World War II spy first Indian-origin woman to get memorial plaque in London
London: Britain's World War II spy, Noor Inayat Khan, on Friday became the first Indian-origin woman to be honoured with a memorial Blue Plaque at her former family home in central London.
The Blue Plaque scheme, run by the English Heritage charity, honours notable people and organisations who were connected with particular buildings across London.
Khan's plaque has gone up at 4 Taviton Street in Bloomsbury, where she lived before she left for Nazi-occupied France in 1943 as an undercover radio operator for Britain's Special Operations Executive (SOE).
Noor, the daughter of Indian Sufi saint Hazrat Inayat Khan and a descendant of the 18th century Mysore ruler Tipu Sultan, went on to be killed at Dachau concentration camp in 1944, having revealed nothing to her captors, not even her real name.
"When Noor Inayat Khan left this house on her last mission, she would never have dreamed that one day she would become a symbol of bravery, said Shrabani Basu, historian and author of Spy Princess: The Life of Noor Inayat Khan'.
She was an unlikely spy. As a Sufi she believed in non-violence and religious harmony. Yet when her adopted country needed her, she unhesitatingly gave her life in the fight against Fascism, said Basu, who formally unveiled the commemorative plaque in a small ceremony to be broadcast on social media, given the coronavirus social distancing requirements.
It is fitting that Noor Inayat Khan is the first woman of Indian-origin to be remembered with a Blue Plaque. As people walk by, Noor's story will continue to inspire future generations. In today's world, her vision of unity and freedom is more important than ever, added Basu, who is also founder-chair of the Noor Inayat Khan Memorial Trust (NIKMT), which installed a sculpture of Noor in nearby Gordon Square in 2012.
The SOE was an independent British Secret Service set up by Britain's war-time Prime Minister Winston Churchill in 1940 and Noor became its first female radio operator sent into Nazi-occupied France. She was posthumously awarded the George Cross (GC) for her bravery in 1949.
Anna Eavis, Curatorial Director at English Heritage, said: We're so pleased to be able to continue unveiling our 2020 blue plaques with this virtual ceremony after a very quiet few months.
"I am particularly delighted to start with Noor Inayat Khan, whose courage was unfaltering even in the face of such extreme danger. The new plaque reads: Noor Inayat Khan GC, 1914-1944, SOE Agent codename Madeleine' stayed here .
Mahatma Gandhi and B R Ambedkar are among some of the other Indian-origin historical figures to be honoured with similar Blue Plaques at buildings associated with their stay in London.
Noor joins the likes of Ada Lovelace, the pioneer of computing, and Rosalind Franklin, the scientist who helped discover DNA, to make up only 14 per cent of over 950 such Blue Plaques celebrating women across London.
English Heritage said that while the figure is still unacceptably low, its ongoing Plaques for Women campaign has seen a dramatic rise in the number of public nominations for women since it launched in 2016.
Later this year, the charity plans to unveil plaques to Christine Granville, a remarkable secret agent of the Second World War, and Barbara Hepworth, one of the 20th century's greatest artists.
Nominations are the lifeblood of the London blue plaques scheme and if we are to continue to see a significant increase in the number of blue plaques for women, we need more female suggestions, the charity said.
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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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