Bantwal : Police accused of harassing youth attacked by a group
PSI Prasanna denies any assault or harassment
“Victim was taken to police station from hospital and assaulted”
Mangaluru, June 20: Police were accused of assaulting a youth, who was undergoing treatment at a hospital after being attacked by a group of people at Amai in Bantwal, after taking him to the police station from the hospital.
The victim is identified as auto driver Abdur Rehman (28) of Puriya in Bantwal taluk.
When Rehman was coming from Vittla on June 18, the fuel of his auto was empty and while he was going to a petrol station to bring petrol, a group of people who were discussing something among themselves, enquired Rehman and insulted him with foul language before assaulting him. Sometime later, a few others came and attacked him, he alleged.
Local people admitted Rehman to the hospital on the same day. Puttur town police station police personnel who came to hospital for collecting information, took him to the police station at around 7 pm without any information to the hospital. After forcing him to sit in the Puttur town police station for some time, he was taken to Bantwal police station in a jeep, he said.
While coming on the jeep, the police assaulted him on his cheek and ears. Even after bringing him to Bantwal police station, he was harassed till 12 am and beaten him up. Because of the assault, he was suffering pain in his legs and hands and he could not listen anything, he alleged.
Responding to the incident, Ashraf, brother of Rehman, said that they were not informed about taking Rehman to the police station from the Puttur government hospital. On June 19, the police called him and said his brother is in police station. Later, he was released on bail. On the same day, as Rehman was unable to walk and listen, he was admitted to a private hospital, he said.
Rehman urged the police to take legal action against the accused Kadeshalya gram panchayat member Sanath and Manoj of Perna village. Along with other accused, Sanath had come to Rehman’s house and threatened him. When Rehman’s sister had been to the police station to lodge a complaint, she was made to wait till 12 midnight in the police station, Ashraf said.
PSI denies any assault
Incident happened between two groups. Case was booked as per the information they have collected. One person was arrested and produced before the court related to this incident. But he was released on bail. He was brought to Bantwal police station and interrogated. But he was neither assaulted nor harassed. He was produced in the open court and if he was assaulted, he could have told this before the judge. Now he is making allegation.
PSI Prasanna, Bantwal rural police station
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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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