UPSC 11 July 2025 Current Affairs brings you top analysis from The Hindu and Indian Express—covering India’s fertility debate, custodial violence reforms, TB elimination strategy, population policy, and voter inclusion. Backed by reports from UN, NCRB, and the Supreme Court, this is essential for UPSC Prelims & Mains 2025.
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1. Widen the Net: Expanding Electoral Inclusion in India
📰 What’s the News?
In a significant observation, the Supreme Court of India has urged the Election Commission of India (ECI) to take proactive measures in ensuring that voter ID verification processes do not exclude marginalized communities. This includes the elderly, differently-abled, nomadic groups, and the homeless, who often struggle to access documentation required for registration in the electoral rolls.
📚 Key Points for UPSC (Prelims & Mains)
- SVEEP Program: The Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation initiative by ECI focuses on promoting voter awareness, especially among marginalized groups.
- Supreme Court’s Directive: Emphasized the need for inclusive mechanisms for issuing and verifying EPICs (Elector Photo Identity Cards), calling for acceptance of alternate documents such as Aadhaar, ration cards, etc.
- Article 326 of the Indian Constitution: Guarantees universal adult suffrage, allowing every Indian citizen aged 18+ to vote, provided they meet qualifying conditions.
Burden of Proof and Procedural Fairness:
- SC criticized the expectation of foolproof documents from marginalized citizens as unrealistic and exclusionary.
- Highlighted concerns over arbitrary exclusion of valid identity documents, violating natural justice principles.
⚖️ Legal Framework Governing Electoral Rolls
Constitutional Basis
- Article 326: Grants the right to vote based on universal adult suffrage.
- Eligibility: Indian citizenship and age 18 years or above.
Statutory Provisions: Representation of the People Act, 1950
- Section 19: Right to register if one is 18 years or older and an ordinary resident.
- Section 20: Elaborates on the concept of ordinary residence.
- Section 21: Governs preparation and revision of electoral rolls.
- Four types of revision: Before general elections, before by-elections, on ECI’s specific directions, special revisions.
Special Notes:
- ECI’s Bihar Order and “SIR” (Special Summary Revision): SC noted that “SIR” is not recognized under the RPA, 1950.
- Section 21(2)(b) mandates revisions be based on a qualifying date (January 1). ECI’s choice of July as the base was criticized.
- Section 21(3): Allows special revision only under limited, justified circumstances.
🌍 Recent Developments & Global Context
- Many marginalized groups, including nomadic tribes and urban homeless, are unable to register due to lack of fixed addresses or acceptable documents.
- ECI data: Over 2 million homeless and nomadic people remain outside the electoral process.
Global Practices:
- Canada: Uses community attestations and alternative proofs.
- South Africa: Provides mobile registration units for remote and underrepresented communities.
📜 Relevant Conventions and Treaties
- UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UN CRPD): Mandates equal rights, including political participation, for persons with disabilities.
- Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), Article 21: Asserts that everyone has the right to take part in government through free and fair elections.
- Sustainable Development Goal 16: Promotes inclusive institutions, justice, and strong governance—electoral inclusion being a vital part.
🌐 Implications for India and the World
🇮🇳 For India:
- Promotes democratic deepening and electoral justice.
- Encourages procedural inclusivity, upholding the spirit of the Constitution.
- Reduces structural disenfranchisement of the vulnerable.
🌏 Global Relevance:
- Reaffirms India’s commitment to democratic values and international human rights obligations.
- Sets an example for other democracies facing documentation barriers.
📋 Procedural & Ethical Concerns Raised
Validation and Documentation:
- Requiring perfect documents affects the poor, landless, elderly, and transient populations disproportionately.
- May violate Rule 8 of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, which allows variety of documents for proof of identity.
Citizenship Determination:
- SC stated ECI should not determine citizenship.
- Warned against demographic engineering through restrictive voter rolls.
Ethical Principles:
- Arbitrary rejection of documents without appeal mechanisms violates natural justice.
- Need for a human-rights-based approach to electoral registration.
🔭 UPSC Quick Facts
- SVEEP: Flagship program for voter awareness by ECI.
- EPIC: Elector Photo Identity Card.
- RPA, 1950: Governs electoral roll management.
- Section 21(2)(b): Sets qualifying date for voter roll revision.
- 2 million+: Homeless and nomadic citizens affected.
- <50%: Voter turnout among senior citizens (80+ years).
🔍 Way Forward
- Adopt Alternate Verification Models: Accept multi-modal identity proofs like Aadhaar, ration cards, pension cards, etc.
- Technology with Inclusion: Use mobile registration units, community-based enumeration.
- Policy Framework: Introduce SOPs for inclusion, regular audits, civil society involvement.
- Legal Reforms: Amend RPA Rules for clarity and fairness.
- Ethics in Electoral Governance: Prioritize non-discrimination, dignity, and accessibility.
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2. Aiding India’s Progress with Choice, Control and Capital
📰 Why It’s in the News
Development experts and international organizations, including UNFPA and World Bank, have emphasized that India’s ability to reap its demographic dividend hinges on empowering its youth — especially young girls — through choice (education and informed decision-making), control (bodily autonomy and agency), and capital (economic opportunities). This focus is vital to ensuring equitable and sustainable development.
📚 Key Points for UPSC (Prelims & Mains)
- India’s Demographic Edge: Home to the world’s largest youth population – approximately 254 million aged 15–24 (UNFPA, 2024), and 371 million aged 15–29 (UNICEF).
- Demographic Dividend: Realized only through strategic investment in education, health, skills, and gender equality.
Women’s Workforce Participation:
- NFHS-5: Only 29.4% of rural women aged 15–49 are employed.
- World Bank: India can potentially add $770 billion to GDP by 2050 through increased female labor participation.
Underfunded Education:
- India invests only 2.9% of GDP in education (Economic Survey 2024–25), lower than global recommendations.
Key Government Schemes:
- Mission Shakti: Integrates women’s safety, empowerment, and assistance.
- Udaan: Focuses on retaining adolescent girls in secondary education.
- Samagra Shiksha: Ensures inclusive and equitable school education.
🌍 Recent Developments & Global Context
- UNFPA’s 2024–25 Report cautions against viewing population through a control lens; instead, it recommends enhancing youth autonomy and bodily integrity.
Global Youth Empowerment Models:
- Rwanda, Vietnam, Brazil: Used integrated programs for youth-led economic growth and gender empowerment.
ICPD (1994) and UNICEF Reports:
- Advocate a 360° empowerment approach: combining education, employment, healthcare, and access to modern contraceptives.
📜 Relevant Conventions and Treaties
- CEDAW (Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women): Obligates states to eliminate gender-based discrimination in education, healthcare, and employment.
- ICPD, 1994: Links reproductive rights with development outcomes.
Relevant SDGs:
- SDG 3 – Good Health and Well-being
- SDG 4 – Quality Education
- SDG 5 – Gender Equality
- SDG 8 – Decent Work and Economic Growth
🚧 Legal and Social Barriers to Youth Empowerment
Key Challenges:
- Child Marriages: Despite decline, NFHS-5 shows a 23.3% prevalence, limiting girls’ autonomy and education.
- Teenage Pregnancies: ~7% nationally, with higher rates in several states.
UNFPA 2025:
- 36% face unintended pregnancies.
- 30% have unmet reproductive goals.
- 23% experience both — a crisis in reproductive choice.
Gender Inequality & Norms:
- Women’s reproductive decisions are constrained by societal expectations, economic dependency, and restricted mobility.
Access to Health Services:
- Many young women lack information and access to modern contraceptives and youth-friendly health services.
📚 Case Studies: Successful Models Driving Change
- Project Advik – Odisha (2019–2020): Awareness initiative focusing on adolescent sexual and reproductive health, promoting safe contraceptive practices.
- Udaan – Rajasthan (2017–2022): Preventing child marriages, teen pregnancies, and ensuring secondary school retention. Linked education with reproductive health awareness.
- Project Manzil – Rajasthan (2019–2025): Empowering young women through human-centered skill training, gender-sensitive employment, access to livelihoods, and financial literacy.
🌐 Implications
🇮🇳 For India:
- Transforms India into a youth-powered economy by ensuring aspirations match opportunities.
- Builds a gender-just development model, suitable for replication across the Global South.
- Enhances India’s standing in human capital indices.
🌏 For the World:
- India offers scalable models for youth empowerment, family planning, and rights-based development.
- Lessons can benefit countries experiencing youth bulges, especially in Africa and Asia.
🔭 UPSC Quick Facts
- 254 million: India’s youth aged 15–24 (UNFPA 2024)
- 29.4%: Rural women employed (NFHS-5)
- $770 billion: GDP potential via increased female workforce (World Bank)
- 2.9% of GDP: India’s education spending
- 23.3%: Child marriage prevalence
- UNICEF: 371 million Indians are aged 15–29
🔍 Way Forward
- Education and Skill Development: Increase investment to at least 6% of GDP in education. Link with market-relevant skills.
- Health and Reproductive Autonomy: Expand youth-friendly health services. Integrate modern contraceptive education in schools and communities.
- Behavioral and Social Norm Change: Launch mass media campaigns to challenge gender biases.
- Economic Empowerment for Young Women: Promote inclusive job opportunities, equal pay, support female-led enterprises.
- Integrated Youth Policies: Create cross-sectoral frameworks aligning education, employment, health, and gender equity.
3. Are Existing Mechanisms Effective in Preventing Custodial Violence in India?
📰 Why It’s in the News
Despite constitutional safeguards, Supreme Court guidelines, and multiple reports by national and international bodies, incidents of custodial torture, abuse, and deaths continue to surface in India. Recent high-profile cases, including the Ambasamudram custodial assault (2023) and the custodial death of a law student in Maharashtra (2024), have reignited debates on the efficacy of India’s legal and institutional mechanisms in curbing custodial violence
📘 Key Points for UPSC (Prelims & Mains)
Prelims:
- Article 21: Protection of life and personal liberty.
- Article 22(1): Rights of arrested persons – legal aid, protection from arbitrary detention.
- Sections 330 & 331, IPC: Penal provisions for causing hurt or grievous hurt in custody.
- DK Basu vs. State of West Bengal (1996): Landmark SC judgment laying down detailed guidelines for arrests and detentions.
Mains:
- Institutional Impunity: Lack of convictions and accountability.
- Absence of Anti-Torture Law: Despite being a signatory to UNCAT, India has not enacted a standalone law criminalizing torture.
- Poor Implementation: DK Basu guidelines, PUCL orders on CCTV installations often not followed.
- Need for Reform: Independent police oversight, legal reforms, community monitoring, and transparency mechanisms are urgently required.
📊 Data & Factual Evidence (UPSC-Centric)
- NCRB Report (2022):
- 175 custodial deaths
- Conviction rate for police personnel below 5%
- NHRC: Receives over 5,000 complaints annually related to police excesses.
- Law Commission of India (273rd Report): Recommended a Prevention of Torture Bill.
- MHA (2017–2022): 669 custodial deaths recorded.
- NHRC 2021–22:
- 2,152 judicial custody deaths
- 155 police custody deaths
- India Justice Report 2022: Exposed gaps in police accountability and oversight.
🧾 Examples of Recent Custodial Death Cases
- Ambasamudram, Tamil Nadu (2023): Alleged custodial assault by senior police officer.
- Guna, Madhya Pradesh (2024): Custodial death of a Dalit man.
- Maharashtra (2024): Law student Somnath Sugarpanshe died under suspicious custody.
These reflect systemic failures, institutional inertia, and deliberate cover-ups
📜 Relevant Conventions and Treaties
- UNCAT (UN Convention Against Torture): Signed in 1997, not yet ratified.
- ICCPR (1966): Article 7 – No torture or inhuman treatment.
- UDHR (1948), Article 5: Prohibits torture.
- Paris Principles: Framework for independent NHRIs.
- Nelson Mandela Rules: International benchmark for humane detention.
- Tokyo Rules: Promote non-custodial measures.
🧠 Reasons Behind Custodial Violence in India
Systemic & Institutional Causes:
- Institutional Inertia and political complicity.
- Weak Oversight: NHRC lacks binding powers; internal police probes ineffective.
Structural and Social Barriers:
- Caste-based targeting of Dalits and minorities.
- Inadequate Training: Reliance on coercion over scientific methods.
Legal and Procedural Gaps:
- No standalone definition/penalty for torture.
- Rule of Law violations and disregard for SC/NHRC guidelines.
⚖️ Important Judicial Interventions
- DK Basu Guidelines (1996): Arrest memo, lawyer access, medical checks.
- PUCL vs. Union of India: Ordered CCTV in all police stations.
- Prakash Singh Case (2006): Directed police reforms.
However, implementation is weak, and enforcement lacking.
🌐 Implications for India and the World
🇮🇳 For India:
- Undermines constitutional values of liberty, dignity, and justice.
- Reduces public trust in justice systems.
- Contributes to prison overcrowding.
- Weakens Rule of Law.
🌏 Global Relevance:
- Hurts India’s image as a rights-based democracy.
- Weakens South-South leadership on human rights.
- Slows progress on SDG 16: Peace, Justice, and Strong Institutions.
🔍 Way Forward
- Legal Reforms: Enact Prevention of Torture Law, ratify UNCAT.
- Independent Oversight: Establish Police Complaints Authorities.
- Technology: Install CCTV, use bodycams, e-interrogations.
- Judicial Monitoring: Set up Fast-track courts, magisterial inquiries.
- Public Accountability & Training: Awareness campaigns, human rights education, community policing
4. The Real Fertility Crisis Is One of Agency: UNFPA Director 🌍
📰 What’s the News?
According to the UNFPA Asia-Pacific Regional Director, the current fertility debate across many countries, including India, misplaces focus on declining birth rates. Instead, the real crisis is the lack of reproductive agency — especially among women and adolescent girls. The freedom to choose when and how many children to have is the true marker of a healthy demographic policy.
📚 Key Points for UPSC (Prelims & Mains)
Prelims:
- Reproductive Agency: The right to make informed choices about reproduction, contraception, and bodily autonomy.
- NFHS-5 Data: 23% of women aged 20–24 were married before 18.
- UNICEF Report: 50% of adolescent girls lack access to basic reproductive and menstrual education.
Mains:
- Fertility Debates should prioritize:
- Freedom, not coercion
- Rights-based approaches, not numerical targets
- Policies must address:
- Child marriage
- Early pregnancies
- Access to modern contraception
🌍 Recent Developments & Global Context
- UNFPA SoWP Report 2024: Frames fertility as a matter of autonomy, not demographic fear.
Global Trends:
- Global Total Fertility Rate (TFR) now at 2.3.
- Countries like Japan, Sweden, South Korea are shifting focus from incentives to enhancing reproductive choices.
- Education, gender equality, and healthcare access are proving more effective than pro-natalist incentives.
📜 Relevant Conventions and Treaties
- ICPD 1994 (International Conference on Population and Development): Recognizes reproductive rights as human rights.
- SDG 5.6: Calls for universal access to sexual and reproductive healthcare, information, and education.
- CEDAW: Protects women’s right to family planning, education, and health.
5. TB Death Audits, Like Maternal Mortality Model, Can Aid Elimination
📰 What’s the News?
The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has proposed implementing TB death audits, modeled after Maternal Mortality Reviews (MMRs), to identify avoidable factors contributing to tuberculosis (TB) deaths. The initiative aims to strengthen India’s strategy to eliminate TB by 2025, in line with its National TB Elimination Program (NTEP).
📚 Key Points for UPSC (Prelims & Mains)
Prelims:
- India’s TB Burden: India accounts for 27% of global TB cases (WHO Global TB Report 2023).
- NTEP: Flagship program under Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
- TB Death Audits: Proposed method to assess missed diagnoses, treatment gaps, and nutritional deficiencies.
Mains:
- Challenge: Existing NTEP data is aggregate, not granular.
- Solution: Localized death audits to identify region-specific vulnerabilities, improve diagnosis and access to care.
- Model Inspiration: Maternal Death Surveillance and Response (MDSR) helped reduce maternal mortality.
🌍 Recent Developments & Global Context
- WHO & Stop TB Partnership: Endorsed real-time TB death surveillance.
Success Stories:
- Ethiopia: Reduced TB mortality via community-level audits.
- Sri Lanka: Used death reviews to improve early care.
- WHO End TB Strategy (2014–2035): Aims to reduce TB deaths by 90% and incidence by 80% by 2030.
📜 Relevant Conventions and Treaties
- WHO End TB Strategy: Aims to end global TB epidemic through UHC, social protection, and research innovation.
- SDG 3.3: Calls for ending epidemics like TB, AIDS, and malaria by 2030.
- GFATM: Global Fund supporting TB control in low- and middle-income countries.
