CLPR Broadcast | October 2021 - Centre for Law & Policy Research

The Centre for Law and Policy Research (CLPR) is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to making the Constitution work for everyone through law and policy research, social and governance interventions, and strategic impact litigation.

Know Your Rights Workshop in Hyderabad, Telangana

On September 26th, 2021, CLPR conducted a ‘Know Your Rights’ seminar for persons employed in manual scavenging to discuss their rights under the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013 (PEMSRA). Read More

Workshops on Implementation of Caste Discrimination Legislations

Last month, CLPR conducted four online workshops across the states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Telangana for lawyers and civil society organisations (CSOs). These workshops were aimed at providing a deeper understanding of caste discrimination laws such as the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 and the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013.

The main objective behind these workshops was to build the legal capacity of lawyers, civil society organizations, and activists working on tackling caste discrimination and to discuss the challenges faced in the implementation of these laws. Read More

Introducing Intersectionality Course

CLPR has designed a course for law and social science students titled “Introducing Intersectionality.” As of last month, CLPR has taught this course at five law colleges/universities. The course seeks to challenge our understanding of discrimination, transforming it from the treatment of individuals as single-identity persons into one that takes into account the multi-faceted experience of oppressed identities at various intersections, say of caste, gender, sexual orientation & disability.

Taught by Jayna Kothari and Vikramadtiya Sahai, the course employs academic & legal writings, commentaries, personal narratives, and cultural texts to understand how intersectionality affects our study of the law, advocacy, and activism. Link to the course curriculum & reading

Litigation: Siddaraju v State of Karnataka & Ors

The Central government filed a petition seeking clarification from the Supreme Court on the order dated 14th January, 2020 passed by the Supreme Court in Siddaraju v State of Karnataka. In this case, the Court upheld the rights of persons with disability (PwD) to reservation in promotions. Representing Siddaraju, Senior Advocate Jayna Kothari submitted that clarifications sought by the Union had already been addressed under this case. The Supreme court held that ambiguity in the judgment does not require any clarification and directed the Union to issue instructions for reservation in promotion under section 34 of the Rights to Persons with Disability Act 2016 within four months. Link to follow the litigation history of this case.

Blog

In September, our blog posts discussed Moplah Rebellion and power of National Green Tribunal. The first blog talks about the socio-economic causes which led to the Moplah Rebellion. The second blog examines whether the National Green Tribunal (NGT) should be given Suo Moto powers.

Constitutionofindia.net

In September, constitutionofindia.net’s ‘This Month in Constitution Making‘ post recounted how the Constituent Assembly named our republic as ‘India, that is Bharat, is a Union of States‘. Other highlights of our work included pieces on affirmative action in Indian constitutional thought and a fascinating story of how Article 372 saved Hyderabad’s Prime Minister Laiq Ali from criminal charges for escaping detention.

We also added biographies of Assembly members that include B.G. Kher, a Congress party stalwart who founded the Adivasi Seva Sangh and P.S. Nataraja Pillai who represented the Princely State of Travancore in the Assembly.

Publications

In this article published by News9live.com, Jayna Kothari and Mihir Rajamane discussed the recent order by the Karnataka Government for providing 1% horizontal reservation for transgender persons. They argue that horizonal reservation is preferable to vertical reservation because it takes into account the multiple and intersectional identities of both caste and gender. Read More

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