Vice President Venkaiah Naidu invokes Nehru in Serbian parliament
Belgrade, Sep 16: Observing that the Indian parliament has evolved as a democratic forum that listens and responds to diverse concerns, Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu has invoked first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in the Serbian parliament to highlight the importance of democracy for participatory development.
On the occasion of International Day of Democracy, Naidu on Saturday addressed the special session of the National Assembly of Serbia wherein he recalled the shared vision with which leaders of both the countries played a key role in launching the Non Aligned Movement (NAM).
"Our ties started on a strong foundation of a shared global view of Non-Aligned Movement and we together created a large platform for the third world. The changes in global geo-politics now again give us an opportunity to work together for mutual benefit and for sharing prosperity with others," said Naidu addressing Serbian lawmakers.
Recalling Nehru's 1961 address at Conference of Non-Aligned nations in Belgrade, Naidu said: "His call which rings so true and relevant even today was to build in our own countries societies where freedom is real.
"Freedom is essential, because freedom will give us strength and enable us to build prosperous societies," he said quoting Nehru and added: "We must strive to strengthen our democratic polities and internalize the concepts of freedom, dialogue, inclusion and rule of law in our governance structures."
Giving an detailed account of the growth and consolidation of parliamentary democracy in India, Naidu said the Indian parliament has "evolved as a democratic forum that attentively listens to complex voices from different parts of the vast country and responds to diverse concerns with agility".
The Vice President also had detailed discussions with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and Prime Minister Ana Brnabic on various bilateral and multilateral issues.
He gave a detailed account of India's progress in various fields including an enabling, predictable and reform oriented financial and investment eco-systems offering mutually beneficial partnerships.
Voicing concerns over the menace of terrorism, he called for early finalisation of draft Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT).
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
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.”
_vb_22.jpeg)
