SP leader Azam Khan gets three-year jail in 2019 hate speech case
Bareilly (UP), Oct 27: A Rampur court on Thursday sentenced Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan to three years in jail in a 2019 hate speech case, a government lawyer said.
However, the court granted bail to the Rampur MLA, allowing him time to file an appeal in a higher court.
The MP/MLA court also imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on Khan, advocate Ajay Tiwari said.
The case was registered against Khan in Rampur in April 2019 for levelling serious allegations against administrative officials posted in Rampur and Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath during an election meeting.
The Special MP/MLA court of Rampur found Khan guilty under Section 153-A (inciting religious feelings), 505-A (giving false statement intended to create feelings of enmity, hatred or animosity between different communities) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Section 125 (promoting animosity between different classes in connection with elections) of the Representation of the People Act. The court sentenced him to three years imprisonment and imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on him, government advocate Ajay Tiwari said.
During the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Khan was booked for making inflammatory speeches while addressing a public meeting in Khatanagaria village of Milak Kotwali area.
The video of Khan's statement also went viral.
Emerging out of the court after the verdict, Khan in his first comments said bail is a mandatory provision of the law.
"I have firm belief in justice," he told reporters.
Khan was released from jail earlier this year after the Supreme Court granted him interim bail in a cheating case.
He spent nearly two years in jail.
The Samajwadi Party leader faces nearly 90 cases, including that of corruption and theft.
The veteran SP leader had won from Rampur Sadar assembly seat in the recent UP Assembly polls for a record 10th time.
After becoming MLA, he resigned as Lok Sabha MP from Rampur which he had won in the 2019 election.
Heavy security deployment was made outside the Rampur court as well as in Rampur keeping in view the court hearing.
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Single higher education regulator bill tabled in LS; Oppn flags ‘centralisation,' JPC likely
New Delhi: A bill to set up a 13-member body to regulate institutions of higher education was introduced in the Lok Sabha on Monday.
Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan introduced the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, which seeks to establish an overarching higher education commission along with three councils for regulation, accreditation, and ensuring academic standards for universities and higher education institutions in India.
Meanwhile, the move drew strong opposition, with members warning that it could weaken institutional autonomy and result in excessive centralisation of higher education in India.
The Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025, earlier known as the Higher Education Council of India (HECI) Bill, has been introduced in line with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020.
The proposed legislation seeks to merge three existing regulatory bodies, the University Grants Commission (UGC), the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), and the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE), into a single unified body called the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan.
At present, the UGC regulates non-technical higher education institutions, the AICTE oversees technical education, and the NCTE governs teacher education in India.
Under the proposed framework, the new commission will function through three separate councils responsible for regulation, accreditation, and the maintenance of academic standards across universities and higher education institutions in the country.
According to the Bill, the present challenges faced by higher educational institutions due to the multiplicity of regulators having non-harmonised regulatory approval protocols will be done away with.
The higher education commission, which will be headed by a chairperson appointed by the President of India, will cover all central universities and colleges under it, institutes of national importance functioning under the administrative purview of the Ministry of Education, including IITs, NITs, IISc, IISERs, IIMs, and IIITs.
At present, IITs and IIMs are not regulated by the University Grants Commission (UGC).
Government to refer bill to JPC; Oppn slams it
The government has expressed its willingness to refer it to a joint committee after several members of the Lok Sabha expressed strong opposition to the Bill, stating that they were not given time to study its provisions.
Responding to the opposition, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said the government intends to refer the Bill to a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) for detailed examination.
Congress Lok Sabha MP Manish Tewari warned that the Bill could result in “excessive centralisation” of higher education. He argued that the proposed law violates the constitutional division of legislative powers between the Union and the states.
According to him, the Bill goes beyond setting academic standards and intrudes into areas such as administration, affiliation, and the establishment and closure of university campuses. These matters, he said, fall under Entry 25 of the Concurrent List and Entry 32 of the State List, which cover the incorporation and regulation of state universities.
Tewari further stated that the Bill suffers from “excessive delegation of legislative power” to the proposed commission. He pointed out that crucial aspects such as accreditation frameworks, degree-granting powers, penalties, institutional autonomy, and even the supersession of institutions are left to be decided through rules, regulations, and executive directions. He argued that this amounts to a violation of established constitutional principles governing delegated legislation.
Under the Bill, the regulatory council will have the power to impose heavy penalties on higher education institutions for violating provisions of the Act or related rules. Penalties range from ₹10 lakh to ₹75 lakh for repeated violations, while establishing an institution without approval from the commission or the state government could attract a fine of up to ₹2 crore.
Concerns were also raised by members from southern states over the Hindi nomenclature of the Bill. N.K. Premachandran, an MP from the Revolutionary Socialist Party representing Kollam in Kerala, said even the name of the Bill was difficult to pronounce.
He pointed out that under Article 348 of the Constitution, the text of any Bill introduced in Parliament must be in English unless Parliament decides otherwise.
DMK MP T.M. Selvaganapathy also criticised the government for naming laws and schemes only in Hindi. He said the Constitution clearly mandates that the nomenclature of a Bill should be in English so that citizens across the country can understand its intent.
Congress MP S. Jothimani from Tamil Nadu’s Karur constituency described the Bill as another attempt to impose Hindi and termed it “an attack on federalism.”
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