Madras High Court orders Centre to disburse funds for SC/ST students

Though the Department of Finance, Government of India, is not a party to this litigation, allocation of funds have to be made as per

Published: 09th December 2018 04:19 AM


Madras High Court (File photo | EPS)

By Express News Service

CHENNAI : The High Court, in a 157-page order, directed the Central Department of Finance to allocate funds of arrears of Rs 822.91 crore, up to 2016-17, enabling the Department of Social Justice and Empowerment, New Delhi, to disburse the fund meant for SC, ST Students under the Post-Matric Scholarship, within two months.

The PIL plea was filed by one D Ashok Kumar, seeking directions to the authorities of the State and Centre, to continue to support Post Matric Scholarship to students hailing from SC/ST communities, to pursue their higher education, as there has been paucity of funds, due to non-release of funds by the Government of India, as a result of which, Government of Tamil Nadu, decided to restrict the benefits of the scheme.

The Division Bench, comprising Justice S Manikumar and Subramonium Prasad, which heard the petition, sought for a direction to the Director, Social Justice and Empowerment, Union of India, New Delhi, to immediately release the funds of Rs 1765.62 crore, to Scheduled Caste students and Rs 31.2 crore to the Scheduled Tribe students, enabling them to pursue their higher education.

The judges said, “The Central Government under the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, New Delhi, has not released the arrears of scholarship to Scheduled Caste students up to 2016-17. A request was made on August 13 to the Ministry of Finance, Government of India, to release additional funds under the Post Matric Scholarship share to scheme on priority, so as to enable Social Justice and Empowerment, New Delhi, to release the funds to states.


However, the Social Justice department has said that in anticipation of funds from the Ministry of Finance, administrative approval of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, has been granted on August 16, for the balance arrears up to 2016-17 to Tamil Nadu. From the above, it is clear that the Central Government has not disbursed the arrears of their shares of Rs 822.91 crore up to 2016-2017.

Though the Department of Finance, Government of India, is not a party to this litigation, allocation of funds have to be made as per the scheme, promptly. The Department of Social Justice and Empowerment, New Delhi, represented by its Director, is directed to disburse the arrears of Rs 822.91 crore, representing the Post-Matric Scholarship to SC students up to 2016-17, within two months, from the date of receipt of a copy of this order and also an amount of Rs 162 crore for the year 2017-18,” said the order.

The social justice department, in its counter, submitted that the Centre has been releasing funds to the government of Tamil Nadu, on regular basis. Further, during the year 2018-19, an amount of ` 584.47 crore has been released and balance arrears up to 2016-2017 are Rs 822.91 crore only.

Man acquitted in murder case

Chennai: Overturning an order of the First Additional District and Sessions Court in Erode that sentenced a person to seven years RI in a murder case a year ago, the Madras High Court acquitted him on the ground that the entire evidence placed was self-contradictory in nature. Chithode police had registered the case in 2015 against one Thangavel of Mamarathupalayam. It was alleged that Thangavel used a sharp object to kill his son-in-law who was in an inebriated condition. Based on the statements provided by the mother of the deceased, a complaint was registered.

Seized vehicle released on conditions

Chennai: The High Court released a vehicle that carried M-sand, seized by the Virudhachalam police two months ago, with certain conditions. A Division Bench comprising Justice M Sathyanarayanan and P Rajamanickam, disposed of the writ petition from Senthilmurugan, the owner of the lorry, seeking a direction to release his vehicle. The court said it was for the probing authority to find out whether the transported sand was M-sand or river sand. The petitioner was asked to deposit a sum of `50,000 to the Deputy Director of Geology and Mining, Tirunelveli.

Tamil Nadu bank manager held as man gets Rs 18 crore loan on forged documents
Taken in by his promise, Nataraj, Ramasamy and Harun Rasheed gave him the documents required for processing the loan.

Published: 09th December 2018 04:36 AM |

Image used for representational purpose only

By Express News Service

TIRUPUR : The Central Crime Branch police on Saturday arrested a senior bank manager for allegedly helping a man get `18 crore loan by furnishing bogus documents. Police said that the debtor, his wife, friend and another bank officer, suspected to be a part of the scam, were on the run.


According to police, Shankar (52), a senior manager with the Foreign Exchange Division of the Corporation Bank, allegedly helped Selvakumar (37), a native of Tiruvannamalai, wife Priya (30) and friend Rajesh Kanna (39) get loan from the bank. Selvakumar was reportedly working at a knitwear unit worker in the district, According to sources, Selvakumar obtained a loan of `10 crore from the Corporation Bank by submitting forged documents. As his loan had been sanctioned, he told his friends Nataraj, Ramasamy and Harun Rasheed that he could get their credit approved as well.

Taken in by his promise, Nataraj, Ramasamy and Harun Rasheed gave him the documents required for processing the loan. However, once the loan of `8 crore was sanctioned through the offices of Corporation Bank’s senior manager Shankar and manager Somaiyajulu, Selvakumar scooted.

AirAsia offers 20 per cent fare discount to Vizagites

The AirAsia international flight will be operated four days a week and it will reach Vizag on Friday, Wednesday, Monday and Sunday.

Published: 08th December 2018 09:05 AM |

For representational purposes (File | Reuters)

By Express News Service

VISAKHAPATNAM: Here is good news for AirAsia travellers from the city. The airline is offering 20 per cent fare discount for all its flights, both domestic and international, exclusively to Vizagites for three days at AirAsia Travel Fair, which began at CMR Central in the city on Friday.

The discount offer will be valid for those who book their tickets in advance for journey from January to December 2019. According to an AirAsia official, the offer is available for even the connecting flights of the airline on international route.

K Vijay Mohan, president of Tours and Travels Association of Andhra, who inaugurated the fair, said AirAsia’s inaugural flight from Bangkok was scheduled to land at Visakhapatnam International Airport at 11.45 pm on Friday and take off at 12.15 am.


The AirAsia international flight will be operated four days a week and it will reach Vizag on Friday, Wednesday, Monday and Sunday. In the return direction, the flight will leave Vizag on Saturday, Thursday, Tuesday and Monday.

AirAsia’s Bangkok flight is the fourth international flight from the city. The other three are flights to Malaysia, Singapore and Dubai.

AirAsia is operating a flight service to Kuala Lumpur, SilkAir to Singapore and Air India to Dubai. All the three international flights are having good occupancy ratio. Based on a survey conducted by Tours and Travels Association of Andhra and Air Travellers Association, a couple of years ago, AirAsia launched its service to Bangkok. The inaugural flight is almost full with 172 of 176 seats having booked, he said. 

Vijay Mohan hoped that the international flights from Vizag would sustain as the Port City has huge potential.

About 30 per cent of air passengers going to Thailand from Kolkata are from AP. The flight from Vizag will have more patronage as it takes only two and a half hours to reach Bangkok and the cost of the return trip from the Port City will be between Rs 10,000 and Rs 12,000. Besides, people from Vijayawada are now boarding Bangkok flight either in Hyderabad or Chennai. Henceforth, they may prefer Vizag to go to Bangkok and this will ensure a healthy occupancy in the international flight. In all likelihood, there will be fifth international flight from Vizag as Nok Air, a low-cost airline, is planning to operate a service to Bangkok from next month, he said.

Referring to suspension of Colombo flight by SriLankan Airlines, Vijay Mohan said they were clueless about its withdrawal though the service was doing extremely good with about 70 per cent occupancy.

Tamil Nadu government hospitals raided after bribery complaints

The officials also conducted raids at Government Chengalpet Medical College Hospital a few days ago.

Published: 08th December 2018 05:36 AM |

A photo of the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital
By Express News Service

CHENNAI : The Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption officials conducted raids at government hospitals across the State, allegedly following complaints of hospital workers demanding bribes from patients, on Friday. In Chennai, the raids were conducted at the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital and Government Kasturba Gandhi Hospital for Women and Children.


According to sources at Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital, the officials entered the hospital around 10. 30 am and searched the premises including the hospital kitchen and provisions storeroom. 

At Government Kasturba Gandhi Hospital for Women and Children, the officials inspected wards, kitchen, storerooms, scan centre and searched the premises.

The officials also conducted raids at Government Chengalpet Medical College Hospital a few days ago. “We have given a strict warning to workers not to take bribe from the patients and are monitoring them. We also alerted our hospital staff following the raid at Government Chengalpet Medical College Hospital recently. However, the officials did not come to our hospital on Friday,” said a hospital official.

Female students bear brunt of unchecked moral policing on Chennai campuses

Arts and science colleges across Chennai have women’s hostel curfew at 7 pm, with a few colleges even capping it at 3 pm.

Published: 09th December 2018 05:05 AM |

Image for representational purpose only

By Sushmitha Ramakrishnan

Express News Service

CHENNAI: Two weeks ago, an hostel warden in the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras put up in the notice board, among other things, the number of ‘used condoms’ they found in a dustbin in the hostel room of a student. The incident caused much outrage among the student community over what they see as moral policing of the students. When Express spoke to students of many other colleges in the city, the stories students shared were far more regressive. Often, mundane everyday activities of students, particularly female students, comes under scrutiny and starts defining their character.

The students are questioned for speaking to students from the other gender and sometimes sent out of the classrooms when the teacher thinks the dress of a female student is too revealing. Swarna*, a student in a women’s arts college in the heart of the city, says she was reprimanded by her hostel warden once for accidentally dropping a cover with sanitary napkins in front of her hostel room.

“She said that I need to start acting like an adult woman now. How can I be so shameless? The warden said that my character was questionable,” she recalled. Swarna said that day, she saw her roommate carrying a suitcase she had brought from home after holidays, and rushed to help her way through the staircase. “I dropped the cover with the pad outside my room and went to help my friend, when the warden walked through the corridor,” she said. The warden had asked Swarna to enlist the possible outcomes, if a gardener or a another male casual worker in the hostel saw it instead.

It was an all girls college with men doing only small clerical jobs. “The Head of my Department used to go around the campus during the inter-collegiate cultural events we hosted, and take pictures of girls, if they were seen casually chatting with boys,” said Rupal* from the English Literature department of another all-women college in the city. The teacher would allegedly call these girls later and ask them if these boys were their boyfriends and threaten to inform their parents.

One day Samir* was talking to a few female friends on college, when a teacher stopped and allegedly commented, “He’s a Muslim. He can have four wives. That’s why he talks to women.” In Anna University for example, there are no strict restrictions on what girls wear within the hostel, but when they go to the mess for dinner, they should wear full pants as boys would be there. “When hostel girls wear leggings to classes, some teachers ask the girls to go back and change,” said Kavya*, a second-year student from the varsity. MK Surappa, the Vice-Chancellor of the university said that there should be no regulatory mechanism to prevent students from wearing what they want. “Different people have different tastes. It will be retrograde to control them,” he said.

A student from another college in Coimbatore said that her teacher had lined up all the girls who wore leggings to stand out of the class and asked other students what they looked like with such skimpy clothing. In another women’s college in the city, the hostel warden asked a student to explain why she was wearing laced underwear, pointing to her clothes hanging on the laundry line. “I didn’t think any explanation I gave would make sense to her,” said Sneha*.

Discriminatory hostel curfews is another issue. Arts and science colleges across Chennai has women’s hostel curfew at 7 pm, with a few colleges even capping it at 3 pm. However, men do not have any such restriction. Even though colleges have a curfew for men’s hostel on paper, most do not enforce it.

“There were no restrictions on when boys moved in and out of college. But girls were not allowed to go out after 6:30 pm. Let alone leaving the campus, we weren’t even allowed outside the hostel” said Madhu* , a recent political science graduate in an arts and science college in the outskirts of the city. “The warden asks “How will I know what all you do outside?”

“The safety of these students are in our hands. The girls may be bold, but if somebody does something to them outside the college, we are responsible for it. Which is why we have different curfews for girls and boys,” said the warden of one of the girls’ hostel blocks in the college.However, in the same college, a student from the chemistry department was slapped by a male classmate in broad daylight, said Madhu adding that the victim had fallen down injuring her head. “When students asked the college to take action on the boy, the dean of women students had allegedly asked the girl to not only consider his future,” she rued.

While these are only a few examples, girls who wear shorts or sleeveless clothing, hug boys, go out with boys, go for weekend trips, stay on the phone for long or behave friendly with male workers on campus are often treated differently, say students. (Names of all students changed)

Former V-C appears before suicide probe team

SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

SALEM, DECEMBER 09, 2018 00:00 IST

C. Swaminathan, former Vice-Chancellor, Periyar University, appeared for an inquiry before the Salem City Central Crime Branch police in connection with the death of K. Angamuthu, former Registrar, who committed suicide.

Angamuthu was the Registrar of Periyar University from 2012-15 and later after relinquishing office continued as Physical Education Director of the university, till he committed suicide in his native Perundurai in Erode district in December last year.

The Perundurai Police, based on the details found in the suicide note, registered a case against a few persons, including Dr. Swaminathan, for abetting his suicide.

Later, the case was transferred to the Salem City Central Crime Branch police.

The Central Crime Branch police issued summons to 15 persons to appear for an inquiry in connection with the suicide of Angamuthu. Dr. Swaminathan appeared before the Central Crime Branch police on Saturday, sources said.

MKU professor faces harassment charge

Pon Vasanth B.A

MADURAI, DECEMBER 09, 2018 00:00 IST

Ph. D scholar files plaint against guide

A full-time research scholar at Madurai Kamaraj University’s Centre for Film and Electronic Media Studies has filed a harassment complaint against her research guide and Head of the centre K. Karnamaharajan. But he has denied the charges.

In the complaint submitted to the Registrar of MKU, the scholar, a native of Kerala, has accused the professor of abusing her and demanding that she do everything he suggested, including sexual favours, if she wanted to obtain her Ph. D degree.

The scholar accused him of taking Rs. 2 lakh to admit her as a full-time scholar.

According to the complainant, he checked her daily schedule and attendance in the hostel. Recently, he issued a memo for being absent and threatened to cancel her Ph. D registration.

Refuting her allegations, Mr. Karnamaharajan said the research scholar, who completed her M. Phil in MKU and joined as a full-time scholar a year before, regularly absented herself without prior information and failed to complete her research-related tasks.

“I have messages, email communications and other records that will prove my innocence,” he said. The research scholar also submitted a complaint with the Convenor’s Committee of MKU that met at the campus on Saturday. While MKU Registrar V. Chinniah could not be reached for a comment, university officials said that the scholar had been asked to appear before a committee set up to enquire into the issue on Wednesday.