The Evening Wrap: India’s COVID-19 death toll almost 10 times official figure, says WHO report

Almost three times as many people have died as a result of COVID-19 as the official data show, according to a new World Health Organization (WHO) report, the most comprehensive look at the true global toll of the pandemic so far. In India, more than 4.7 million people -- nearly 10 times higher than official figures – have died of COVID-19, according to the report. The government of India has rejected the figure, stating that the methodology is flawed. There were 14.9 million excess deaths associated with COVID-19 by the end of 2021, the U.N. body said on Thursday. The official count of deaths directly attributable to COVID-19 and reported to WHO in that period, from January 2020 to the end of December 2021, is slightly more than 5.4 million. The WHO’s excess mortality figures reflect people who died of COVID-19 as well as those who died as an indirect result of the outbreak, including people who could not access healthcare for other conditions when systems were overwhelmed during huge waves of infection. It also accounts for deaths averted during the pandemic, for example, because of the lower risk of traffic accidents during lockdowns. But the numbers are also far higher than the official tally because of deaths that were missed in countries without adequate reporting. Even pre-pandemic, around 6 in 10 deaths around the world were not registered, WHO said. The WHO report said that almost half of the deaths that until now had not been counted were in India. The report suggests that 4.7 million people died there as a result of the pandemic, mainly during a huge surge in May and June 2021. The Indian government, however, puts its death toll for the January 2020-December 2021 period far lower: about 480,000. WHO said it had not yet fully examined new data provided this week by India, which has pushed back against the WHO estimates and issued its own mortality figures for all causes of death in 2020 on Tuesday. WHO said it may add a disclaimer to the report highlighting the ongoing conversation with India. The WHO panel, made up of international experts who have been working on the data for months, used a combination of national and local information, as well as statistical models, to estimate totals where the data is incomplete – a methodology that India has criticised. However, other independent assessments have also put the death toll in India far higher than the official government tally, including a report published in Science which suggested three million people may have died of COVID in the country. Other models have also reached similar conclusions about the global death toll being far higher than the recorded statistics. For comparison, around 50 million people are thought to have died in the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic, and 36 million have died of HIV since the epidemic began in the 1980s. J&K delimitation panel makes final report public; recommends two seats for Kashmiri migrants The Jammu and Kashmir Delimitation Commission on Thursday notified the new boundaries, names and number of Assembly constituencies in Jammu and Kashmir, paving the way for the first-ever Assembly elections in the Union Territory that was carved out of the erstwhile State of J&K in 2019. While not mentioned in its order, the Delimitation Commission said in a statement that it had recommended to the Centre to nominate at least two “Kashmiri migrants” to the Legislature who would have the same powers as nominated members of the Puducherry Assembly and to “consider” giving “some representation” to persons displaced from Pakistan-occupied J&K. A source said this was a “proposal” that the Centre would take a call on. A day before its term was to end, the Commission, chaired by Justice (retired) Ranjana Prakash Desai and including Chief Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra and J&K State Election Commissioner K.K. Sharma as ex-officio members, met to finalise its order and later issued a gazette notification. The delimitation was carried out based on the 2011 Census and other considerations like geographical features and access. The new Assembly would have 90 seats, 47 in Kashmir and 43 in Jammu, which was an increase from the earlier 83, with six of the additional seats being in Jammu and one in Kashmir. The commission said in its statement that for the first time in J&K, nine seats have been reserved for Scheduled Tribes. Six of the ST reserved seats were in Jammu region and three in the Kashmir Valley. Seven seats had been reserved for Scheduled Castes. “There are five Parliamentary Constituencies in the region. The Delimitation Commission has seen Jammu & Kashmir as a single entity for purposes of the delimitation. Therefore, one of the parliamentary constituencies has been carved out combining Anantnag region in the Valley and Rajouri and Poonch of Jammu region. By this reorganisation, each Parliamentary constituency will have equal number of 18 Assembly Constituencies each,” the commission said in its statement. The move to merge the two regions in one Lok Sabha constituency had been criticised by regional parties, including the National Conference, given the two areas remain cut off in winter and have no direct access. The commission said it had accepted many of the suggestions regarding names of constituencies that came up during consultations. It restored old names and reworked a few Assembly segments in the Kashmir division, which had been renamed in the previous draft and had evoked criticism from local parties. In north Kashmir, Gulmarg and Wagoora-Kreeri Assembly segments were restored on traditional geographical limits. Similarly, the constituency names like Hazratbal, Zadibal, Lal Chowk, Eidgah have been restored in Srinagar. In Jammu division, the name of Gulabgarh constituency has been restored. In Reasi district, a constituency was named after the famed Shri Mata Vaishno Devi shrine. Noting the challenges of carrying out the delimitation, the commission said unique issues arose due to factors like “competing political aspirations of the geographically and culturally distinctive Jammu and the Kashmir regions”, the wide range of population density from 3,436/square km to 29 sg/km, geographical barriers affecting connectivity and inadequate conveniences along the International Border. The commission, which was appointed on March 6, 2020, had visited J&K twice, meeting 242 delegations during the first visit and around 1,600 people during the second that was in April, the statement said. In addition, the commission received inputs from its associate members – the five Lok Sabha MPs from J&K. The three National Conference MPs who were associate members had raised concerns over the entire exercise, since the J&K Reorganisation Act, 2019, which had mandated the delimitation, is under judicial scrutiny. Gujarat MLA Jignesh Mevani, nine others get three-month jail for holding protest march without permission in 2017 A magisterial court in Mehsana town of Gujarat on Thursday convicted independent MLA Jignesh Mevani and nine others in a five-year-old case of holding a protest march without police permission, and sentenced them to three months of imprisonment. Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate J.A. Parmar held Dalit leader Mevani and nine others, including NCP leader Reshma Patel, guilty of being part of an unlawful assembly under section 143 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The court also slapped a fine of ₹1,000 on each of the 10 convicts, who include members of Mevani’s Rashtriya Dalit Adhikar Manch. After delivering the verdict, the court accepted Mevani’s plea for a stay on the order and granted bail to all the convicts till they file an appeal in the higher court against this judgement. Mehsana ‘A’ division police had registered an FIR against Mevani and others for trying to take out ‘Azadi Kooch’ or Freedom March from Mehsana to Dhanera in Banaskantha district in July 2017 without the police permission. Reshma Patel, a Patidar quota leader back then, was not part of any political party when she took part in the march. Of the total 12 accused shown in the FIR, one had died, while trial against former president of the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) students’ union, Kanhaiya Kumar, who is also an accused, is still pending before the court. On July 12, 2017, Mevani’s outfit had organised Freedom March from Mehsana to Dhanera to mark the first anniversary of Una Dalit flogging incident. One of the agenda of the march was to pressure the government to allocate agricultural land to Dalits as per the law. Though the Mehsana district authorities had granted permission earlier, it was revoked later on. Since Mevani, who became an MLA in December 2017, and others went ahead with their plan without permission, an FIR was registered against them and the march was eventually stopped on the outskirts of Mehsana city. Mevani returned to Gujarat on Tuesday, nearly two weeks after being arrested by the Assam police over his purported tweet against Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Soon after being released on bail in the tweet case, he had been rearrested for allegedly assaulting a policewoman who was part of the police party which accompanied him to Kokrajhar in Assam. The legislator was later granted bail in the second case as well. ‘Honour killing’ in Telangana: Man killed by wife’s family In a suspected case of honour killing, a 26-year-old car salesman was allegedly murdered by his wife’s brother and a relative on the busy road in Saroornagar on Thursday night for marrying her against their wishes as the former belongs to a different faith. According to police, the offence took place when the couple was travelling on a scooter and the woman’s family followed them and obstructed them. The suspects, who are currently in police custody, hit the victim, Billipuram Nagaraju, with an iron rod on his head and later attacked him with a knife in full public view. When the onlookers attempted to stop them, suspects threatened them. “He was stabbed to death,” police said. Nagaraju and Syed Ashrin Sultana, who were in a relationship since their school days, got married at Arya Samaj, Lal Darwaza on January 31 after the woman’s family declined their proposal despite the couple repeatedly expressing their intention to marry. Nagaraju, a native of Marpalle in Rangareddy district, was even willing to convert to Islam, but the family never accepted the relationship. She hails from Ghanapur. After their marriage, the couple started to live in a rented house at Panjala Anil Kumar Colony. Fearing threat from the woman’s family they moved to Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh for a brief period and returned recently. Police said that the suspects were following the movements of the couple and finally attacked Nagaraju. While police claim that two persons who killed Nagaraju are in custody, the woman claimed that five persons attacked her husband. Supreme Court to examine whether Constitution Bench should hear sedition challenge The spectre of a 60-year-old Constitution Bench judgment validating sedition law led a three-judge Bench headed by Chief Justice of India N.V. Ramana on Thursday to pause to examine if petitions challenging the colonial provision should be referred to a larger Bench of five or seven judges of the court. The 1962 judgment in Kedar Nath versus State of Bihar delivered by a Bench of five judges of the Supreme Court had upheld Section 124A (sedition) of the Indian Penal Code while restricting its applicability to “activities involving incitement to violence or intention or tendency to create public disorder or cause disturbance of public peace”. A judicial law laid down by the Supreme Court cannot be countered by a numerically inferior Bench. The Chief Justice Bench, also comprising Justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli, scheduled a hearing on the question of reference on May 10 (Tuesday) at 2 p.m. The court warned lawyers against seeking adjournment on that day. “First we have to determine whether we should sit in a composition of three judges or five or seven before going into the question of legality of Section 124A... Assuming the CJI decides to constitute a larger Bench, then that Bench can straightaway take up the question of Section 124A. Such a larger Bench, if formed, can directly hear on merits whether sedition should continue or be struck down in the light of subsequent developments in law post the Kedar Nath judgment and global opinions on sedition,” Justice Kant addressed the lawyers. Attorney General of India K.K. Venugopal, who has been asked by the court to assist in the capacity of his constitutional office, however, said there was no need to refer the petitions to a larger Bench. “The Kedar Nath judgment is the last word on the issue of sedition law. It has balanced well the right of security of state and the right of free speech,” Venugopal gave his prima facie opinion. He said Section 124A had to be retained in the penal code. “However, the misuse of sedition law should be controlled. This court can lay down certain guidelines in the implementation of the law... Recently, sedition has been invoked in Maharashtra even for chanting the Hanuman Chalisa...” Venugopal submitted. Senior advocate Kapil Sibal and advocate Vipin Nair also argued that there was no need to refer the case to a larger Bench because of the Kedar Nath judgment. He submitted that the Kedar Nath judgment was limited to an examination of how sedition could be invoked by the government to silence free speech under Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution. It had not examined how sedition could be misused by the government to cripple right to life and dignity and right to equal treatment under Articles 21 and 14, respectively. Sibal said the three-judge Bench could go ahead and decide their petitions without touching on the Kedar Nath verdict. He said sedition was now being invoked even against the right to protest. “Our colonial masters have gone. We are the masters of our own destiny. There has been a sea change in the law post Kedar Nath. We are the masters of our democracy. We are the masters of the government. We are not subjects of the Crown. The government serves us. We can change our government every five years,” Sibal argued. Advocate Kaleeswaram Raj, for senior journalist Shashi Kumar, said the fact that the Supreme Court had upheld adultery in 1954 did not stop it from decriminalising the offence in 2018. “Despite the Kedar Nath judgment, we can still proceed. The 1962 verdict has ultimately upheld Section 124A while watering it down... But Section 124A is, we argue, per se unconstitutional. It cannot be used to silence dissent and take away personal liberty,” Sibal contended. But Justice Kant invoked judicial propriety. “Subsequent changes in law does not give a three-judge Bench the right to ignore an earlier five-judge Bench decision on the same issue,” Justice Kant said. The question of reference could not be bypassed. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre, agreed with the court that the point of reference to a larger Bench needed to be heard and decided first before going into the merits of the case. Mehta was given time till Monday to file a detailed counter-affidavit clarifying the government’s stand on whether sedition should be struck down or not. “But tell us your stand... Should it (Section 124A) continue or be withdrawn?” Chief Justice Ramana asked him during the hearing. But Mehta refrained from giving a clear oral reply, saying the issue had to be debated. In Brief LIC’s public offer, the country’s biggest-ever IPO, was fully subscribed on the second day of bidding on Thursday. Against 16,20,78,067 shares on offer, 16,25,35,125 bids were received, making the public issue fully subscribed, as per data on stock exchanges as of 6.24 p.m. Of the total, the policyholders’ portion was subscribed a little over three times, while that for employees was subscribed 2.14 times. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow [logo] The Evening Wrap 05 MAY 2022 [The Hindu logo] Welcome to the Evening Wrap newsletter, your guide to the day’s biggest stories with concise analysis from The Hindu. [[Arrow]Open in browser]( [[Mail icon]More newsletters]( India’s true COVID-19 toll almost 10 times the official figure, as per WHO report  Almost three times as many people have died as a result of COVID-19 as the official data show, according to a new World Health Organization (WHO) report, the most comprehensive look at the true global toll of the pandemic so far. In India, more than 4.7 million people -- nearly 10 times higher than official figures – have died of COVID-19, according to the report. The government of India has rejected the figure, stating that the methodology is flawed. There were 14.9 million excess deaths associated with COVID-19 by the end of 2021, the U.N. body said on Thursday. The official count of deaths directly attributable to COVID-19 and reported to WHO in that period, from January 2020 to the end of December 2021, is slightly more than 5.4 million. The WHO’s excess mortality figures reflect people who died of COVID-19 as well as those who died as an indirect result of the outbreak, including people who could not access healthcare for other conditions when systems were overwhelmed during huge waves of infection. It also accounts for deaths averted during the pandemic, for example, because of the lower risk of traffic accidents during lockdowns. But the numbers are also far higher than the official tally because of deaths that were missed in countries without adequate reporting. Even pre-pandemic, around 6 in 10 deaths around the world were not registered, WHO said. The WHO report said that almost half of the deaths that until now had not been counted were in India. The report suggests that 4.7 million people died there as a result of the pandemic, mainly during a huge surge in May and June 2021. [The body of a COVID-19 victim is brought for cremation at Nigam Bodh Ghat in New Delhi. File ] The Indian government, however, puts its death toll for the January 2020-December 2021 period far lower: about 480,000. WHO said it had not yet fully examined new data provided this week by India, which has pushed back against the WHO estimates and issued its own mortality figures for all causes of death in 2020 on Tuesday. WHO said it may add a disclaimer to the report highlighting the ongoing conversation with India. The WHO panel, made up of international experts who have been working on the data for months, used a combination of national and local information, as well as statistical models, to estimate totals where the data is incomplete – a methodology that India has criticised. However, other independent assessments have also put the death toll in India far higher than the official government tally, including a report published in Science which suggested three million people may have died of COVID in the country. Other models have also reached similar conclusions about the global death toll being far higher than the recorded statistics. For comparison, around 50 million people are thought to have died in the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic, and 36 million have died of HIV since the epidemic began in the 1980s. J&K delimitation panel makes final report public; recommends two seats for Kashmiri migrants The Jammu and Kashmir Delimitation Commission on Thursday [notified the new boundaries, names and number of Assembly constituencies in Jammu and Kashmir]( paving the way for the first-ever Assembly elections in the Union Territory that was carved out of the erstwhile State of J&K in 2019. While not mentioned in its order, the Delimitation Commission said in a statement that it had recommended to the Centre to nominate at least two “Kashmiri migrants” to the Legislature who would have the same powers as nominated members of the Puducherry Assembly and to “consider” giving “some representation” to persons displaced from Pakistan-occupied J&K. A source said this was a “proposal” that the Centre would take a call on. [**EDS: IMAGE POSTED BY @SpokespersonECI ON THURSDAY, MAY 5, 2022** New Delhi: Delimitation Commission for Jammu & Kashmir UT, headed by Chairperson Justice (Retd.) Ranjana Prakash Desai, ex-officio members CEC Sushil Chandra (L) and State Election Commissioner, J&K, K K Sharma (R), finalise the Delimitation order. (PTI Photo) (PTI05_05_2022_000158B)] A day before its term was to end, the Commission, chaired by Justice (retired) Ranjana Prakash Desai and including Chief Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra and J&K State Election Commissioner K.K. Sharma as ex-officio members, met to finalise its order and later issued a gazette notification. The delimitation was carried out based on the 2011 Census and other considerations like geographical features and access. The new Assembly would have 90 seats, 47 in Kashmir and 43 in Jammu, which was an increase from the earlier 83, with six of the additional seats being in Jammu and one in Kashmir. The commission said in its statement that for the first time in J&K, nine seats have been reserved for Scheduled Tribes. Six of the ST reserved seats were in Jammu region and three in the Kashmir Valley. Seven seats had been reserved for Scheduled Castes. “There are five Parliamentary Constituencies in the region. The Delimitation Commission has seen Jammu & Kashmir as a single entity for purposes of the delimitation. Therefore, one of the parliamentary constituencies has been carved out combining Anantnag region in the Valley and Rajouri and Poonch of Jammu region. By this reorganisation, each Parliamentary constituency will have equal number of 18 Assembly Constituencies each,” the commission said in its statement. The move to merge the two regions in one Lok Sabha constituency had been criticised by regional parties, including the National Conference, given the two areas remain cut off in winter and have no direct access. The commission said it had accepted many of the suggestions regarding names of constituencies that came up during consultations. It restored old names and reworked a few Assembly segments in the Kashmir division, which had been renamed in the previous draft and had evoked criticism from local parties. In north Kashmir, Gulmarg and Wagoora-Kreeri Assembly segments were restored on traditional geographical limits. Similarly, the constituency names like Hazratbal, Zadibal, Lal Chowk, Eidgah have been restored in Srinagar. In Jammu division, the name of Gulabgarh constituency has been restored. In Reasi district, a constituency was named after the famed Shri Mata Vaishno Devi shrine. Noting the challenges of carrying out the delimitation, the commission said unique issues arose due to factors like “competing political aspirations of the geographically and culturally distinctive Jammu and the Kashmir regions”, the wide range of population density from 3,436/square km to 29 sg/km, geographical barriers affecting connectivity and inadequate conveniences along the International Border. The commission, which was appointed on March 6, 2020, had visited J&K twice, meeting 242 delegations during the first visit and around 1,600 people during the second that was in April, the statement said. In addition, the commission received inputs from its associate members – the five Lok Sabha MPs from J&K. The three National Conference MPs who were associate members had raised concerns over the entire exercise, since the J&K Reorganisation Act, 2019, which had mandated the delimitation, is under judicial scrutiny. Gujarat MLA Jignesh Mevani, nine others get three-month jail for holding protest march without permission in 2017 A magisterial court in Mehsana town of Gujarat on Thursday [convicted independent MLA Jignesh Mevani and nine others]( in a five-year-old case of holding a protest march without police permission, and sentenced them to three months of imprisonment. Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate J.A. Parmar held Dalit leader Mevani and nine others, including NCP leader Reshma Patel, guilty of being part of an unlawful assembly under section 143 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The court also slapped a fine of ₹1,000 on each of the 10 convicts, who include members of Mevani’s Rashtriya Dalit Adhikar Manch. After delivering the verdict, the court accepted Mevani’s plea for a stay on the order and granted bail to all the convicts till they file an appeal in the higher court against this judgement. Mehsana ‘A’ division police had registered an FIR against Mevani and others for trying to take out ‘Azadi Kooch’ or Freedom March from Mehsana to Dhanera in Banaskantha district in July 2017 without the police permission. Reshma Patel, a Patidar quota leader back then, was not part of any political party when she took part in the march. Of the total 12 accused shown in the FIR, one had died, while trial against former president of the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) students’ union, Kanhaiya Kumar, who is also an accused, is still pending before the court. On July 12, 2017, Mevani’s outfit had organised Freedom March from Mehsana to Dhanera to mark the first anniversary of Una Dalit flogging incident. One of the agenda of the march was to pressure the government to allocate agricultural land to Dalits as per the law. Though the Mehsana district authorities had granted permission earlier, it was revoked later on. Since Mevani, who became an MLA in December 2017, and others went ahead with their plan without permission, an FIR was registered against them and the march was eventually stopped on the outskirts of Mehsana city. Mevani returned to Gujarat on Tuesday, nearly two weeks after being arrested by the Assam police over his purported tweet against Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Soon after being released on bail in the tweet case, he had been rearrested for allegedly assaulting a policewoman who was part of the police party which accompanied him to Kokrajhar in Assam. The legislator was later granted bail in the second case as well. ‘Honour killing’ in Telangana: Man killed by wife’s family In a suspected case of honour killing, [a 26-year-old car salesman was allegedly murdered by his wife’s brother and a relative]( on the busy road in Saroornagar on Thursday night for marrying her against their wishes as the former belongs to a different faith. According to police, the offence took place when the couple was travelling on a scooter and the woman’s family followed them and obstructed them. The suspects, who are currently in police custody, hit the victim, Billipuram Nagaraju, with an iron rod on his head and later attacked him with a knife in full public view. When the onlookers attempted to stop them, suspects threatened them. “He was stabbed to death,” police said. Nagaraju and Syed Ashrin Sultana, who were in a relationship since their school days, got married at Arya Samaj, Lal Darwaza on January 31 after the woman’s family declined their proposal despite the couple repeatedly expressing their intention to marry. Nagaraju, a native of Marpalle in Rangareddy district, was even willing to convert to Islam, but the family never accepted the relationship. She hails from Ghanapur. After their marriage, the couple started to live in a rented house at Panjala Anil Kumar Colony. Fearing threat from the woman’s family they moved to Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh for a brief period and returned recently. Police said that the suspects were following the movements of the couple and finally attacked Nagaraju. While police claim that two persons who killed Nagaraju are in custody, the woman claimed that five persons attacked her husband. Supreme Court to examine whether Constitution Bench should hear sedition challenge The spectre of a 60-year-old Constitution Bench judgment validating sedition law led a three-judge Bench headed by Chief Justice of India N.V. Ramana on Thursday [to pause to examine]( if petitions challenging the colonial provision should be referred to a larger Bench of five or seven judges of the court. The 1962 judgment in Kedar Nath versus State of Bihar delivered by a Bench of five judges of the Supreme Court had upheld Section 124A (sedition) of the Indian Penal Code while restricting its applicability to “activities involving incitement to violence or intention or tendency to create public disorder or cause disturbance of public peace”. A judicial law laid down by the Supreme Court cannot be countered by a numerically inferior Bench. The Chief Justice Bench, also comprising Justices Surya Kant and Hima Kohli, scheduled a hearing on the question of reference on May 10 (Tuesday) at 2 p.m. The court warned lawyers against seeking adjournment on that day. “First we have to determine whether we should sit in a composition of three judges or five or seven before going into the question of legality of Section 124A... Assuming the CJI decides to constitute a larger Bench, then that Bench can straightaway take up the question of Section 124A. Such a larger Bench, if formed, can directly hear on merits whether sedition should continue or be struck down in the light of subsequent developments in law post the Kedar Nath judgment and global opinions on sedition,” Justice Kant addressed the lawyers. Attorney General of India K.K. Venugopal, who has been asked by the court to assist in the capacity of his constitutional office, however, said there was no need to refer the petitions to a larger Bench. “The Kedar Nath judgment is the last word on the issue of sedition law. It has balanced well the right of security of state and the right of free speech,” Venugopal gave his prima facie opinion. He said Section 124A had to be retained in the penal code. “However, the misuse of sedition law should be controlled. This court can lay down certain guidelines in the implementation of the law... Recently, sedition has been invoked in Maharashtra even for chanting the Hanuman Chalisa...” Venugopal submitted. Senior advocate Kapil Sibal and advocate Vipin Nair also argued that there was no need to refer the case to a larger Bench because of the Kedar Nath judgment. He submitted that the Kedar Nath judgment was limited to an examination of how sedition could be invoked by the government to silence free speech under Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution. It had not examined how sedition could be misused by the government to cripple right to life and dignity and right to equal treatment under Articles 21 and 14, respectively. Sibal said the three-judge Bench could go ahead and decide their petitions without touching on the Kedar Nath verdict. He said sedition was now being invoked even against the right to protest. “Our colonial masters have gone. We are the masters of our own destiny. There has been a sea change in the law post Kedar Nath. We are the masters of our democracy. We are the masters of the government. We are not subjects of the Crown. The government serves us. We can change our government every five years,” Sibal argued. Advocate Kaleeswaram Raj, for senior journalist Shashi Kumar, said the fact that the Supreme Court had upheld adultery in 1954 did not stop it from decriminalising the offence in 2018. “Despite the Kedar Nath judgment, we can still proceed. The 1962 verdict has ultimately upheld Section 124A while watering it down... But Section 124A is, we argue, per se unconstitutional. It cannot be used to silence dissent and take away personal liberty,” Sibal contended. But Justice Kant invoked judicial propriety. “Subsequent changes in law does not give a three-judge Bench the right to ignore an earlier five-judge Bench decision on the same issue,” Justice Kant said. The question of reference could not be bypassed. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre, agreed with the court that the point of reference to a larger Bench needed to be heard and decided first before going into the merits of the case. Mehta was given time till Monday to file a detailed counter-affidavit clarifying the government’s stand on whether sedition should be struck down or not. “But tell us your stand... Should it (Section 124A) continue or be withdrawn?” Chief Justice Ramana asked him during the hearing. But Mehta refrained from giving a clear oral reply, saying the issue had to be debated. In Brief LIC’s public offer, the country’s biggest-ever IPO, was [fully subscribed on the second day of bidding]( on Thursday. Against 16,20,78,067 shares on offer, 16,25,35,125 bids were received, making the public issue fully subscribed, as per data on stock exchanges as of 6.24 p.m. Of the total, the policyholders’ portion was subscribed a little over three times, while that for employees was subscribed 2.14 times. 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