Daily Briefing: BJP era will last 30-40 years, says Amit Shah; SC judge calls for mandatory regulation of social media

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In this edition of the Idea Exchange, AICTE chairman Anil Sahasrabudhe talks about why civil and mechanical engineering courses need to incorporate AI and a start-up/entrepreneurial spirit, and how industry involvement and curriculum upgrade are key to students’ employability.

From the front page

Two heavily armed militants from the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) were overpowered by villagers in J&K’s Reasi district and were tied up in ropes, prompting  Lt Governor Manoj Sinha to announce a cash reward of Rs 5 lakh. However, their capture led to a flutter in J&K political circles after it emerged that one of them had headed the IT and Social Media Cell of the BJP Minority Morcha in Jammu province.

The Calcutta High Court ordered the termination of services of 273 primary teachers in state-in schools due to alleged irregularities and corruption in the recruitment process. Among them, several were found to have links to the ruling-Trinamool Congress or CPI(M). We visited the homes of 12 of those 12 sacked in the districts of Hooghly, Howrah, and Purba Bardhaman.  Most of them were not available. Their family members spoke of fear and public shame. 

Days after a Supreme Court vacation Bench lashed out at former BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma for her remarks on the Prophet, one of the judges who was part of the Bench has expressed concern over the use of digital and social media for “expressing personalised opinions” against judges, and called for mandatory regulation of such media to “preserve the rule of law” in the country. His remarks come amid criticism on social media of the Bench’s observations in the case. 

Must Read

A total of 303 cases — relating to divorce, maintenance, and guardianship of children — were resolved by the Lok Adalat on June 26; a record for a single day, family court judge R G Devdhara said. And in about 30 per cent of the cases that were resolved, the estranged couples decided to give themselves a second chance of being together. Advocate Preeti Joshi told The Indian Express that the curse of Covid turned out to be a blessing for several separated couples whom the crisis reunited.

A massive landslide which hit the Tupul railway construction site late on June 29 in Manipur’s Noney district has so far claimed 42 lives — 27 Territorial Army personnel and 15 civilians, including railway employees, construction workers and villagers. Still missing are 20 people. Now into its fourth day, a massive operation by a combined force of the National and State Disaster Response Forces, the Indian Army, Assam Rifles and police has run into hurdle after hurdle. Sporadic rain. Mud roads caused by inclement weather. The sheer volume of debris. And fear — loose soil and small boulders continue to tumble down from the hills.

The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council in its 47th meeting held last week undertook a series of rate changes as part of correction of inverted duty structure, withdrawal of certain exemptions in what could be a precursor for an overall tweaking of tax slabs and rate rationalisation in future. The GST Council discussed recommendations of four ministerial panels — on rate rationalisation, on movement of gold and precious stones, system reforms, and casinos, horse racing and online gaming.

More than half of the flights operated by IndiGo, India’s largest airline, were delayed on Saturday as a large number of its cabin crew members called in sick. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has taken note of this development, and has sought a report from the airline on the delays, officials said. According to information sourced from the Ministry of Civil Aviation, IndiGo’s on-time performance on Saturday was 45.2 per cent, meaning less than half of its flights departed within 15 minutes of their scheduled departure time. Notably, Saturday also marked the beginning of the second phase of Tata Group-owned Air India’s recruitment drive for cabin crew members.

And Finally

The raw digits convey that India’s bowlers let England fightback from 83 for 5 and then 149 for 6 to post 284 runs. A classic England stung-by-the-lower-order tour story. Just change the names and dates. A once-typical losing the steam at the end narrative. Except that it was not. Instead, it was one of India’s finest bowling recoveries in recent times. They did let England off the hook, but they regathered to pull the hook back. Bazball-indoctrinated Jonny Bairstow could have blown them away, but they clutched at the straws, hung onto the swaying pole and then whipped up a furious storm of their own post lunch, counterpunching the counterpunch.

Acting governor of the State of California Eleni Kounalakis met Chief Justice of India N V Ramana at the official residence of the Consul General of India in San Francisco on Saturday. The CJI, who is on a tour of the US, presented to her a copy of the autobiography of Mahatma Gandhi.

In today’s episode of the ‘3 Things’ podcast, we talk about the murder in Maharashtra’s Amravati district of the 54-year-old chemist named Umesh Prahladrao Kolhe, who had allegedly posted Nupur Sharma’s video on social media. Silchar witnesses unprecedented flooding, and Neeraj Chopra breaks the national record twice in two weeks.

Until next time,

Leela Prasad and Srishti Kapoor