What is new
Balance Euphoria over Corona Vaccine with Rationalism Shots
- Published on 30 October 2020
(Corona vaccine. Image Credit: taxindiaonline.com)
The political narrative on India’s war against Covid-19 continues to sustain new hopes. Every morning starts with positive dose of feel-good news on vaccines or how lockdown saved crores of lives.
The spindle of hope has turned many times over from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s stunning resolve on 25th March 2020 to win the Corona war in 21 days to solemn promise to give vaccine for each and every citizen.
This optimism must be balanced with basics and the history. It is replete with frantic efforts to develop and inject people with wrong vaccines during 1918 pandemics & vaccine developers getting shock at fast disappearance of virus as happened in 1957 pandemic and 2003 SARS epidemic.
It is not anyone’s contention that vaccine against novel corona viruses should not get highest priority. The efforts should not lead to grand illusion and false hope about corona vaccines serving as panacea.
It is here pertinent to quote Washington-based vaccine developer Sabin Institute (SI), which has been working vaccines against these viruses for several years. In a pre-covid write-up on its website, SI stated: “Past and ongoing pandemic threats from coronaviruses have prompted a new urgency to develop a pan-coronavirus vaccine as a global countermeasure”.
The plain truth is viruses causing influenza and its ilk keep mutating. Hence the composition of seasonal vaccines is decided at the start of season in cold countries. Public is encouraged to take shots of such vaccines at the start of flu season in developed countries. Efficacy of seasonal vaccines is an issue that puts off many from taking shots.
Amend Constitution & Relevant Laws to Legalize Act of God
- Published on 12 September 2020
The Centre’s two debt-burdening GST compensation options (GST-COs), offered to States, should trigger a serious debate on ‘Act of God’ (AoG).
India should provide constitutional and statutory protection to AoG that empowered Union Finance Ministry to contrive GST-COs. The AoG clarity on the Statute Book can help nip in the bud potential litigation in commercial contracts. It can also help arrest burgeoning trust deficit in the Centre-State relations.
Indian Constitution is outdated. It left out AoG. The name ‘God’, however, figures 13 times in the Constitution in relation to oath/swearing in of key personnel in the overall governance system.
Parliament should thus debate whether the Constitution should be amended to specify and define AoG to cap political liability of authorities. Should it be defined as exclusive privilege of the central government? Or, should all three tiers of governments have the right to renege or tweak their obligations towards the citizens? Should invocation of AoG enjoy immunity from litigation?
Statutory protection against any official decision taken in the name of AoG can be granted by taking a leaf from The Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act (FRBMA), 2003.
FRBMA says: “No suit, prosecution or other legal proceedings shall lie against the Central Government or any officer of the Central Government for anything which is in good faith done or intended to be done under this Act or the rules made thereunder”.
It adds: “No civil court shall have jurisdiction to question the legality of any action taken by, or any decision of, the Central Government, under this Act”.
Parliament should debate laws that require amendments to empower different stakeholders of economy to invoke AoG.
A fleeting look at Indian laws show that AoG finds mention only in three laws. None of them define AoG. The AoG-carrying laws are: The Railways Act, 1989 (RA), The Mines Act, 1952 and The Indian Carriage of Goods by Sea Act, 1925.
World Now Grapples With Pandemic Management Trade-Offs
- Published on 31 July 2020
(Image Courtesy: taxindiaonline.com)
“Trade-Offs are central to economies, as they are to life. They are at the heart of economics because neither the decision-makers nor society can have everything it wants”. Two American economists, Donald E. Campbell and Jerry S. Kelly stated this way back in May 1994.
They penned their thoughts in an article on “Trade-off Theory” in The American Economic Review. Twenty-six years later, trade-offs have become central to prevention and control of Covid-19 pandemic.
Trade-Offs pendulum has swung across the world from obsessive bias for the lockdowns to the nightmares over the cost of lockdowns. Countries are struggling to strike a balance between preventing Covid deaths and preventing socio-economic crisis.
The shift is becoming palpable as lockdowns are hard to enforce for several months. And botched lockdowns have contributed to spread of virus in over-populated countries such as India and Pakistan. Defiance of the law of land is fashionable in such countries. Rampant poverty also forces people to eke out a living at risk of catching infection.
Reputed global institutions are now computing the humungous costs due to restrictions of all sorts on human mobility imposed to rein in pandemic. The hidden costs include actual non-Covid deaths & potential deaths due to negligence of non-Covid patients in future.
Trade-offs with Corona prevention have several dimensions and variants. The dimensions are: Lives versus Livelihood; health vs wealth; deaths vs jobs lost; Covid-cum-lockdown vs global $30 trillion fiscal deficit for 2020-2023 and Covid deaths vs non-Covid deaths.
India’s Lockdown Necessitates More Parkinson’s Laws
- Published on 03 July 2020
(C. Northcote Parkinson - Image Courtesy: openlibrary.org)
“Work expands to fill the time available for its completion”. This Satirical, maxim stands validated 1000% by India’s extended lockdown, lauded globally for its stringency.
Known as Parkinson’s Law (PL), this maxim now needs strong articulation in the light of amazing speed & efficiency with which bureaucracy spun rules & orders to keep itself & others busy.
Lockdown’s diktats have had multiplier effect as they keep citizens busy during the shutdown & even under the phased unlocking. A law-abiding citizen is always on his toes as he/she has to keep abreast of dynamic regulations for remaining compliant.
If PL creator, C. Northcote Parkinson, were alive, he would have certainly polished Parkinson’s. laws. He might have added a few more.
Dr. Parkinson would certainly have been overwhelmed by unprecedented rise in workload for all during the total shutdown of India beginning midnight of 24th March. The diktats issued by bureaucracy covers all activities in all spheres of life.
Take the simple case of charity. Ideally, one should not disclose whether one has helped the needy. A Government department, however, decided to create a data bank on this.