The Evening Wrap: Supreme Court to steer ex gratia payment to kin of COVID-19 deceased

The Supreme Court on Wednesday decided to take the reins and marshal the efforts to pay compensation to families that lost their relatives to COVID-19, after noticing some States responded to the humanitarian move in a lukewarm fashion. A Bench of Justices M.R. Shah and Sanjiv Khanna told the States that many of these families were economically challenged. They may have been further crippled by the fact that COVID-19 took away their sole breadwinner. The court said payment of ₹50,000 each as ex gratia to the loved ones of every COVID-19 patient was a welfare gesture, and so, essential to a welfare State. Delays and bureaucratic red-tape to release the money or process the application did not augur well. Moreover, applications for compensation ought not to be rejected merely on technical glitches. Every reason for denying a claim should be recorded, it noted. The court ordered the States to reach out especially to children orphaned by the pandemic and whose details have been uploaded in the Bal Swaraj portal of the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR). The Commission, through its web portal, is identifying and collecting information from across the country about children orphaned, abandoned or left with one parent. The Bench said the States should take advantage of the portal and use the information available on it to identify and pay children the ex gratia amount of ₹50,000. During the hearing, after a short discussion with Justice Khanna, Justice Shah told the lawyers present, “We have decided to directly step in and see that payments are made.” He said the court would pass an order in the next few days to rope in the legal services authorities at State and district to act as it’s “ombudsman”. “In the 2001 earthquake in Gujarat, the High Court involved the legal services authorities as the ombudsman to identify and pay compensation to the victims,” he observed. The court said that it would intervene in every State where the applications received for compensation were lesser than the deaths registered. It indicated that it would, in its proposed order, direct the State and district legal services authorities in these States to get the details of all those applicants to facilitate the payment of the ex gratia amount. The court earlier in the day summoned the Chief Secretaries of Andhra Pradesh and Bihar for non-payment of compensation to the kin of the victims. “It is unfortunate that we have to call out State after State like this... Every State believes the people are at its mercy,” it said. In the post lunch session, however, the Andhra Pradesh Chief Secretary said the State had received 49,292 applications for compensation, of which 31,000 were found eligible. Bihar had also received over 10,000 claims for compensation. The hearing saw the Bench ask Gujarat why 4,000 applications for ex gratia payment were rejected. In Kerala, the court noted that only 27,000 claims were received though there were 49,000 deaths. Maharashtra informed the court that it had paid compensation to over a lakh people. Even in past hearings, the court had expressed its anxiety about why there was only a trickle of claimants for the compensation. In fact, it had prepared a questionnaire for the States that included the number of deaths recorded in each State, the number of claims received by them individually, the compensation paid so far, and whether a grievance redressal committee in each district had been constituted. It had also asked the States if online portals for disbursal of compensation were created or not. The court had approved the revised and simplified model of disbursement of compensation adopted by Gujarat. It had said the same model could be applied across the country. No foreign dignitary as Republic Day chief guest this year too Prime Minister Narendra Modi will host a meeting with five Central Asian leaders virtually next week, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) announced on Wednesday, formally indicating that they will not travel to Delhi, as planned, as chief guests at the Republic Day celebrations. An official also confirmed that there will be no foreign dignitary as chief guest during the events around January 26. The MEA had not officially confirmed their presence, but sources said the Presidents of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan had in December accepted an invitation to jointly attend the parade and Republic Day reception. They were due to also participate in the first India-Central Asia summit meeting during their visit to Delhi. The Hindu had reported last week that the decision not to have any foreign dignitary as a chief guest was among a series of decisions to downsize Republic Day parade events, given the rising Coronavirus cases and estimates that the present wave would reach a peak in the last week of January. Sources said proposals to this effect had been sent out to Presidents Kassym-Jomart Tokayev (Kazakhstan), Sadyr Japarov (Kyrgyzstan), Emomali Rahmon (Tajikistan), Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov (Turkmenistan) and Shavkat Mirziyoyev (Uzbekistan), suggesting changing the summit to the virtual format. The size of the marching contingents at Republic Day is down by about a third this year and the route taken by them has also been reduced to a few kilometres from Vijay Chowk to National Stadium, and the size of the audience is down from the usual 1.5 lakh to only about 5,000 special invitees, including officials and diplomats this year. Modi had chaired a meeting on Saturday to decide on the options and proposals. This is the second year in a row the government has had to cancel invitations to chief guests due to the COVID-19 pandemic after U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson was unable to attend the celebrations in 2021. Foreign leaders have graced the Republic Day parades every year barring 1952, 1953 and 1966. The then Indonesian President Sukarno was the first chief guest to grace Republic Day in 1950. In 2020, Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro was the chief guest. Gen. Bipin Rawat’s brother joins BJP, may contest Uttarakhand polls Vijay Rawat, brother of India’s first Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat who recently died in a helicopter crash, joined the BJP on Wednesday. The BJP may field him as its candidate in poll-bound Uttarakhand, sources said. Vijay Rawat, who retired as a colonel from the army, joined the BJP in the presence of Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami and Rajya Sabha MP Anil Baluni. Noting that his father, also a former army officer, was associated with the BJP, Rawat expressed happiness at working for the party and lavished praise on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying he has a unique vision and mindset. He thinks out of the box and all his efforts are directed towards the country’s betterment, Rawat said. Welcoming Rawat into the party, Dhami said the late CDS wanted to work for the state after retirement and his younger brother will advance his vision. The BJP is inspired by nationalist ideology and has always worked for security personnel’s welfare, he said. Noting that Rawat’s family has been joining the army for three generations, he said his decision to join the BJP will boost its strength. Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls: BJP announces alliances with Apna Dal, Nishad Party The BJP on Wednesday formally announced its alliance with the Apna Dal and Nishad Party for the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls, with party president J. P. Nadda declaring that the alliance will fight all 403 seats in the Assembly together. But he declined to spell out the exact contours of the seat-sharing agreement. Flanked by Apna Dal leader and Union Minister Anupriya Patel, and Nishad Party leader Sanjay Nishad, Nadda insisted that after the large-scale exodus of Other Backward Classes (OBC) MLAs to the Samajwadi Party, including three Ministers in the Yogi Adityanath government, the alliance was en route to victory. “We are going to fight all 403 seats together, and keep to Prime Minister Modi’s goal of sabka saath, sabka vikas, sabka vishwas (all together, all for development, everyone’s trust),” he said. Patel of the Apna Dal, which had contested 11 seats in the 2017 polls in alliance with the BJP, also stressed on the social justice aspect of the alliance, blaming non-National Democratic Alliance (NDA) parties who claim the support of backward communities of not doing enough for those sections of society, and lauding Modi’s government. Covid Watch: Numbers and Developments The number of reported coronavirus cases from India stood at 3,80,21,418 at the time of publishing this newsletter, with the death toll at 4,87,505. In Brief The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved a three-year extension of the tenure of the National Commission for Safai Karamcharis (NCSK) that was set to end on March 31. The Cabinet, at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, approved the extension at a cost of ₹43.68 crore. The commission was set up in 1993 under the NCSK Act 1993 for a period of three years, which has been extended since then, despite the Act ceasing to have effect from February 29, 2004. “After that, the tenure of the NCSK has been extended as a non-statutory body from time to time through resolutions,” a government statement said. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow. [logo] The Evening Wrap 19 JANUARY 2022 [The Hindu logo] Welcome to the Evening Wrap newsletter, your guide to the day’s biggest stories with concise analysis from The Hindu. [[Arrow]Open in browser]( [[Mail icon]More newsletters]( Supreme Court to steer ex gratia payment to kin of COVID-19 deceased The Supreme Court on Wednesday [decided to take the reins and marshal the efforts to pay compensation to families that lost their relatives to COVID-19]( after noticing some States responded to the humanitarian move in a lukewarm fashion. A Bench of Justices M.R. Shah and Sanjiv Khanna told the States that many of these families were economically challenged. They may have been further crippled by the fact that COVID-19 took away their sole breadwinner. [The court said payment of ₹ 50,000 each as ex gratia to the loved ones of every COVID-19 patient was a welfare gesture and essential to a welfare state. File]  The court said payment of ₹50,000 each as ex gratia to the loved ones of every COVID-19 patient was a welfare gesture, and so, essential to a welfare State. Delays and bureaucratic red-tape to release the money or process the application did not augur well. Moreover, applications for compensation ought not to be rejected merely on technical glitches. Every reason for denying a claim should be recorded, it noted. The court ordered the States to reach out especially to children orphaned by the pandemic and whose details have been uploaded in the Bal Swaraj portal of the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR). The Commission, through its web portal, is identifying and collecting information from across the country about children orphaned, abandoned or left with one parent. The Bench said the States should take advantage of the portal and use the information available on it to identify and pay children the ex gratia amount of ₹50,000. During the hearing, after a short discussion with Justice Khanna, Justice Shah told the lawyers present, “We have decided to directly step in and see that payments are made.” He said the court would pass an order in the next few days to rope in the legal services authorities at State and district to act as it’s “ombudsman”. “In the 2001 earthquake in Gujarat, the High Court involved the legal services authorities as the ombudsman to identify and pay compensation to the victims,” he observed. The court said that it would intervene in every State where the applications received for compensation were lesser than the deaths registered. It indicated that it would, in its proposed order, direct the State and district legal services authorities in these States to get the details of all those applicants to facilitate the payment of the ex gratia amount. The court earlier in the day summoned the Chief Secretaries of Andhra Pradesh and Bihar for non-payment of compensation to the kin of the victims. “It is unfortunate that we have to call out State after State like this... Every State believes the people are at its mercy,” it said. In the post lunch session, however, the Andhra Pradesh Chief Secretary said the State had received 49,292 applications for compensation, of which 31,000 were found eligible. Bihar had also received over 10,000 claims for compensation. The hearing saw the Bench ask Gujarat why 4,000 applications for ex gratia payment were rejected. In Kerala, the court noted that only 27,000 claims were received though there were 49,000 deaths. Maharashtra informed the court that it had paid compensation to over a lakh people. Even in past hearings, the court had expressed its anxiety about why there was only a trickle of claimants for the compensation. In fact, it had prepared a questionnaire for the States that included the number of deaths recorded in each State, the number of claims received by them individually, the compensation paid so far, and whether a grievance redressal committee in each district had been constituted. It had also asked the States if online portals for disbursal of compensation were created or not. The court had approved the revised and simplified model of disbursement of compensation adopted by Gujarat. It had said the same model could be applied across the country. [underlineimg]  No foreign dignitary as Republic Day chief guest this year too Prime Minister Narendra Modi will host a meeting with five Central Asian leaders virtually next week, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) announced on Wednesday, [formally indicating that they will not travel to Delhi, as planned, as chief guests at the Republic Day celebrations](. An official also confirmed that there will be no foreign dignitary as chief guest during the events around January 26. The MEA had not officially confirmed their presence, but sources said the Presidents of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan had in December accepted an invitation to jointly attend the parade and Republic Day reception. They were due to also participate in the first India-Central Asia summit meeting during their visit to Delhi. The Hindu had [reported last week]( that the decision not to have any foreign dignitary as a chief guest was among a series of decisions to downsize Republic Day parade events, given the rising Coronavirus cases and estimates that the present wave would reach a peak in the last week of January. Sources said proposals to this effect had been sent out to Presidents Kassym-Jomart Tokayev (Kazakhstan), Sadyr Japarov (Kyrgyzstan), Emomali Rahmon (Tajikistan), Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov (Turkmenistan) and Shavkat Mirziyoyev (Uzbekistan), suggesting changing the summit to the virtual format. The size of the marching contingents at Republic Day is down by about a third this year and the route taken by them has also been reduced to a few kilometres from Vijay Chowk to National Stadium, and the size of the audience is down from the usual 1.5 lakh to only about 5,000 special invitees, including officials and diplomats this year. Modi had chaired a meeting on Saturday to decide on the options and proposals. This is the second year in a row the government has had to cancel invitations to chief guests due to the COVID-19 pandemic after U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson was unable to attend the celebrations in 2021. Foreign leaders have graced the Republic Day parades every year barring 1952, 1953 and 1966. The then Indonesian President Sukarno was the first chief guest to grace Republic Day in 1950. In 2020, Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro was the chief guest. [underlineimg]  Gen. Bipin Rawat’s brother joins BJP, may contest Uttarakhand polls Vijay Rawat, brother of India’s first Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat who recently died in a helicopter crash, [joined the BJP]( on Wednesday. The BJP may field him as its candidate in poll-bound Uttarakhand, sources said. Vijay Rawat, who retired as a colonel from the army, joined the BJP in the presence of Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami and Rajya Sabha MP Anil Baluni. Noting that his father, also a former army officer, was associated with the BJP, Rawat expressed happiness at working for the party and lavished praise on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying he has a unique vision and mindset. He thinks out of the box and all his efforts are directed towards the country’s betterment, Rawat said. Welcoming Rawat into the party, Dhami said the late CDS wanted to work for the state after retirement and his younger brother will advance his vision. The BJP is inspired by nationalist ideology and has always worked for security personnel’s welfare, he said. Noting that Rawat’s family has been joining the army for three generations, he said his decision to join the BJP will boost its strength. [underlineimg]  Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls: BJP announces alliances with Apna Dal, Nishad Party The BJP on Wednesday [formally announced its alliance with the Apna Dal and Nishad Party]( for the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls, with party president J. P. Nadda declaring that the alliance will fight all 403 seats in the Assembly together. But he declined to spell out the exact contours of the seat-sharing agreement. [BJP National President JP Nadda with Apna Dal leader Anupriya Patel at a meeting at BJP HQ in New Delhi, Wednesday, Jan. 19, 2022.]  Flanked by Apna Dal leader and Union Minister Anupriya Patel, and Nishad Party leader Sanjay Nishad, Nadda insisted that after the large-scale exodus of Other Backward Classes (OBC) MLAs to the Samajwadi Party, including three Ministers in the Yogi Adityanath government, the alliance was en route to victory. “We are going to fight all 403 seats together, and keep to Prime Minister Modi’s goal of sabka saath, sabka vikas, sabka vishwas (all together, all for development, everyone’s trust),” he said. Patel of the Apna Dal, which had contested 11 seats in the 2017 polls in alliance with the BJP, also stressed on the social justice aspect of the alliance, blaming non-National Democratic Alliance (NDA) parties who claim the support of backward communities of not doing enough for those sections of society, and lauding Modi’s government. [underlineimg]  Covid Watch: Numbers and Developments The [number of reported coronavirus cases from India]( stood at 3,80,21,418 at the time of publishing this newsletter, with the death toll at 4,87,505. [underlineimg] In Brief The Union Cabinet on Wednesday [approved a three-year extension of the tenure of the National Commission for Safai Karamcharis (NCSK)]( that was set to end on March 31. The Cabinet, at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, approved the extension at a cost of ₹43.68 crore. The commission was set up in 1993 under the NCSK Act 1993 for a period of three years, which has been extended since then, despite the Act ceasing to have effect from February 29, 2004. “After that, the tenure of the NCSK has been extended as a non-statutory body from time to time through resolutions,” a government statement said. 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