ONGC, Oil India and Reliance Industries who often find that the price is not worth their time and effort to increase output.
• This eventually leads to increased gas imports at higher prices.

Formula Review:

• What India needs to do to have a mature gas market is to review is its existing formula.
• The argument put forth is that the formula is based on markets which are either very matured or are themselves producers and not exactly India-specific.
• India has set the target to raise share of natural gas in energy mix to 15 per cent by 2030, and to attain this, the entire eco-system needs to be addressed.

India’s growing import dependency:

• India is the world’s second-largest gas importer. It sources roughly half of its needs from foreign suppliers, primarily from West Asian producers in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman and Kuwait.
• Over the years, India’s import dependency for natural gas has steadily risen and now is inching towards 50 per cent.
• The consumption of Liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) rose sharply after the Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) was launched in 2016.

 News Summary:

• In September, the government constituted the committee, led by energy expert Kirit Parikh, to review the gas pricing formula for gas produced in the country with the aim to ensure a fair price even as global prices for gas remained high.
• The committee has submitted its recommendations to the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MOP&NG).

Major Recommendations:

• The committee has recommended a price band of $4-6.50/unit for gas from old legacy fields, which account for over 70 per cent of the domestic output.
  • A price band will ensure a predictable pricing regime for producers and protect consumers by moderating CNG and PNG price spikes.
    • State run ONGC and OIL largely operate legacy fields in the country.
• The panel had suggested linking the price of gas produced by state-owned firms from fields given to them on a nomination basis to imported crude oil prices rather than benchmarking them to gas rates in international market
• The committee has proposed abolishing formula-based gas pricing and implementing fully market-determined rates by January 2027.
• It also suggested including natural gas in the one-nation-one-tax regime of GST.
  • It can be done by subsuming excise duty charged by the central government and varying rates of VAT levied by state governments.
• To address state concern of loss of revenue, the panel was in favour of setting up a mechanism similar to the compensation cess regime.
  • This regime made good for any revenue loss that states incurred by way of giving their right to levy VAT and other taxes on goods and services in first five years of implementation of GST regime from July 1, 2017.
• Also, the panel was in favour of moderation in rates of excise duty.

Source: Indian Express

Context

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is helping the people working in the waste segregation industry in India to move into formal economy, by helping them access government welfare programmes.

Context

The Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi has greeted the BSF personnel and their families on the occasion of BSF's Raising Day.