VISION

 What is the issue?

• A public interest litigation has been filed in the Supreme Court by Wasim Rizvi seeking declaration of 26 verses of the Quran as unconstitutional, non-effective and non- functional.
• In this context, here is a look at the limitations of judicial review in this regard.

What is the petition?

• The petitioner has made the demand on the ground that those 26 verses of the Quran promote extremism and terrorism.
• It is also said to pose a serious threat to the sovereignty, unity and integrity of the country.
• Response - The petition has led to protests among Muslims, and several clerics have issued fatwas against the petitioner.
  • In Vishwa Lochan Madan (2014), the Supreme Court has already observed that such fatwas have no validity.
• Shia clerics have excommunicated Rizvi from the fold of Shias.

What are the legal incongruities in the petition?

• Rizvi had named three secretaries of the Centre and also 56 private persons as respondents.
• In purely legal terms, the writ jurisdiction lies against the “state.”
• But the persons named as respondents are certainly not ‘state’ within the meaning of Article 12 of the Constitution.
• Ideally he should have made Muslim God, Allah, as respondent number one as Muslims believe him to be the sole author of the Quran.
  • Under Indian law, idols are juristic persons and recently Ram Lalla won the historic Babri Masjid case.
• The petition also claims the Quran promotes terrorism and therefore these 26 verses must be removed.
• There are a number of laws such as the IPC, UAPA, TADA, POTA, etc that already prohibit and severely punish terror activities.
• No terrorist can certainly defend himself by relying on his religious texts as the law of the land.

Does the court have jurisdiction in this regard?

1)  7th annual summit of NATHEALTH

•Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare, Dr Harsh Vardhan, addressed the 7th annual summit of NATHEALTH. The summit focused on ‘Indian Health system expansion in post-COVID era’. While addressing the summit the minister reiterated the commitments of the government for fulfilling the goal of Health for all.

•The primary vision of the policy-framework is to attain highest possible level of health and well-being for all irrespective of all age groups. To attain this vision, the policy emphasizes on preventive & promotive aspects of health and providing universal access to good quality healthcare services. Government also launched Ayushman Bharat program with the objective of providing Universal Free Access to primary health care, promoting health and wellbeing.

2)  Nagaland Health Minister launches ‘i-Learn’ for Community Health Officers

•Nagaland Health and Family Welfare Minister, S Pangnyu Phom has launched i-Learn, a capacity building and performance tracking application for Community Health Officers, CHOs in the state at his office chamber in Kohima. The state government launched the i-Learn application in partnership with USAID-NISHTHA/Jgpiego which will cater across the 189 Health & wellness centres in the state.

3)  US President Biden invites PM Modi to Leaders Summit on Climate

•President Joe Biden has invited 40 world leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, to a US-hosted virtual summit on climate next month to underscore the urgency and the economic benefits of stronger climate action. Biden will host a two-day climate summit of world leaders starting on Earth Day, April 22, in which he will outline the US goal for reductions of carbon emissions by 2030, known as the nationally determined contribution under the historic Paris accord.

•The White House said a total of 40 world leaders, including Prime Minister Modi, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin, were invited to the conference, which will be live-streamed to the public.

•Other leaders invited for the summit include Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Saudi Arabia King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud and UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Bhutanese Prime Minister Lotay Tshering are the other two leaders from South Asia to be invited for the mega-conference.

4)  New Zealand passes miscarriages bereavement leave law

•New Zealand’s parliament has passed legislation giving mothers and their partners the right to paid leave following a miscarriage or stillbirth, becoming only the second country in the world to do so. India is the only other country with similar legislation.

•The leave provisions apply to mothers, their partners as well as parents planning to have a child through adoption or surrogacy. One in four New Zealand women has had a miscarriage. The bill will give women and their partners time to come to terms with their loss without having to tap into sick leave. Because their grief is not a sickness, it is a loss. New Zealand was the first country in the world to give voting rights to women and has been a pioneer on issues around woman’s rights.

5)  S&P raises India’s FY22 GDP growth forecast to 11% from 10%

•S&P Global Ratings raised India’s growth forecast for the financial year 2021-22 to 11% from 10% earlier, led by an expansionary fiscal policy aimed at boosting domestic private spending. It has also raised the 2021 growth forecast for China to 8% from 7% on stronger-than-expected exports and lingering momentum in the property market.

6)  SAIL Chairperson Soma Mondal appointed Chairperson of SCOPE

•Soma Mondal, the chairperson of the state-owned Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL), was on March 26, 2021, elected the new chairperson of the Standing Conference of Public Enterprises (SCOPE). Mondal will have a two-year term starting April; she took charge of SAIL on January 1, 2021.

7)  Mahinder Giri, range officer won the International Ranger Award

•Mahinder Giri, range officer of Rajaji Tiger Reserve for being the only ranger from Asia to win the prestigious International Ranger Award for his contribution towards conservation. The award has been announced for 10 professionals across the world by the International Union for Conservation of Nature IUCN and World Commission on Protected Areas WCPA.

•Developed through a collaboration between the IUCN WCPA, the International Ranger Federation, Global Wildlife Conservation, and Conservation Allies, these awards, created in 2020, aim to highlight and felicitate the extraordinary work that rangers do in protected and conserved areas worldwide.

📰 Only 5.4% of houses under Centre’s flagship scheme reached completion so far this year