GS Paper II 2019

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. Take a position: does the Constitution reject strict separation of powers? Show the overlap of organs and functions
2. Explain how checks and balances operate among the three organs, with provisions and cases

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• Overlap by design: ministers sit in Parliament and answer to the Lok Sabha (Articles 74–75); the executive also issues ordinances (Articles 123, 213) and rules.
• Legislature's other functions: Parliament impeaches the President (Article 61), removes judges (Article 124(4)), punishes breach of privilege and amends the Constitution.
• Judiciary's wider role: judicial review of laws and executive acts (Articles 13, 32, 226), rule-making, and directions filling legislative gaps, as in Vishaka (1997).
• Checks and balances: questions and no-confidence motions, presidential assent, judicial review, impeachment, and safeguards for judges' independence (Articles 121, 124(4), 125).
• Strict separation where needed: Article 50 separates judiciary from executive in public services, and Article 122 bars courts from questioning parliamentary proceedings for procedural irregularity.
• Ram Jawaya Kapur (1955) rejected absolute rigidity; Kesavananda (1973) counted separation of powers among basic features; Raj Narain (1975) stopped Parliament deciding a specific dispute.
• Limit to overlap: no organ may take over another's essential function; Parliament cannot adjudicate disputes, and courts should avoid substituting their own policy.

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. Explain the CAT's origin and purpose: redress of service grievances of central government employees
2. Explain how it now functions as an independent judicial authority: its court-like powers, judicial backing and the limits to that independence

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• Basis: Article 323A (42nd Amendment, 1976, on the Swaran Singh Committee's advice) lets Parliament create service tribunals; the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985 followed.
• Scope: it hears recruitment, seniority, promotion, pay and discipline cases of Union employees, but not those of armed forces personnel.
• Court-like powers: it follows natural justice, has civil-court powers over summons and evidence, can grant interim relief and can punish contempt.
• Review of executive action: it tests promotion, seniority, pay, transfer and disciplinary decisions against law and can quash arbitrary Government orders.
• Chandra Kumar (1997): tribunals act as courts of first instance and may test laws except their parent Act, subject to High Court review (Articles 226–227).
• Independence: benches combine judicial and administrative members, and the Supreme Court has insisted that tribunals be independent of the executive (Madras Bar Association cases).
• Limits: the Government, the main litigant, controls appointments, service terms and funds; the Law Commission (2017) found high pendency defeats some tribunals' objective.
• Way forward: the Law Commission (2017) urged uniform appointment, tenure and service conditions, and one nodal agency under the Ministry of Law and Justice.

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. Identify the methods farmers' organisations use to influence policy-makers
2. Assess how effective these methods have been: gains, limits and weaknesses

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• Mass mobilisation: rallies, dharnas, rail and road blockades and tractor marches, as by the Bharatiya Kisan Union, Shetkari Sanghatana and Samyukt Kisan Morcha.
• Lobbying: memoranda, delegations to ministers and MPs and depositions before committees, often through bodies such as the All India Kisan Sabha and Bharatiya Kisan Sangh.
• Electoral leverage: as a large voting bloc, farmers extract loan waivers, cheap power and higher support prices before elections; some groups back or float parties.
• Legal and media routes: public interest litigation, challenges to land acquisition and pricing, social media campaigns and alliances with trade unions and civil society.
• Gains: Budget 2018–19 promised kharif MSP at least 1.5 times production cost; loan waivers recur (2008 onwards); since then, repeal of three farm laws (2021).
• Limits: strength lies in wheat, rice, sugarcane and cotton belts among better-off farmers; small, tenant and landless farmers and women are under-represented.
• Weaknesses: demands centre on prices, subsidies and waivers rather than structural reform; fragmentation and party links weaken bargaining.
• Way forward: collective bargaining through Farmer Producer Organisations (10,000 FPO scheme, 2020) and a voice for smallholders and women.

It asks 3 things — answer each

1. Explain the context: overlapping entries of the Seventh Schedule and the courts' role in settling distribution-of-powers disputes
2. Explain harmonious construction: how courts read the entries so that both survive
3. Explain federal supremacy: when and how the Union entry prevails

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• Root of supremacy: Article 246(1) gives Parliament exclusive power over List I notwithstanding the State and Concurrent powers in clauses (2) and (3).
• Harmonious construction: courts read entries of different lists together, giving each a wide but reconcilable meaning, so that no entry is made redundant.
• Pith and substance: a law is placed in the list its true nature belongs to; incidental encroachment on another list is tolerated (Balsara, 1951).
• Federal supremacy: if reconciliation fails, the Union entry prevails over the State entry; colourable legislation, meaning indirect encroachment, is struck down.
• Concurrent List: a repugnant State law is void to that extent (Article 254) unless it has Presidential assent, and Parliament can still override it.
• Federalism protected: the Supreme Court treats federalism as a basic feature (S.R. Bommai, 1994), so courts try to preserve State domains before applying Union supremacy.
• Cooperative mechanisms: Inter-State Council, Zonal Councils and the GST Council help reduce overlapping claims and litigation.

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. Contrast France's laïcité with the Indian Constitution's approach to secularism
2. Identify what France can learn: specific features of the Indian model, with caveats

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• Equal respect: Articles 25–28 protect freedom of religion; France bans religious symbols in public schools (2004) and face coverings in public (2010).
• Accommodation: the Constitution treats the wearing of kirpans as part of Sikh religion (Article 25, Explanation I), an example of reasonable accommodation of religious dress.
• Minority rights: Articles 29–30 let minorities conserve their culture and run educational institutions; France's republican model recognises citizens as individuals, not communities.
• Principled distance: the State may intervene to secure equality within religions, as on untouchability (Article 17) and triple talaq (2017), instead of staying aloof.
• Public culture: festivals of many faiths are public holidays in India; Article 28 keeps State-funded schools free of religious instruction without banning students' religious identity.
• Caveats: India's model has its own problems (personal laws, communal violence, uneven application), while France's reflects its history of Church power; lessons must be adapted.

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. Establish the paradox: sustained high growth alongside low human development indicators
2. Examine the issues that make balanced and inclusive development elusive: economic, social, regional and governance dimensions

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• Low investment in people: government health spending was 1.15% of GDP when the National Health Policy 2017 set a 2.5% target for 2025.
• Nutrition deficit: the Global Hunger Index 2019 put child stunting at 37.9% and wasting at 20.8%, the highest wasting rate in the report.
• Learning crisis: ASER surveys show weak foundational learning, dropouts and skill mismatch, wasting the demographic dividend.
• Jobless growth: capital-intensive industry and skill-intensive services leave most workers in low-productivity farm and informal work.
• Regional gaps: NCERT notes Kerala has lower per capita income than Haryana but better human development, with infant mortality of 6 against 28 per 1,000.
• Social exclusion and weak delivery: SCs, STs, women and the rural poor lack land, credit and services; leakages and weak panchayats dilute schemes.
• Way forward: the Aspirational Districts Programme (January 2018) drives convergence, collaboration and competition; raise health spending to the NHP target and empower panchayats.

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. Elucidate the divergence: why poverty by the expenditure line has fallen while hunger persists
2. Elucidate how shrinking social expenditure raises non-food spending and squeezes the poor's food budget

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• Calorie puzzle: rural per-person calorie intake in NSS surveys fell by nearly 9% between 1983 and 2004-05 even as incomes rose (Deaton and Drèze).
• Narrow measure: expenditure-based poverty lines capture minimum consumption, not diet quality; hidden hunger from protein and micronutrient deficits escapes the count.
• Absorption and inheritance: poor sanitation and infections reduce nutrient absorption; undernourished mothers pass hunger to the next generation.
• Health costs: public health spending was 1.15% of GDP; NHP 2017 calls catastrophic health expenditure one of the major contributors to poverty.
• Private substitutes: weak public schools and clinics push families to fees and tuition, while transport, fuel and rent take more of the budget.
• Cereal-heavy safety net: food schemes supply grain more than pulses, milk, eggs and vegetables, so squeezed diets are calorie-heavy but nutrient-poor.
• Counterview and remedies: NFSA 2013, PDS, mid-day meals and POSHAN Abhiyaan cushion households; raise health spending to the 2.5% target and diversify food baskets.

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. Identify the vital factors on which ICT-based projects and programmes usually suffer
2. Suggest measures for their effective implementation, matched to those factors

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• Access: patchy power and connectivity, English-only interfaces and low digital literacy shut out rural and poor users.
• Design: processes are automated as they are, built around departments rather than citizens, and missing data standards create silos.
• Capacity and change management: too few trained staff, weak leadership, resistance to transparency and frequent transfers of project heads.
• Funding and procurement: poor planning, cost overruns, vendor lock-in and no maintenance budget leave systems abandoned after launch.
• Security and inclusion: data leaks and cyber threats erode trust; authentication failures exclude genuine beneficiaries.
• Measures on design: e-Kranti's mandatory process re-engineering (also urged by the 2nd ARC's 11th Report, 2008), 'integrated services, not individual services', open standards and outcome-based contracts with maintenance budgets.
• Measures on access and trust: BharatNet, Common Service Centres, PMGDISHA (2017), local-language and offline options, data-protection safeguards, third-party audits and grievance redress.

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. Comment on the case for a strong contemporary India–Japan partnership: strategic, economic and technological convergence
2. Comment on its significance for Asia and the world, and the gaps that qualify the statement

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• Evolution: Global Partnership (2000), Global and Strategic Partnership (December 2006), Special Strategic and Global Partnership (2014).
• Strategic convergence: maritime security and China's rise; the Quad (revived 2017), Japan in Malabar and a Free and Open Indo-Pacific.
• Economic weight: India has long been the largest recipient of Japanese ODA loans (Delhi Metro, freight corridor, high-speed rail); CEPA in force since August 2011.
• Financial safety net: the 2018 Vision Statement welcomed a USD 75 billion bilateral swap arrangement.
• Connectivity, defence and technology: North-East projects, the Asia-Africa Growth Corridor (2017), the civil nuclear agreement (2016) and the first 2+2 (November 2019).
• Global role: G4 push for Security Council reform; disaster relief, climate action and resilient supply chains.
• Gaps: modest trade beside Japan–China trade, land and delay problems, and differences on non-proliferation and strategic autonomy.

It asks 3 things — answer each

1. Discuss ‘too little cash’: the funding crisis and its causes, including the US default on dues
2. Discuss ‘too much politics’: politicisation and the US charge of ‘anti-Israel bias’, with the withdrawal as the example
3. Assess what this means for UNESCO's mandate and survival

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• Too little cash: the US, once about a fifth of the budget, suspended contributions in 2011 after Palestine's admission because of domestic legislation.
• Consequences: cuts, hiring restraint and reliance on earmarked voluntary funds that let donors steer priorities.
• Too much politics: Hebron/Al-Khalil Old Town was inscribed under the State of Palestine and put on the Danger list in 2017; Jerusalem resolutions became bloc votes.
• US case: arrears, reform and anti-Israel bias; Israel announced its own withdrawal at the same time.
• Precedent: the US left in 1984 and returned in 2003; it rejoined in July 2023 and in July 2025 announced a fresh withdrawal.
• Mandate: universality and finances suffer, but standard-setting on heritage, education and science continues; India, with Jaipur City inscribed in 2019, needs a depoliticised UNESCO.
• Way forward: broad, predictable assessed funding and consensus-based technical decisions on heritage.

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. State the grounds on which a representative can be disqualified under the Representation of the People Act, 1951 (sections 8 to 10A)
2. Mention the remedies available to the disqualified person: appeal and stay, Election Commission relief, the Article 103 route, election appeals and judicial review

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• Conviction (section 8): two years' sentence or listed offences disqualify from conviction until six years after release.
• Lily Thomas (2013) struck down section 8(4), so sitting members lose their seats on conviction itself.
• Corrupt practice (section 8A, section 123): period fixed by the President on the Election Commission's opinion.
• Dismissal for corruption or disloyalty (9), government contracts (9A), government-company office (10), unlodged election accounts (10A).
• Remedy: a stay of the conviction itself suspends disqualification, granted only in exceptional cases (Ravikant S. Patil, 2006).
• Remedy: Election Commission may remove or reduce disqualification (section 11), except under section 8A; Article 103 route for sitting MPs.
• Remedy: High Court election-petition orders appealable to the Supreme Court (section 116A); judicial review stays open.
• Next step: the Election Commission's 2016 proposal to debar candidates once charges are framed for offences punishable with five years or more.

It asks 2 things — answer each

1. Explain the nature and limits of Parliament's amending power under Article 368, through the case law from Golaknath to Kesavananda Bharati
2. Explain whether Parliament can destroy the basic structure by expanding its own amending power: the 42nd Amendment, Minerva Mills, later cases and the debate

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• Article 368(1): a constituent power to amend by addition, variation or repeal; the 24th Amendment (1971) made it explicit after Golaknath (1967).
• Kesavananda Bharati (1973), by 7:6: Parliament may amend any provision but cannot alter the basic structure.
• Raj Narain (1975) applied the doctrine to strike down Article 329A(4).
• 42nd Amendment (1976) added clauses (4)–(5) to Article 368, claiming unlimited power beyond judicial review.
• Minerva Mills (1980): a limited amending power is itself a basic feature; judicial review and the Part III–IV balance are basic.
• Later: Waman Rao (1981) cut-off of 24 April 1973; I.R. Coelho (2007); NJAC (2015) struck down the 99th Amendment.
• Debate: critics see judicial supremacy without textual basis; supporters see a guard against transient majorities.

It asks 3 things — answer each

1. Comment on what reservation of seats for women in local self-government has achieved
2. Comment on why its impact on the patriarchal character of the political process has been limited
3. Suggest what would deepen the impact

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• Presence: about 14.5 lakh elected women representatives, about 46%; 21 States provide 50% against the constitutional minimum of 33%.
• Priorities: Chattopadhyay and Duflo found women-led councils in West Bengal and Rajasthan invested more in drinking water.
• Capacity: training, self-help groups and Kerala's Kudumbashree build women's public leadership.
• Proxy rule: 'sarpanch-pati'; on the Supreme Court's direction the Ministry set up an Advisory Committee in September 2023.
• Structural limits: rotation under Article 243D(3), weak devolution, and caste hierarchy restrict real power.
• No spill-over: women won 78 of 542 seats filled in the 2019 Lok Sabha; party structures remain male-dominated.
• Way forward: the Advisory Committee's safeguards (ombudspersons, social audits, penal provisions), longer tenure and real devolution.

It asks 3 things — answer each

1. Discuss the Attorney-General as chief legal adviser: appointment, tenure and advisory duties under Article 76
2. Discuss the Attorney-General as the Government's lawyer: rights in courts and Parliament, and the restrictions on him
3. Discuss the limits of the office and the questions about its independence, with a way forward

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• Appointment by the President of a person qualified to be a Supreme Court judge; holds office during the President's pleasure (Article 76(4)).
• Advises the Government on legal matters referred to him and performs duties assigned by the President (Article 76(2)); advice is not binding.
• Right of audience in all courts (Article 76(3)); appears for the Union, including Article 143 references.
• Speaks in either House and committees but cannot vote (Article 88), with members' privileges (Article 105(4)).
• By convention and terms of appointment, does not advise against the Union or defend accused persons without its consent.
• Pleasure tenure and political choice of appointee raise questions of independence; State counterpart is the Advocate-General (Article 165).

It asks 3 things — answer each

1. Discuss why the individual MP's role as national law-maker has declined: structural and behavioural causes
2. Discuss how this has affected the quality of debates and legislative outcomes
3. Suggest reforms to restore the MP's role

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• Anti-defection: paragraph 2(1)(b) of the Tenth Schedule disqualifies members who vote or abstain against the party's direction.
• Executive dominance: 58% of Bills passed within two weeks of introduction in the 17th Lok Sabha; ordinances and Money Bills cut scrutiny.
• Committees bypassed: only 16% of Bills referred in the 17th Lok Sabha, lower than the previous three.
• Private members: only 14 private members' Bills ever enacted, none since 1970.
• Impact: 274 sittings, the fewest of any full-term Lok Sabha; 35% of Bills passed with under an hour's debate.
• Outcomes: party messaging replaces clause-by-clause scrutiny; drafting flaws surface later as amendments and litigation.
• Reforms: default committee referral, research support for MPs, protected private members' time, a whip limited to confidence and money votes.

It asks 4 things — answer each

1. Explain multi-level planning and its place in the neo-liberal (post-1991, indicative) planning paradigm
2. Discuss how it can make operations cost-effective
3. Discuss how it can remove implementation blockages
4. Discuss its limits and the way forward

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• Facilitating State: after 1991 plans became indicative; Articles 243G, 243W and 243ZD give Panchayats, municipalities and District Planning Committees a planning role.
• Cost-effectiveness: local knowledge avoids duplication; 2.52 lakh Gram Panchayats uploaded GPDPs for FY24 on e-Gram SWARAJ, linked to PFMS for real-time payments.
• Fewer blockages: gram sabha ownership; Aspirational Districts Programme's convergence, collaboration and competition across 112 districts.
• Kerala model: the People's Plan Campaign devolved 35 to 40 per cent of plan funds to local governments (decision of July 1996).
• Limits: 2nd ARC's 6th Report found Kerala the only southern State with active DPCs; tied scheme funds, thin capacity, neglect of backward areas.
• Way forward: devolve funds, functions and functionaries; professional planning cells in DPCs; integrate spatial and financial plans; monitor outcomes, not outlays.

It asks 3 things — answer each

1. Examine how partnership among sectors (State, market, civil society, community, international) has shaped India's development process, with examples
2. Examine how partnership builds collaboration and team spirit, and where it has fallen short
3. Suggest what would strengthen partnership

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• State and community: DAY-NRLM mobilised 8.7 crore women into 81 lakh SHGs (Economic Survey 2022–23); NABARD's 1992 SHG–bank–NGO linkage.
• State and market: PPPs; section 135 CSR at 2 per cent of average net profit; yearly CSR spending above Rs 25,000 crore for three years.
• Civil society and global partners: WHO, UNICEF, Rotary and government made India polio-free (2014); campaigns shaped RTI and MGNREGA.
• Between governments: GST Council and the Aspirational Districts Programme's convergence, collaboration and competition.
• Team spirit: partnership pools public reach, private efficiency, NGO trust and community knowledge into shared ownership.
• Gaps: FCRA curbs and mistrust, CSR concentrated in developed States, PPP disputes, donor priorities, weak local bodies.
• Way forward: clear roles, joint monitoring, outcome-based contracts, CSR steered to backward districts, capacity building for local bodies and NGOs.

It asks 3 things — answer each

1. Discuss how absence of awareness weakens welfare schemes for vulnerable sections
2. Discuss how absence of active involvement at every stage of the policy process (design, delivery, monitoring) weakens them, along with other causes
3. Show what works and suggest how awareness and participation can be built into schemes

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• Awareness gap: low literacy, language barriers and weak outreach keep eligible people from pensions, scholarships and insurance; documents and middlemen add exclusion.
• Design: uniform, top-down schemes ignore tribal, migrant, disabled and elderly needs; PESA (1996) shows the gram-sabha alternative.
• Delivery and monitoring: elite-dominated or irregular gram sabhas and uneven social audits leave failures unreported.
• Other causes: understaffing, poor coordination, delayed funds and weak beneficiary data.
• What works: MGNREGA section 17 social audit by the Gram Sabha; Meghalaya's 2017 social audit Act covering 26 schemes; Kerala's Kudumbashree (1998).
• Reforms: local-language campaigns through SHGs, citizen charters and jan sunwai, DBT with offline back-up, beneficiary seats in scheme committees.

It asks 3 things — answer each

1. Elaborate India's earlier image as a leader of the oppressed and marginalised nations
2. Elaborate how India's new role in the emerging global order has altered that image
3. Judge whether the image has really disappeared: continuities and the balance

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• Older image: anti-colonial, anti-apartheid voice; NAM and G-77; ITEC since 1964 has trained over 2,00,000 professionals in 160 countries.
• New role: post-1991 interests, the Quad and the bid for a permanent UNSC seat; courted by major powers; a swing power among the US, Russia and China.
• Neighbourhood asymmetry breeds suspicion and weakens India's claim to speak for smaller states.
• Continuities: WTO G-20 bloc (2003) and food security, climate justice, the International Solar Alliance (2015), lines of credit and disaster relief.
• Since 2019: Voice of Global South Summits (100+ countries in each of three editions); African Union made a permanent G20 member under India's presidency.
• Assessment: the image has changed, not vanished; leadership now rests on capacity and interest, not solidarity alone.

It asks 3 things — answer each

1. Explain the source of friction: Washington's failure to give India a place in its global strategy that matches India's self-esteem and ambitions
2. Illustrate with suitable examples: status, strategic autonomy, trade, regional and multilateral differences
3. Balance with the areas of convergence and suggest the way forward

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• Balancer, not equal: the 2017 US National Security Strategy places India within quadrilateral cooperation against China; Major Defence Partner (2016) and STA-1 (2018) are tools of that strategy.
• Strategic autonomy: CAATSA (2017) threat over the S-400, end of Iranian oil waivers in May 2019.
• Trade: GSP benefits withdrawn in June 2019; steel and aluminium tariffs (2018); disputes on data and e-commerce.
• Regional and multilateral: Taliban talks, Trump's Kashmir mediation offer (July 2019), WTO differences, US Paris exit announced in 2017.
• Convergence: nuclear deal (2008), LEMOA (2016), COMCASA and the first 2+2 (2018), the Quad.
• Way forward: treat India as a co-equal shaper of Indo-Pacific strategy, respect its autonomy, settle trade through a package, co-produce defence technology.