ArdorComm Media Group

Contact Us
logo
Menu
logo
ArdorComm ArdorComm ArdorComm

Supreme Court

Supreme Court Seeks Centre’s Response on Plea for Rape Law Awareness in School Curriculum

Leave a Comment / By / Education Community

The Supreme Court on Friday issued a notice to the Centre, seeking its response to a petition calling for increased awareness of rape laws and women’s rights through school curriculums. The petition aims to address the growing incidents of rape in the country by integrating education about sexual equality, women’s rights, and the freedom of girls to live with dignity into school syllabi. A bench led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud heard the petition filed by senior advocate Aabad Harshad Ponda. The petition was motivated by the recent rape and murder of a junior doctor at RG Kar Medical College in Kolkata. Ponda, a criminal lawyer practicing in the Bombay High Court, argued that while states have introduced stricter punishments for rape, including the death penalty and life imprisonment, these measures alone would not solve the problem unless tackled at the grassroots level. Ponda emphasized the need to raise awareness about rape laws, particularly among the uneducated and economically disadvantaged populations. He argued that repeated cases of rape in the country reflect gaps in governance and the effective implementation of existing laws. According to Ponda, there is a pressing need to bridge the communication gap between the creation of laws by the legislature and their proper dissemination to all sections of society. The petition calls for including topics like moral training, sexual equality, and women’s rights as part of the school syllabus to ensure that the youth are aware of rape laws and the consequences of such crimes.Top of Form Source: Hindustan Times  

Students to move Supreme Court after centre cancelled controversial-NEET exam

Leave a Comment / By / Education Community

Over 50 successful Gujarat-based NEET-UG candidates, including several top rankers, have moved the Supreme Court seeking a direction to restrain the Centre and the National Testing Agency (NTA) from cancelling the controversy-ridden exam. They have requested the top court to direct the Union education ministry to investigate and take strict action against students and others who indulged in unfair practices like paper leak and impersonation in the NEET-UG exam conducted on May 5 this year. A fresh plea by 56 students was filed just days before a Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud is scheduled to hear 26 petitions seeking various reliefs, including a re-test and a probe into the conduct of the exam, which has been plagued by allegations of malpractices. These allegations, including paper leaks, have led to protests in several cities and disputes between rival political parties. The pleas seeking the cancellation of the exam, a re-test, and a high-level probe are listed for hearing on July 8 in the Supreme Court.

NEET UG Row: Retest for 1,563 Candidates an Option; Exam Sanctity Affected, Says Top Court

Leave a Comment / By / Article/Stories
Article

A retest for all 1,563 candidates who were awarded “grace marks” for “loss of time” in this year’s National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (Undergraduate) is among the options being considered by the four-member committee formed last week by the National Testing Agency (NTA). This follows an uproar over the extraordinarily large number of candidates scoring well in the entrance test, with 67 securing the perfect score of 720/720. The Indian Express has learned that the committee, headed by a former UPSC chairman, in its first few meetings, has discussed offering all 1,563 candidates the option to either sit for a retest or accept the “non-normalised score,” which reflects the scores they actually achieved before the addition of grace marks. The exact composition of the committee hasn’t been disclosed by the government, but it is expected to submit its recommendation to the NTA in the next two days, sources said. On Tuesday, the Supreme Court, while hearing a petition seeking the cancellation of the exams amid allegations of leakage of the NEET-UG paper, said the exam “sanctity has been affected” and sought answers from the NTA and the Centre. However, the bench, presided over by Justice Vikram Nath, declined to stay the counselling and tagged the petition with another to be heard on July 8 by a bench led by Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud. “Let the counselling start. We are not stopping the counselling,” Justice Nath said when Senior Advocate Mathews J Nedumpara, appearing for the petitioners, urged the bench to stay the counselling. Announced on June 4, the NEET-UG results drew immediate attention after 67 candidates got the perfect score of 720/720, and some candidates got 718 or 719 — marks others claimed were not possible under the exam scheme. The NTA attributed this to a combination of factors, including a relatively easier paper, the decision to award additional marks to students who lost time during the exam because of errors and delays on the part of NTA staff and invigilators, and an incorrect question. Of these three reasons, as many as 1,563 candidates, across six test centres, witnessed an artificial bump in their results due to the additional marks awarded to them in proportion to the time they lost because of mistakes made by invigilation staff. Of the six centres, two were in Chhattisgarh (one each in Balod and Dantewada), one each in Meghalaya, Surat, Haryana’s Bahadurgarh, and Chandigarh. According to video footage reviewed by the NTA, it was determined that candidates across the six centres had lost up to 40 minutes and were compensated appropriately with grace marks based on a normalisation formula from a 2018 Supreme Court judgement regarding a similar incident in CLAT. The NEET-UG paper duration is 200 minutes. The announcement of NEET-UG results was followed by an uproar, forcing the NTA and the Ministry of Education to constitute a committee to at least review the results of the 1,563 candidates. “Although this is not the final decision, many members are leaning towards the option of asking these candidates to either accept their raw score (pre-normalisation) score or sit for a retest. The majority of the 1,500 candidates scored less than 300 out of 720 marks even after normalisation. It was felt they may not come forward for the retest even if offered as an option. For the remaining numbers, it will not be too difficult to conduct the exam again,” said a source who did not wish to be identified. The Directorate General of Health Services hasn’t announced the counselling schedule yet. If the NTA finally decides to conduct a retest, it will have to consult DGHS to ensure that the results are announced before the counselling process begins. Around 24 lakh candidates took the entrance examination held on May 5 in 571 cities, 14 of which were outside India. According to the latest available data, there are a total of 1,08,940 MBBS seats in more than 700 medical colleges across the country. In the Supreme Court, a fresh writ petition, filed by a batch of students, raised doubts about the sanctity of the examination in the light of allegations of the paper leak and urged the court to cancel it and direct the NTA to hold it again. In their plea, the students said, “After having stumbled upon news of the NEET exam paper leak, they have been shaken… the Petitioners are under tremendous stress and anxiety … their family members nurtured the dream of Petitioners becoming a medical practitioner one day.” Hearing a similar plea on May 17, a CJI-led bench had declined to stay the declaration of the NEET exam results and posted the matter for hearing on July 8.

Delhi Government Moves Supreme Court Seeking Relief Amid Water Crisis During Heatwave

Leave a Comment / By / Governance Community

The Delhi government has taken the issue of the water crisis amidst scorching heatwave conditions in the national capital to the Supreme Court. In its plea, the AAP-led government has appealed for the release of additional water from neighboring states like Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Himachal Pradesh for a month to address the water shortage. The soaring temperatures in Delhi, with some areas reaching up to 50 degrees Celsius, have escalated the demand for water, prompting urgent action from the Delhi government. Emergency measures have been implemented, including banning the use of potable water for car washing and construction activities. The Delhi Jal Board (DJB) has announced stringent penalties, with fines of Rs 2,000 for wastage of water. Additionally, a war room has been established by the DJB to manage water tanker supply, with citizens urged to contact 1916 for assistance. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has called for political cooperation, emphasizing the need to prioritize the welfare of Delhi’s residents over partisan interests. He stressed the importance of securing water resources from neighboring states and urged the BJP leaders to collaborate in resolving the crisis. Amid the heatwave, Delhi has also witnessed a record peak power demand, surpassing 8,300 MW for the first time in its history. Despite the unprecedented demand, the power situation in Delhi remains stable, distinguishing it from neighboring areas where residents are grappling with prolonged power cuts. As protests erupt in Noida and Ghaziabad over power outages, Kejriwal highlighted the nationwide challenge posed by the heatwave, emphasizing the need for collective action to mitigate its impact. He underscored Delhi’s relatively stable power supply amidst the crisis, attributing it to effective management by the government. The plea filed by the Delhi government underscores the severity of the situation and seeks urgent intervention to alleviate the water shortage, emphasizing the importance of collaborative efforts to ensure the well-being of Delhi’s residents during the ongoing heatwave.  

Supreme Court Advocates Leeway for Government Adjustments in Citizenship Act, Cites National Interest

Leave a Comment / By / Governance Community
news on government

Supreme Court of India emphasized the need for the government to have the flexibility to make crucial adjustments for the nation’s well-being. The statement came during the hearing of 17 petitions challenging the constitutional validity of section 6A of the Citizenship Act, which is specific to Assam. A five-judge constitution bench, led by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud, highlighted the challenges faced by northeastern states, particularly those affected by insurgency and violence. Chief Justice Chandrachud stressed that governments must be granted “latitude and leeway” to make necessary adjustments, acknowledging the complexities and unique circumstances in various regions. Section 6A of the Citizenship Act, inserted as a special provision for individuals covered under the Assam Accord, outlines criteria for granting citizenship to those who migrated to Assam between January 1, 1966, and March 25, 1971. The provision sets March 25, 1971, as the cutoff date for citizenship, affecting individuals from specified territories, including Bangladesh. The bench, comprising Justices Surya Kant, M M Sundresh, J B Pardiwala, and Manoj Misra, is considering the constitutional validity of section 6A, particularly its impact on the rights of individuals and the homogeneous classification of states. Senior advocate Shyam Divan, representing the petitioners, argued that section 6A operates in a “blanket manner” and rewards illegal immigrants who continue to reside in Assam against the citizenship law. Divan called for a declaration of the provision as invalid and urged the government to formulate a policy for the settlement and rehabilitation of individuals who arrived in Assam after January 6, 1951. The court questioned whether Parliament could allow the continuation of strife in Assam due to discrimination among states. It raised concerns about the potential discrimination between states and the need for a balanced solution to address the complex issues faced by Assam. The hearing, which remained inconclusive, will resume on Thursday. The court had earlier sought data on the beneficiaries of section 6A to evaluate its impact on Assam’s demographic and cultural identity. As the legal battle unfolds, the Supreme Court’s stance reflects the delicate balance between national interest, security concerns, and the protection of individual rights.

AICTE Extends Admission Deadlines for 2023-24 Academic Session

Leave a Comment / By / Education Community

The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has introduced a modified academic schedule for the 2023-24 academic session. As per the newly announced calendar for technical and professional education, the deadline for first-year student admissions into vacant seats at technical institutions has been extended to October 30. Additionally, the last date for lateral entry admissions into second-year courses for newly enrolled students is also October 30. Furthermore, the cutoff date for universities or boards to grant affiliation to technical institutes is also October 30. Nevertheless, institutions offering online and open-distance learning (ODL) programs will adhere to the University Grants Commission (UGC) guidelines for approval and course admissions in the first and second sessions. The updated academic calendar is available on the official AICTE website, aicte-india.org. The AICTE made these adjustments in response to a Supreme Court order dated October 13, 2023. Consequently, the deadline for admissions into all AICTE-approved institutions and affiliation with universities has been extended to October 30, 2023. Previously, the deadline for admitting first-year students to institutions was set for September 15, and the affiliation grant deadline was July 31. It’s important to note that these revisions do not apply to standalone PGDM and PGCM institutions.