Judge Commissioner; Purposeful CWC; Broad Basket
Parliament; CWC meeting; Sukhoi 30-MKI
Opinion Watch
Judge Commissioner
The special session of parliament begins from today and amid suspense of the intent of the government behind summoning the event the move to lower the stature of the members of the Election Commission has invited condemnation from the dailies. The likes of The Indian Express, Deccan Herald and others have called out the government’s attempt to dilute the strength of the institutions. They have underlined that while terms and references to be changed through a legislative proposal listed in the special session of parliament lowers the stature of the members of the commission from a Supreme Court judge to the Cabinet Secretary, the message is loud and clear that a powerful executive can tame independent entities.
By dropping the Chief Justice of India from the selection panel to pick Chief Election Commissioner and other members, the bill is only strengthening the scope for the executive to command more influence on the election body.
Purposeful CWC
The first meeting of the Congress Working Committee (CWC) in Hyderabad, Telangana has invited a close scrutiny of the political observers and dailies to cull out the messages from the grand old party ahead of the Lok Sabha elections. While the show of unity has been admittedly most noticeable, The Asian Age in its Editorial has hailed the “purposeful” meeting. The New Delhi-based daily has argued that the CWC meeting could send out a powerful message of a party firm in its role of an Opposition by rejecting the idea of one nation and one election, while also demanding raising quota for the other backward castes, scheduled tribes and scheduled cates.
The dissenters in the Congress have been defanged with party veteran Mallikarjuna Kharge becoming president and the subsequent poll victories in Himachal Pradesh and Karnataka. The Congress will need to prove mettle as the pivot of the Opposition bloc – INDIA – in the coming weeks.
Broad Basket
The Tribune has said that the decision of India to buy 12 Sukhoi 30-MKI fighter jets to compensate for losses during crash, while it’s being jointly produced since 1990s, may test the US legislation to sanction buyers of the Russian military hardware. Yet, the Chandigarh-based daily has reasoned that India by buying military gadgets from the US has also asserted that New Delhi is not relying on a few countries.
The decision to buy 12 fighter jets from Russia may be to serve the immediate concerns of the Air Force. But India must now aim to boost technological prowess to produce such fighter jets on own.
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