TOP 5 TAKKAR NEWS OF THE DAY (19th JUNE 2023)

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1. UNIFORM CIVIL CODE

TAG: GS 2: POLITY

THE CONTEXT: 22nd Law Commission of India sought the views of religious organisations and the public on the issue of a Uniform Civil Code (UCC).

EXPLANATION:

• A notice issued by the Commission said those interested and willing may present their views within 30 days.
• This comes eight months after the Centre told the Supreme Court that the Constitution obligated the State to have a UCC for its citizens, saying that people of different religions and denominations following different property and matrimonial laws was an “affront to the nation’s unity”.
• Responding to petitions before the Supreme Court for uniformity in laws governing matters of divorce, succession, inheritance, adoption and guardianship, the Centre, in October 2022, had told the apex court that the Constitution obligated the State to have a UCC for its citizens. It had also submitted that the matter would be placed before the 22nd Law Commission.

What did the 21st Law Commission say on the matter?

• Underlining that the Uniform Civil Code is “neither necessary nor desirable at this stage”, the 21st Law Commission of India, in 2018, argued for reform of family laws of every religion through amendments and codification of certain aspects so as to make them gender-just
• In its ‘Consultation Paper on Family Law Reforms’, the Law Commission took a stand in favour of “equality ‘within communities’ between men and women” (personal law reform), “rather than ‘equality between’ communities” (UCC).
• It further noted that “women must be guaranteed their freedom of faith without any compromise on their right to equality” as it would be unfair to make women choose between one or the other.

What is Uniform Civil Code?

• A UCC would provide for one law for the entire country, applicable to all religious communities, in their personal matters such as marriage, divorce, inheritance, adoption etc.
• Currently, Indian personal law is fairly complex, with each religion adhering to its own specific laws. Separate laws govern Hindus including Sikhs, Jains and Buddhist, Muslims, Christians, and followers of other religions.
• The exception to this rule is the state of Goa, where all religions have a common law regarding marriages, divorces, and adoption.

What does the Constitution say about a UCC?

• Article 44 of the Constitution lays down that the state shall endeavour to secure a UCC for citizens throughout the territory of India.
• Article 44 is among the Directive Principles of State Policy. Directive Principles are not enforceable by court, but are supposed to inform and guide governance.
• While Article 44 uses the words “state shall endeavour”, other Articles in the ‘Directive Principles’ chapter use words such as “in particular strive”; “shall in particular direct its policy”; “shall be obligation of the state” etc.
• Furthermore, the phrase “by suitable legislation” is absent in Article 44. All this implies that the duty of the state is greater in other directive principles than in Article 44.

Why is there no uniform code for personal law?

• Article 25 lays down an individual’s fundamental right to religion.
• Article 26(b) upholds the right of each religious denomination or any section thereof to “manage its own affairs in matters of religion”.
• Article 29 defines the right to conserve distinctive culture.
• An individual’s freedom of religion under Article 25 is subject to “public order, health, morality” and other provisions relating to fundamental rights, but a group’s freedom under Article 26 has not been subjected to other fundamental rights.

2. HAWKISH PAUSE

TAG: GS 3: ECONOMY

THE CONTEXT: The Federal Reserve of the United States, the world’s most influential central bank, decided to pause raising interest rates. While it is a pause, many are calling it a hawkish one a characterisation used for India’s RBI as well.

EXPLANATION:

• Over the past two reviews (in April and June) of monetary policy which essentially involves the RBI’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) tweaking interest rates in such a manner as to contain inflation while promoting growth and employment  the RBI has decided to “pause” raising interest rates.

• In any policy review, a central bank either raises interest rates or cuts them or decides to maintain the status quo.

What is a “hawkish pause”?

• Those central banks (or bankers) who have a very low threshold for tolerating variation from the targeted inflation level (or a range), and who keep their eyes peeled for such divergence and immediately swoop in to raise interest rates, are called “Hawks”.
• “Doves”, on the other hand, favour boosting growth (by keeping the interest rates low) and are far more willing to risk having higher inflation.
• A hawkish pause then implies that while the central bank has decided to pause raising interest rates, ending a streak of repeated interest rate .
• Low interest rates, for instance, imply that stock markets will move higher because fresh credit is cheaper than previously imagined.
• These are the things that make a pause “hawkish”. Essentially, no one should take it for granted that the Fed (or the RBI) have stopped taking the threat of inflation lightly.

3. MIYAWAKI TECHNIQUE

TAG: PRELIMS PERSPECTIVE

THE CONTEXT: Prime Minister during his latest ‘Mann ki baat’ episode spoke about Miyawaki plantation, the Japanese method of creating dense urban forests in a small area. The PM also cited the example of a Kerala-based teacher, Raafi Ramnath, who used the Miyawaki technique to transform a barren land into a mini forest called Vidyavanam by planting 115 varieties of trees.

EXPLANATION:

• Meanwhile, to fight climate change, curb pollution levels, and increase the green cover of the financial capital, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has been creating Miyawaki forests in several open land parcels of Mumbai.

What is the Miyawaki plantation method?

• Named after Japanese botanist Akira Miyawaki, this method involves planting two to four different types of indigenous trees within every square metre. In this method, the trees become self-sustaining and they grow to their full length within three years.
• The methodology was developed in the 1970s, with the basic objective to densify green cover within a small parcel of land.
• The plants used in the Miyawaki method are mostly self-sustaining and don’t require regular maintenance like manuring and watering.

• Over the years, this cost effective method has become the go-to solution for the civic body to restore the green cover in a space-starved city like Mumbai.

How is Miyawaki useful?

• The dense green cover of indigenous trees plays a key role in absorbing the dust particles of the area where the garden has been set up. The plants also help in regulating surface temperature. Some of the common indigenous plants that are used for these forests include Anjan, Amala, Bel, Arjun and Gunj.

• With several infrastructure projects like real estate metro rail construction in progress in Mumbai over the past few years, it was recorded that the surface temperature in certain pockets of Mumbai has increased. Therefore, to fight this challenge, such forests are being created.
• These green patches play a major role in regulating the carbon levels of a given area, which may in return help in maintaining a clean year. Also, these forests encourage new biodiversity and an ecosystem is developed around it, which in turn increases the fertility of the soil and regulates surface temperature.

4. KAMALA SOHONIE

TAG: GS 1: HISTORY

THE CONTEXT: On June 18, Google Doodle honours scientist Kamala Sohonie on her 112th birth Anniversary and here is the brief account of how she made CV Raman change his stance on women in science institutions.

EXPLANATION:

• Kamala Sohonie was the first Indian woman to get a PhD degree in a scientific discipline and went on to win the Rashtrapati Award for her work on Neera, a palm extract that could fight malnutrition among children from tribal communities in India.

Early life of Kamala Sohonie:

• Kamala Sohonie (nee Bhagvat) was born on June 18, 1911 in Indore, in present-day Madhya Pradesh.
• Her father, Narayanarao Bhagvat, and his brother Madhavrao Bhagvat were both chemists who had studied at the Tata Institute of Sciences, now Bengaluru’s Indian Institute of Science (IISc).
• Following in their footsteps, Kamala graduated in 1933 with a BSc degree in Chemistry (principal) and Physics (subsidiary) from Bombay University, topping the merit list. She then applied for an MSc degree at the IISc, headed by CV Raman where she was rejected.
• Undeterred, the young Kamala went all the way to Bengaluru to confront Raman.
• In 1997, at an event to felicitate her at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), She challenged Raman that she would complete the course with distinction, and finally, he allowed her in, imposing several conditions.
• Sohonie completed her course with distinction and secured admission to Cambridge University, England, in 1936. “This incident forced Raman to change his opinion about women and from that year he admitted a few students every year.

Work at Cambridge and after

• At Cambridge, Sohonie finished her PhD in merely 14 months, and her thesis was just 40 pages. During her time there, she worked on potatoes and discovered the enzyme ‘Cytochrome C’, a type of protein in the mitochondria which plays an important role in cellular respiration.
• In 1939, she came back to India to serve her country.
• She served as head of the Department of Biochemistry at Lady Hardinge College, New Delhi.
• She then served as Assistant Director of the Nutrition Research Lab, Coonoor, before join the Royal Institute of Science in Mumbai. Here, she studied different food items to identify the nutrients present in them.

• According to an article on the website of the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISER), Kolkata, she worked on ‘neera’, a drink made from palm extract on the suggestion of the First Indian President of India, Dr. Rajendra Prasad. Her studies established that ‘neera’ was a good source of Vitamin C along with other vitamins, moreover there are sulfhydryl compounds in Neera that protect vitamins during storage. Realising that this would be a cheap and good supplement for poor tribals, she went to popularise this drink. The introduction of neera in the diet of tribal malnourished children and pregnant women improved their health significantly.
• She also worked with the administration of the Aarey Milk project to improve the quality of the milk produced.
• Apart from her academic work, Kamala Sohonie was among the founding members of consumer protection body Consumer Guidance Society.

5. SCIENTIFIC NAMES OF SPECIES

TAG: PRELIMS PERSPECTIVE

THE CONTEXT: In recent years, the field of taxonomy, the science of naming and classifying all living beings, has been witnessing a raging debate whether species with objectionable scientific names should be renamed.

EXPLANATION:

• In recent years, the field of taxonomy, the science of naming and classifying all living beings, has been witnessing a raging debate whether species with objectionable scientific names should be renamed.
• Rare insects, exotic flowers and deadly arachnids have been named in honour of people linked to racism and anti-Semitism. Racial slurs have figured in names of flora and fauna. Now, a debate about changing these names is brewing.
• Although such discussions have always existed, they became mainstream only recently, especially after the emergence of Black Lives Matter (2013-present) in the USA.

What are some of the species with problematic names?

• The best known example of such a living being is Anophthalmus hitleri. Named after the former German Führer, Adolf Hitler, this rare blind beetle, popularly known as the Hitler beetle, was discovered in 1933 by “Oscar Scheibel, a German amateur entomologist and ardent Hitler fan, and is found in only around 15 caves in central Slovenia. The popularity of the Hitler beetle touched such heights that it became nearly extinct.
• Another example is the common small-blotched lizard. With the scientific name Uta stansburiana, the reptile, in 1852, was named after Howard Stansbury, who led a famous expedition to study the flora and fauna in the USA’s Utah region and collected this lizard’s type specimens. He was a vocal supporter of and played a key role in a locally-infamous massacre of Timpanogos Native Americans in which more than 100 were killed.

• The flowering shrub Hibbertia scandens is one more case in point. The plant has the moniker after George Hibbert, an English amateur botanist, who was one of the leading members of the pro-slavery and anti-abolition lobby during the late 1700s.
• Among the species which have been named after derogatory terms is the Hottentotta tamulus scorpion “colonialists in the 17th century used “Hottentot” as a derogatory term for Indigenous Black people in Africa.
• One more example is Rauvolfia caffra, commonly known as the quinine tree, which gets its moniker from another offensive term regarded as hate speech against Black communities in South Africa.

How are species given their scientific names?

• Every species of animal or plant has two scientific names. The first name denotes the genus to which the species belongs. It is a generic name and is always capitalised. The second name identifies the species within the genus and is never capitalised. Both names are italicised.
• A genus may comprise several closely related species. Thus many large hawks are placed in the genus Buteo. Just as closely related species are placed in the same genus, closely related genera (the plural of “genus”) are grouped into a family. Jaguars, tigers, and house cats all belong to the family Felidae.
• These names are usually of Latin or Greek origin. Oftentimes, species are named based on their distinctive features.
• But other times, organisms are named after people who discover them. They are also sometimes named in honour of somebody. These practices, as mentioned before, have been quite controversial in recent times.

Who makes the rules regarding giving scientific names to organisms?

• Although anybody can propose a name for a type of organism they think hasn’t been formally identified by anyone else, there are certain rules, or nomenclature codes, that they have to follow.
• A new name is considered to be valid only when it is published in an “openly distributed publication, and it must be accompanied by a detailed description of the specimens the author claims are typical for the group.
• These nomenclature codes are governed by international bodies such as the International Commission of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) which governs the naming of animals, the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICNafp) that sees the naming of plants (including cyanobacteria), and the International Code of Nomenclature of Bacteria (ICNB) that governs the naming of bacteria (including Archaea) and the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) that governs virus names.

Can a species’ offensive scientific name be changed?

• The International Code of Botanical Nomenclature (ICBN) in its rulebook says, “The only proper reasons for changing a name are either a more profound knowledge of the facts resulting from adequate taxonomic study or the necessity of giving up a nomenclature that is contrary to the rules.”
• Similarly, as Financial Times reported last week, ICZN recently refused to change problematic names, saying its “commitment to a stable and universal nomenclature remains the priority”.