Kota double murder case: Two including Reddy brother arrested
Udupi, Feb 14: With the arrest of two more accused including main accused Chandrashekar Reddy (48), the total number of accused arrested in the double murder case of Chikkanakere of Kota Manur village has increased to 15.
Police arrested Chandrashekar Reddy of Manur Chikkanakere who was the main accused in the case, on February 14 and another accused Rathish M Karkera (34) of Brahmagiri was arrested on February 12 near Udupi City hospital, said SP Laxman Nimbargi.
Chandrashekar Reddy was working as a driver and he is the elder brother among Reddy brothers. Already, other main accused and his brothers Rajashekar Reddy (44) and Harish Reddy (40) were arrested. Rathish Karkera who helped the main accused to abscond after the murder. Police have already produced him before the court which handed him over to the judicial custody, he said.
Police have so far arrested Rajashekar Reddy, Medical Ravi, ZP BJP Member Raghavendra Kanchan, Harish Reddy, Mahesh Ganiga, Ravichandra Poojary, police staff Pavan Amin and Veerendra Acharya, Abhishek Palan, Santosh Kunder, Rotti Nagaraj, Student Pranav Rao and Shankar Mogaveera in related to double murder case of Bharat Kumar and Yathish in a toilet pit dispute at Chikkanakere in Manur village on January 26. The police have registered case under IPC column 143, 147, 148, 447, 120 (b), 323, 307, 302, 112, 201, 212 and 149.
All accused to produced to court tomorrow
All arrested accused in the case would be produced before the Kundapura Additional JMFC Court with tight police security on February 15.
As the police custody of Rajashekar Reddy, Medical Ravi, Raghavendra Kanchan, Harish Reddy, Mahesh Ganiga, Ravichandra Poojary, and judicial custody of Pavan Amin, Veerendra Acharya, Abhishek Palan, Santosh Kunder, Rotti Nagaraj, Pranav Rao and Shankar Mogaveera and Rathish Karkera would end on February 15, the police would produce all of them before the court. Sources said that the court may hand over them to the judicial custody.
Chandrashekar Reddy who was arrested today would also be produced before the court tomorrow. Police sources said that whether to take Chandrashekar Reddy to police custody or hand over to judicial custody has to be decided.
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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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