NCW sends notice to Myladuthurai college
 
15/01/2020 , Staff Reporter, CHENNAI

The National Commission for Women (NCW) has sent a notice to Dharmapuram Adheenam Arts College in Myladuthurai, following a complaint raised by an activist about the college’s dismissal of four students for consuming alcohol at a friend’s house.

In December, a video where the four second-year undergraduate students consuming alcohol went viral. The students, three female and one male, were dismissed from the college.

Following this, K.M. Karthik, founder of the All India Private Colleges Employees Union submitted a complaint to the NCW stating that the students had been dismissed without any prior warning or any corrective measures. He further allegedthat the college had circulated the dismissal circular on social media to publicly shame the students.

“I had approached Bharathidasan University which the college is affiliated to, with my concerns before approaching the Commission but no action was taken,” Mr. Karthik alleged. In his complaint to the NCW, Mr. Karthik had requested the future and the education of the girls to be protected and action to be taken against the college.

In the notice to the college, Shyamala S. Kundar member, NCW, has said that the complaint raised by Mr. Karthik pertains to the alleged cruelty, harassment and indecent representation of women and has asked the principal to look into the issue. The Commission has further directed the college principal to communicate the action taken about the same within 30 days from the date of the circular.

‘Candidates for exam put to hardship’

15/01/2020 , staff reporter, MADURAI

Students writing the main examination for recruitment to clerical cadre in 17 nationalised banks have been gravely inconvenienced as their preferred centres and the centres appearing on their hall tickets were different, said Madurai MP Su. Venkatesan.

In a press release, he said students residing in Madurai would have to travel all the way to Chennai and Coimbatore to appear for the main exam scheduled for January 19.

“Some people have been asked to go to Chennai. In fact, the centre at Coimbatore was not even a choice for the main examination as per the notification. The unemployed youth cannot be expected to spend thousands of rupees just to attend the exam,” the statement read.

Socially and economically backward and rural poor aspirants would not even have the chance to appear for the exam as they would not be able to shell out the money for travelling. “The bank officially should not create a new controversy,” he said.

Happy Pongal 2020

Three V-Cs attend TMC’s anti-CAA demonstration 

Oppn. raises questions on their conduct

15/01/2020 , Special Correspondent, Kolkata

The presence of Vice-Chancellors of State Universities at a sit-in demonstration against the amended citizenship law organised by the students’ wing of the Trinamool Congress on Tuesday triggered a controversy with the Opposition raising questions on their conduct.

Three Vice-Chancellors – Subiresh Bhattacharya of North Bengal University, Dipak Kar of Sidho-Kanho-Birsha University and Deb Kumar Mulhopadhyay of Cooch Behar Panchanan Barma University – were present at the agitation organised by the Trinamool Congress Chhatra Parishad, which entered its fifth day on Tuesday.

Later in the day, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee also visited the demonstration site on Rani Rashmoni Avenue and said she was happy to receive inputs from experts on the protests against CAA.

The presence of the Vice-Chancellors at the protest raised eyebrows as only a day ago as they had given a meeting called by Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar a miss. Mr. Dhankhar, who was upset with the development, said educational institutions and universities were being dismantled “brick by brick”.

Will get you arrested, pilot tells passenger seeking help 

IndiGo de-rosters captain who threatened woman seeking wheelchair assistance for her mother at Bengaluru airport

15/01/2020 , Staff Reporter, CHENNAI

An IndiGo pilot, who reportedly harassed and threatened to get arrested two women passengers for seeking wheelchair assistance, has been taken off duty, pending an enquiry by aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), Union Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said on Tuesday.

Supriya Unni Nair, a resident of Bengaluru, had posted a harrowing account on social media of the “harassment” meted out to her and her mother late on Monday. Ms. Nair and her 75-year-old mother Vijayalakshmi had taken an IndiGo flight from Chennai to Bengaluru and sought wheelchair assistance in advance.

The ordeal began after the flight landed.

Recounting her experience, Ms. Nair said, “Our flight was late and when we landed at 9.15 p.m., I tried calling the assistance bell and when the crew did not respond, I walked up for help.”

The airline staff allegedly claimed that they didn’t have access to a wheelchair. “When I pointed this out, the captain Jayakrishna came barging out [of the cockpit] and yells at me for pressing the assistance button and annoying him and his crew,” she said in her post.

Ms. Nair said the captain then prevented the staff from bringing a wheelchair to help her mother out of the aircraft. He allegedly threatened them, saying that he would get them arrested.

“He prevents the wheelchair people from taking my mom out of the aircraft threatening us that he will ensure we are detained and spend a night in jail. Disbelievingly I ask him whether he is serious. ‘Shut up. Who do you think I am? I’ll get my CEO to make sure you spend a night in jail; we will teach you some manners, he says’,” Ms. Nair said in her post.

“We reach the bus and the captain is meanwhile ranting and stops it from moving forward,” Ms. Nair said, adding that it was the on-ground security and IndiGo staff who came to their rescue.

Speaking to The Hindu, Ms. Nair said the entire experience was traumatic. “I felt the need to put it out on social media because this shouldn’t happen to anyone else. No one, especially, a senior citizen should have to endure what my mother did. She was nervous and shivering.”

On seeing the post, Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri tweeted: “I requested my office to contact @IndiGo6E as soon as I saw the tweet by Ms @SupriyaUnniNair about the pilot’s behaviour.... The airline has informed @MoCA_GoI that the pilot has been off-rostered...”

Ms. Nair said she was happy that the Minister had responded quickly to the complaint.

A statement from IndiGo said it was aware of the complaint raised by the passenger, and the matter was “under internal review”, and that necessary action would be taken.

(With inputs from Bengaluru, Mumbai and Delhi)

Rajiv Gandhi case: SC unhappy at CBI report on larger conspiracy

15/01/2020 , Legal Correspondent , NEW DELHI

 
The Supreme Court on Tuesday expressed its unhappiness about the CBI’s status report on the probe into the larger conspiracy behind the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi at Sriperumbudur in Tamil Nadu in 1991.

Instead of revealing the progress made to unearth the truth, the report filed in the Supreme Court by the investigating agency merely parroted its past reports over the years. “We are not happy with the report,” a Bench of Justices L. Nageswara Rao and Hemant Gupta said.

The court called for the presence of a senior law officer, an Additional Solicitor General, to appear, and kept the case on hold to be taken up later.

After half-an-hour, the case came up again. This time, Justice Rao expressed the court’s dissatisfaction without mincing words.

“There is no difference between this report and the ones filed before. Everything said is quite the same as before... going to Bangkok or something... What we want to know is what progress has been made [in the investigation] in the past two years at least,” Justice Rao observed.

Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, appearing for Rajiv Gandhi assassination convict A.G. Perarivalan, submitted that the CBI’s Multi Disciplinary Monitoring Agency (MDMA), probing the larger conspiracy behind the killing, was yet to conclude its investigation pertaining to the origin and make of the bomb.

The Bench allowed Perarivalan’s lawyers to peruse the CBI report in the courtroom. The report was filed in a sealed cover. The court finally ordered the CBI to file a fresh report detailing the work done. The case is listed on January 28.

Perarivalan, who is in his mid-forties now, has spent about a quarter of a century inside jail serving life imprisonment. He was 19 at the time of his arrest. Perarivalan has sought an order from the court to stay his life sentence till the MDMA probe is completed. He has argued that the CBI has still not been able to question Nixon alias Suren, one among the 21 suspects the MDMA is waiting to investigate, who allegedly knows about the making of the bomb. He contended that his role in the alleged crime taken to the maximum would be that of supplying two nine-volt batteries without the knowledge of what it was going to be used for.

SC rejects curative pleas of 2 Nirbhaya death row convicts
No merit in their appeals to spare them the gallows: Bench

15/01/2020 , Krishnadas Rajagopal, NEW DELHI

The curative petitions of Vinay Sharma, 26, and Mukesh Singh, 32, who were sentenced to death in the 2012 Nirbhaya gang rape and murder case, were rejected by a five-judge Supreme Court Bench, led by Justice N.V. Ramana, on Tuesday.

In a three-page order, the Bench concluded, after an in-chamber consideration that began about 1.45 p.m., that there was no merit in their pleas to spare them from the gallows.

“We have gone through the curative petitions and relevant documents. In our opinion, no case is made out within the parameters indicated in the decision of this court in Rupa Ashok Hurra versus Ashok Hurra. Hence, the curative petitions are dismissed,” the Bench held.

Curative is a rare remedy devised by a Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court in its judgment in the Rupa Ashok Hurra case in 2002.

A party can take only two limited grounds in a curative petition — one, he was not heard by the court before the adverse judgment was passed, and two, the judge was biased.

A curative plea, which follows the dismissal of review petition, is the last legal avenue open for convicts in the Supreme Court. Sharma was the first among the four convicts to file a curative.

The Bench also rejected their pleas to stay the execution of their death sentence and for oral hearing in open court.

Besides Justice Ramana, the Bench comprised Arun Mishra, Rohinton Nariman, R. Banumathi and Ashok Bhushan.

Mercy plea

Shortly after the Supreme Court ruling, Mukesh filed a mercy plea before the President, Tihar jail authorities said.

Mukesh, Sharma, Akshay Kumar Singh, 31, and Pawan Gupta, 25, are scheduled to be hanged at 7 a.m. on January 22 in Tihar jail. A Delhi court issued their death warrants on January 7.