 Greetings dear aspirants, welcome to today's current affairs session of civil spedia. Today we will be discussing about national culture fund and about national anti-profit hearing authority under our prelims topic and about the citizenship amendment bill and the 124th constitutional amendment bill under our main topic. So let's move on to our first prelims topic of the day, national culture fund. So we have a setup called ministry of culture under the government of India which takes care towards the promotion and the conservation of art and culture. But this particular national cultural fund is a very unique fund. So we will be seeing about this fund in the later slides. So when you are studying about this fund try to know something about the fund and about the council which manages this fund and the objectives of national cultural fund. So this wasn't recent news in our public information bureau that about 68.86 crores of funds have been collected under the national culture fund. So something about the national culture fund. So it was established as a funding mechanism, a unique funding mechanism from the existing sources and the pattern of funding for the arts and culture in India. So it will enable the institutions and individuals to support the arts and culture directly as partners with government. The government supporting the arts and culture is one thing. But the private support and the corporate supporting the government towards promoting and preserving the art and culture is another thing. So the private institutions will help the government towards preserving the art and culture. So this particular national culture fund was created as a trust in the year 1996 under the charitable endowment act of 1890 which means whatever amount that we pay to this particular trust will be free of taxes. So there will be tax benefits. So this you need to keep it in mind. So there is a council established for this managing this particular fund. So it is being administered by this particular council which will decide on the policies and there is also an executive committee which will actualize this policies nothing but executing the policies. So this council is shared by the union minister of culture. So this you need to know. So there is a separate minister for the ministry of tourism and there is a separate minister for ministry of culture. So just have this in mind. So you need to know about this national cultural fund the objectives of this particular national cultural fund. So there are four main objectives. First is to administer and apply the fund for conserving, maintaining, promoting, protecting and preserving and also the upgradation of whatever monuments that have been protected under law. And second thing is the human resource development nothing but the training and the development of the cadre of specialist and cultural administration who are very much specialized towards maintaining the arts and culture. And this fund will also be utilized for innovations and experiments in arts. And this fund will also be utilized for documentation of cultural expressions and forms that have lost their relevance in contemporary scenario which means nothing but which are likely facing extinction at the present or which might face extinction in the future. So the Archaeological Survey of India plus the private institutions have clubbed up with the government to donate to this particular national cultural fund and many monuments have been preserved with the help of this national cultural fund. So if you go to this particular national cultural fund website you would be able to see the number of monuments that have been preserved that is not required for prelims exam. Just know what are the objectives of the fund and if it is a trust or whatever body it is and regarding the tax benefits and who is the head of that particular council that administers this fund. So this is all that you need to know about the national culture of the fund. So the next topic is the national anti-profit hearing authority. National anti-profit hearing authority. So the keywords that you need to know under this topic is about the national anti-profit hearing authority and about the Directorate General for Anti-profit hearing and about the Standing Committee, Screening Committee and the functions of this particular national anti-profit hearing authority. So this is all a part of national anti-profiting mechanism. So the recent news was that the government has tabled the number of complaints that have received by the national anti-profiting authority in the Lokshaba. So you need to know what is anti-profiting. So when the GST was established, this national anti-profiting authority came into being because there were complaints that whenever there were cuts in the GST rates, the same cuts were not transformed from the business providers or the business people to the common public. So the business people largely enjoyed the benefits because of the cut in the taxes. Hence this national anti-profiting authority came into being. So under this mechanism, there are four things. First thing is the national anti-profiting authority. Second thing is the director general of anti-profiting. Third thing is the standing committee which will operate at the national level. And fourth one is the steering committee which will operate at the state level. So whenever at state level, the screening committee receives complaints, it will scrutinize those complaints and send to the standing committee. And this standing committee, if this particular committee finds those claims as a proper one, it will again forward to the director general of anti-profiting. So under the authority of this particular national anti-profiting authority, he has to take action within three months timeframe to the maximum plus three months. Within three months, he has to take at extraordinary circumstances, he can go for plus three months. And he has to give a solution for that particular complaint. So this is all about that particular anti-profiting mechanism. So the national anti-profiting authority will be managing all these DGAP standing committees, steering committees, et cetera. So this national anti-profiting authority has been constituted under section 17, one of the central goods and services tax act of 2017. So its main function is to ensure the reduction in the rate of tax or the benefit of input tax credit that is being passed on to the recipient by way of commensurate reduction in the prices. Because whatever cut in the tax rates can be only seen by the reduction in the prices. So it has to be passed on to the consumer accordingly. So this particular authority as a chairman whose the post is equal to a secretary post and plus four technical members whose position are equal to commissioners of the income tax departments. And what are the steps that have been taken by the national anti-profiting authority to ensure full benefits of tax cuts to the consumers. So it holds regular meetings with the zonal screening committees at the state level and with the chief commissioners of central tax to stress upon the consumer awareness program. So they will be conducting a large amount of consumer awareness programs. For that they'll be conducting meetings. The authority will conduct the meetings. Second thing is launching a helpline to resolve the queries of citizens regarding the registration of complaints against profiteering. If you see in the particular website, the frequently asked questions topic will be having this particular helpline for the consumers. And additionally will be having one more helpline. And next thing is receiving complaints through post email and the NAA portal. So this particular complaint list was tabled by the government in the Lok Sabha. And if you see for the year 2018, the complaints were at last from the month July to October. So at numbers, if you see it's ranging from 67 to 93. And along with this one more function of the national anti-profiting authority is to work with the consumer welfare organizations in order to facilitate the outreach activities because the awareness at the business side can also be low because the big corporates or the big businesses will be making use of these tax cuts and they will profit at last. But by mistake even small businesses can perform this in. So the government will take outreach activities in order to give awareness to the business people as well. So this is all about the national anti-profiting authority. And this we will move on to our main topic. The first topic is the Citizenship Amendment Bill of 2016. So this particular bill was introduced in the month of July 2016 in order to amend the Citizenship Bill of 1955. So the original bill is 1955. And now it has been passed in the Lok Sabha. So it seeks to amend the Citizenship Act of 1955. Under this three amendments have been made. The first amendment is all those religions apart from Muslims. So the religions such as Hindus, Sikhs, Parsis, Jains and Christians who migrate to India without the travel documents. So technically they're illegal migrants from the countries of Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan which happened to be the neighboring countries of India. Will not be regarded as illegal migrants. So this was the first amendment that was made. And the second thing is the bill also amends the act to allow the cancellation of overseas citizens of India registration if the person violated any law in Indian territory. So if a particular OCI citizen performs any crime so his card might be rejected. And third thing is it has relaxed some thing in the acquisition of citizenship by naturalization for these categories of persons. So that is a naturalization process. Some norms have been relaxed by the government. So one particular norm is so when a particular person applies for citizenship the time frame preceding 12 months of that application form he has to reside in India. Plus he also has to reside out of 11 out of the 14 years. So this was the present norm. So this amendment has eased this norm to six years. So application date minus 12 months minus the six out of 14 years this particular citizens who are Hindu, Sikhs, Pasis, Jains or Christians can reside in India. So this particular norm has been relaxed. So these are the three amendments made to the Citizenship Amendment Bill of 1955. So there have been some criticisms against the government and the government has also claimed something. So let us see that in detail. So the first criticism is that it is perpetuating the religious discrimination. This was largely voiced by the Muslim outfits because it excludes Muslims only and all the other religions are benefited. And some other persons have said that it has conflated the idea of nationality with religion which means they have confused the idea of nationality with religion. And next thing is citizenship cannot be granted on the basis of religion because we claim that even as per our constitution of India that India is a secular country but this particular amendments that have been made to the Citizenship Bill seems to be non-secular to some sectional people. And the main issue is that this bill will be a divisible bill which will burn the state of Assam is what those outfits from Assam claim. So this bill is against the Assam Accord of 1985 because as per that Assam Accord of 1985 people those who have been in India after this cut off date of March 24th of 1971 must be deported as per the Assam Accord. But now this will contradict this particular amendment to the Citizenship Bill will contradict this Assam Accord. And next thing is it will disturb the demographics of the Assam society and will also affect the rights of the Indignus communities those Indignus communities that are living in different districts of Assam. And it also goes against the ongoing process of updating the national register of citizens primarily based on the 1951 Otis list. So it will contradict some of the sections of the Assam record and also this national register for citizens particularly in the state of Assam. But the government is telling that this bill does not targets the state of Assam but it targets the entirety of India especially the western states and the northwestern states of Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab, Rajasthan where the illegal migrants have settled in those states who want for a proper citizenship. So India has been accommodating Muslim refugees from Bangladesh and Pakistan by giving long term visas. So this is also happening at present. So the government has claimed that it is also supporting the Muslim population. And if you also see when in the 1950s Jawaharlal Nehru Rx prime minister and also Sushita Kripal who was the first chief minister, women's chief minister for India. I have told that it is the overall policy of India from the beginning itself to give special consideration to minority refugees from the neighboring Muslim majority countries because the partition happened because of religion only. India largely became a Hindu majority population and Pakistan become a Muslim majority population. And now opposed to partition the government wants to accommodate those minority communities living in our neighboring nations which have been partitioned from India. So these are some of the claims that have been made by the government. So this is all about the citizenship amendment bill. With this you can give your critical analysis or you can even analyze the bill with the help of these points. And the next topic we'll be discussing is the 124th constitutional amendment bill. So you need to know what a constitutional amendment bill is. So if you're making amendment to any articles of the constitution that can be done only by introducing a bill into the, any either of the houses of the parliament. So introduction of bill is required in either house of the parliament. Then this particular bill once introduced after discussion has to be passed by a majority of the total membership of that particular house. So for Lok Sabha, majority is more than the 50% so out of 545 more than 50% is a majority. Plus a majority of not less than two thirds of the members of the house present and voting. So if 545 members roughly 50% plus some person can be there. So those members should be present and they should also only then a bill introduced for amending the constitution is deemed to be passed in that particular house of the parliament. So we need to know what is this particular 124th constitutional amendment bill is about. So it aims to provide reservations in public employment and also in education for the economically weaker sections. So we need to know what the economically weaker sections that we'll be discussing in the later part of the slide. So this particular bill aims to provide reservation in matters of employment and matters of education to the economically weaker sections. So the economic reservation in jobs and in education is proposed to be provided by inserting the class six in the articles 15 and 16 of the constitution. So article 15 deals with the discrimination of prohibition of discrimination. Prohibition of discrimination. And article 16 deals with equality in matters of all education, employment, et cetera. So the government or the majority party ruling party in the Lok Sabha has taken these two articles as a reference for amending this particular constitutional amendment bill. So it has aimed to give reservation in education and also in employment. So let's discuss that. So in order to give reservation in matters of education, article 15 six will enable the state to make special provisions for the advancement of economically weaker section of citizens, which includes reservations in educational institutions as well. So this is not limited only to the public educational institutions but also to the private educational institutions. If they are aided or anided, except for the minority educational institutions that have been covered on the section one of the article 30. And it also states that the upper limit for reservation will be 10%. So the reservations cannot exceed 10%. So we'll be seeing about the scenario of reservations in the later slide. And with regards to employment, the job reservations proposed under the class six of the article 16 will enable the state to make provision for the reservation in appointments. In addition to the existing reservations subject to a maximum of 10%. So the upper limit is 10% in both matters of education and also in matters of employment. So this you need to keep it in mind. So now who are these economically weaker sections and what is the present reservation criteria that is present in India that you need to note. So let's see the present reservation status. So the constitution of India provides reservations to other socially backward sections, socially backward population that largely comprises of your schedule cast, schedule tribes and other backward cast. So reservation is up to 15% for the schedule cast and 7.5% for the schedule tribes and around 27% for the other backward cast. So this is the present reservation status. So this will be 49.5. And in a judgment which will be discussing in the later slide as put a maximum limit for the reservations to 50% in the Indra Saini case. So now in addition to this, the government intends to provide 10% reservation to all those economically backward sections in the general category. So the remaining 51.5 will be the general category. In this 10% reservation will be given to this economically weaker sections. So who are these economically weaker sections that we'll get to know only when the government notifies as in went. So it tells that as notified by the state from time to time on the basis of family income and other indicators of economic disadvantage. So they have clearly mentioned that this class will be distinct from already present, the schedule cast, schedule tribes and the other economic other backward classes. And if you see one exception is the state of Tamil Nadu where the reservations have capped above the 50% cap. So it is around 69% reservations. So this has been inserted in the schedule nine of the constitution of India in order to immunize it from the judicial review. So a person cannot go for a judicial review in terms of reservations, especially in the state of Tamil Nadu. So we might, the center might face a legal scrutiny because by introducing reservation for these economically weaker sections. So the government has claimed that the economically weaker sections of the citizens have largely remained excluded from higher education and public employment due to their financial capacity. That because of their economical positions, they are not able to access proper education stream. They are not able to access proper employment screen. So they are left backward right from the, the country got independence. Even now they are economically backward. So the government has found it a need to amend the constitution in order to give them a fair chance of getting higher education and public employment. So also as to fulfill the mandate of Article 46 of the constitution of India. Article 46 is one of the directive principles of state policy, which tells that the state should work towards uplifting these socially and economically backward sections, especially the scheduled cast and the scheduled tribes. So the government has taken this as a reference and gone for giving reservation, 10% reservation to the economically backward sections. But we might not know what is the legality of this particular amendment. So we might get to know once it comes to judicial review. If you see in the year 1992 Indra Saini case, she had put a cap of 50% for the reservation. So the upper limit as 50%. Now the proposed amendment seek to get over this limit. And also in the particular Indra Saini case, the judges told that the social backwardness cannot be determined only with reference to economic criteria. So if a person is poor, we cannot tell that that particular person is socially backward. So economically, economic reason can be one of the criteria. So the money value can be one of the criteria, but not the major criteria. But if you see what the government intends to come up with this amendment is the economically weaker sections. It is largely focusing on the economy. And if you also see in 1950s, when the reservation first came up in the parliament, people or the members of the parliament emphasized that reservation is only for those people who are socially backward and educationally backward. They did not highlight on economically backward. It was in present in only the directive principles of state policy. So this is one of the major move taken by the government in order to provide reservation to the economically backward sections. And now if you see majority of the parties have voted in favor of this particular constitutional amendment, but they did give their comment that this particular government which has brought in the amendment is doing it with a political motive because Lokshapa elections are near. Hence it wants to pick those upper caste votes. So this was a recent thing. And if you also see in the year 2016, August, the Gujarat High Court had questioned ordinance that has been brought by the government for providing 10% reservations to the general category or the weaker sections in the forward cast. So this particular judgment is now pending in the Supreme Court. So this is the status of the reservation with regards to economically weaker sections. So this again will go through a judicial review and it has just been passed in the Lokshapa as of now. It will be discussed in the last day of the winter session in the Rajesh Abba. And we'll get to know if this particular bill has been passed in Rajesh Abba or not. So this is all about the 124th constitutional amendment bill that you need to know. From prelims point of view, just know the criteria that is required for a particular bill or a particular article that has to undergo amendment in the constitution. So just remember this with prelims point of view. And this 124th constitutional amendment bill deals with what? So it deals with reservation to the economically backward sections. So this you can take. And for mains, you can quote this article 15, 16 and your article 46 of the constitution, which is the Directive Principles of State Policy. And you can also critically analyze with your views to this particular constitutional amendment bill. With this, we are winding up our today's topic. Please do like, comment and share the video. And please subscribe to Shankar IAS Academy channel for latest videos and updates. Stay focused and motivated friends. Thank you.