Right to Life Under Constitution May be Interpreted to Include Right to Food: SC

New Delhi: Taking note of basic global concept on food security, the Supreme Court Tuesday said in that the absence of explicit provision for it, the fundamental right to life under Article 21 of the Constitution may be interpreted to include the right to live with human dignity, having the right to food and other basic necessities.

“The Right to Life as guaranteed by Article 21...gives the right to every human being to live a life of dignity with access to at-least bare necessities of life. To provide food security to impoverished persons is the bounden duty of all States and Governments,” the top court observed while issuing a slew of directions on a plea of three activists.

The activists -- Anjali Bharadwaj, Harsh Mander and Jagdeep Chhokar -- had sought implementation of welfare measures for migrant workers who faced distress again due to curfews and lockdowns in various parts of the country during the second wave of COVID-19.

“There has been worldwide awareness regarding the right to food for human beings. Our country is no exception. Lately, all Governments have been taking steps and taking measures to ensure that no human being should be affected by hunger and no one dies out of hunger. The basic concept of food security globally is to ensure that all people, at all times, should get access to the basic food for their active and healthy life.

"The Constitution of India does not have any explicit provision regarding the right to food. The fundamental right to life enshrined in Article 21 of the Constitution may be interpreted to include the right to live with human dignity, which may include the right to food and other basic necessities,” held a bench of justices Ashok Bhushan and M R Shah.

The top court, in its 80-page judgement, referred to the National Statistics Office (NSO) data of 2017-2018 and said there are around 38 crore workers engaged in the unorganised sectors and to provide food security to them is the duty of the government.

“Thus, the number of persons in the unorganized sector is more than 1/4th population of the entire country. These unorganized workers did not have any permanent source of employment and have engaged themselves in small time vocations and occupations at various places away from their native places. Contributions of these labourers towards different projects, industries, make considerable additions in the economic development of the country,” it said.

The Constitution enjoins that the control of resources of the community are for promoting welfare of people by securing social and economic justice to the weaker section, it said.

It acknowledged the fact that migrant workers had been exposed to financial and other hardships during the pandemic due to their limited access and claim to the welfare resources offered by states and union territories (UTs).

”When migrant labourers form more than 1/4th population of the country, all Governments or authorities have to take special care regarding welfare of these migrant workers/labourers. The Parliament has enacted various legislations to safeguard the interest and welfare of the migrant labourers, which we shall notice hereinafter,” it said.

Holding that states are duty-bound to provide food security to poor people, the bench said Parliament with an objective to provide such a security had enacted the National Food Security Act, 2013.

“The Central Government may undertake exercise under Section 9 of the National Food Security Act, 2013 to re-determine the total number of persons to be covered under the Rural and Urban areas of the State,” the top court said in the judgement.

Right to Food Campaign Hails Order

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The Right to Food Campaign (RFC) on Tuesday hailed the  Supreme Court’s order directing the government to continue making provision of dry grains and cooked food through community kitchens  till the pandemic.

“This is significant as there is deep economic distress in the country and one time relief is woefully inadequate,” said RFC in a press statement.

 “Recognising that migrant workers are often excluded from the ambit of the food security net under the National Food Security Act, the Supreme Court has directed all state governments to formulate schemes to provide rations to migrant workers who do not possess ration cards. The court has directed the central government to allocate dry grains to states for the purpose of the schemes,” the statement read.

Read the full statement below:

Welcome Supreme Court’s direction to give rations to migrant workers and revise state-wise coverage of food security net under NFSA T

he Right to Food campaign welcomes the judgement of the Supreme Court in the migrant workers case. Recognising that migrant workers are often excluded from the ambit of the food security net under the National Food Security Act, the Supreme Court has directed all state governments to formulate schemes to provide rations to migrant workers who do not possess ration cards. The court has directed the central government to allocate dry grains to states for the purpose of the schemes. The Supreme Court has directed that provision of dry grains and cooked food through community kitchens must continue till the pandemic. This is significant as there is deep economic distress in the country and one time relief is woefully inadequate.

The Supreme Court also took cognizance of the fact that the state wise coverage of PDS under the NFSA was determined on the basis of the 2011 census and has not been revised since then leading to exclusion of many persons in need. The court has directed the central government to revisit the state wise coverage. This is crucial to ensure food security in this time of unprecedented distress and the Right to Food Campaign urges the central government to immediately revise the allocations and coverage as per the latest available population projections.

Given that the Census 2021 is likely to be delayed on account of the pandemic, the government can immediately revise coverage on the basis of the population projections and when the final census figures are available it can be adjusted appropriately. Therefore, only by doing this about 100 million people will be added. Continued exclusion of people on account of the delay in census is absolutely unacceptable given the crisis in the country.

On the issue of one nation one ration (ONOR) while the RTFC is in agreement on the need for portability of all social welfare schemes, however its reliance on Aadhaar-based biometric authentication, of which there is documented exclusion, is problematic. The lack of cohesive overrides when biometric authentication fails exacerbates the distress of the poor as they are unable to access their ration entitlements.

Universal public distribution system is the need of the hour as crores of people have slipped into poverty on account of the economic recession. The directions on time bound registration of migrant workers and workers in the informal sector are much needed as the government has been dragging its feet on the issue.

The court has noted the lackadaisical approach of the concerned ministry in this regard. Lockdown restrictions put in place to curb the pandemic since last year have caused unprecedented distress among people and the relief packages by the central and state governments have been rather inadequate to address the deep nature of the crisis. Therefore, these orders given by the Supreme Court need to be implemented as soon as possible as they can provide some relief.

Along with this, there is a need to revive ICDS, Mid-day Meal and universalise PDS by the government. The Right to Food Campaign will extensively push for effective implementation of these directions with state governments and will strengthen its campaigns on the ground.