Poverty eradication has been a major challenge in our country since independence, and it has deepened its roots in India’s national development goal to establish a just and equal society. World Bank has defined poverty as the deprivation of well-being, income, inability to obtain basic needs and necessities for a dignified existence, lack of health education, lack of access to clean water and sanitation, and so on. According to the Global Hunger Index 2020, India is rated 94th out of 107 countries and is suffering from severe hunger. India ranks 62nd out of 107 nations in the Global Multidimensional Poverty Index 2020, with an MPI score of 0.123 and a headcount ratio of 27.91 percent.
The spirit of the Indian Constitution is enshrined in the Preamble, which guarantees social, economic, and political justice to all citizens. As a result, Article 39 (A) (1) is inserted into the Indian Constitution by the 42nd amendment, which provides free legal aid to the poor and feeble sections of society, encouraging justice based on equal opportunity. The Legal Service Authorities Act of 1987 was enacted with the goal of carrying out “the Constitutional right of providing free and competent legal services to the weakest sectors of society. Under the Legal Service Authority Act, a person belonging to a Schedule Tribe or Schedule Caste, a woman, a child, a victim of human trafficking, a differently abled person, an industrial worker, and a person in custody in a protective home, as well as the poor, are entitled to free legal services.
It is the state’s responsibility to make plans and suitable enactment, and effective arrangements to provide free legal aid, to ensure that the doors of justice are open to every individual and are not denied to any citizen due to financial or other disabilities, and that the state’s insufficient funds cannot be used as a justification for not providing legal aid to the needy.
The State shall ensure that the legal system operates in a manner that promotes justice on an equal footing, and shall provide free legal aid, through appropriate legislation or schemes or in any other manner, to ensure that no citizen’s right to justice is denied due to economic or other disabilities.
If there is no pleader for representing the accused in a trial before the Session Court, and the court believes that the accused has no need to have a pleader, the state bears the cost.
The Parliament passed the Legal Services Authority Act, 198710, to provide legal help to the poor. A free legal aid scheme is now available to about 80% of the country’s population. This Act establishes several authorities and committees, ranging from the trial court to the Supreme Court.
Legal assistance is crucial because it aids in the protection of the law, which is a government obligation. This means that the state must give legal services to those who are in need and cannot afford the expense of legal services to proceed with legal processes. The state has a responsibility to provide legal services since exploitation and scarcity are the causes of a lack of legal understanding about the rights and benefits that the poor are entitled to.
Aishwarya Says:
I have always been against Glorifying Over Work and therefore, in the year 2021, I have decided to launch this campaign “Balancing Life”and talk about this wrong practice, that we have been following since last few years. I will be talking to and interviewing around 1 lakh people in the coming 2021 and publish their interview regarding their opinion on glamourising Over Work.
If you are interested in participating in the same, do let me know.
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We also have a Facebook Group Restarter Moms for Mothers or Women who would like to rejoin their careers post a career break or women who are enterpreneurs.
We are also running a series Inspirational Women from January 2021 to March 31,2021, featuring around 1000 stories about Indian Women, who changed the world. #choosetochallenge