hai frds iam Bollepalli anu
iam providing the hindu editorial page and vocabulary
happy reading................
happy reading................
TOPIC:1:Hope floats again on
Section 377
Section
377 of the Indian Penal Code, which criminalises gay sex, reflects only
medieval prejudice. A lost opportunity to invalidate
it has been dramatically resurrected. Two years ago, the Supreme Court declined to review its retrograde
decision of 2013 upholding the validity of Section 377. By rejecting the review
petition, the court then failed to make use of an opportunity to revisit the contentious Suresh Kumar Koushal verdict and bring
the law in line with its own vision of fundamental rights, especially the idea
that equality and dignity cannot be denied to
any section. The court has now paved the
way for a comprehensive hearing on how to protect the dignity and rights of
individuals with alternative sexual orientation by referring the matter to a
five-judge Constitution Bench. The Chief Justice has noted that the case
involves questions with constitutional dimensions. The court has indicated that
the larger Bench could traverse beyond the limits of a curative petition, which is essentially a limited,
additional remedy to aggrieved litigants after the Supreme Court’s
final verdict and the rejection of a review. There is new hope that the Delhi
High Court judgment of 2009, reading down Section 377 to restrict its criminal
import to non-consensual sexual acts involving adults and all sexual acts
inflicted on minors, may be restored.
Read: LGBT rights - The journey
till now
The
latest challenge to its continuance on the statute book comes in a fresh
context where the intervening years have
seen considerable legal progress in the jurisprudence
of sexual orientation and gender
identity. In April 2014, while recognising
the transgender community as a third gender entitled to the same rights and
constitutional protection as other citizens, a Bench of the Supreme Court subtly recorded its criticism of Koushal.
Departing from the Koushal formulation that there was no evidence that Section
377 was an instrument of harassment, the Bench had highlighted the misuse of
the provision as one of the principal
forms of discrimination against the
transgender community. Further, it observed that “even though insignificant in
numbers”, transgenders were entitled to human rights. That was obviously a rebuttal
of the earlier Bench’s claim that those affected by Section 377 were only a
“minuscule fraction of the population”,
as though the relative smallness of a group’s size disentitled
it from constitutional protection. On the global front, the United States
Supreme Court held last year that the gay community was entitled to due process
and equal protection in the matter of marriage, thus allowing same-sex
marriages. In view of these developments, the time has come for an honest
judicial evaluation of where India
VOCABULARY:
1.invalidate : make or prove (an argument, statement,
or theory) unsound or erroneous.
2.jurisprudence : the theory or philosophy of law.
3.orientation : a person's basic attitude, beliefs, or feelings in
relation to a particular subject or issue.
4.recognising : identify (someone or something) from having
encountered them before; know again
5.subtly : difficult to perceive or understand.
6.provision : the action of providing or supplying something for
use.
7.discrimination: recognition and understanding of the difference
between one thing and another.
8.obviously: in a way that is easily perceived or
understood; clearly.
9.rebuttal : an instance of rebutting evidence or an
accusation.
10.minuscule : extremely small; tiny.
11.disentitled : deprive (someone) of a right.
12.evaluation : the making of a judgement about the
amount, number, or value of something; assessment.
13.dramatically : something done with great flare or done in an
overly exaggerated or theatrical manner.
14.resurrected : revive or revitalize (something that is inactive,
disused, or forgotten).
15.declined : politely refuse (an invitation or offer).
16.retrograde : directed or moving backwards.
17.contentious :
causing or likely to cause an argument; controversial.
18.denied: state that one refuses to admit the
truth or existence of.
19.paved : cover (a piece of ground) with flat stones or
bricks; lay paving over.
20.Bench :
a long seat for several people, typically made of wood or stone.
21.traverse : move back and forth or sideways.
22.curative : able to cure disease.
23.aggrieved : feeling resentment at having been unfairly
treated.
24.litigants :a person involved in a lawsuit.
TOPIC:2:Gearing up for the Zika threat
The
World Health Organization has declared that the outbreak of Zika and congenital malformations and neurological
disorders in newborns believed to be
connected to the virus is a global public health emergency. Since the current
outbreak began in Brazil Brazil Caribbean , it has become
difficult to estimate the true scale of the epidemic since the infection
remains asymptomatic in nearly 80 per
cent of cases. The Zika virus has the potential to spread wherever the Aedes
aegypti mosquito, that transmits the infection, is found and where people lack
natural immunity against it. As in the case of Ebola, no specific treatment or
vaccine is currently available for the Zika virus; there are no rapid and
reliable diagnostic tests either. All this is likely to change as the WHO’s
declaration galvanises international response to improve surveillance, detect
infections and study the causal link between Zika infection and microcephaly
and Guillain-Barré syndrome. However, unlike diagnostic tests, vaccine
development may face ethical problems as it would need to be tested on pregnant
women, who are the worst-affected.
Though
there are stray hints of the Zika virus spreading through bodily fluids, the
virus is normally spread by the Aedes mosquito. The WHO has urged all countries
where dengue is endemic to be on high alert and look out for cases of Zika. The
current natural immunity against the virus in the Indian population is not
known. And since the Aedes, the vector for both the dengue and Zika viruses, is
widespread in India India India
VOCABULARY:
1.congenita : (of a disease or physical abnormality) present
from birth.
2.believed : accept that (something) is true,
especially without proof.
3.suspected : have an idea or impression of the existence,
presence, or truth of (something) without certain proof.
4.asymptomatic : (of a condition or a person) producing
or showing no symptoms
5.aggressive : behaving or done in a determined and forceful way.
6.unreliable : not able to be relied upon.
7.symptoms : an indication of the existence of something, especially of an
undesirable situation.
8.assist : help
(someone), typically by doing a share of the work.
9.Surveillance: close observation, especially of a suspected
spy or criminal.
10.clusters : a group of similar things or people positioned
or occurring closely together.
11.contingency: a provision for a possible event or
circumstance.
