Centre clarifies on definition of land as forest
- The Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) of the Environment Ministry has clarified that the States need not take the Centre’s approval to define what constitutes unclassified land as forest.
About:
- States, having well established forest departments, are in a better position, rather than Union Environment Ministry, to understand their own forests and needs, and should frame criteria for their forests; criteria so finalised by a State need not be subject to approval by Union Environment Ministry.
- The freedom to define land, not already classified as forests by the Centre or State records, as forest has been the prerogative of the States since 1996 and stems from a Supreme Court order.
1996 Supreme Court judgment:
- The 1996 Supreme Court judgment expanded the definition of forest to include lands that were already notified by the Centre as forests, that appear in government records as forests as well as those that fell in the “dictionary definition” of forest.
- The latter clause allows the States to evolve their own criteria and define tracts of land as forest, and these would then be bound by forest conservation laws.
- An all-encompassing definition of forest wasn’t possible for India because the country has 16 different kinds of forest. A tract of grassland in one State might qualify in one region as forest, but not in another.
Mamallapuram informal summit
Relevance: G.S paper II: International Relations
Context
- The recently held Mamallapuram informal summit between the leaderships of India and China was a reminder of an earlier golden age of sail when Asia’s seas were a common heritage of mankind.
Issues
- The seas are now divided and have become arenas for violation of sovereign boundary rules and laws.
- India and China control the choke points in their maritime regions and thus seek control of the trade through them.
Way forward
- As a first step, India and China must commit to respecting each other’s ‘core’ interests and sovereign sea area integrity.
- India, China and their Asian partners should aim to develop soft laws that fortify the ongoing development and conservationist orientation of global sea law.
- The lessons learnt by India and China in stabilising their disputed land boundary offer useful pointers to chart a framework to regulate their interactions at sea.
Conclusion
- India and China must aspire to once again restore Asia’s seas to their former purpose as win-win economic passageways rather than zerosum arenas of contestation.
The scenarios of women education investment.
Relevance: G.S Mains Paper II: Governance
Context
- There should be no doubt that educating a woman serves a larger ameliorative purpose.
- The recently released Comprehensive National Nutrition Survey by the Heath Ministry showed a direct correlation between the nutritional status of children and their mothers’ education is a further stroke for the case of women’s education.
The findings
- On two counts, meal diversity and minimum acceptable diet, and in terms of bolstering food with micronutrients, the children of mothers with better education did well.
- Nobel laureate Amartya Sen reasons, has clearly shown how the relative aspect and regard for women’s well being is strongly influenced by women’s literacy and educated participation in decisions within and outside the family.
Issues
- In Census 2011, the female literacy rate was 65.46%, much lower than for males, at 82.14%.
Way forward
- Thus it is opined that no other task can assume greater urgency for a nation striving to improve its performance on all fronts.