India, Kazakhstan agree to boost trade, defence cooperation
Astana, Aug 3: India and Kazakhstan agreed to strengthen cooperation in the areas of trade and defence and security following delegation-level talks headed by Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Kazakh Foreign Minister Kairat Abdrakhmanov here on Friday.
"We covered the full range of bilateral, regional and global issues of mutual interest," Sushma Swaraj said while addressing the media following the meeting.
"We took stock of progress in our bilateral relations," she said.
Noting that both India and Kazakhstan have developed multifaceted cooperation in all areas of bilateral and multilateral relations and are strategic partners since 2009, she said New Delhi seeks to consolidate and further strengthen its friendly relations with the Central Asian nation.
"I discussed with Foreign Minister Abdrakhmanov our interest to partner with Kazakhstan to explore markets for new products, diversifying from the trade in traditional products to inject fresh impetus to the trade between the two countries," Sushma Swaraj said.
"There is immense potential to be tapped in sectors like agricultural products, food processing, pharmaceuticals, energy and chemicals."
Kazakhstan is India's largest trade and investment partner in Central Asia. Bilateral trade between the two countries stood at $642.42 million in 2016-17.
Cumulative investments from India into Kazakhstan and from Kazakhstan to India from 2005 to 2016 amounted to $244 million and $83.09 million respectively, according to figures provided by the Indian External Affairs Ministry.
Sushma Swaraj also said that India has keen interest in improving connectivity with the Central Asian region.
"In December 2017, India acceded to TIR convention and in February 2018, India joined the Ashgabat Agreement," she said.
"The International North South Transport Corridor (INSTC) is gaining momentum and the member states are working together to popularise the corridor."
The Transports Internationaux Routiers (TIR) Convention is a multilateral treaty that seeks to simplify and harmonise the administrative formalities of international transport.
The Ashgabat Agreement is a multimodal transport agreement between India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Oman, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
Sushma Swaraj also said that she and Abdrakhmanov expressed their interest to further strengthen defence cooperation between the two sides "based on solid foundation that we have in place".
"Our defence and security sector cooperation has intensified in the last two years," she said.
"Kazakh Armed Forces Unit underwent training on peacekeeping operations in India and presently a mobile training team from the Indian Army is training Kazakh personnel in Almaty."
Pointing out that both countries have growing cooperation in capacity building, Sushma Swaraj said: "Kazakhstan's professionals and students have been attending courses on scholarships in India every year under ICCR (Indian Council for Cultural Relations) and ITEC (Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation) programme in a wide range of disciplines."
She also stressed on enhancing people-to-people contact and promoting tourism between the two countries.
Following the delegation-level talks, Sushma Swaraj called on Kazakh Prime Minister Bakytzhan Sagintayev.
"Good exchange of views on strengthening cooperation in trade and investment, ICT, joint film production, tourism and people-to-people contacts," Indian External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar tweeted following the meeting.
Sushma Swaraj arrived here on Thursday on the first leg of her three-nation Central Asian tour that will also see her visiting Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan.
She interacted with members of the around 7,000-strong Indian community in Kazakhstan soon after her arrival.
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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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