In Focus by The Hindu

There have been some dire predictions about how hazardous the heat is going to be this summer. India this year experienced its warmest February since 1877, and in November last year, the World Bank warned that India could become one of the first places in the world where wet-bulb temperatures could increase beyond the survivability threshold of 35°C.

Furthermore, last month, Peter Dynes, chief strategy officer at Mirrors for Earth's Energy Rebalancing (MEER), tweeted that India this summer is at “serious risk of wet-bulb” if global temperatures continue to rise.

So, what exactly is the wet bulb phenomenon, and what does it mean when it is said that summer temperatures in India could cross the wet bulb threshold? Have heat wave conditions in India worsened due to climate change? What should we be doing to mitigate the effects of heat wave conditions and protect the most vulnerable?

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

By quashing the Information & Broadcasting Ministry’s order ceasing operations of the Malayalam news channel, Media One, the Supreme Court appears to have sent a clear message to the government of the day – that the freedom of the press is a key pillar of Indian democracy.

At a time when the press is under pressure to toe the Government’s line, the judgment is also a signal to members of the media – that they should do their job without fear or favour.

The press, the Supreme Court held, had a duty to speak truth to power.

Is the press performing this duty today? What are the larger implications of this April 6 verdict?

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A survey of nearly 10,000 people carried out for the Status of Policing in India Report 2023 suggests a high level of support for certain forms of government surveillance but reveals a lack of public awareness regarding critical issues such as the Pegasus spying scandal.

The report, prepared by the NGO Common Cause and Lokniti, CSDS, finds that three out of four people believe CCTVs can help monitor and reduce crime. The poor, Adivasis, Dalits and Muslims are the least trusting of the police.

Interestingly, 44 per cent of those surveyed across 12 states and union territories believe that the police should not have the freedom to check people’s phones without a warrant. 

So, what is the bigger picture from the survey? Why choose this theme at this time? How does surveillance impact dissent? 

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last month, Rajasthan became the first state to enact a Right to Health Act. The legislation sparked massive protests from the medical community, with the protests finally being called off on April 4, after an agreement was reached, on the applicability of the law. The Act gives every resident of Rajasthan the right to emergency treatment care without prepayment of fees at designated health centres -- a provision that was contentious. The private healthcare sector had called the Act "draconian" and was apprehensive of the government’s interference in their functioning after the enforcement of the law.

But does the private medical sector, which forms a huge segment of the healthcare sector in our country, need legislation? Should emergency care be provided to every resident in need of it at any hospital that is able to provide it? Should the Right to Life, enshrined in our Constitution, also guarantee all citizens the Right to Health in India?

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

All four persons, who had been given the death sentence by a trial court for the May 2008 Jaipur bomb blasts that killed 71 persons, were acquitted by the Rajasthan High Court on the 30th of March. Those acquitted of all charges were: Mohammed Saif, Mohammed Salman, Saifur and Mohammed Sarver Azmi. The State of Rajasthan plans to file an appeal against the acquittal in the Supreme Court. 

The two-judge bench ruled that the prosecution had been unable to establish a conspiracy between the now-acquitted persons, pointing out that for a conspiracy to be established there had to be a meeting of minds. 

The judges were of the view that nefarious means were used by the investigating agencies and even fabrication had been done during the course of the investigation. They directed the Rajasthan Director-General of Police to initiate an appropriate inquiry / disciplinary proceedings against erring officers. 

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

March 21, was single parents day, commemorating mothers and fathers, who parent alone. And while in India, families are still widely seen as that of two biological parents and their children, this is rapidly changing: families can come in all sorts of forms – from single parents, to parents who are not married but live together, adoptive parents, step-families, queer families and more. However, while some laws and court judgements are clearing the path towards easier access to procedures and systems for non-traditional families, there are still multiple hurdles faced by single parents and others for even basic procedures such as school admissions and banking.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

India’s women boxers have created history by winning four golds at the IBA World Boxing Championships that just concluded in Delhi. India topped the medals table, matching its best ever performance of 2006. The golden girls this time around were Nitu Ghangas (48 kg), Nikhat Zareen (50 kg), Lovlina Borgohain (75kg), and Saweety Boora (81kg).

What is the significance of India’s performance in the context of the upcoming Hangzhou Asian Games, and the 2024 Paris Olympics? Can India replicate this outcome at the Olympics? And is India slowly turning into a global hub for women’s boxing, as is being asserted by some observers?

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposals for a judicial overhaul that would limit the powers of the Supreme Court have triggered massive protests in the country. More than 100,000 protesters gathered in front of the Israeli Parliament or the Knesset, and as the country’s most powerful trade unions called a general strike, there were flight cancellations at Tel Aviv international airport, and municipality workers, tech workers, government bureaucrats, and most significantly, even army reservists joined the pushback against the proposals.

US President Joe Biden pitched in, asking Netanyahu to ‘walk away’ from the judicial overhaul, prompting Israeli Prime Minister to retort that he does not take decisions based on pressure from abroad. On Monday, however, Netanyahu announced that he was delaying the judicial changes to the next Parliamentary session, ostensibly to buy more time to build a compromise with the proposals’ political opponents.

So, what exactly are the implications of the proposed judicial changes? Do they constitute a threat to Israeli democracy, as alleged by their Opposition leaders? What are the security implications of the fact that these proposals seem to be causing deep divisions in Israeli society? 

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The phenomenon of Amritpal Singh has taken Punjab by storm. In a daring act, his supporters ransacked a police station in Ajnala and freed some of his associates in February. From a businessman in Dubai till September last year, Amritpal has become Punjab’s leading practitioner of separatist politics, telling Frontline magazine in a recent interview that he does not recognize the Indian Constitution as it doesn’t see Sikhism as a separate religion. 

He has inherited Waris Punjab De, an organisation intended to help young people follow the tenets of Sikhism. Currently, Amritpal is on the run after the Punjab police launched efforts to arrest him on March 18. Some recent reports say CCTV cameras showed him at a Delhi market while others said he had reached Nepal. 

So, who is Amritpal Singh? How has he managed to capture the spotlight in a matter of months? Whom does he represent? Is he popular? Is Amritpal filling a political vacuum in Punjab? 

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Last week the Supreme Court asked the Centre for data that could point to a more dignified, less painful, and socially acceptable method of executing prisoners other than death by hanging. A Bench of Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud and Justice P.S. Narasimha even mooted the setting up of an expert committee to relook at India’s method of carrying out the death penalty.

The alternatives that were discussed included death by lethal injection, lethal gas, and firing squad, among others. The court was hearing a petition filed by advocate Rishi Malhotra challenging the constitutionality of death by hanging as a mode of execution. Section 354 (5) of the Code of Criminal Procedure mandates that a person sentenced to death shall “be hanged by the neck till he is dead”. Malhotra argued that there was a need to evolve a “humane, quick and decent alternative”. He termed hanging as “cruel and barbarous” compared to lethal injection.

So, is death by hanging a “cruel and barbaric”? Are there more ‘humane’ methods of execution? Is the goal of protection of human dignity and eliminating cruelty compatible with any mode of execution – that is, with capital punishment itself? 

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices