A Justice Ashok Bhushan led bench of the Supreme Court to hear a batch of petitions today seeking to postpone the NEET-UG exams set to be held on September 13.
There are three cases listed. Lead case of Keshav Maheshwari is set to be argued by @advocate_alakh .. the other two of Arijit Sau and Pragya Pranjal too seeks to postpone NEET-UG exams. Pleas filed through @anubha1812
Justice MR Shah: Mr. Datar, all arrangements will be made for the #NEET exams
Arvind Datar refers to UGC judgment by #SupremeCourt
Datar seeks to highlight the example of Bihar where there are only 2 exam centres
SC observes that there cannot be different dates for different States.
SC: Whatever date is fixed, there might be some difficulty
Datar urges for the exam to be considered to be postponed by three weeks
SC points out that a review petition was also dismissed
Senior Advocate KTS Tulsi arguing for petitioners: #COVID19 cases are increasing and now there are 90,000 daily case.
Tulsi shows example of the Bombay HC's recent order where the JC said those who could not appear for the exam should be appropriately considered @MPKTSTulsi
Justice Ashok Bhushan: Whether the students should be considered or not is for the body to decide not for this Court to pass directions on
@MPKTSTulsi cites the Disaster Management Act and says that the students are at a high risk of contracting the virus
Senior Adv Tulsi cites Article 21
Advocate Shoeb Alam now arguing: My petition (Arijit Sau) is different from the petitions so far and is not seeking for deferment of the exams
Alam: I want to point out some lacuna in the guidelines issued by the NTA
Adv Shoeb Alam Alam prays that there might be some facilitation for aspirants to reach the exam centres.
Alam: The local authorities may be directed to ensure that the guidelines are enforced
SC: All this will be done
Adv Shoeb Alam: A slight nudge from your lordships will go a long way. At a time when there is a cap on large gatherings, there are hundreds of students who have to go out to take the exams so a direction from the Court will go a long way
Supreme Court to shortly resume hearing its suo motu case on stray dogs.
Bench: Justices Vikram Nath, Sandeep Mehta, and NV Anjaria
#straydogs #SupremeCourt
The court is expected to continue reviewing compliance affidavits filed by various states with respect to its 7th November order relating to removal of stray dogs from institutional areas etc.
Yesterday, the Court took a dim view of “vague” affidavits filed by some states.
Amicus Curiae Gaurav Agarwal: Punjab has not submitted any action plan etc.
Counsel for Punjab: there is a budgetary allocation of 11cr. There are 20 dog catching vehicles available. There is a district level committee which we have formed. We have given a full action plan for institutions.
Court: how many dogs have you collected from institutions?
Counsel: for Malerkotla it is 108. I will place as and when information comes.
Supreme Court to hear petitions challenging the University Grants Commission (UGC)'s recently notified rules intended to prevent caste discrimination in educational institutions #UGC #UGCRegulations #SupremeCourt
The rules have been challenged for excluding 'general category' students from complaining under its grievance redressal mechanism #UGC #UGCRegulations
University Grants Commission (Promotion of Equity in Higher Education Institutions) Regulations, 2026 was notified on January 13 and applies to all higher educational institutions in India.
Its objective is to "eradicate discrimination only on the basis of religion, race, gender, place of birth, caste, or disability, particularly against the members of scheduled castes and scheduled tribes, socially and educationally backward classes, economically weaker sections, persons with disabilities, or any of them, and to promote full equity and inclusion amongst the stakeholders in higher education institutions."
MK Stalin case: Supreme Court hears plea by AIADMK leader SA Duraiswamy challenging TN CM Stalin’s 2011 assembly election win from Kolathur constituency.
The plea alleges that Stalin and his party representatives indulged in corrupt practices, particularly by providing money and gifts to secure votes.
Bench: Justices JK Maheshwari and Vijay Bishnoi.
Sr. Adv. DS Naidu, appearing for Duraiswamy refers to a prosecution witness statement:
Naidu: the witness is the editor of a magazine called “kumudam snehidi”.
Court: what’s the meaning of that?
Another counsel: kumudum means lotus. Snehidi means friend.
Naidu: a friend of lotus. May be figurative meaning.
Sr. Adv. Kapil Sibal (for Stalin): most inappropriate definition.
Court bursts into laughter.
Naidu: kumudam was once India’s largest selling family magazine. It’s basically a women’s magazine. Like women’s era. It’s the women’s wing of kumudam publications. Perhaps, the lotus is being compared with women and Snehidi is the friend of the woman, or the fairer sex.
Justice Maheshwari: (in jest): we can’t say anything…
Plea concerning seizure of electronic devices during criminal investigations
Sr Adv A Sundaram: some sort of information is being looked at. No predicate offence against me and my phone is being looked to find a link with predicate offence. There needs to be some guidelines to stop such fishing and roving inquiry. Where is my privacy I ask ? If my phone contain something.. then how it affects them.. there is nothing.
CJI: tell us why your mobile has been taken away ? There are people siphoning off thousands of crores and phones cannot be looked into? If they rely on something which is not related to this then we can intervene. We can look at it from case to case also. But not like this. Let them see first.
Sundaram: Then my plea becomes infructuous!
CJI: why did they come to you.
Sundaram: please see the summons, nothing against me.
Justice Bagchi: This is a fallacious argument by you Mr Sundaram. ECIR is in respect of an offence and not an individual. There is no notice needed for seizing a device.
CJI: you are behaving as if you have nothing to do. ED just raided your place early morning as if you called them for tea.