Sri Lankan Navy rejects reports of conducting war games with Pakistan
Colombo (PTI): The Sri Lankan Navy on Sunday rejected as "fallacious" media reports that it will hold war games with a Pakistani warship docked at the Colombo port but confirmed that it will hold a "Passage Exercise" in the western seas with PNS Taimur as it leaves the island nation.
The docking of Pakistan's newly-commissioned Chinese-built frigate at the Colombo port on Friday came amid Sri Lankan government allowing a high-tech Chinese research ship to visit the southern port of Hambantota from August 16 till 22 for "replenishment purposes," despite India's concern over the vessel's presence in its neighbourhood.
Sri Lanka allowed PNS Taimur to make a port call in Colombo while on its way to join the Pakistan Navy fleet after the Bangladesh government denied it permission to dock at Chattogram Port.
The Sri Lankan Navy in a statement on Sunday said the Pakistan Navy Ship (PNS) Taimur, which arrived in Sri Lanka on Friday on a formal visit, is scheduled to conduct a Passage Exercise with SLNS Sindurala in seas off Colombo as she departs the island nation on August 15 upon completion of her visit.
"In this backdrop, certain media reports circulating about a War Game' between Sri Lanka Navy and Pakistan Navy are fallacious," the release said.
It said that the Sri Lanka Navy, with the concurrence of foreign navies, conducts Passage Exercises as a routine engagement when their visiting naval ships departing the island after making official port calls.
"The prime motive of these efforts is to enhance interoperability, partnerships and goodwill as well as exchange best practices with foreign navies," it said.
It said the Sri Lankan Navy had conducted similar Passage Exercises with the navies of countries such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Japan, Germany, UK, Russia and Australia on a number of previous occasions.
Conducting similar naval exercises with regional and extra-regional navies will enable each partner to overcome common maritime challenges in the future, through enhanced cooperation. In addition, such engagements will also be vital for its own maritime operations of the Sri Lanka Navy," the statement said.
PNS Taimur is the second of four powerful Type 054A/P frigates built by China. It was delivered to the Pakistan Navy in Shanghai on June 23. The first ship in the Type 054A/P-class, the PNS Tughril, joined the Pakistan Navy Fleet in January. Two more frigates of the same class are currently under construction in China.
PNS Taimur took part in exercises in Malaysia and Cambodia along its journey to Karachi. The 134m-long ship is a technologically advanced and highly capable sea asset having hi-tech weapons and sensors, the latest combat management and electronic warfare system to fight under multi-threat environments.
The Sri Lankan government on Saturday said that it has allowed Chinese ballistic missile and satellite tracking ship, 'Yuan Wang 5', to dock at the southern port of Hambantota from August 16 till 22 for "replenishment purposes," days after Colombo asked Beijing to defer the portcall amidst India's concern over the vessel's presence in its neighbourhood.
The Chinese research ship was earlier scheduled to arrive on Thursday and remain at the port until August 17 for replenishment. However, the Sri Lankan foreign ministry requested the Chinese embassy here to postpone the vessel's visit following security concerns raised by India. Subsequently, the vessel did not dock at the Hambantota port on Thursday as planned.
The southern deep-sea port of Hambantota is considered strategically important for its location. The port has been developed largely with Chinese loans. India has said it carefully monitors any development having a bearing on its security and economic interests.
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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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