Following their victory in the recent Lok Sabha elections, the Modi government came back to power with a massive win, of over 300 seats of its own. After a long time, a single political party secured the majority in the lower house of the Parliament. People have had many expectations from this government, and why shouldn’t they? As the ministers, during their election campaign, showed many dreams to the people, now it’s the Modi 2.0’s turn to fulfill their promises.
It may not be fair to judge a government based on the work done by them in the last 100 days, but this is the era of advertisement, and one has to show every small contribution done by them. Also, through this, they try to gain massive support from their party workers as well as the people who had elected them. This will also help them in the upcoming state elections.
I want to bring to your attention some statistics regarding 100 days of their work under the NDA government:
1. Right To Information (RTI) Act
The center introduced a bill in the Lok Sabha to amend the RTI act, which gave the government the power to fix salaries, tenures and other terms and conditions of employment of Information Commissioners. The government described the previous RTI law as “clumsy” and assured the Parliament that This new bill leads to ease of delivery of the RTI act but is it so? Now, I want to know what type of liberalisation this is? Will the Information Commissioners be able to do their duty now without any fear? I don’t think so, as now, the government will get to decide the salary and tenure of those officials. So now, there might be some fear in the mind of officials whenever any question related to government work is asked.
Despite protests from the Opposition, The bill was passed down the Lok-Sabha as well as the Rajya-Sabha.
2. Motor Vehicle Act
Now, this is the most thoughtful decision presented by the government. There is an increase in the fines for traffic violations and update of many terms in the act. I know many people have been penalised because of their habit of breaking traffic rules. This Act will make people aware of traffic rules, but I want to see each people, I repeat each people of this country, be bound to follow the traffic rules. It should not be limited to the common people and must be followed by every government official, as well as rich people. Also, I want to see this rule followed in small towns and villages as well. Only then can we say that we have been successful in our mission.
3. POCSO Amendment Act
This POCSO (Amendment) Bill, 2019 was passed by the Parliament and includes the death penalty for aggravated sexual assault on children, and strict action to be taken for other crimes. This Amendment also provided for fines and imprisonment to curb child pornography. I hope this Bill works well to curb such crimes. We have seen many bills in the past, presented before the Parliament, and most of them become a law, but none of them has worked very smoothly to deter the crime rates.
4. Unlawful Activities Prevention Act
Many regional parties supported the government while passing this bill in both houses of the Parliament. This bill mainly contains an amendment that allowed an individual to be declared as a terrorist. Home Minister Amit Shah had said that “this Act will not be misused”, and also that there will be “four-stage scrutiny done by officials”. But, there are still some disadvantages, one of which is that the Central government can declare any individual as a terrorist if they believe in their involvement, which is a cause for concern.
5. The Muslim Women (Protection Of Rights On Marriage) Bill, 2019
It replaces an ordinance which had come into effect on February 21, 2019. The Bill made all declarations of instant Talaaq (divorce), which includes written or electronic, illegal. According to the bill, now a law, no Muslim man can pronounce ‘instant’ and ‘irrevocable’ divorce, which, under triple talaq, happened when the word ‘talaq’ would be pronounced thrice in one sitting. Muslim women have welcomed this bill as they felt that women would be more empowered with the existence of this type of law. Despite being opposed by the Opposition in the Parliament, it was passed by both the houses. The bill includes the provision of allowance for the woman and the children dependent on her.
6. Removal Of Article 370 And The Formation Of Two New UT’s
One of the toughest and shocking decisions by the Modi-led cabinet was the revocation of Article 370 and the revocation of ‘statehood’ from Jammu and Kashmir. It has now been reorganised it into two new Union Territories (UT): J&K and Ladakh. The decision was taken by the government when there was no state legislature. Moreover, President’s Rule has been imposed there for over a year. So, this was done under the rule of the Governor and the Central government, keeping the people of J&K in ‘silent mode’. Ministers are saying this is to be done to remove terrorism and to develop J&K and Ladakh area.
7. The Slowdown Of The Economy
India’s GDP growth for the first quarter of the fiscal year 2019-2020 (FY20) slumped to 5% (the lowest in 25 quarters or in six years). Key Indian factors are facing the effects of the slowdown as jobs continue to be slashed. But, the government is yet to acknowledge that the economy is going through a period of slowdown. Almost all Indian sectors including auto, manufacturing, agriculture, FMCG, real state, and construction have slumped badly. Also, foreign investors are also constantly pulling out their capital from the Indian market. All major Indian companies, from biscuit manufacturing to automobiles have seen the record fall down over the last few quarters, forcing them to call out for support from the government. The Indian Rupee has, once again, become one of the worst-performing Asian currencies, and has seen the steepest decline in the last six years. Also, this all led the government to borrow a huge sum from the RBI, yet the government has been saying “All is going well”.
8. Mission Chandrayan-2
An important event that made sure everyone’s eyes were glued to their TVs late at night was ISRO’s attempt to land Chandrayaan-2 lander Vikram on the lunar surface in the first attempt. As the process is still in continuation I would say we should see what information we get, because we had lost communication with Vikram.
This article was first published here.