 Good evening aspirants. I have an announcement to make as prelims is nearing our academy That is Shankar Ayes Academy has launched a mock test program That is a free all India mock test program the test starts on 15th of May 2022 the test will be held in both online and offline modes across 13 centers the link for registration for the online Mock test is given in the description use this opportunity and check your progress with this good news Let us get into the Hindu news analysis session by Shankar Ayes Academy for the date 29th of April 2022 these are the list of articles that we will be discussing today now Let us start the discussion look at this editorial article this editorial article talks about death penalty jurisprudence or legal system in India this topic is in limelight again as the Supreme Court has decided to look into the matter mainly the routine and the abrupt way in which Death penalty is imposed by trial judges in this backdrop Arthur has provided the need to revisit a famous death penalty case called the Pachansing case and certain reason as to why Supreme Court should re-examine the Constitutional validity of death penalty in India So let us see the status of death penalty in India the need for it matters Considered while imposing death penalty and some arguments against death penalty We will also see the significance of Pachansing case This is the plan for today before getting into the discussion the syllabus regarding this discussion is highlighted here for your reference You can go through it now. Let us start our discussion see the proposition behind all punishment is there must be a penalty For wrong doing punishment is necessary as it is both right and just to that wrong doer should suffer for it It is also necessary as a general deterrence that is it will discourage others from doing wrong on these lines Death penalty is imposed as a most severe form of punishment for various offenses in India What is it? It is called as capital punishment It is the execution of an offender who is sentenced to death After conviction by a court of law for a criminal offense note that these are not Extrajudicial executions which are carried out without the due process of law rather death penalty is imposed after Due process of law note the difference So when death penalty is imposed this severe punishment is awarded for the most heinous Gravious and detestable crimes against humanity these crimes where death penalty is imposed is called capital offenses I have given a list here. Just go through it We also need to remember that impulsion of death penalty is not always followed by Execution why because our law provides space for the possibility of commutation of death penalty to life imprisonment So from when India has this capital punishment it existed since ancient times death penalty was Incorporated in the Indian penal code 1860 during British India after independence It was retained as one of the serious punishments imposed under law But India's position on the matter changed since 1955 when the parliament rippled section 367 subsection 5 of the old code of criminal procedure 1898 this section mandated the courts to record reasons when it was decided not to impose a Sentence of death so after 1955 death penalty was no longer the now a new view was placed when Criminal procedure code was reenacted in 1973 under it for a capital offense Punishment with imprisonment was an equal possibility along with death penalty more importantly under section 354 subsection 3 now the judges need to provide Special reasons for why they imposed the death sentence previously why death sentence was not imposed had to be informed But after 1973 why death sentence is given is to be informed therefore Capital punishment of death penalty still continues under Indian laws. This is why India is called a Retentionist country in the global arena. This is a classification based on death penalty status of a country Retentionists are those who have retained the death penalty and still use death penalty as a punishment as per the 2020 death sentence and executions report of Amnesty International as of December 2020 There were a total of 55 retentionist countries. It includes India also India carried out four executions from 2016 to 2020 but to a surprise it is not a Middle Eastern country that is world's largest Executioner, but it is China China remained world's leading executioner in 2020 and 88 percent of all recorded execution took place in just four countries namely Iran Egypt Iraq and Saudi Arabia you may have a question of did India ever try to re-examine its position on death penalty actually yes Resolutions were also moved in the parliament to abolish it which led to the matter being dealt by the law Commission of India in 1962 before the new criminal procedure code was enacted this resulted in the 35th report of law Commission of India on capital punishment law Commission of India considered the issue of abolition of capital punishment and Analyzed the existing socio-economic cultural structures including education levels and crime rate and finally the law Commission of India concluded that death penalty should be Retained then the Supreme Court also had the same opinion that was spelt in the Bachchan Singh case In the Bachchan Singh this union of India 1982 case Supreme Court held the constitutionality of the death penalty After this the law Commission of India revisited its 35th report in 2014 it led to the report 262 title the death penalty After re-examining the 35th report law Commission of India held that it is time for India to move towards Abolition of the death penalty and such movement should be swift and irreversible Now all these discussion bring us to the crucial point of what is the need behind death penalty first? It acts as a deterrent which we saw in the beginning itself second It satisfies the demand for retribution and justice in society retribution means punishment Infracted on someone as vengeance for their wrongdoing Society demands retribution as public denunciation of crime more importantly Retribution also satisfies the demand of the victims family. It also upholds the theory that punishment must be proportional to the crime Some also argue that certain heinous criminals do not deserve the opportunity to reform See these are some of the arguments Supporting death penalty even though these arguments justify death penalty. It is still a serious punishments So there are also those who oppose death penalty and advocate its abolition The primary argument put forward by them is the fallibility of the courts and the possibility of erroneous Convention fallibility means the tendency to make mistakes Courts can also make mistakes as it is led by humans only But such a mistake takes the life of a person without giving them opportunity for remorse in the past Supreme Court has itself admitted errors in the application of death penalty in various cases This is the first point moving on the next argument is the violation of human rights and fundamental rights They argue that death penalty violated article 14 19 and 21 of the Constitution of India they say death penalty extinguishes all the freedoms guaranteed under article 19 one subsection a to g along with life So it causes an unreasonable denial of these freedoms. Therefore, it is cruel inhuman and degrading Further the discretion to impose death penalty is vested in the judges So their decision might be uncontrolled and unguided and hence violates article 14 note that too much judicial Discretion and too little both could result in arbitrary and unfair Sentencing the next argument is the discriminatory and arbitrary Implementation of death penalty it is discriminatory because death penalty is imposed mostly against poor and deprived sections of the society Often the rich and the affluent escape from death penalty plus such poor and deprived sections are often unaware of the Legal aid available to them. This leads to the lack of proper defense during trial leading to conviction and punishment of death penalty There is also valid argument that we need to focus here, which is the unproven Penalogical purpose of deterrence see Indian Penalogy is based on the principle that punishment should be Reformative and rehabilitative therefore Retribution is arguably not an acceptable basis for punishment another valid argument is the nature of Irreversibility of the punishment once death penalty is imposed and executed the punishment cannot be turned back Even if they find that the person was wrongly punished nothing can be done See these are some points that advocate the abolition of death penalty the Supreme Court even tried to solve some of the issues Sighted here. This is where the Bacchan Singh case is important See in this case not only the Constitutionalty of death penalty was upheld but certain other Interpretation were also made these mainly aimed at removing the arbitrary implementation of death penalty Now, let us see the interpretations made by the Supreme Court in the Bacchan Singh case 1982 the Supreme Court Interpreter section 354 subsection 3 that requires Special reasons to be given when the death sentence was imposed the Supreme Court Interpreter these special reasons as exceptional reasons found on the exceptionally grave circumstances It also mentioned that the normal sentence of murder should be imprisonment for life and death sentence should be an exception So Supreme Court confined the application or imposition of death penalty to the rarest of the rare cases the Supreme Court also emphasized on considering the Aggravating and mitigating Circumstances in a case while imposing death penalty here Aggravating circumstances refers to factors that increases the severity or culpability of a criminal act It involves a long criminal record of the offender or whether the offence was pre-planned, etc Conversely a mitigating circumstance is a factor that provides reason as to why Punishment for a criminal act are to be reduced such circumstances render the action of the criminal more reasonable or less guilty It could include reasons such as self-defense, etc If the aggravating and mitigating circumstances are not analyzed properly then it would not satisfy the exceptional reasons criterion so the Supreme Court held that the special reasons must include Aggravating and mitigating circumstances in a case and should pay due respect to the Circumstances of the crime and the criminal through this approach the court established a Principled sentencing this is the second important interpretation made by the Supreme Court now moving on the third important interpretation made by the Supreme Court is that the rarest of the rare dictum should be used when the Alternative option is unquestionably Foreclosed that is an alternative option should have been ruled out in case of capital offenses alternative option to death penalty is life imprisonment and When will they rule out the option of life imprisonment in case of capital offenses when it could be proved by leading Evidences that the offender is incapable of reform So through this interpretation the Supreme Court implied that no person is definitely Irreformable which means everyone can be reformed based on these interpretations only the author opinions that in Bachchan Singh case the Supreme Court Practically removed the death penalty provision because it asked to look for alternative option Asked to look into Reformation of the offender all these has set the benchmark to impose death penalty very high But still the author has suggested to revisit the case It is due to the fact that there was arbitrary application of Bachchan Singh framework or doctrine by codes or benches or in even some cases the doctrine was completely Ignored for example, they had determined the possibility of reformation Based on their hunches rather than through leading evidences this led to improper conclusion of Reformation is impossible according to the author the arbitrary application of Bachchan Singh framework is a result of unavailability of concrete and Elaborate mitigating factors and methods the courts did not mention what constitute the mitigating factors Plus it also failed to explain the burden of proof with respect to Reformation so there is a need for a concrete guidelines and it should be based on Individual centred Sentencing policy this individualistic approach should examine the social economic Emotional and genetic components that constitute the offender rather than the offense Even though the author suggested to revisit the Bachchan Singh case and fill the gaps his final conclusion is while doing so explicitly the Supreme Court must declare capital punishment as Unconstitutional this would mean the judicial abolition of death penalty and thereby saving many lives This is all regarding this discussion Although this discussion was a little bit lengthy. It is a well researched discussion You can pick points from this discussion to use it in your main senses So note down all the points we discussed here. Okay, since the discussion was little lengthy Let me summarize what we discussed first. We saw what is death penalty or capital punishment? Capital punishment is the execution of an offender who is sentenced to death after conviction by a court of law for a criminal offense when this capital punishment imposed it is awarded for the most heinous and detestable crimes against humanity then we saw how death penalty jurisprudence evolved in India it first started with the removal of section 367 subsection 5 of criminal procedure code 1898 after the re-enactment of criminal procedure code 1973 under section 354 subsection 3 now the judges needed to provide Special reasons for why they imposed the death sentence see previously judges had to provide Why death sentence was not imposed but after 1973 judges has to provide reasons why Death sentence is given then we saw that in the 35th the law commission report which was published in 1962 the law commission of India held the opinion that death penalty should be retained Then in 1982 the supreme court upheld the constitutionality of death penalty in the pachans in case finally in 2014 in the 262 law commission report titled the death penalty the law commission of India Held that India should move towards abolition of death penalty. So this is how Death penalty jurisprudence evolved in India then we saw two arguments in favor of death penalty What are the arguments? One is death penalty acts as a deterrence and number two is Death penalty Satisfies the demand for retribution and justice in society that is it satisfies the demands of the victims family Then we saw some arguments against death penalty also in that we saw Fallibility of the courts and the possibility of erroneous convection that is how even the courts can be wrong sometimes Then we saw that death penalty violated article 1419 and 21 of the constitution of India Then we saw that since death penalty is at the discretion of the judges it could lead to unfair sentencing Then we saw that how death penalty is imposed mostly against the poor and the deprived section of the community and finally we saw that how Indian penology is built on Reformation and rehabilitation and how death penalty finds no place in our society These are some points against death penalty Then we saw the important interpretations made by the Supreme Court in the bhajansing case 1982 through this judgment the Supreme Court Confined the application or imposition of death penalty to the rarest of the rare cases the Supreme Court Also said that before awarding death penalty the judges should pay due regards to the circumstances of the crime and the criminal through this approach the Supreme Court established a principled sentencing Finally through the bhajansing case the Supreme Court said that the rarest of the rare dictum should be used only when the alternative options is Unquestionably foreclosed through these interpretation made by the Supreme Court in the bhajansing case the Supreme Court Practically removed death penalty in India then finally before concluding we saw some of the issues highlighted by the author The author argues that in some cases there is arbitrary application of bhajansing framework and even in some cases the bhajansing framework is totally ignored To address this issue the author argues that there is a need for Concrete guidelines and this guidelines should be based on individual centered sentencing policy and the author also Pleads to make death penalty and constitutional. I hope you found this discussion useful with this Let us conclude this discussion and take up the next news article Look at this news article this news article states that according to the labor and employment ministries Third quarterly employment survey report over four lakh jobs were created in October December 2021 the survey covered manufacturing construction trade Transport education health accommodation and restaurants IT and financial services that accounted for 85% of total employment in India know that Manufacturing sector recorded highest number of workers followed by education sector This is the crux of the news article given here See we are not going to discuss about the survey in detail instead We will take this opportunity to revise about unemployment and its types from police perspective First of all, what is unemployment? See unemployment can be defined as a state of worklessness for a person who is fit and willing to work at the current wage rate simply put an Unemployed person is the one who is an active member of the labor force and is seeking work But is unable to find the work. Okay, it is a condition of involuntary Idleness now what is this involuntary idleness? See in case of voluntary unemployment a person is out of job on his own choice and does not Work on the prevalent wages either he wants higher wages or he does not want to work at all On the other hand the involuntary unemployment is a situation when a person is separated from Riminulative works and divide of wages although he is capable of earning his wages We have seen that it is the involuntary idleness that constitutes unemployment This involuntary unemployment can be further divided into cyclical unemployment seasonal unemployment structural unemployment frictional unemployment natural rate of unemployment Disgaster unemployment and under-employment. Now we will see about all these types briefly. This is important for your problems No, we will start with cyclical unemployment. See cyclical unemployment can be otherwise called as demand deficit unemployment it occurs when the economy is in need of Low workforce when there is a decline in aggregate demand for goods and services Employment declines and unemployment correspondingly increases cyclical unemployment mainly occurs during recession or depression This form of unemployment is most commonly known as cyclical unemployment since unemployment moves with the trade cycle For instance during the recent global slowdown in late 2008 many workers around the world lost their jobs This is about cyclical unemployment now moving on to seasonal unemployment See seasonal unemployment occurs in a particular time of the year or season So it is rightly called as seasonal unemployment Seasonal unemployment is most common in industries like agriculture, tourism, hotel catering, etc For example after harvesting the crops there is no work before the next sowing season. People engage in agriculture Remains unemployed during this time period. This is about seasonal unemployment No moving on to structural unemployment Structural unemployment arises when the qualification of a person is not sufficient to meet his job responsibilities it arises due to long-term change in the pattern of demand that changes the Basic structure of the economy the person is not able to learn new technologies used in the new Expanding sectors and they may be rendered permanently Unemployed for example when computers were introduced many workers were displaced because of mismatch between Existing skills of workers and the requirement of the job although jobs were available There was a demand for a new kind of skills and qualification So persons with old skills did not get employment in the changed economic regime and they remained unemployed This is about structural unemployment now moving on to frictional unemployment Frictional unemployment occurs when a person is out of one job and is searching for another For different reasons the reasons may be like seeking a better job being fired from the current job or having Voluntarily quit a current job. It generally requires some time before a person can get the next job rate during this time He is frictionally unemployed now moving on to natural rate of unemployment the total sum of Frictional and structural unemployment is referred as the natural rate of unemployment. This is quite important Remember this point now moving on to disguised unemployment See the unemployment which is not visible is said to be disguised unemployment It occurs when a person doesn't contribute anything to the output even when visibly working This happens amongst family labor mainly in agriculture who are engaged on land But are not contributing to the given level of output any number of persons may work on the field like 3 or 4 or even more people but the total output from the agricultural field will remain the same So their marginal productivity is zero So in essence disguised unemployment occurs when a person appears to be working But does not contribute anything to the output. So this is about disguised unemployment Finally now coming to the last type which is known as under employment Under employment is nothing but the under use of work force because a job does not use the workers full set of skills The classic example for this is over qualification over qualification is a condition in which the employee has Education Experience our skills beyond the requirements of the job So in a sense when a person is over qualified for a job. He is under employed. Okay This is all with this discussion in this discussion We saw what is unemployment then we saw the types of unemployment in that we saw about cyclical unemployment seasonal unemployment structural unemployment frictional unemployment natural rate of unemployment disguised unemployment and Under employment with this let us conclude this discussion and now let us take up the next news article Look at this news article. This news article states that Manapari government hospital won the first place at the state level for clean hospital in the national health missions Kaya Kalp program 2021-22 the hospital was awarded a cash prize of 50 lakh rupees in this context Let us briefly learn about national health mission and the Kaya Kalp program We will start our discussion with national health mission See the national health mission consists of two submissions They are national rural health mission and the national urban health mission the national health mission envisages achievement of Universal access to equitable affordable and quality health care services that are Accountable and responsive to people's needs the main components include health system strengthening Reproductive maternal and neonatal child health and adolescent health in addition to this communicable and Non-communicable disease prevention and a national health mission Government of India provides financial and technical support to states and unitaritaries to strengthen their health care systems The objectives of the national health mission are given in this table Just go through it any one of the goal can be a potential question in preliminary examination Having seen about the national health mission No, we will see about the Kaya Kalp awards see Kaya Kalp was that initiative launched on 15th May 2015 to promote cleanliness hygiene and infection control practice in public health facilities Under this initiative public health facilities are appraised appraised in the sense the public health facilities that show exemplary performance meeting standards of protocol of cleanliness hygiene and Infection control will receive awards and commendation Simply these awards are given to the hospitals public health centers community health centers Etc for promoting hygiene in health care facilities See the objectives of Kaya Kalp scheme award are fourfold First objective is to promote cleanliness hygiene and Infection control practice in public health care facilities Secondly to incentivize and recognize such public health facilities that show exemplary performance in adhering to standard protocol of cleanliness and Infection control. Thirdly it strives to inculcate a culture of ongoing assessment and peer review of performance related to hygiene cleanliness and Sanitation finally it aims to create and share sustainable practices Related to improved cleanliness in public health facilities linked to positive health outcomes See there are several parameters based on which the performance of the facility would be judged these parameters include hospital upkeep Sanitation and hygiene waste management Infection control support services and hygiene promotion I have given here about the details of the award for different levels of facility Just go through it. That's all regarding this news article in this discussion We saw some basic information about national health mission and the Kaya Kalp awards Now we will move on to the next news article discussion Look at this news article this news article states that the reactor pressure vessel of Kudankulam Nuclear power project unit 3 will be installed soon This reactor pressure vessel will function as a barrier and will prevent leakages of Radiative material and the atomic energy regulatory board has given its nod for this project in this context We will briefly see about reactor pressure vessel and away from reactor facility We will then learn about atomic energy regulatory board from prelims perspective first We will see about reactor pressure vessel see reactor pressure vessels are thick steel containers that hold Reactor fuel when the reactor operates the vessels provide one of the several barriers that keep radioactive material out of the environment the away from reactor storage is nothing but a Spent fuel storage facility outside a reactor site boundary It typically involves receiving and temporarily storing the irradiated fuel from a number of nuclear power projects So this is about away from reactor storage Now we will see about atomic energy regulatory board, which is important See atomic energy regulatory board was constituted on November 15th 1983 by the president of India by exercising the powers conferred by the atomic energy act 1962 note that the regulatory powers of atomic energy regulatory board is derived from the rules and Notification promulgated under the atomic energy act and the environment protection act 1986 atomic energy regulatory boards headquarters is in Mumbai the atomic energy regulatory board has some mandate to enforce rules and regulations promulgated under the atomic energy act 1962 for ensuring Radiological safety in the country atomic energy regulatory board also administers the provisions of factories act 1948 for ensuring industrial safety in the units of Department of atomic energy that are under the purview of the board currently the board consists of Full-time chairman and ex-officio member four part-time members and a secretary Atomic energy regulatory board has some mechanism to check its effectiveness and quality assurance in its activities and a process by which It improves its systems through own experience feedback and international regulatory practices That's all about this news article discussion with this Let us conclude the news article discussion session and take up the practice problems questions There are three practice problems questions today. Let us see them one by one. Let us take up the first question Let me read out the question David was working in a private firm Recently his company decided to use laptops for all the operations which was earlier than manually David failed to learn the skill of operating laptop He was thrown out of the company for skill deficiency. He is now unemployed. This is a classic example of see here Four options are given we have to find which of the options is correct Let us take up the first option Cyclical unemployment cyclical unemployment mainly occurs during recession or depression here unemployment moves with the trade cycle See this is not the answer Option A is wrong. Let us take up option C frictional unemployment Frictional unemployment occurs when a person is out of one job and is searching for another for different reasons So option C is also wrong. Let us take up option D disguised unemployment Disgusted unemployment occurs when a person doesn't contribute anything to the output when visibly working So option D is also wrong. So the correct option here is option B structural unemployment Structural unemployment arises when the qualification of a person is not sufficient to meet his job responsibilities So from the given example, David's qualification is not sufficient to meet his responsibilities That is why David was thrown out of his job and he's now unemployed. So once again, the correct answer here is option B Structural unemployment. Let us take up the second question Let me read out the question which of the following award is given to public health facilities to promote cleanliness hygiene and infection control practices see from our discussion We know that answer here is option a kaikal power kaikal power was an initiative Which was launched on 15th May 2015 to promote cleanliness hygiene and infection control in public health facilities under this initiative public health facilities are appraised Okay, so once again the correct answer here is option a kaikal awards Moving on to the last question for today. This question is in regards to atomic energy regulatory board Statements are given. We have to find the incorrect statements. Let me read out the statements Let us take up option a atomic energy regulatory board was constituted by the president of India by exercising the powers Conferred by the atomic energy act 1962. Now, let us take up option B Atomic energy regulatory boards headquarters is in Mumbai. Now, we want to option C atomic energy regulatory board also administers the provisions of factory act 1948 for ensuring Industrial safety in the units of the department of atomic energy option D is none of the bow here all the Three options that is option a option B option C are correct So since the question is asking us to find the incorrect statements the correct answer here is Option D none of the bow see all these statements be saw in the discussions They are all just basic facts only option C might seem confusing, but it is actually correct We also saw this fact that is atomic energy regulatory board administers factory act 1948 This fact we saw in the discussion itself. So once again the correct answer here is Option D none of the above the mains question based on today's discussion is here Write the answers and post it in the comment section If you like today's video like comment and share it with your friends for more updates regarding UPSC preparation Subscribe to Shankara IS Academy YouTube channel