Vishnu Sarvanan wins bronze; sailors end campaign with one silver, two bronze medals
Ningbo (PTI): Indian sailor Vishnu Sarvanan won a bronze, the country's first-ever medal in the men's dinghy ILCA-7 event at the Asian Games here on Wednesday.
Sarvanan finished with a net score of 34 points to miss the silver medal by just one point in the gruelling 11-race competition.
South Korea's Jeemin HA took the second spot with 33 points. Singapore's Jun Han Ryan Lo claimed the gold with a net score of 26.
Lack of wind, however, denied India a medal in women's single dinghy ILCA-6 event where Nethra Kumanan had to settle for a disappointing fourth place finish after race No 12, which was to be the final one in the category, was cancelled.
After the penultimate race, Nethra (41 net points) was three points behind Singapore's Jing Hua Victoria Chan (38).
But she eventually failed to secure a podium finish as race 12 could not be held and the event was cancelled.
Nevertheless, the Indian sailors matched their 2018 Asian Games feat of one silver and two bronze medals here.
Earlier on Tuesday, 17-year-old Neha Thakur grabbed a silver, while Eabad Ali claimed a bronze, India's first-ever medal in the men's windsurfer RS:X event.
In sailing, the competitor's worst score (which is equivalent to their respective positions) from all the races is subtracted from the total points to determine the net score.
The one with the lowest net score is adjudged the winner.
Sarvanan had a total score of 48 and his worst race was No. 8, where he finished last in the 13-competitor field after retiring because of a technical foul.
So, he ended up with 14 points with the addition of one penalty-point in race No 8.
Sarvanan, thus, finished with 34 net points by subtracting 14 points from his overall score of 48, just one-point behind Jeemin, who took the silver.
A reigning National champion since 2017, Sarvanan finished second as the second-best Asian at the Tokyo Olympics by virtue of his 20/25 overall finish.
Sarvanan, who learnt sailing under his father's guidance at the age of nine at Army Yachting Node in Mumbai, won a silver in the 2019 Under-21 World Championships in Croatia.
He also won a silver in 2021 Olympic Qualifiers Asian Championships.
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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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