UPSC Mains Daily Answer Writing (19-12-2022) - GS 2


Questions

Q1. Electoral reforms are the need of the hour to ensure public trust in the election process. Enumerate the electoral reforms introduced in the past, and the need of empowering the election commission to deregister a political party. (10 marks)

Q.2 Explaining the idea behind one nation one ration card and the benefits it entails, enumerate the disadvantages which need to be addressed. (15 marks)


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Model Solutions

Q1. Electoral reforms are the need of the hour to ensure public trust in the election process. Enumerate the electoral reforms introduced in the past, and the need of empowering the election commission to deregister a political party. (10 marks)

Model Structure
Introduction

  • Electoral reforms are changes undertaken by either the government or the election commission itself to address issues like money and muscle power, misuse of government machinery, criminalization of politics etc and ensure free and fair elections.

Main Body

  • Election Commission of India (ECI) is a constitutional body with responsibility of conducting elections at both center and state level. For this, it derives powers from the constitution and also the Representation of People Act 1951 and 1950.
  • Till date, ECI has taken reforms some of which are-
    • Lowering of voting age from 21 to 18 years, by 61st amendment.
    • Increase in the number of proposers and security deposit to ensure only serious candidates enter the fray.
    • Electronic voting machines to foster the process and eliminate chances of booth capturing.
    • Disqualification of elected members upon conviction under National Honours Act 1971.
    • Restriction on contesting from more than 2 seats.
  • ECI is empowered to register political parties but when it comes to deregistering, it lacks teeth. The demand for this power owes its genesis to 1994 when the Representation of People (Second Amendment) Bill was introduced but lapsed upon dissolution of Lok Sabha in 1996.
    • Under it, a complaint could be filed with the High Court for cancellation of registration if regulations are not complied.
    • ECI in 2016 proposed 47 reforms like empowering ECI to countermand elections and power to deregister parties.
    • Madras High Court in 2017 under a PIL accepted the empowerment of ECI to deregister any political party.
    • It has boiled down to the intention of parliament. In this context, Supreme Court opined that parliament purposefully omitted to give the ECI the power of deregistration

Conclusion

  • Public trust is the edifice on which democracy works and to further improve it, time has come to further empower ECI to usher in more reforms and power to deregister parties is one of them.

Q.2 Explaining the idea behind one nation one ration card and the benefits it entails, enumerate the disadvantages which need to be addressed. (15 marks)

**Model Structure
Introduction **

  • One nation one ration card is based on the idea that eligible beneficiaries can get their entitlements from any place in India without any hassle. It is formulated under the National Food Security Act and aims to improve food and nutrition security to fulfill sustainable development goals 2,3 and 11.

Main body

  • Due to its portability and hassle free nature, it has many benefits like-
    • Biometric authentication addresses issues of leakages thus ensuring entitlements and preventing a lot of black marketing.
    • Important for the migrant workers especially labourers in unorganized sector who have a negligible social security net.
    • Also, there is the issue of multiple and bogus ration cards. Cross verification across states by this scheme will eliminate this and address the issue of subsidy burden.
    • It allows customization in a sense that migrants can take their share in a new place and their family members can claim remaining food-grains in native place.
  • In its nascent stage, the scheme has some challenges like-
    • Diversity in eating habits means there is product and quality difference at fair price shops. Like Maharashtra gives only wheat while Andhra Pradesh only rice to BPL card holders.
    • Issues in veracity of migrant data brings difficulty in policy making resulting in exclusion errors.
    • Also, there is inter-state variation in prices like some states give rice free but some give at subsidized Rs 3/kg.
    • With increased portability and use of technology, glitches in the POS machines results in disruption and delays of food supply.

Conclusion

  • The scheme is well crafted but some issues like logistics, supply-chain, migrant data, inter-state price parity etc needs to be worked out for better targeting and welfare of migrants.
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