SOCIAL ISSUE
1. Jallikatu Vedict spurred a flood of animal rights
· In recent years, the Supreme Court has upheld the rights of animals and birds to lead a life of “intrinsic worth, honour and dignity,” even at the cost of popular faith and practices of human beings.
· The starting point of the trend dates back to May 7, 2014 — the day of pronouncement of the judgment banning jallikattu, a bull taming sport practised in Tamil Nadu.
· In Animal Welfare Board of India versus A. Nagaraja, the Supreme Court historically extended the fundamental right to life to animals.
o It held that bulls have the fundamental right under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution to live in a healthy and clean atmosphere, not to be beaten, kicked, bitten, tortured, plied with alcohol by humans or made to stand in narrow enclosures amidst bellows and jeers from crowds.
o In short, the Supreme Court declared that animals have a right to protect their life and dignity from human excesses.
· Article 21, till then, had been confined to only human life and dignity. In May 2014, with its jallikattu verdict, the Supreme Court stretched the fundamental right to include “every species.”
· Since May 2014, the court has heard a flood of cases dealing with the rights of the animal world ranging from bulls, elephants, horses, dogs, roosters to even exotic birds.
Treating with compassion
· The apex court has spent precious judicial hours contemplating how to induce humans to treat animals with compassion. Often, the court has played a game-changing role in the way animals are treated during religious events and festivities.
· In the jallikattu case, the court had held that the sport, even though has cultural significance, was an act of “inherent cruelty.”
· In Andhra Pradesh, the Supreme Court did not lift the ban on rooster fights conducted during the Makarsankranthi festival. The court only stayed the power of the police to arbitrarily raid farmsteads and private property for prize roosters.
· In both jallikattu and cock fight cases, the Supreme Court refused to heed the common argument that a ban would destroy the livelihoods of farmers and end the indigenous species of bulls and roosters, respectively.
Thrissur Pooram
· In another case dealing with the rights of captive elephants used in Kerala for temple festivals like Thrissur Pooram, the Supreme Court put temple managements and private owners of the elephants on a tight leash, threatening them with criminal prosecution and “severe consequences” if they were found torturing the animals merely for the sake of the grandeur of the festival.
· In December 2015, in another case, the Supreme Court asked the Central government to clarify whether it was cruelty to employ elephants for joyrides.
· A month prior to that, in November 2015, the court had also asked the government to respond on whether exotic pet birds were safer in cages or do they have a fundamental right to fly.
· This debate was between the right to livelihood of pet shop owners and the right of birds to live freely. Animal lovers want the apex court to ban practices like ringing, tagging and stamping of birds.
Stray dogs
· Again, a “shocked” Supreme Court recently found out that its message of compassion for stray dogs had been blatantly ignored in Kerala. The top court has for the past one year been trying to find a balance between saving stray dogs from torture and death in the hands of an enraged population in Kerala, where there has been rising incidents of fatal dog bites, especially among the economically-disadvantaged sections of society, women and children.
2. Proximity rule unconstitutional, unfair to minorities
· The Delhi High Court on Thursday termed “unconstitutional” the AAP government’s guidelines to minority unaided schools to grant admission to minority community students only from the neighbourhood or from within a radius of 1 kilometre.
· One cannot interfere in their operations of minority school. It is against the settled principle of law as per Article 13 of the Constitution
3. Church court cannot veto divorce law, says SC
· Canon law and decrees of divorce given by ecclesiastical tribunals or ‘Church Courts’ cannot veto the statutory law of divorce, the Supreme Court said
· A Bench of Chief Justice of India J.S. Khehar and Justice D.Y. Chandrachud disposed of a writ petition filed in 2013 seeking a judicial declaration that divorce decrees passed by ecclesiastical tribunals are valid and binding.
1996 verdict
· The Supreme Court referred to its 1996 judgment in the case of Molly Joseph versus George Sebastian upholding the binding nature of the Indian Divorce Act of 1869, which governs divorce among Christians.
· In Molly’s case, the court said the implication of the Canon law is confined to either theological or ecclesiastical, but has no legal impact on the divorce or annulment of marriage between two persons professing the Christian religion.
· “After the Divorce Act came into force, a dissolution or annulment under such personal law cannot have any legal impact as statute has provided a different procedure and a different code for divorce or annulment,” the Supreme Court had held.
Triple talaq argument
· In his petition, Pais, a former president of the Catholic Association of Dakshina Kannada in Karnataka, had argued that when courts can recognise dissolution by triple talaq under the Mohammedan personal law, they should also recognise the Canon law as the personal law of Indian Catholics.
· The court is presently hearing a row of petitions, including a suo motu one, on the question whether practices of Islamic personal law like triple talaq and polygamy discriminate against Muslim women.
· The petition had challenged why courts prosecute Roman Catholics under Section 494 of the Indian Penal Code for the alleged offence of bigamy without considering the Canon law. Further, it added that even “ministers of the church who blessed the nuptials of the second marriage run the risk of being prosecuted for abetment.”
· The petitioner, represented by senior advocate Soli Sorabjee, had contended that the case touches the lives of over one crore citizens “who are Indian Christians/ Catholics governed by the Code of Canon Law both regarding marriage and its dissolution.”
· Marriage, dissolution
· “The Canon law enjoins that Catholics are required to marry in a Catholic church and equally enjoins that they seek nullity in the canonical court (ecclesiastical court/ tribunal) also under the Code of Canon Law. Otherwise, the marriage and the dissolution will not be recognised by the Catholic Church,” the petition had said.
· About 1,000 applications in Mumbai and about 100 in Mangaluru — not to mention Kolkata and Chennai — for a declaration of nullity were pending before ecclesiastical tribunals in the country, the petitioner pointed out.
4. Safe childhood for safe India
· After a long wait of almost two decades, the Government of India finally decided last week to ratify the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Convention 182 on the worst forms of child labour and Convention 138 on Minimum Age of Employment.
· About 4.3 million children wake up to a day of labour and not school. Another 9.8 million are officially out-of-school.
· Child labour perpetuates illiteracy and poverty. It is the root cause of organised crimes such as human trafficking, terror and drug mafia. However, today, I feel optimistic and am experiencing a sense of fulfilment and satisfaction similar to what I experienced in 1997.
An African epiphany
· I was about 50 kilometres away from Abuja, the capital city of Nigeria. The place I had travelled to was a high-risk zone, particularly for foreigners and those travelling alone. I was both, but I made the journey because it was important to identify individuals and organisations to join me for a physical march that would put forth a demand for an international law to ban the worst forms of child labour.
· By the time I reached the place, it was already dark and the local NGO had closed for the day. Since I was travelling with my passport and some money, I had to find shelter for the night, especially with men of dubious character stalking the area. Not left with a better alternative, I hid in a thick shade of bushes. When dawn arrived with the sound of the azan (the Muslim call for prayer), I found a way to interact with those returning from prayer. Through signs and actions, I brought them closer to the cause I worked for. A young man who understood a little English helped convey the message. After which, he very kindly dropped me back to the city.
· A few months later, closer to the date of the march, I received a letter from the local NGO pledging support. They asked, “What did you do? What did you tell them?”
· I learnt that after my interaction all children of the ghetto were put in school and pulled out of labour by those I conversed with. I had found the crux of the march. It was the language of compassion and humanity that would help accelerate the global movement against childhood exploitation.
· The march began in January 1998. We traversed 80,000 kilometres across 103 countries and became a strong group of 7.2 million marchers. The Global March Against Child Labour, as it came to be called, culminated finally in Geneva on June 1, 1998 where the ILO conference was in session. We put forward our demand for an international convention to ban the worst forms of child labour. The voice of the marchers was heard and reflected in the draft of the ILO Convention 182.
· In June 1999, delegates of the ILO unanimously adopted the convention. It was the first time that a convention or treaty had been adopted with the full support of all members. Over the years, I have spearheaded its ratification by member nations. With 180 countries having already done so, it has become the fastest-ratified convention in the history of ILO. This clearly shows that support for the movement against child labour is gaining momentum worldwide.
Clearing the hurdles
· The main bottleneck in the way of India ratifying Conventions 182 and 138 was addressing forced or compulsory recruitment of children and appropriately raising the age of employment in hazardous occupations from 14 to 18 years.
· Consequent to the passing of the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2016 by the Indian Parliament prohibiting the employment of children up to 14 years of age, and children up to 18 years of age in hazardous occupations, it was imperative that we ratified Conventions 182 and 138.
· Moreover, our failure to ratify the two conventions, which are two of the eight core labour conventions, despite being a founder-member of the ILO, reflected poorly on us as a nation.
· Under the provisions of the ILO Conventions 182 and 138, India will not adhere to a fixed deadline by which the worst forms of child labour must be eliminated. It will ultimately depend on the level of moral courage, public concern, social empathy, political will and the implementation of resources invested in the development and protection of children.
