Former SC judges oppose Bill on Biotechnology

Before the start of Parliament's winter session, former judges of Supreme Court has questioned the efficacy of three government bills on new regulatory authority for bio-technology, unfair practices in higher education and constitution of education tribunals.

Updated on: Nov 21, 2011, 24:42:57 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Before the start of Parliament's winter session, former judges of Supreme Court has questioned the efficacy of three government bills on new regulatory authority for bio-technology, unfair practices in higher education and constitution of education tribunals.

The winter session has hectic agenda for MPs as there are over 30 bill lists for introduction or consideration including six education bills and the Bio-technology Regulatory Authority Bill.

The former judges of Supreme Court S P Jeevan Reddy, Kuldeep Singh and M H Kania in a similar statement have expressed serious concern saying the ministry mandated to promote bio-technology was introducing the bill. They also said that the regulatory framework should have experts from other related ministries such as environment, agriculture, health and rural development.

“The primary mandate of any biotechnology bill must be to ensure safety to consumers, farmers and the environment and not to facilitate quick clearances,” the judges said.

They also found the bill lacking in ensuring that citizens have a right to reject a Genetically Modified food, gram sabha refusal to all sowing of GM food crops and ensure that there is no contamination of environment because of GM crops.

“The penalties for transgressing of the rights of consumers or farmers to be GM free and for any environmental damage must be of a deterrent nature and quickly enforceable,” they said.

In another set of view, former chief justices of India, A S Anand, Madan Mohan Punchhi and K N Singh had claimed that the government does not have legal competence to set regulatory mechanisms for universities as it was a domain of the state legislative bodies.

Their view was sought by Association of Self Financing Universities on HRD ministry’s Education Tribunal Bill and Prohibition of Unfair Practices in Technical, Medical and Universities Bill. These bills aim at setting up regulatory mechanisms at centre and state levels to address issues of concern in higher education including capitation fee, inadequate teaching facility and problem related to teachers.

The views of the former chief justices are based on entries in the Constitution related to matters on incorporation, regulation and winding up of the universities.

They said it was exclusively a state subject. The government, however, differ saying that there already is the University Grants Commission set up under a Central Law to regulate universities.

In addition to contrary legal views, Members of Parliament cutting across party lines have also opposed the proposed laws on different grounds.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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