Karnataka govt revises COVID protocol for travellers from Kerala
Bengaluru, Sep 2: The Karnataka government has revised its COVID-19 protocol for people coming from Kerala, exempting a set of people from mandatory seven days institutional quarantine.
It had earlier stated that all those coming from Kerala have to be under institutional quarantine for seven days in view of the alarming rise in COVID cases.
The revised protocol exempted constitutional functionaries, healthcare professionals and their spouses from institutional quarantine.
Apart from them, children below two years, people in dire emergency situation such as death in the family or medical treatment, short term travellers (within three days), students arriving to Karnataka for examination along with one parent each and go back within three days and passengers in transit from and to Kerala via any mode of transport have been exempted, the order said.
According to the government order, all students and employees should compulsorily bring negative RT-PCR certificate that is not older than 72 hours irrespective of their COVID-19 vaccination status. It clarified that the validity of such certificates is for one week.
Meanwhile, state Health Minister Dr K Sudhakar said the situation in Kerala was "scary."
"We are scared of the prevailing situation in Kerala. The number of COVID patients is not reducing. Yesterday also more than 30,000 people were tested positive for COVID-19," Sudhakar told reporters in Bengaluru on Thursday.
He also said that the situation had prompted the Karnataka government to make institutional quarantine mandatory for those coming from Kerala.
"Students appearing for the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) have complained that institutional quarantine for a week will affect them. Hence, keeping in view the academic future of the students, the government has directed the centres and institutions to arrange for institutional quarantine," Sudhakar said.
He further said the employers will have to make arrangement for institutional quarantine of their staff.
Others coming here will be home quarantined, he explained.
The Karnataka government had earlier made it mandatory for everyone coming from Kerala to get quarantined for a week even if they possess a negative RT-PCR report or have taken the COVID-19 vaccine.
These measures were taken in view of the alarming rise in COVID cases in the neighbouring Kerala which reported 32,803 new COVID-19 cases and 173 deaths on Wednesday.
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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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