Out-of-form KL Rahul retains his place for last two Tests, Unadkat recalled for ODIs
New Delhi, Feb 19: India opener K L Rahul on Sunday kept his place in the Test team for the remaining two matches of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy as the selectors announced an unchanged squad following the six-wicket win over Australia in Delhi.
With Shubman Gill warming the bench, Rahul's scores so far in the series read 20, 17 and 1. The opener also endured a lean run in Bangladesh last year when he led the side in the two-Test series.
Interestingly, he was the designated vice-captain for the first two Tests against Australia but no deputy to Rohit Sharma has been named for the last two games.
The third Test will be played in Indore from March 1 and the fourth in Ahmedabad from March 9.
Besides naming the Test squad, the four selectors, following the unceremonious exit of selection committee chief Chetan Sharma, also picked the team for the three ODIs against Australia beginning March 17.
Seasoned left-arm seamer Jaydev Unadkat, who was part of the squad for the first two Tests of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy before being released to represent Saurashtra in the Ranji Trophy final against Bengal, is back in the team for the remaining two games.
The Saurashtra skipper also finds himself in the ODI squad for the three-match series against Australia. He last played an ODI back in 2013, but the selectors have shown faith in the veteran, highlighting the lack of quality left-arm pacers in the country.
The much younger Arshdeep Singh was tried in ODIs recently but has not made the cut for the Australia series.
Star speedster Jasprit Bumrah, who has been out of action at the international level since September 2022 due to back issues and missed the T20 World Cup, Bangladesh tour and the home series versus Sri Lanka and New Zealand, is not part of either the Test or the ODI team. He is likely to make a comeback in the IPL beginning March 31.
The BCCI release also stated that Rohit will be unavailable for the first ODI due to family commitments and Hardik Pandya will lead the side in his absence.
As far as the out-of-form Rahul is concerned, head coach Rahul Dravid said that the team management would like to give him a longer run.
Following the win at Kotla on Sunday, skipper Rohit also backed the under-fire Rahul.
"Of late, there has been lot of talk on his batting. But for us as team management, we always look at the potential of any individual, not just KL. I have been asked in the past about lot of players. If a guy has potential, guys will get that extended run," Rohit said.
"It is not just about KL, but anyone. If you look at couple of hundreds, he got outside India (England 2021 and SA 2022), one of the best I have seen from KL, especially the one at the Lord's," he added.
From the last ODI squad picked for the New Zealand series, Shahbaz Ahmed and K S Bharat are the expected omissions.
Ishan Kishan is the designated wicket-keeper in the 50-over squad and not Rahul, as per the BCCI release.
India's Test squad for third and fourth Test against Australia: Rohit Sharma (captain), KL Rahul, Shubman Gill, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, KS Bharat (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), Ravichandran Ashwin, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohd. Shami, Mohd. Siraj, Shreyas Iyer, Suryakumar Yadav, Umesh Yadav, Jaydev Unadkat.
India's ODI squad for series against Australia: Rohit Sharma (captain), Shubman Gill, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Suryakumar Yadav, K L Rahul, Ishan Kishan (wk), Hardik Pandya (Vice-captain), Ravindra Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav, Washington Sundar, Yuzvendra Chahal, Mohd. Shami, Mohd. Siraj, Umran Malik, Shardul Thakur, Axar Patel, Jaydev Unadkat.
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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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