India – Nepal relations

• Rail Transportation between India & Nepal got a major boost today with coming into force of authorization to all cargo train operators to utilize the Indian railway network to carry all containers bound for Nepal whether bilateral freight between India and Nepal or third country freight from Indian ports to Nepal.
• This liberalization will allow market forces to come up in the rail freight segment in Nepal and is likely to increase efficiency and cost- competitiveness, eventually benefiting the Nepalese consumer.
• These cargo train Operators include public and private container trains Operators, automobile freight train operators, special freight train operators or any other operator authorized by Indian Railways.
• After this LoE, all kinds of cargoes in all categories of wagons that can carry freight on the Indian Railways network within India can also carry freight to and from Nepal.
• The move will reduce transportation costs for automobiles and certain other products whose carriage takes place in special wagons.
• The signing of this LoE marks another milestone in India’s efforts to enhance regional connectivity under the “Neighbourhood First” policy.

Background of Rail Services Agreement (RSA) – 2004 and LoE.

• The Rail Services Agreement was executed on 21.05.2004 between the Ministry of Railways, Government of India and the Ministry of Industry, Commerce & Supplies (now Ministry of Commerce), His Majesty’s Government of Nepal (now Govt. of Nepal) for the introduction of freight train services between these two countries to and from Birgunj (Nepal) via Raxaul (India).
• This is an agreement which guides movement between India and Nepal by rail. The rationale for this Agreement is that there was no rail movement prior to this between the two countries and hence a framework was required for operational and commercial aspects and procedures for customs clearances for rail-bound cargo.
• Since then large various developments have taken place which requires changes to the Rail Services Agreement.
• There is a provision in Article 1.4 of the RSA that “the Agreement shall be reviewed every five years and may be modified by the Contracting Parties by mutual consent.
• For effecting amendments in the relevant Articles to RSA, Letters of Exchange (LoE) are signed from both sides.
• In the past, there have been amendments to RSA through LoE on three occasions. The first such amendment to RSA-2004 was effected through a Letter of Exchange (LoE) signed on 21st May 2004.
• The second LoE was signed on 17th December 2008 at the time of the introduction of bilateral cargo between the two countries which required the introduction of new customs procedures and Third LoE was signed on 19/20.02.2016 enabling rail transit traffic to/from Vishakhapatnam Port in addition to the existing provision of rail transportation through Kolkata/Haldia Port.

NGT Delhi is equal to all other branches of NGT

• First, read the complete topic on National Green Tribunal (NGT) through this link and then read this news.
• Observing that all five zonal Benches of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) are equally powerful and that their orders would be applicable pan India, the Madras High Court has disapproved of a 2017 Central notification which terms the north zone Bench in Delhi as the principal Bench.
• Though in the notification dated August 10, 2017 the north zone Bench in Delhi is called principal Bench, it is prima facie contrary to the NGT Act of 2010 as the latter does not speak about any principal Bench.
• Vesting of power only with the Bench in Delhi is not contemplated anywhere in the statute even though power is actually concentrated in Delhi.
• The orders were passed on a writ petition filed by an environmental activist K. Saravanan of Chennai against a decision taken by the south zone Bench of NGT on June 15 to transfer his case to the “principal” Bench in Delhi since the orders to be passed in it would have pan India effect.
• Not in agreement with such a decision taken by the south zone Bench, the judges stayed the operation of the transfer order. “The decision taken by any Bench of NGT will have pan India effect and it cannot be said that only if the issue is decided by Delhi, it will have pan India effect,” the judges observed.
• They pointed out that the country had been divided into five zones — North, West, Central, South and East — and one Bench of the NGT had been established for each of them, with territorial jurisdiction over specified States, only for the convenience of the litigants residing in those zones.
• “The jurisdiction of every Bench has been distinctly given and it is only to enable the citizens to approach the forum constituted in their zone and not to make the citizens travel to Delhi spending huge amount of money which is not possible for every citizen on each and every issue,” the judges said.
• They went on to add: “If such a procedure (of transferring cases to Delhi) is adopted, it would amount to denying access to justice as is being done in other matters.” Easy access to justice was the primary reason for establishing courts at the Taluk level and that was the reason why even High Court Benches were being created in different parts of a State, the judges pointed out.