Following World War II, the United States of America anointed itself the leader of the free world, committed to planting the flag of democracy globally. Much of this global positioning was facilitated by a celebration of its constitution. The constitution, though written in dense legal prose, enshrined the concepts of liberty, equality and freedom. Nourished by a powerful Supreme Court and gushing popular culture portrayals, it became the global gold standard for constitutional documents. Oil producers and refineries exporting downstream products have had a good run this year. Consequently, tax on them to capture a part of the windfall gains. The levy of indirect in the form of chess on domestic crude production sold at import parity prices, and on export of petrol, diesel and aviation turbine fuel will accrue entirely to GoI. This is because a chess is not part of the divisible pool of taxes that has to be shared with states. Last week, the GST Council had a two day meeting where steps to reform the structure of the indirect tax by closing some exemptions and correcting inverted duties were approved. Its a welcome move. has withstood stress tests in 2020 when the economy contracted. It withstood the challenge and its resilience is now beyond question. However remains a work in progress. For example, the Council needs to extend to important economic inputs currently outside its purview. Notably, petroleum products and electricity. One of the aims of is to improve Indians economic competitiveness by removing the cascading impact of taxes. Keeping petroleum and electricity outside will not help us realise this goal as input tax credit is unavailable when they are used in economic activity. afeguarding against double jeopardy, and also an judgment that subjecting an individual to numerous proceedings on the basis of the same cause is violative of fundamental rights, the clubbing of multiple into one jurisdiction is yet to become a procedural commonplace. Nupur Sharma is just the latest to experience this. In a much more widespread malaise, the elemental concept of bail not jail has yet to be internalised by the judicial labyrinth. On the transparency front, judicial appointments themselves present the most glaring gaps. In a strongly worded minority opinion when struck down the Justice Chelameswar had written that transparency is an aspect of rationality and the need for transparency is more in the case of appointment process. The judgment too had underlined the need to enhance the collegiums transparency. And yet, great opacity still persists in appointments, as also in case listing. Constitutional matters like challenges to the nullification of Article 370 sit delayed before multi judge benches, with poor explanation. These are challenges that are very much within the judiciarys domain to address. It can do a far better job of keeping faith with the Constitution, plus the citizens and their civil liberties. Last weeks Bricks summit was bookended by some excitement over the possibility of the group expanding by accepting new members and reports that Argentina and Iran had applied for membership. What this obscures, is the fact that amid the evolving geopolitical situation, the Bricks mechanism appears to be undergoing an identity crisis. There is a deepening contradiction at the heart of