Editorials/Opinions Analysis For UPSC 09 March 2023

Editorials/Opinions Analysis For UPSC 09 March 2023

Contents

1. Myanmar’s Spring Revolution Needs India and the World’s Help
2. What Does the New Surrogacy Law Say?

Myanmar’s Spring Revolution Needs India and the World’s Help

Context

An uprising against the Tatmadaw, Myanmar’s military regime, is currently underway in the country in an effort to establish a federal democratic union in place of the military government.

Relevance

GS Paper-2: Bilateral, regional and global groupings and agreements involving India and/or affecting India’s interests

Mains Question

Discuss the implications of Myanmar’s struggle for freedom and democracy on geopolitical relationships in the region. What steps can be taken to ensure the success and stability of Myanmar’s democracy? (250 Words)

Do you know?

• Southeast Asia is home to Myanmar, also referred to as Burma. Thailand, Laos, Bangladesh, India, and China are its neighbours.
• With evidence of human settlement dating back to the Paleolithic era, Myanmar has a rich cultural and historical heritage. The nation gained independence from British rule in 1948, but has since been marked by a turbulent political history, including numerous military coups and authoritarian rule.
• The ethnic diversity and variety of languages in Myanmar, including the predominance of Bamar, are well-known.
• Buddhism is the most popular religion in the nation, and there are numerous significant religious sites and monuments there.
• Natural resources like oil, gas, and minerals also play a role in the economy of Myanmar, which is largely based on agriculture with rice as the main crop. Despite this, Myanmar continues to be one of Southeast Asia’s most impoverished nations, with high rates of inequality and poverty.

Key Highlights

• The outcome of the revolution will determine whether Myanmar becomes a new federal democracy or a fragmented, failed state that is vulnerable to rapacious forces, drug lords, and organised crime.
• There have been thousands of deaths, tens of thousands of arrests, resistance hubs burned, shelled, or bombed, and an estimated 1.5 million people displaced, including refugees in Mizoram and Manipur. The struggle has been marked by a crackdown on peaceful protests, followed by armed guerrilla warfare, waged by hundreds of local “peoples defence forces” against military rule and repression.
• The Tatmadaw is at a dead end, lacks political imagination, and holds no future for Myanmar’s youth. Real power is subtly shifting to the more powerful Ethnic Armed Organizations, which have established their administrative and justice systems.

Geopolitical Implications:

• The unrest and political unpredictability in Myanmar may have a significant effect on the region’s political and economic stability.
  • Create a power vacuum: If Myanmar becomes a failed state, extremist organisations, drug traffickers, and organised crime could take advantage of the situation and further destabilise the region.
  • Refugee influx in neighbouring nations: In addition, the violence and forced emigration brought on by the military crackdown in Myanmar have resulted in a refugee influx in neighbouring nations, which could further destabilise the region.
  • The conflict in Myanmar is a war by the Myanmar Army against its own people, free from majoritarian, ethnic, sectarian, religious, linguistic, left, right, or communist motivations or labels.

Way Forward:

• International support and intervention are essential for the survival and stability of Myanmar’s democracy.
• The international community should take action to support and offer humanitarian aid to the displaced and refugees in the surrounding nations.
• The military junta should be under diplomatic and financial pressure to stop using violence and repressing peaceful protesters.
• In order to resolve the crisis in Myanmar, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) may have a significant impact.
• ASEAN could use its clout to persuade Myanmar’s military junta to communicate with the opposition parties and reinstate democracy.
• The UN and other international organisations should also offer assistance in order to guarantee free and fair elections and help build a strong, democratic government in Myanmar.
• Additionally, since they have significant economic and strategic interests in Myanmar, nearby nations like China and India should contribute to a peaceful resolution of the crisis.

Conclusion

They ought to exert pressure on the military junta to put an end to its use of force and suppression of nonviolent protesters, and they ought to support the establishment of a democratic and stable government in Myanmar.

What Does the New Surrogacy Law Say?

Context

• In order to have a child through surrogacy, foreign couples have flocked to India in large numbers.
• However, the surrogate mother has been exploited and suffered greatly as a result of surrogacy’s commercialization.
• A new surrogacy law has recently been introduced by the government with the intention of ending profiteering, racketeering, and exploitation in the practise.

Relevance

GS Paper-2: Issues relating to the development and management of Social Sector/Services relating to Health, Education, and Human Resources.

Mains Question

Examine the potential effects of the proposed surrogacy law in India for the year 2022 and discuss its main provisions. (250 Words)

Do you know?

• When a surrogate offers to carry the child of the commissioning couple in her womb out of pure love and compassion for them and their need to have a child, surrogacy is regarded as altruistic.
• Payment made to the surrogate in exchange for her services is viewed as a commercialization act.
• Indians have been suffering immeasurable pain from this commercialization for a very long time. It should be noted that surrogacy is illegal in many nations around the world.

What qualifications must a couple meet?

• Under the new law, a government medical board made up of obstetricians, paediatricians, and other specialists must be contacted first by the commissioning parents, or the couple hoping to have a child through surrogacy.
• In such a case, the woman and the man must be between the ages of 25 and 50; • They should not have had a child, whether naturally conceived, adopted, or born through surrogacy.
• Additionally, they should carry a clear medical and radiological report, as well as, if requested, a report that exonerates them of any genetic anomalies.
• In addition, the couple should have a surrogate mother’s insurance policy to cover her medical expenses for 36 months following the embryo transfer.
• The couple receives an essentiality certificate after the board approves their submission.
• The certificate must then be presented to a first-class judicial magistrate’s court for a suitable order.
• The order would be used as the surrogate child’s birth certificate, allowing the commissioning couple to register their child in the relevant municipality.

Who can serve as a surrogate?

• The surrogate must meet the legal requirements for eligibility.
• She must be married and have her own child, and she must be between the ages of 25 and 35.
• She ought to be a first-time surrogate as well. She must also receive a psychiatrist’s certification of mental fitness.
• The couple and the surrogate can go to an assisted reproductive technology (ART) centre for the embryo transfer once they have obtained their eligibility certificates.
• The surrogate and the couple’s Aadhaar cards must be linked, according to the law.
• It would aid in tracing the biometrics of those involved in the arrangement, greatly reducing the possibility of malpractice.

How does the law handle surrogacy’s commercialization?

• According to the law, surrogacy must be performed for charitable purposes.
• As a result, commercial surrogacy is prohibited.
• No one is allowed to purchase or sell surrogacy services, human embryos, or gametes.
• In addition, the surrogate, her dependents, or her representative cannot receive any kind of payment, reward, benefit, fee, remuneration, or inducement.
• Additionally, the law forbids the export of embryos to other nations.
• Even moving embryos between laboratories or ART facilities needs permission from the relevant authorities.
• Those who break the law face fines and up to 10 years in prison.

Legal Problems:

• The Indian Marriage Act only recognises marriages between heterosexual people. Consequently, gay couples are unable to use surrogacy to have a child.
• The surrogate cannot refuse to carry the pregnancy to term after signing the contract.
• Without the appropriate authority’s consent, she cannot end her pregnancy.
• According to the law, the embryo must share some genetic ancestry with the couple—either the man or the woman, or both. Donating embryos is not permitted in surrogacy.
• As long as she is between 35 and 45 years old, the law permits a divorcee or widow to donate her eggs for surrogacy.
• The child born as a result of an Indian couple using a surrogate outside of India will not be recognised as an Indian citizen.
• If the commissioning couple passes away before the child is born, the nominees of the couple named at the time of signing the surrogacy contract are responsible for raising the child.
• The responsibility of the newborn child would fall on the nominees. The nominees may, nonetheless, later decide to give the child up for adoption or to an orphanage if they so choose.
• When they turn 18, the children so born may assert their right to know they were the product of a surrogate.
• They can also make use of their right to find out the surrogate mother’s identity.

Conclusion

• To regulate and limit the practise of commercial surrogacy while ensuring that surrogacy is carried out in an altruistic manner, the new surrogacy law in India seeks to
• Although the law is seen as a step in the right direction towards addressing the problems of surrogacy exploitation and profiteering, it must be carefully monitored in order to ensure that the rights and interests of all parties involved are safeguarded.