Ebadot Hossain stars as Bangladesh beats New Zealand by 8 wickets
Mount Maunganui (New Zealand) (AP): Fast bowler Ebadot Hossain took a career-best 6-46 as Bangladesh beat World Test Champion New Zealand by eight wickets in the first cricket test Wednesday, capturing its first-ever win in New Zealand.
Ebadot had bowled Bangladesh to the brink of a famous victory by the end of the fourth day when he had figures of 4-39. He broke down the last of New Zealand's resistance with two quick wickets as the home team was dismissed in its second innings for 169, its lowest score against Bangladesh.
New Zealand trailed by 130 runs on the first innings, leaving Bangladesh to score only 40 for victory. It lost two wickets in doing so but current captain Mominul Haque, top-scorer in the first innings, and former captain Mushfiqur Rahim were at the crease when Bangladesh reached 42-2.
It was only Bangladesh's sixth test win away from home and its first test win over a team ranked in the top 5 ranked team: New Zealand is ranked No. 2 and Bangladesh No. 9. The result also brought to an end New Zealand's unbeaten streak in its last 17 tests at home.
Ebadot, a former volleyball player who became a test cricketer after winning a fast bowling competition, had only 11 test wickets at an average of 81 when he came into this match as Bangladesh's third seamer.
He took 1-75 in New Zealand's first innings of 328 but came into his own in the second innings, running through the middle order on Tuesday with the wickets of Devon Conway (13), Henry Nicholls (0), Tom Blundell (0) and Will Young (69). That left New Zealand 147-5 at the start of play Wednesday, only 17 ahead of Bangladesh.
The possibility of any stern resistance by New Zealand, marshaled around veteran batsman Ross Taylor who was 37 not out when play began, quickly dissolved, thanks to Ebadot.
The tall right-armer, who snaps to attention and salutes when he takes a wicket, saluted twice when he bowled Taylor for 40. Then he dismissed Kyle Jamieson to leave New Zealand 160-7. Shoriful pulled off a brilliant diving catch at mid-wicket to complete the second dismissal.
Taskin Ahmed then stepped in to help wrap up the New Zealand innings. He removed the other overnight batsman, allrounder Rachin Ravindra, for 16. Ravindra had edged a delivery from Ebadot between first slip and the wicketkeeper but this time the edge carried finer to keeper Liton Das.
Taskin bowled Tim Southee (0) and Mehidy Hasan Miraz finished it off with the wicket of Trent Boult, who was brilliantly caught at deep mid-wicket by the substitute Taijul Islam.
It's a long story, volleyball player to test cricketer, Ebadot said. But I'm a soldier of the Bangladesh Air Force and I know how to salute.
On New Zealand soil over the last 11 years our brothers and our teams didn't get any wins. But when we came to New Zealand we set a goal. We raised our hands and said Yes, we have to do it and we can do it on New Zealand soil.'
New Zealand are test champions so if we raise our hands and beat New Zealand on New Zealand soil our next generation will be able to beat them too.
Ebadot credits Bangladesh's West Indies-born bowling coach Ottis Gibson for his transformation as a fast bowler, for urging him to pitch the ball up on off stump. That was the key to Bangladesh's bowling success on the a docile pitch at Bay Oval, where New Zealand's shorter lengths were unsuccessful.
We were short in all three facets, New Zealand captain Tom Latham said.
Bangladesh showed us how to go about things on that wicket. They were able to build partnerships, to bowl well from both ends and build pressure and unfortunately we weren't able to do it for long enough.
The second test begins at Christchurch on Sunday. (AP)
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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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