Commentaries

Introduction: India’s Data Security Crisis In a significant breach of data security, the private information of lakhs of Indians who registered on the CoWIN app for Covid-19 vaccination has allegedly been leaked. According to reports,  a Telegram bot was responsible for divulging the details provided during registration on the CoWIN app. Journalists and opposition politicians […]

लोकतंत्र को अपराधियों की छाया से मुक्त करने के प्रयास में सुप्रीम कोर्ट ने दस साल पहले एक अहम फैसला दिया था। लिली थॉमस बनाम भारत सरकार के मामले में सुप्रीम कोर्ट ने दागी निर्वाचित जनप्रतिनिधियों की सदस्यता बरकरार रखने का विशेषाधिकार समाप्त कर दिया था। जनप्रतिनिधित्व अधिनियम, 1951 की धारा 8(4) को असंवैधानिक करार […]

फरवरी 2023 में सुप्रीम कोर्ट में सात न्यायाधीशों की नियुक्तियां हुई। नियुक्तियों के बीच सुप्रीम कोर्ट के एक वरिष्ठï वकील के बयान ने कानूनी जगत में हलचल मचा दी। वरिष्ठ वकील का कहना था कि इनमें से एक जज ऐसे हैं जिन्होंने हाई कोर्ट के अपने समूचे कार्यकाल में एक भी महत्वपूर्ण निर्णय नहीं दिया। […]

International Flow of Virtual Water India is home to nearly 18% of the world’s population but only holds 4% of the global water resources, making it one of the most water-stressed countries in the world. A country is categorised as ‘water-stressed’ when its annual per-person water availability is less than 1,700 cubic metres. Availability below […]

  On 8 December 2022, the central government discontinued the Maulana Azad National Fellowship [MANF], stating that it overlapped with other fellowships benefitting minority students. Implemented by the Ministry of Minority Affairs, MANF was launched in 2009 to execute the Sachar Committee’s recommendations on inclusive development. MANF assimilated 6 minority communities notified under Section 2(c) […]

Conference of Parties: A Talk Shop? The 27th United Nations Climate Change Conference of Parties [COP] was held in Sharm-El Sheikh, Egypt, between November 6 and November 18, 2022. Although touted as the authority on climate action decision-making, the long-term effects of COP remain to be seen.  Over the years, representatives have repeatedly called for […]

ABSTRACT Special courts are an oft-touted solution to the judicial delays plaguing Indian courts. Legislative and executive leaders, civil society members, and even judges often resort to calling for them when faced with case pendency, particularly in heinous cases of sexual assault, etc. However, inspecting laws and judicial orders setting up special courts shows inconsistencies […]

The Electoral Promise of Farm Loan Waivers Farmers and other agricultural stakeholders make up a significant portion of the voting population. Therefore, their issues remain an essential part of the electoral discourse. Farm loan waivers appear to be a favourite pre-election announcement among political parties in response to the growing agrarian distress. The 2021 National […]

A 2022 IMF working paper authored by Surjit Bhalla, Karan Bhasin, and Arvind Vimani has discussed how extreme poverty has been almost entirely eradicated in India (Bhalla et al., 2022). The World Bank (2015) categorises those in ‘extreme poverty’ as those who live on less than US $1.9 purchasing power parity [PPP] per day globally. […]

INTRODUCTION Ayushman Bharat, an umbrella scheme that included other major Publicly Funded Health Insurances [PFHI] schemes, was launched in 2018 by the Union government. The vision was one of achieving universal health coverage (National Health Authority, n.d.). The flagship scheme contains two components, health and wellness centres [HWCs] and the Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana […]

Introduction: The Invisible Work of Women in India Due to the traditional division of labour, women and girls majorly perform unpaid household chores such as cooking, cleaning, and care work. According to the recent National Statistical Office (2020) report on time use in India, women spend close to 5 hours (299 minutes) per day on […]

INTRODUCTION  The IPCC’s sixth assessment report, “Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis” (IPCC 2021), tells us that “the climate catastrophe timer is about to go off and we don’t have much time”. The report highlights that countries do not have the luxury to forgo climate concerns for the sake of economic growth. The obstacle […]

INTRODUCTION  Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the repeal of the contentious farm laws on 19 November 2021 and urged the protesting farmers to return home. These three bills, namely, the Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill 2020, the Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill 2020, and […]

INTRODUCTION The importance of water, sanitation, and hygiene, collectively known as WASH, has been stressed ever since the unprecedented rise of COVID-19. The emphasis was especially seen in urban centres where “inadequate sanitation” across informal settlements is an issue of concern. Often addressed as “messy and hidden”, migration and informal settlements that house rural migrants […]