4-1, SC upholds citizenship provision for migrants to Assam from East Pak

Upholding the Constitutional validity of Section 6A of the Citizenship Act, 1955, which essentially sets March 24, 1971, as the cut-off date for entry into Assam for the grant of citizenship, the Supreme Court Thursday called for stricter implementation of laws against illegal immigration and judicial monitoring of the implementation of immigration and citizenship legislations

SC upholds Parliament primacy, but also flags fraternity as a key factor

By framing the fraught citizenship question in Constitutional definitions of fraternity and plurality and firmly establishing the cut-off date for citizenship of those in Assam as March 24, 1971, the Supreme Court's ruling pushes for an inclusive view on who is a citizen.

Nawaz: Jaishankar's visit is a good opening, India and Pak need to move forward

Underlining that India and Pakistan should "bury the past" and "think of the future", former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif said External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar's visit to Islamabad for the SCO meeting was a "good beginning" and a "good opening" and the two countries "should move forward from here".

Marital rape: Will striking down immunity to husbands create new offence, asks SC

The Supreme Court sought to know whether it would be creating a new offence by striking down the provision in penal law which prevents wives from prosecuting their husbands for rape. 

A three-judge bench presided by CJI DY Chandrachud and comprising Justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra began hearing petitions challenging the exception clause of Section 375 of the IPC, now BNS, under which sexual intercourse or sexual acts by a man with his wife, the wife not being minor, is not rape. 

CJI names Justice Khanna as his successor

Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud has written to the Union Law Ministry naming Justice Sanjiv Khanna, the second-most senior judge of the Supreme Court, as his successor. Once approved by the government, Justice Khanna will become the 51st Chief Justice of India. 

With CJI Chandrachud set to retire on November 10, the government, as per convention, had written to him last week requesting him to name his successor in office. 

Elevated as a judge of the Supreme Court on January 18, 2019, Justice Khanna will superannuate on May 13, 2025, making it a tenure of little over six months. 

He is among the few judges who were elevated to the Supreme Court even before becoming a Chief Justice of any High Court. 

Justice Pardiwala dissents: Passage of time made Section invalid, more prone to abuse

Declaring Section 6A of the Citizenship Act, 1955 invalid with prospective effect, Justice J B Pardiwala, in his dissenting judgement, said the provision is "manifestly arbitrary" and "in the absence of any temporal limit to its application, with the efflux of time is rather counter- serving the object with which it was enacted." 

He said the "open-ended nature of Section 6A has, with time, become more prone to abuse" and "promotes further immigration into Assam - immigrants come hoping with forged documents to set up the defence of belonging to pre-1966 or the 1966-71 stream upon identification as a foreigner and reference to the tribunal". 

An inclusive beginning

One of the main grounds of the challenge before the SC was that the presence of Section 6A violates the right to conserve the culture of the indigenous people of Assam and is, therefore, unconstitutional. 

The majority rejects this argument by adopting a multicultural and pluralist interpretation of Article 29 and rejecting an interpretation that could be used to entrench cultural exclusivity. 

It notes that the Article aims to 'conserve' the culture of any group of citizens, but does not prevent the simultaneous existence of any other culture. -

Direct tax share up at 57 per cent of total tax revenue, highest in 14 years

The contribution of direct taxes to total tax revenue climbed to 56.72 per cent in 2023-24, the highest in 14 years. 

The surge was even more stark in the direct tax-to-GDP ratio - the share of direct taxes in the overall economic output in the country jumped to over a two-decade high of 6.64 per cent, time-series data released by the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) under the Ministry of Finance showed.

With the direct tax to total tax revenue increasing in FY24 from 54.63 per cent the previous year, the share of indirect taxes to total tax revenue is now down to 43.28 per cent. 

The last time the share of direct taxes had zoomed higher than the 56.72 level recorded in FY24 was way back in FY10 at 60.78 per cent. 

A higher share of direct taxes is considered progressive as it is linked to income levels compared to indirect taxes that are levied across the board and so, are considered to impact the poor more than the well-to-do. 

'Excessive pricing': RBI bars 4 NBFCs from giving loans

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has barred Asirvad Micro Finance Ltd, Arohan Financial Services Ltd, DMI Finance and Navi Finserv from sanctioning and disbursing loans for violation of multiple rules, including excessive pricing of loans. The ban on these non-bank finance companies (NBFCs) will come into effect from October 21.

This action is based on material supervisory concerns observed in the pricing policy of these companies in terms of their Weighted Average Lending Rate (WALR) and the interest spread charged over their cost of funds, which are found to be excessive and not in adherence with the regulations," RBI said.

Four issues in the Assam verdict

A Five-Judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court on Thursday upheld by a 4-1 majority the unique process for granting citizenship to migrants who entered Assam until March 24, 1971. 

The verdict has importance not just for Assam, where politics has long been shaped by issues of migration and demography, but also for wider issues of citizenship and Parliament's powers in this regard. 

The majority comprising Chief Justice of India (CJI) DY Chandrachud, and Justices Surya Kant, MM Sundresh and Manoj Misra, upheld Section 6A of The Citizenship Act, 1955, which codified the political consensus of the 1985 Assam Accord. Justice JB Pardiwala dissented.