The Evening Wrap: No objection to SC setting up panel in Hindenburg-Adani case, says Centre

The Centre has no objection to a proposal for setting up a panel of domain experts to look into strengthening the regulatory mechanisms for the stock market, the Supreme Court was told on Monday while it was hearing pleas relating to the Adani stocks rout after the Hindenburg report. The central government, however, told a bench headed by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud that it wanted to give the names of the domain experts for the committee and the scope of its mandate in a sealed cover in larger interest. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre and Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), said that the market regulator and other statutory bodies are equipped to deal with the present situation arising out of the Hindenburg report. “The government has no objection to forming a committee. But, the remit of the committee, we can suggest. We can provide names in a sealed cover,” the law officer said. Mehta apprehended that any “unintentional” message on setting up of the panel may have some adverse impact on the inflow of money. The top court has now listed two PILs, alleging exploitation of innocent investors and “artificial crashing” of the Adani Group’s stock value, for hearing on Friday. On February 10, the top court said the interests of Indian investors need to be protected against market volatility in the backdrop of the Adani stocks rout and asked the Centre to consider setting up a panel of domain experts headed by a former judge to look into strengthening the regulatory mechanisms. It had also sought the views of the SEBI and the Centre as to how to ensure a robust mechanism is in place since the capital movement now is “seamless” in the country. Supreme Court dismisses plea challenging delimitation in Jammu & Kashmir The Supreme Court on February 13 dismissed a challenge concerning delimitation in Jammu and Kashmir. A Bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and A.S. Oka had found that the petitioners did not challenge the constitutional validity of a specific provision in the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act which conferred the Delimitation Commission with the power to “carry out” the re-adjustment of constituencies in the Union Territory formed after the abrogation of Article 370 in the erstwhile State. The petition filed by Srinagar residents, Haji Abdul Gani Khan and Dr. Mohammad Ayub Mattoo, was limited to a challenge of the notification issued by the Centre in March 2020 establishing the Jammu and Kashmir Delimitation Commission and a second one in March 2021 extending its term for the purpose of conducting delimitation only for Jammu and Kashmir. Justice Oka had said the notifications drew their power specifically from Section 62(2) of the 2019 Act. Section 62(2) provided for the readjustment of constituencies to be carried out by the Delimitation Commission. The court, during the hearing, had asked why the petitioners without challenging the source of the government’s notifications, that is Section 62(2), had confined their challenge solely to the notifications. The petitioners, represented by senior advocate Ravi Shankar Jandhyala and advocates Sriram Parakkat and M.S. Vishnu Shankar, had argued that only the Election Commission of India, under Section 60 of the 2019 Act, was empowered to conduct the delimitation exercise. They had further argued before the Bench that Article 170 of the Constitution barred delimitation exercise on the basis of the 2011 census. It has to either happen on the basis of the 2001 census or await “the first census after the year 2026”, they had argued. The petitioners had alleged that Sections 60 and 61 of the 2019 Act, which define the role of the Election Commission in the process of delimitation of constituencies, were in contradiction to Section 62. The plea had said that if August 5, 2019, was to unite Jammu and Kashmir with India, then the delimitation process had defeated the “new order” of “One Nation One Constitution”. The petitioners had questioned why Jammu and Kashmir was “singled out” for delimitation in the 2021 notification. The earlier March 6, 2020, one had constituted the Delimitation Commission chaired by former Supreme Court judge, Justice Ranjana P. Desai, for the delimitation of Assembly and Parliamentary constituencies in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir as well as Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nagaland. The government had countered that there were two alternative mechanisms to carry out delimitation for the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. By virtue of Sections 60-61, while the power to determine delimitation was conferred on Election Commission, Section 62(2) and 62(3) conferred powers to carry out delimitation on the Delimitation Commission. The Home Ministry and the Election Commission of India had argued that the delimitation orders already acquired the “force of law”. The ECI and the Ministry had maintained that the delimitation order had already been brought into effect from May 20, 2022. The delimitation order cannot be “re-agitated” in a court once it had gained finality by publication in the gazette. Parliament Budget Session: Opposition leaders hold meeting to chalk out strategy in Parliament Leaders of 14 Opposition parties on February 13 held a meeting in New Delhi to discuss their joint strategy in Parliament. Sources said the leaders of the Congress, the RJD, the DMK, the NCP, the JDU, the AAP and the Left parties met in the chamber of Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge in Parliament complex. The meeting comes in the wake of continued attack on the government over the Adani issue and the demand for a joint Parliamentary Committee probe into it. Adani Group stocks have taken a beating on the bourses after U.S.-based short-selling firm Hindenburg Research made a litany of allegations, including fraudulent transactions and share-price manipulation, against the business conglomerate. The Adani Group has dismissed the charges as lies, saying it complies with all laws and disclosure requirements. The meeting also comes after the Rajya Sabha suspended Congress member Rajani Patil from the House for the remainder of the Budget session, for circulating an unauthorised video of House proceedings. Patil had said it was not fair to give her the harshest punishment as she had not done anything deliberately. “I belong to a freedom fighter’s family and I should be given natural justice. I have not done anything deliberately,” Patil had said. 16-year-old Dalit student beaten for drinking water from principal’s bottle in U.P. A 16-year-old Class 11 Dalit student in Uttar Pradesh’s Bijnor district was allegedly beaten up by principal Yogendra Kumar and two others after he drank water from the principal’s bottle during a farewell party organised for outgoing Class 12 students. In the complaint submitted at Afzalgarh police station, the student of the Chamandevi Inter College alleged that when he was drinking water from a bottle kept on a table, the principal and his brother thrashed and hurled abuses at him on Sunday, saying that it was for the principal’s use only. The police lodged a complaint against the principal and two others under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Prevention of Atrocities Act and other Sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). “We have lodged the complaint of the student under the SC/ST Act and other Sections of the IPC, the Circle Officer of Afzalgarh police station is probing the matter. We will take necessary action as per law,” Additional Superintendent of Police Bijnor Ram Arj told The Hindu. U.S. not flying any balloons over China, says White House The White House on February 13, 2023 denied Beijing’s accusation that the United States has been sending balloons over China to conduct surveillance, as tensions about espionage rise between the two superpowers. “Any claim that the U.S. government operates surveillance balloons over the PRC is false,” National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said on Twitter. “It is China that has a high-altitude surveillance balloon program for intelligence collection, that it has used to violate the sovereignty of the U.S. and over 40 countries across 5 continents.” The State Department responded with a similar rejection, and called Beijing’s accusation “the latest example of China scrambling to do damage control.” “It has repeatedly and wrongly claimed the surveillance balloon it sent over the United States was a weather balloon and to this day has failed to offer any credible explanations for its intrusion into our airspace and the airspace of others,” a State Department spokesperson said in a statement. Earlier Monday China hit back against US charges of balloon espionage, accusing the United States of having sent more than 10 balloons into its airspace since January 2022. Washington’s response marked the latest development in an increasingly tense saga that included the downing of an alleged Chinese spy balloon off the coast of South Carolina earlier this month, after it had traversed much of the United States. The U.S. military subsequently shot down three other unidentified objects over North America in recent days, sparking widespread jitters and speculation as to their origins. Only the first object has been officially attributed to China, with Beijing insisting it was a civilian craft that had blown off course. On Monday, White House spokesman John Kirby said US authorities “haven’t been able to gain access” yet to the latest three objects shot down, due largely to weather conditions which have slowed search and recovery operations. In Brief: The first part of the Budget session of Rajya Sabha was adjourned till March 13 on February 13, Monday, after continued disruptions by Opposition MPs who kept up their demand for a Joint Parliamentary Committee probe into allegations against the Adani Group. The House, which was briefly adjourned in the morning, will now meet at 11 a.m. on March 13 after recess. Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar, who spoke about deliberate obstruction of proceedings, adjourned the House for the day after repeated appeals to bring order went unheeded and Opposition MPs raised slogans in support of their demand for a JPC and also revocation of the suspension of Congress MP Rajani Patil. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow. [logo] The Evening Wrap 13 FEBRUARY 2023 [The Hindu logo] Welcome to the Evening Wrap newsletter, your guide to the day’s biggest stories with concise analysis from The Hindu. [[Arrow]Open in browser]( [[Mail icon]More newsletters]( Adani-Hindenburg row: Centre agrees to SC proposal of setting up of a panel of experts on regulatory mechanism The [Centre has no objection to a proposal for setting up a panel of domain experts to look into strengthening the regulatory mechanisms for the stock market]( the Supreme Court was told on Monday while it was hearing pleas relating to the Adani stocks rout after the Hindenburg report. The central government, however, told a bench headed by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud that it wanted to give the names of the domain experts for the committee and the scope of its mandate in a sealed cover in larger interest. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre and Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), said that the market regulator and other statutory bodies are equipped to deal with the present situation arising out of the Hindenburg report. “The government has no objection to forming a committee. But, the remit of the committee, we can suggest. We can provide names in a sealed cover,” the law officer said. Mehta apprehended that any “unintentional” message on setting up of the panel may have some adverse impact on the inflow of money. The top court has now listed two PILs, alleging exploitation of innocent investors and “artificial crashing” of the Adani Group’s stock value, for hearing on Friday. On February 10, the top court said the interests of Indian investors need to be protected against market volatility in the backdrop of the Adani stocks rout and asked the Centre to consider setting up a panel of domain experts headed by a former judge to look into strengthening the regulatory mechanisms. It had also sought the views of the SEBI and the Centre as to how to ensure a robust mechanism is in place since the capital movement now is “seamless” in the country. Supreme Court dismisses plea challenging delimitation in Jammu & Kashmir The [Supreme Court on February 13 dismissed a challenge concerning delimitation in Jammu and Kashmir](. A Bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and A.S. Oka had found that the petitioners did not challenge the constitutional validity of a specific provision in the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act which conferred the Delimitation Commission with the power to “carry out” the re-adjustment of constituencies in the Union Territory formed after the abrogation of Article 370 in the erstwhile State. The petition filed by Srinagar residents, Haji Abdul Gani Khan and Dr. Mohammad Ayub Mattoo, was limited to a challenge of the notification issued by the Centre in March 2020 establishing the Jammu and Kashmir Delimitation Commission and a second one in March 2021 extending its term for the purpose of conducting delimitation only for Jammu and Kashmir. Justice Oka had said the notifications drew their power specifically from Section 62(2) of the 2019 Act. Section 62(2) provided for the readjustment of constituencies to be carried out by the Delimitation Commission. The court, during the hearing, had asked why the petitioners without challenging the source of the government’s notifications, that is Section 62(2), had confined their challenge solely to the notifications. The petitioners, represented by senior advocate Ravi Shankar Jandhyala and advocates Sriram Parakkat and M.S. Vishnu Shankar, had argued that only the Election Commission of India, under Section 60 of the 2019 Act, was empowered to conduct the delimitation exercise. They had further argued before the Bench that Article 170 of the Constitution barred delimitation exercise on the basis of the 2011 census. It has to either happen on the basis of the 2001 census or await “the first census after the year 2026”, they had argued. The petitioners had alleged that Sections 60 and 61 of the 2019 Act, which define the role of the Election Commission in the process of delimitation of constituencies, were in contradiction to Section 62. The plea had said that if August 5, 2019, was to unite Jammu and Kashmir with India, then the delimitation process had defeated the “new order” of “One Nation One Constitution”. The petitioners had questioned why Jammu and Kashmir was “singled out” for delimitation in the 2021 notification. The earlier March 6, 2020, one had constituted the Delimitation Commission chaired by former Supreme Court judge, Justice Ranjana P. Desai, for the delimitation of Assembly and Parliamentary constituencies in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir as well as Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nagaland. The government had countered that there were two alternative mechanisms to carry out delimitation for the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir. By virtue of Sections 60-61, while the power to determine delimitation was conferred on Election Commission, Section 62(2) and 62(3) conferred powers to carry out delimitation on the Delimitation Commission. The Home Ministry and the Election Commission of India had argued that the delimitation orders already acquired the “force of law”. The ECI and the Ministry had maintained that the delimitation order had already been brought into effect from May 20, 2022. The delimitation order cannot be “re-agitated” in a court once it had gained finality by publication in the gazette. Parliament Budget Session: Opposition leaders hold meeting to chalk out strategy in Parliament [Leaders of 14 Opposition parties on February 13 held a meeting in New Delhi to discuss their joint strategy in Parliament](. Sources said the leaders of the Congress, the RJD, the DMK, the NCP, the JDU, the AAP and the Left parties met in the chamber of Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge in Parliament complex. The meeting comes in the wake of continued attack on the government over the Adani issue and the demand for a joint Parliamentary Committee probe into it. Adani Group stocks have taken a beating on the bourses after U.S.-based short-selling firm Hindenburg Research made a litany of allegations, including fraudulent transactions and share-price manipulation, against the business conglomerate. The Adani Group has dismissed the charges as lies, saying it complies with all laws and disclosure requirements. The meeting also comes after the Rajya Sabha suspended Congress member Rajani Patil from the House for the remainder of the Budget session, for circulating an unauthorised video of House proceedings. Patil had said it was not fair to give her the harshest punishment as she had not done anything deliberately. “I belong to a freedom fighter’s family and I should be given natural justice. I have not done anything deliberately,” Patil had said. 16-year-old Dalit student beaten for drinking water from principal’s bottle in U.P. A [16-year-old Class 11 Dalit student in Uttar Pradesh’s Bijnor district was allegedly beaten up by principal Yogendra Kumar and two others after he drank water from the principal’s bottle]( during a farewell party organised for outgoing Class 12 students. In the complaint submitted at Afzalgarh police station, the student of the Chamandevi Inter College alleged that when he was drinking water from a bottle kept on a table, the principal and his brother thrashed and hurled abuses at him on Sunday, saying that it was for the principal’s use only. The police lodged a complaint against the principal and two others under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Prevention of Atrocities Act and other Sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). “We have lodged the complaint of the student under the SC/ST Act and other Sections of the IPC, the Circle Officer of Afzalgarh police station is probing the matter. We will take necessary action as per law,” Additional Superintendent of Police Bijnor Ram Arj told The Hindu. U.S. not flying any balloons over China, says White House The [White House on February 13, 2023 denied Beijing’s accusation that the United States has been sending balloons over China to conduct surveillance]( as tensions about espionage rise between the two superpowers. “Any claim that the U.S. government operates surveillance balloons over the PRC is false,” National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said on Twitter. “It is China that has a high-altitude surveillance balloon program for intelligence collection, that it has used to violate the sovereignty of the U.S. and over 40 countries across 5 continents.” The State Department responded with a similar rejection, and called Beijing’s accusation “the latest example of China scrambling to do damage control.” “It has repeatedly and wrongly claimed the surveillance balloon it sent over the United States was a weather balloon and to this day has failed to offer any credible explanations for its intrusion into our airspace and the airspace of others,” a State Department spokesperson said in a statement. Earlier Monday China hit back against US charges of balloon espionage, accusing the United States of having sent more than 10 balloons into its airspace since January 2022. Washington’s response marked the latest development in an increasingly tense saga that included the downing of an alleged Chinese spy balloon off the coast of South Carolina earlier this month, after it had traversed much of the United States. The U.S. military subsequently shot down three other unidentified objects over North America in recent days, sparking widespread jitters and speculation as to their origins. Only the first object has been officially attributed to China, with Beijing insisting it was a civilian craft that had blown off course. On Monday, White House spokesman John Kirby said US authorities “haven’t been able to gain access” yet to the latest three objects shot down, due largely to weather conditions which have slowed search and recovery operations. In Brief: The [first part of the Budget session of Rajya Sabha was adjourned till March 13]( on February 13, Monday, after continued disruptions by Opposition MPs who kept up their demand for a Joint Parliamentary Committee probe into allegations against the Adani Group. The House, which was briefly adjourned in the morning, will now meet at 11 a.m. on March 13 after recess. Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar, who spoke about deliberate obstruction of proceedings, adjourned the House for the day after repeated appeals to bring order went unheeded and Opposition MPs raised slogans in support of their demand for a JPC and also revocation of the suspension of Congress MP Rajani Patil. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow. First Day First Show Stay up-to-date on all things cinema with the "First Day First Show" cinema & entertainment newsletter. 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