Russell, Rana help KKR survive Klaasen fury for thrilling four-run win over SRH
Kolkata, Mar 23: Harshit Rana's resilience in the final over and Andre Russel's muscling fifty helped Kolkata Knight Riders survive Heinrich Klaasen's six-hitting spree and score a thrilling four-run victory over Sunrisers Hyderabad in their IPL match here on Saturday.
Klaassen almost turned the match on its head with a 29-ball 63 in which he moussed eight sixes without a single four.
But SRH bravely chased KKR's imposing 208/7, which was built around Russell's (64, 25b) and Phil Salt's 54 (40b), but could only make 204 for seven.
The South African took IPL's costliest buy Mitchell Starc to cleaners smashing him for three sixes, while Bengal cricketer Shahbaz Ahmed ended the Aussie left-arm quick's over with another six.
That 26-run over meant Starc, who joined the Knight Riders for a record Rs 24.75 crore, finished with woeful figures of 4-0-53-0.
Needing 13 off the last over, KKR gambled with rookie pacer Rana as he was hammered for seven runs off the first two balls.
But first he dismissed Shahabaz and then Klaassen off his penultimate delivery, which came through a superb backward diving catch by Suyash Sharma, to give the local side a fantastic win.
The Hyderabad outfit needed five runs off the last ball but skipper Pat Cummins failed to connect the ball, as Rana finished with fine figures (3/33).
Chasing the imposing target on a beautiful batting deck at Eden Gardens, Hyderabad found themselves at 145/5, needing 61 runs from 19 balls before Klaasen came in.
Earlier, openers Mayank Agarwal and Abhishek Sharma, who both scored identical 32, gave SRH a perfect start.
The duo made 60 runs in 33 balls before Agarwal was dismissed by Rana.
Before Rana got into the act, KKR's trump card Narine dished out his sorcery. The West Indian bowled from seventh to 13th over, and gave away just 19 runs in four overs.
He took only one wicket but stifled SRH's progress in the middle-overs.
However, KKR's fielding was an eyesore. Varun Chakravarthy's fitness was always a concern and it came to fore when he dropped a dolly to deprive Narine the wicket of Rahul Tripathi.
The former KKR batter got another reprieve in the next over and this time impact player Suyash failed to hold on to a return catch.
It would have been a boundary, but umpire Yeshwant Barde got in the way of the ball, leaving him grounded.
Earlier, Salt got third IPL fifty in just 38 balls before being dismissed by Mayank Markande (2/39).
The Englishman made 54 off 40 after Narine (2), Venkatesh Iyer (7), Shreyas Iyer (0) and Nitish Rana (9) fell cheaply with pacer T Natarajan (3/32) making early dents.
But KKR had the Dre Russ' power in their ranks.
Russell teed off against Markande when he launched the SRH leg-spinner deep into the stands -- three sixes in five balls.
Markande for a moment thought that he had the last laugh when Aiden Markram took a blinder at long-on but replays showed he grounded the forward diving catch, giving Russell a breather on 20.
The warning signs were on for SRH and the Jamaican went ballistic in Bhuvneshwar Kumar's penultimate over hitting him for two fours and two sixes, taking 26 runs.
Rinku Singh, at the other end, made a 15-ball 23 as the duo put together 81 runs from 33 balls as Kolkata scored 85 runs in the last five overs.
However, credit should also go to Salt and Ramandeep Singh.
Salt remained firm despite early wickets and got handy support from debutant Ramandeep who quickly ran off the blocks in an entertaining 54-run partnership.
Ramandeep slammed Cummins for a boundary and then pulled a short one for a six.
He also hit Markande and Marco Jansen and Shahbaz Ahmed for three more sixes in his 17-ball 35 before being dismissed by Cummins.
The partnership set the tone for the final assault by Russell and Rinku.
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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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