Union Cabinet has recently approved extradition treaty between India and Malawi.
The Treaty would provide a legal framework for seeking extradition of terrorists, economic offenders and other criminals from and to Malawi.
Extradition Treaty Vs Arrangement
An extradition treaty is a mutually agreed text signed and ratified by two Governments.
The arrangement is made in the absence of an extradition treaty on the assurance of reciprocity including under an international convention.
In the arrangement, two countries consider any international convention as the legal basis for extradition in respect of any offence to which the convention applies.
It does not cover all offences.
For e.g India has signed extradition arrangement with Italy.
India and Italy are both States Parties to the 1988 UN Convention against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances.
This Convention has been notified under the Extradition Act by the Government of India.
Thus, the legal basis for extradition will be based on this convention.
National Monitoring Framework on SDG
Union Cabinet has recently approved the constitution of a High Level Steering Committee for monitoring of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with associated targets.
The committee will periodically review and refine the National Indicator Framework (NIF) for SDG.
The committee will be chaired by Chief Statistician of India and Secretary, Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI).
United Nations General Assembly in its 70th session adopted SDG for 2015-2030.
The 17 SDGs with 169 targets came into force with effect from January, 2016.
SDGs are not legally binding, but it has become de facto international obligations to reorient domestic spending priorities of the countries.
FIDF
Union cabinet has recently approved creation of Fisheries and Aquaculture Infrastructure Development Fund (FIDF).
The nodal loaning entities for the fund are
National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD),
National Cooperatives Development Corporation (NCDC) and
All scheduled Banks.
The fund would provide concessional finance to take up investment activities of fisheries development.
The beneficiaries are State Governments / UTs and State entities, cooperatives, individuals and entrepreneurs etc.,
International UDAN
International UDAN, a new international air connectivity scheme is an extension of the domestic UDAN scheme.
Domestic UDAN seeks to boost air connectivity by linking up un-served and under-served airports in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities with the big cities.
This is done by offering cheap tickets to passengers and the Central and State governments paying a subsidy to the airlines to enable them to offer cheap tickets.
Under International UDAN, the plan is to connect India’s smaller cities directly to some key foreign destinations in the neighbourhood.
The scheme seeks to make use of the open skies policy that India has with other Asian countries that allows direct and unlimited flights to and from these nations to 18 Indian destinations.
Unlike in domestic UDAN where both the Centre and the State government share the subsidy, it is only the State government that will provide the financial support for flights under international UDAN.
Like the domestic UDAN, the financial support and flying exclusivity on the route will be for three years.
Only Indian carriers can participate in the international UDAN scheme, and only aircraft with capacity of 70 seats or more can fly the foreign routes.
