Part J. Newspapers and Magazines on Law and Reforms

Section 1: India Set for Law Reforms

Section 2: New Bill Fails the Forests in Bulgaria

Section 3: Anti Smoking Law Proposed in the USA

Section 4: New Education Law in the State of Vermont, USA

Section 5: A Proposed Reform of the House of Lords in the UK

Section 6: Britain's Referendum Campaign over the Euro

Section 1: India Set for Law Reforms

Pre-reading questions:

1. Is the official name of India the Republic of India (Hindi Bharat)?

2. What do you know about the past and present of this country?

The prudish spirit of India's former empress, Britain's Queen Victoria, lives on, embodied in Section 377 of India's Penal Code. Try committing suicide in India and you could go to prison. Accepting a bribe is not considered corruption unless taken by a government servant.

And if you have plans of hijacking an aircraft, there is no law under which you can be prosecuted – hijacking is a crime but attempted hijacking is not. And nearly 50 years after the constitution declared them equal to men, a woman still cannot be the legal guardian of her child until a court declares her fit.

Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujral has vowed to overhaul some 1,500 irrelevant laws, some of which were written in the 19th century. «The effective delivery of services and benefits under various welfare schemes to the public is frustated by rigid procedures and archaic laws», the Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances recently admitted. It is working closely with a panel of legal experts charged with reviewing some federal and state laws of India.

A few social activists are working to introduce a Freedom of Information Bill which will provide 930 million people with the right to information about the functioning of government.

Law in India is further complicated by separate regulations for each of its religious groups – Hindus, Moslems, Parsis, Christians and other communities. Each is covered by different civil laws. These complex distinctions are a sensitive legal area that the government dare not touch for fear of offending religious leaders, who fiercely defend their right to be different.

Constitutionally secular, but mostly Hindu, India has the world's second largest population of Moslems. According to civil law drawn from the Koran, a Moslem can divorce his wife merely by uttering the word «talaq», or divorce, three times in front of two witnesses. Moslem women were granted the right to seek divorce in 1939, but a Moslem woman's share in ancestral inheritance is still half of her brother's.

Most official forms in India ask the applicants to fill in their father's name – unless the applicant is a married woman, in which case she is supposed to write her husband's name. The Sanskrit word for husband, «pati», means owner.

It is considered disrespectful for a woman to utter her husband's name, and Election Commission officials say their reluctance to provide that vital detail is the reason why many women are not included in voters lists.

Lawyer Sona Khan, who in 1986 won a landmark ruling that granted Moslem women the right to maintenance, says Indian laws still have a tenuous link with justice. «We borrowed the judicial system from the colonial power», she says. «It was meant to administer a colony».

Vocabulary notes

prudish	['pru:dIS]	не в меру щепетильный, ханжеский
empress	['Impres]	императрица
to hijack	['haI³{k]	1) угонять самолет; 2) нападать с целью грабежа
to vow	[vau]	давать обет, клясться
to overhaul	['ouv@ho:l]	1) разбирать, тщательно осматривать; 2) перестраивать
irrelevant		неуместный, не относящийся к делу
welfare	['welfE@]	1) благосостояние, благоденствие; 2) благотворительность
to frustrate		расстраивать, срывать, делать тщетным, бесполезным
	rigid		1) жесткий, негнущийся, негибкий; 2) непреклонный; 3) строгий
	archaic	[a:'keIk]	архаический, устарелый
	grievance	['grI:v@ns]	1) обида; 2) жалоба
	distinction		1) различие, отличие, разница; 2) индивидуальность; 3) известность; 4) знатность
	sensitive		1) чувствительный;
			2) чуткий; 3) легко поддающийся раздражению
	to dare		сметь, отваживаться, рисковать
	to offend		обижать, оскорблять, задевать
	fierce	[fI@s]	1) сильный, горячий, неистовый; 2) свирепый
	secular	['sekjul@]	1) вековой, вечный; 2) мирской, светский
	to utter		1) произносить; 2) выражать словами; 3) пускать в обращение (особ, фальшивые деньги)
	to utter a lie		солгать
	ancestral	[{'sestr@l]	наследственный, родовой
	inheritance		1) наследство; 2) наследие
	to be supposed to do smth		иметь определенные обязанности сделать что-либо
	reluctance		нежелание, нерасположение
	vital		1) жизненно важный; 2) существенный
	tenuous	['tenju@s]	незначительный, тонкий
	to borrow		1) занимать, брать в долг, заимствовать (средства);
			2)заимствовать (слова, традиции)

Words and Grammar

aWrite out the English equivalents from the text:

раздел 377 Уголовного кодекса............................................................

строгие процедурные требования........................................................

устаревшие законы.................................................................................

экспертная комиссия юристов..............................................................

комиссия, которой поручено пересмотреть........................................

законы штатов........................................................................................

внести закон о свободе информации...................................................

законы гражданского права..................................................................

законодательная система......................................................................

федеральные законы.............................................................................

b Match the English and Russian equivalents:

rigid	строгий
prudish	жизненно важный
sensitive	ханжеский
secular	сильный
vital	незначительный
tenuous	чувствительный
ancestral	родовой

с Add as many nouns as possible to the following adjectives:

archaic.............word, tradition, law, rule, regulation...................................

effective............................................................................................................

irrelevant........................................................................................................

fierce................................................................................................................

former.............................................................................................................

complicated judicial......................................................................................

d Choose the synonyms from the box and write down short examples with them:

to entrust, to promise, to reconsider, to pronounce, to agree, to express, to try, to state .

to vow.................................... to attempt.................................

to overhaul............................ to declare.................................

to utter.................................. to charge..................................

to embody............................. to admit....................................

§ Translating and Speaking

e Translate the following sentences into Russian:

1 Law in India is further complicated by separate regulations for each of its religious groups.

2 The religious groups are each covered by different civil laws.

3 These distinctions are a sensitive legal area.

4 The government dare not touch them for fear of offending religious leaders.

f Sum up what the text said about religious groups and law in India. Say what you think about these figures, showing the percentage of various religious groups in the population of India:

Hindu – 80% Sunni Moslems– 10% Christians – 2.5% Sikh – 2%

The following may be of help:

I never thought...

Is rather strange.

I wonder what the world...means?

I don’t think...is of much importance.

The figures might have changed...

g Find the answers in the text: