Daily Prelims Notes 12 January 2021

  • January 12, 2021
  • Posted by: OptimizeIAS Team
  • Category: DPN
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Daily Prelims Notes 12 January 2021

By

Santosh Sir

All 6 Prelims qualified

4 CSE Mains qualified

If I can do it, you can too

Table Of Contents

  1. The Supreme Court put a stay on the three farm laws as an Interim order
  2. People Mover
  3. Sea Vigil and Topex
  4. Tirthan Wildlife Sanctuary and Great Himalayan National Park in Himachal Pradesh/Management Effectiveness Evaluation (MEE)
  5. Prevention of cruelty to Animal’s Act

 

1. The Supreme Court put a stay on the three farm laws as an Interim order

Subject: Polity

Context: The Supreme Court has put a stay on the three farm laws while hearing petitions dealing with issues leading to farmers protest due to these laws.

Concept:

  • The Supreme Court under article 13, 31 and also art 136 and 143 gets implicit power for judicial review.
  • Judicial Review is power of judiciary to review the lawfulness of a decision or action made by a public body.
  • Under this power Supreme Court examines the constitutionality of any laws or executive action.

Staying the laws:

  • Stay on the laws are different from holding it unconstitutional. It just prevents it from implementation till the time matter is decided by the court.
  • Traditionally the courts have taken approach not to pass interim order to stop implementation. For ex- Even in case of NJAC, Act it didn’t put stay, even though later on held it unconstitutional.
  • However, Supreme Courts have pout stay on orders passed by the High courts time to time. Apart from that it has stayed away from putting a stay. Generally, approach is that the Parliament’s power to legislate, drawn from Article 254(1) of the Constitution, can only be restricted if the law violates the Constitution.
  • Three grounds for halting implementation of laws:
    1. Legislative competence: if parliament has no power to legislate on the matter.
    2. Violation of fundamental rights
    3. Violations of any other Part of the Constitution

What next?

  • The Centre opposed stay on law, yet, the order passed means the Supreme Court taking position based on consideration of matter of “public interest”. Though, this is welcome it may bring back the question of judicial overreach.
  • For now possibility is that the SC may propose a court-led committee to look into laws and associated problems.

2. People Mover

Subject: Infrastructure

Context: Construction of Central Vista or Parliament building.

Concept:

  • Underground people mover will be constructed to directly connect building with the two metro stations in New Delhi.
  • People mover is small transit systems serving a limited number of people in a defined area, like theme parks, airport terminals, etc.
  • It is generally an automated guided transit system serving small areas.

About Central Vista Project

CENTRAL VISTA REDEVELOPMENT PROJECT – Optimize IAS

3. Sea Vigil and Topex

Subject: Defence Exercise

Context: Navy is set to conduct Sea Vigil a coastal defence exercise on January 12 and 14.

Concept:

  • Sea vigil is a biennial coastal defence exercise conducted by Indian Navy along the entire coastline and Exclusive Economic Zone of India (What are EEZ and Continental Self? – Optimize IAS)
  • It includes all 13 coastal states and UTs, with other maritime stakeholders (Indian Air Force, Coast Guard, National Security Guard, the Border Security Force, oil handling agencies and airports) and coastal and fishing communities.
  • Its conduct is being facilitated by Ministries of Defence, Home Affairs, Shipping, Petroleum and Natural Gas, Fisheries, Customs, State Governments and other agencies of Centre/ State.
  • It aims at assessing strengths and weaknesses along coast to boost maritime and national security.
  • Theatre Level Readiness and Operational Exercise (TROPEX) is an inter-service military exercise involving the participation of the Indian Army, Air Force, Navy and the Coast Guard.
  • TROPEX was started as an annual exercise in 2005 and is now a biennial exercise.
  • TROPEX extending over a month is done in three phases:
    1. Individual level
    2. Joint exercise
    3. Tactical phase
  • TROPEX focusses on combat readiness of Indian navy as well as Indian army, Air force and also seeks to ensure interoperability and jointness for overall security.

4. Tirthan Wildlife Sanctuary and Great Himalayan National Park in Himachal Pradesh / Management Effectiveness Evaluation (MEE)

Subject: Environment

Context: Management Effectiveness Evaluation (MEE) of 146 national parks and wildlife sanctuaries in the country was released by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change. These two topped in the survey.

Concept:

  • India has a network of 903 Protected Areas in the country covering about 5% of the total geographic area of the country. In order to assess the efficacy of Protected Areas, evaluation of management effectiveness is required.
  • Management Effectiveness Evaluation (MEE) of Protected Areas (PAs) is a tool to study effectiveness of protected areas and is used by those involved in better strategy across the globe today.
  • India’s MEE score of 62.01% is better than the global average mean of 56%.
  • It provides valuable guidance on various aspects of wildlife and protected area.
  • It has now been extended for Marine protected areas as well by WII (Wild Life Institute of India) and MoEF&CC.
  • MEE-ZOO has also bean launched for survey of zoo across India.

5. Prevention of cruelty to Animal’s Act

Subject: Environment

Context: The Supreme Court held that the removal of an animal from the custody of an accused as mentioned in 2017 rules brought by the government is not contrary to the provisions of the Act.

Concept:

  • 2017 rules notified by the Centre allowed forfeiting of animals of traders and transporters during pendency of trial in cases under The Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, 1960.
  • It just provided for “seizure” and not confiscation. Confiscation means transfer of ownership of the property (only done after order in case comes) and seizure is just taking possession of property and is temporary in nature (one gets back property if decision is in their favour).
  • Under 2017 rules the local magistrate by its discretion on interim custody sometimes hand over the animal to some local Pinjarapoles or Gaushala or Animal Shelter Houses, when the accused owners are not fit to get interim custody of the cattle as per law laid down by the court.
  • The expenditure incurred by such shelter houses in caring for the rescued cattle during pendency of the litigation has to be borne by the accused owner and the transporter as provided in the Act.

About the Prevention of Cruelty to Animal Act:

  • It prohibits any person from inflicting, causing, or if it is the owner, permitting, unnecessary pain or suffering to be inflicted on any animal.
  • It provides for punishment for causing unnecessary cruelty and suffering to animals.
  • Section 2 of the act defines animals and types of animals like domestic or captive animals.
  • Section 4 provides for Welfare Board of India (WBI), a statutory advisory body for animal welfare and protection of animals from unnecessary suffering and pain. Late Smt. Rukmini Devi Arundale, well known humanitarian and Bharatnatyam exponent led it since its foundation for almost 20 years.
  • It mentions forms of cruelty, exceptions, and killing of a suffering animal in case any cruelty has been committed against it, so as to relieve it from further suffering.
  • Provides the guidelines relating to experimentation on animals for scientific purposes.
  • An animal cannot be exhibited or trained by any person, if:
    1. Such a person is unregistered as per the provisions of this chapter;
    2. Such an animal has been barred from being included in any performance by the Central Government through a notification in the Official Gazette.
Prelims Notes