The Evening Wrap: VHP procession attacked in Haryana’s Nuh; prohibitory orders imposed

Violence erupted in Haryana’s Muslim-dominated Nuh district on July 31 during Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s Brij Mandal Jalabhishek Yatra with the armed mob attacking the procession and setting the vehicles on fire. Though many were feared injured, there was no official word on the casualties till the time of filing of this report. According to PTI, a home guard was shot dead and about a dozen policemen injured. Prohibitory orders under Section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code have been imposed in the district to prevent the assembly of five or more people and the internet services in the district suspended, said Deputy Commissioner Prashant Panwar. Several hundred devotees, including women, took shelter inside Nalhar temple and remained trapped inside, surrounded by the mob, for around five hours before the police reinforcement called from neighbouring four districts rescued them. Speaking to The Hindu over phone from inside the temple, Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Gurugram, president Ajit Yadav said the devotees rushed to the temple attacked by the mob around 2 p.m. “While we remained stranded inside waiting for the police to rescue us, the mob outside went on rampage setting vehicles on fire. We could hear the gunshots as well,” Yadav claimed. Tension was brewing in the region after Bajrang Dal member Monu Mansar, a suspect in the kidnapping and murder of two young Muslim men in Rajasthan’s Bharatpur over suspicion of cow smuggling in February this year, in a video on social media a few days back claimed that he and his team would be part of the procession. The locals opposed Monu’s visit to Nuh because of his alleged involved in the murder case saying that it would disturb communal harmony in the region. According to eye-witnesses, the violence broke out around noon today when around half-a-dozen vehicles, including a black Sports Utility Vehicle, carrying devotees reached Nuh Chowk leading to rumours that Monu Manesar was inside one of the vehicles. In the videos of the violence emerging from Nuh on social media, the mob carrying lathis could be seen stone pelting on the vehicles and setting them afire. Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal made an appeal for peace saying all issues could be resolved with dialogue. Political activist Yogendra Yadav, in a press statement, said the “clash between two communities” in Nuh was much-awaited riot that the BJP had been trying to engineer in Mewat region. Land-for-jobs case: ED attaches ₹6-cr assets of RJD chief Lalu Prasad’s family, ‘linked’ firms The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on July 31 said it has attached assets worth more than ₹6 crore belonging to RJD supremo Lalu Prasad’s family — his wife Rabri Devi, daughter Misa Bharti and linked companies — as part of its money laundering investigation against them in an alleged land-for-railway jobs scam. A provisional order under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) has been issued to attach the six immovable assets in Patna, Ghaziabad (Uttar Pradesh) and a four-storey bungalow at D-1088 in the posh New Friends Colony area of south Delhi, the agency said in a statement. The properties attached also include two land parcels situated at Mahuabagh (Danapur) in Patna of which one each is owned by former Bihar CM Rabri Devi and A K Infosystems Pvt Ltd (a company stated to be controlled by Prasad’s family), a land parcel owned by RJD chief’s MP daughter Misa Bharti in the Bihta area of Patna. A portion of two industrial plots (one plot each registered in the names of Vineet Yadav and Shiv Kumar Yadav, the husband and father-in-law respectively of Yadav’s daughter Hema Yadav) situated in the Sahibabad industrial area of Ghaziabad, were also attached. The ED said A B Exports Pvt Ltd is a “shell” or fake company owned by Prasad’s son and Bihar deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav and Chanda Yadav (another daughter of the RJD chief) and its registered address is the bungalow located in the New Friends Colony area. All these assets have a combined “book value” of ₹6.02 crore, the agency said. The ED case stems from a CBI FIR against Yadav, a former cabinet minister for railways, Rabri Devi and others and it is alleged that seven land parcels were “acquired” by the family members of Lalu Prasad from the candidates “irregularly” appointed (as substitutes) and their family members, as a “quid pro quo” for Group D jobs in the Railways. The family members of candidates gifted/sold land (at cheap rates/lesser than the circle rate) to family members of Lalu Prasad and associated companies in lieu of jobs which was given in a “mala fide” manner with undue haste and in “violation” of extant law and procedure, the ED alleged. This criminal conspiracy, the agency claimed, to abuse his (Lalu Yadav) official position for the sake of seeking “bribes” led to accretion of the land parcels by his family members at Mahuabagh (Danapur) and Bihta, Patna, in such a manner so as to consolidate the land holdings already in their possession. The alleged scam pertains to Lalu Yadav’s tenure as the railways minister between 2004-09 in the UPA-I government at the Centre. The ED alleged Rabri Devi and Hema Yadav sold four land parcels “illegally” acquired from appointees in the Railways to Meridian Construction India Ltd., a company related to Syed Abu Dojana, a former RJD MLA, and the “proceeds of crime” so obtained by Rabri Devi and Hema Yadav were further transferred through a maze of transactions to A B Exports Pvt Ltd and M/s Bhagirathi Tubes respectively. “Rabri Devi and Hema Yadav sold these land parcels for ₹3.5 crore against the acquisition cost of ₹7.5 lakh, thus deriving huge gains,” the ED claimed. It said Bhagirathi Tubes is a partnership firm under the control of the father-in-law and husband of Hema Yadav, with its principal place of business at Ghaziabad. Talking about the New Friends Colony property in the national capital, the ED said it was an independent four-storeyed bungalow, registered in the name of A B Exports Private Limited, which was shown to have been acquired in 2011 at a value of mere ₹4 lakh. Despite being declared as the registered corporate office of various companies under the control of the members of the Lalu Prasad Yadav family, the same is being used solely for residential purposes, which was found during the search operations conducted at the said premises on March 10 this year, the ED said. The ED has recorded the statement of Prasad’s wife and former Bihar chief minister Rabri Devi, their children including Bihar Deputy Chief minister Tejashwi Yadav, daughters Misa Bharti (RJD MP in Rajya Sabha), Chanda Yadav and Ragini Yadav, over the last few months, in this case. Cannot excuse sexual violence against women in Manipur on ground that crimes are committed against them in other parts of country: Supreme Court The Supreme Court on July 31 said the “systemic” and “unprecedented magnitude” of sexual violence committed against women in Manipur amidst ethnic clashes cannot be excused on the ground that crimes happened to women in other parts of the country too. “You cannot excuse what is taking place in Manipur now on the ground that such crimes are happening to several other women as well in other parts of the country,” Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud, heading a three-judge Bench, observed. The Bench was dealing with an application that there were women in West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, and Kerala, all of which happened to be non-BJP ruled States, who were victims of crimes and still waiting for justice. Advocate Bansuri Swaraj, who represented the application, argued that any mechanism evolved by the Supreme Court to bring justice to the women of Manipur, be it a CBI probe or Supreme Court monitoring of investigations, should be extended to the women victims of these States. The Chief Justice said nobody was denying the fact that there were crimes against women, possibly in West Bengal as well. Swaraj persisted that the crimes against women in West Bengal were “equally grave”. She submitted that a panchayat election candidate in West Bengal was sexually assaulted by a mob and paraded nude. Parliament Monsoon Session | Lok Sabha clears Cinematograph (Amendment) Bill, 2023 Parliamentary logjam between the Indian National Developmental, Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) bloc and the BJP-led government continued as the Manipur issue stalled proceedings on Monday as well. In the Rajya Sabha, leader of the House Piyush Goyal said that the government is ready for a short-duration discussion under Rule 176 on Manipur, and Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar endorsed the proposal. The Opposition, however, insisted on a debate under Rule 267 and reiterated its demand for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s statement before a discussion. Even the Question Hour could not be completed amid the ruckus in the Upper House. Lok Sabha too was adjourned within minutes of commencement in the morning amid heavy sloganeering related to Manipur violence. The Lower House briefly debated The Cinematograph (Amendment) Bill, 2023 before it was passed without any Opposition. Meanwhile, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the Opposition, and their shedding of “crocodile tears”, had been exposed to the public by their refusal to discuss Manipur in Parliament, despite a discussion being listed in the Rajya Sabha. She also named Opposition MPs, including John Brittas of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), Manoj Jha of the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), G.C. Chandrashekhar of the Congress, Fauzia Khan of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), and Elamaram Kareem of the CPI(M) from a list of 20 MPs, both Treasury and Opposition, who had sent notices asking for a discussion on Manipur under Rule 176 of the Rules of Business. Sitharaman said that the Opposition’s demand was something that was within the purview of the Chairperson of the Rajya Sabha, but more importantly, eight days had gone by in the session, and while a discussion under Rule 267 was for really urgent matters, she asked, “People have visited the State since the incident first came to light. Doesn’t the Opposition want to talk about what they saw?” SC declines to intervene in Karnataka High Court’s interim stay of CBI proceedings against D.K. Shivakumar The Supreme Court on July 31 declined to intervene in a Karnataka High Court’s interim stay of CBI probe against Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar in a corruption case. A Bench led by Justice B.R. Gavai said that the order under challenge was an interim one. The Bench requested the High Court to expeditiously hear and decide the case in its merits. The High Court on February 10 stayed the CBI probe and the stay was extended in subsequent hearings. In 2017, the Income Tax Department raided Shivakumar, on the basis of which, the ED started its probe against him. Following the ED investigation, the CBI later sought sanction from the State government to file a FIR against him. The sanction came on September 25, 2019. On October 3, 2020, Shivakumar was booked by the CBI under the Prevention of Corruption Act for the alleged possession of disproportionate assets to the tune of ₹ 74.93 crore. Shivakumar had approached the Karnataka High Court challenging the sanction and proceedings against him, alleging that the CBI was applying mental pressure on him ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections by repeatedly issuing notices to him, even though the case dated back to 2020. IIT-Bombay sends missive on anti-discrimination guidelines ahead of arrival of new batch After the suicide of a Dalit B. Tech. student shook up the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay with allegations of widespread caste discrimination early this year, the institute is publicising its anti-discrimination policy, which now specifically includes triggers and don’ts for caste discrimination, with the Dean of Student Affairs sending out the guidelines to everyone on campus in an email on July 31. The institute is expecting its fresh batch of undergraduates and postgraduates in the coming weeks. Less than six months ago, the death of 18-year-old Darshan Solanki from Gujarat, a Dalit student at IIT-Bombay, led to allegations of caste discrimination on campus. This eventually led to the disclosure of results from a two-year old survey conducted by the institute, which showed widespread caste discrimination. Since then, the institute’s Schedule Castes/Schedule Tribes Cell has formulated guidelines against caste discrimination on campus. These include disallowing students from asking each other their Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) (Advanced) or Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) entry categories; suggests students bond over where they were from, and mutual interests such as music, movies and sports; and prohibits the spreading of casteist, sexist, or hateful messages or jokes. However, the guidelines do not specifically prohibit the circulation of jokes that are anti-reservation, something students have said is among the most common ways of being discriminated against, according to the institute’s own survey. Despite the institute putting up these guidelines in public, which has been done in IIT-Bombay for the first time, according to some students, student groups have alleged instances of casteism occurring in hostels. Two weeks ago, there were photos of a space in the mess of Hostel 12 being marked ‘Vegetarian only’, when the institute has no policy for segregating spaces in the mess. Students said this was linked to the notion of vegetarianism being connected to “purity” and was thus casteist. Shortly afterward, the general secretary of the hostel mess wrote to students denouncing the segregation in the mess and reminding students that while Jain food (following the dietary principles of Jainism) was cooked and served at a different counter, no space in the mess could be reserved or seek to exclude anyone. But even as the Dean on Monday circulated the guidelines, which promise “severe punishment” for any violations, students of the Ambedkar Periyar Phule Study Circle pointed to other worries. “The SC/ST Cell does not have a mandate yet, such as the one IIT-Delhi passed earlier this year. There is also no public record of what the grievance redressal procedure for complaints will be like,” a student said. ISIS behind suicide blast at JUI-F political convention that killed 44 in Pakistan: Police Police in Pakistan’s restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province said on July 31 that an initial probe has suggested that the banned terrorist group ISIS is behind the suicide attack on a political convention of a hardline Islamist party that killed at least 44 people and injured more than 100. The attack took place on July 30 when more than 400 members of the conservative Jamiat Ulema Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) party, known for its links to hardline political Islam, had gathered for a meeting under a canopy in the town of Khar, which borders Afghanistan. “We are still investigating and gathering information on the Bajaur blast. The Initial probe shows that banned outfit Daesh (ISIS) was involved,” Geo News quoted police officials as saying. The police said they were gathering details of the suicide bomber, while the bomb disposal squad team was collecting evidence from the site. District Police Officer Nazir Khan said three suspects have been taken into custody. Provincial police chief Akhtar Hayat Khan said 10 kilogrammes of explosives set off by a suicide bomber were used in the blast. He said the bomber was among the attendees seated in the front rows of the convention. Local police said the attacker detonated explosives near the convention’s stage. An emergency has been declared in the hospitals of Bajaur and adjoining areas where most of the injured were taken. The critically injured have been transported from Bajaur to hospitals in the provincial capital Peshawar by military helicopters. Bajaur District Health Officer Dr. Faisal Kamal said more than 150 injured people had been brought to the Bajaur District Headquarters Hospital. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has strongly condemned the blast and vowed that those responsible will be identified and punished and ordered an investigation into the incident and instructed that the critically injured persons be transferred to other hospitals on a helicopter. In Brief: India’s core sectors’ output surged at a five-month high pace of 8.2% in June, as per data from the Commerce and Industry Ministry, led by a 21.9% spike in steel output and nearly double-digit rise in coal and cement production. Infrastructure output, which comprises eight sectors, including coal and electricity, accounts for nearly 40% of industrial output. The core sector growth was 13.1 per cent in June 2022, the Commerce Ministry data showed. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow. [logo] The Evening Wrap 31 July 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]( VHP procession attacked in Haryana’s Nuh; prohibitory orders imposed [Violence erupted in Haryana’s Muslim-dominated Nuh district on July 31 during Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s Brij Mandal Jalabhishek Yatra]( with the armed mob attacking the procession and setting the vehicles on fire. Though many were feared injured, there was no official word on the casualties till the time of filing of this report. According to PTI, a home guard was shot dead and about a dozen policemen injured. Prohibitory orders under Section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code have been imposed in the district to prevent the assembly of five or more people and the internet services in the district suspended, said Deputy Commissioner Prashant Panwar. Several hundred devotees, including women, took shelter inside Nalhar temple and remained trapped inside, surrounded by the mob, for around five hours before the police reinforcement called from neighbouring four districts rescued them. Speaking to The Hindu over phone from inside the temple, Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Gurugram, president Ajit Yadav said the devotees rushed to the temple attacked by the mob around 2 p.m. “While we remained stranded inside waiting for the police to rescue us, the mob outside went on rampage setting vehicles on fire. We could hear the gunshots as well,” Yadav claimed. Tension was brewing in the region after Bajrang Dal member Monu Mansar, a suspect in the kidnapping and murder of two young Muslim men in Rajasthan’s Bharatpur over suspicion of cow smuggling in February this year, in a video on social media a few days back claimed that he and his team would be part of the procession. The locals opposed Monu’s visit to Nuh because of his alleged involved in the murder case saying that it would disturb communal harmony in the region. According to eye-witnesses, the violence broke out around noon today when around half-a-dozen vehicles, including a black Sports Utility Vehicle, carrying devotees reached Nuh Chowk leading to rumours that Monu Manesar was inside one of the vehicles. In the videos of the violence emerging from Nuh on social media, the mob carrying lathis could be seen stone pelting on the vehicles and setting them afire. Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal made an appeal for peace saying all issues could be resolved with dialogue. Political activist Yogendra Yadav, in a press statement, said the “clash between two communities” in Nuh was much-awaited riot that the BJP had been trying to engineer in Mewat region. Land-for-jobs case: ED attaches ₹6-cr assets of RJD chief Lalu Prasad’s family, ‘linked’ firms [The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on July 31 said it has attached assets worth more than ₹6 crore belonging to RJD supremo Lalu Prasad’s family]( — his wife Rabri Devi, daughter Misa Bharti and linked companies — as part of its money laundering investigation against them in an alleged land-for-railway jobs scam. A provisional order under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) has been issued to attach the six immovable assets in Patna, Ghaziabad (Uttar Pradesh) and a four-storey bungalow at D-1088 in the posh New Friends Colony area of south Delhi, the agency said in a statement. The properties attached also include two land parcels situated at Mahuabagh (Danapur) in Patna of which one each is owned by former Bihar CM Rabri Devi and A K Infosystems Pvt Ltd (a company stated to be controlled by Prasad’s family), a land parcel owned by RJD chief’s MP daughter Misa Bharti in the Bihta area of Patna. A portion of two industrial plots (one plot each registered in the names of Vineet Yadav and Shiv Kumar Yadav, the husband and father-in-law respectively of Yadav’s daughter Hema Yadav) situated in the Sahibabad industrial area of Ghaziabad, were also attached. The ED said A B Exports Pvt Ltd is a “shell” or fake company owned by Prasad’s son and Bihar deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav and Chanda Yadav (another daughter of the RJD chief) and its registered address is the bungalow located in the New Friends Colony area. All these assets have a combined “book value” of ₹6.02 crore, the agency said. The ED case stems from a CBI FIR against Yadav, a former cabinet minister for railways, Rabri Devi and others and it is alleged that seven land parcels were “acquired” by the family members of Lalu Prasad from the candidates “irregularly” appointed (as substitutes) and their family members, as a “quid pro quo” for Group D jobs in the Railways. The family members of candidates gifted/sold land (at cheap rates/lesser than the circle rate) to family members of Lalu Prasad and associated companies in lieu of jobs which was given in a “mala fide” manner with undue haste and in “violation” of extant law and procedure, the ED alleged. This criminal conspiracy, the agency claimed, to abuse his (Lalu Yadav) official position for the sake of seeking “bribes” led to accretion of the land parcels by his family members at Mahuabagh (Danapur) and Bihta, Patna, in such a manner so as to consolidate the land holdings already in their possession. The alleged scam pertains to Lalu Yadav’s tenure as the railways minister between 2004-09 in the UPA-I government at the Centre. The ED alleged Rabri Devi and Hema Yadav sold four land parcels “illegally” acquired from appointees in the Railways to Meridian Construction India Ltd., a company related to Syed Abu Dojana, a former RJD MLA, and the “proceeds of crime” so obtained by Rabri Devi and Hema Yadav were further transferred through a maze of transactions to A B Exports Pvt Ltd and M/s Bhagirathi Tubes respectively. “Rabri Devi and Hema Yadav sold these land parcels for ₹3.5 crore against the acquisition cost of ₹7.5 lakh, thus deriving huge gains,” the ED claimed. It said Bhagirathi Tubes is a partnership firm under the control of the father-in-law and husband of Hema Yadav, with its principal place of business at Ghaziabad. Talking about the New Friends Colony property in the national capital, the ED said it was an independent four-storeyed bungalow, registered in the name of A B Exports Private Limited, which was shown to have been acquired in 2011 at a value of mere ₹4 lakh. Despite being declared as the registered corporate office of various companies under the control of the members of the Lalu Prasad Yadav family, the same is being used solely for residential purposes, which was found during the search operations conducted at the said premises on March 10 this year, the ED said. The ED has recorded the statement of Prasad’s wife and former Bihar chief minister Rabri Devi, their children including Bihar Deputy Chief minister Tejashwi Yadav, daughters Misa Bharti (RJD MP in Rajya Sabha), Chanda Yadav and Ragini Yadav, over the last few months, in this case. Cannot excuse sexual violence against women in Manipur on ground that crimes are committed against them in other parts of country: Supreme Court The [Supreme Court on July 31 said the “systemic” and “unprecedented magnitude” of sexual violence committed against women in Manipur amidst ethnic clashes cannot be excused]( on the ground that crimes happened to women in other parts of the country too. “You cannot excuse what is taking place in Manipur now on the ground that such crimes are happening to several other women as well in other parts of the country,” Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud, heading a three-judge Bench, observed. The Bench was dealing with an application that there were women in West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, and Kerala, all of which happened to be non-BJP ruled States, who were victims of crimes and still waiting for justice. Advocate Bansuri Swaraj, who represented the application, argued that any mechanism evolved by the Supreme Court to bring justice to the women of Manipur, be it a CBI probe or Supreme Court monitoring of investigations, should be extended to the women victims of these States. The Chief Justice said nobody was denying the fact that there were crimes against women, possibly in West Bengal as well. Swaraj persisted that the crimes against women in West Bengal were “equally grave”. She submitted that a panchayat election candidate in West Bengal was sexually assaulted by a mob and paraded nude. Parliament Monsoon Session | Lok Sabha clears Cinematograph (Amendment) Bill, 2023 [Parliamentary logjam between the Indian National Developmental, Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) bloc and the BJP-led government continued as the Manipur issue stalled proceedings on Monday as well](. In the Rajya Sabha, leader of the House Piyush Goyal said that the government is ready for a short-duration discussion under Rule 176 on Manipur, and Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar endorsed the proposal. The Opposition, however, insisted on a debate under Rule 267 and reiterated its demand for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s statement before a discussion. Even the Question Hour could not be completed amid the ruckus in the Upper House. Lok Sabha too was adjourned within minutes of commencement in the morning amid heavy sloganeering related to Manipur violence. The Lower House briefly debated The Cinematograph (Amendment) Bill, 2023 before it was passed without any Opposition. Meanwhile, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the Opposition, and their shedding of “crocodile tears”, had been exposed to the public by their refusal to discuss Manipur in Parliament, despite a discussion being listed in the Rajya Sabha. She also named Opposition MPs, including John Brittas of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), Manoj Jha of the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), G.C. Chandrashekhar of the Congress, Fauzia Khan of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), and Elamaram Kareem of the CPI(M) from a list of 20 MPs, both Treasury and Opposition, who had sent notices asking for a discussion on Manipur under Rule 176 of the Rules of Business. Sitharaman said that the Opposition’s demand was something that was within the purview of the Chairperson of the Rajya Sabha, but more importantly, eight days had gone by in the session, and while a discussion under Rule 267 was for really urgent matters, she asked, “People have visited the State since the incident first came to light. Doesn’t the Opposition want to talk about what they saw?” SC declines to intervene in Karnataka High Court’s interim stay of CBI proceedings against D.K. Shivakumar The [Supreme Court on July 31 declined to intervene in a Karnataka High Court’s interim stay of CBI probe against Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar]( in a corruption case. A Bench led by Justice B.R. Gavai said that the order under challenge was an interim one. The Bench requested the High Court to expeditiously hear and decide the case in its merits. The High Court on February 10 stayed the CBI probe and the stay was extended in subsequent hearings. In 2017, the Income Tax Department raided Shivakumar, on the basis of which, the ED started its probe against him. Following the ED investigation, the CBI later sought sanction from the State government to file a FIR against him. The sanction came on September 25, 2019. On October 3, 2020, Shivakumar was booked by the CBI under the Prevention of Corruption Act for the alleged possession of disproportionate assets to the tune of ₹ 74.93 crore. Shivakumar had approached the Karnataka High Court challenging the sanction and proceedings against him, alleging that the CBI was applying mental pressure on him ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections by repeatedly issuing notices to him, even though the case dated back to 2020. IIT-Bombay sends missive on anti-discrimination guidelines ahead of arrival of new batch After the suicide of a Dalit B. Tech. student shook up the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay with allegations of widespread caste discrimination early this year, the [institute is publicising its anti-discrimination policy]( which now specifically includes triggers and don’ts for caste discrimination, with the Dean of Student Affairs sending out the guidelines to everyone on campus in an email on July 31. The institute is expecting its fresh batch of undergraduates and postgraduates in the coming weeks. Less than six months ago, the death of 18-year-old Darshan Solanki from Gujarat, a Dalit student at IIT-Bombay, led to allegations of caste discrimination on campus. This eventually led to the disclosure of results from a two-year old survey conducted by the institute, which showed widespread caste discrimination. Since then, the institute’s Schedule Castes/Schedule Tribes Cell has formulated guidelines against caste discrimination on campus. These include disallowing students from asking each other their Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) (Advanced) or Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering (GATE) entry categories; suggests students bond over where they were from, and mutual interests such as music, movies and sports; and prohibits the spreading of casteist, sexist, or hateful messages or jokes. However, the guidelines do not specifically prohibit the circulation of jokes that are anti-reservation, something students have said is among the most common ways of being discriminated against, according to the institute’s own survey. Despite the institute putting up these guidelines in public, which has been done in IIT-Bombay for the first time, according to some students, student groups have alleged instances of casteism occurring in hostels. Two weeks ago, there were photos of a space in the mess of Hostel 12 being marked ‘Vegetarian only’, when the institute has no policy for segregating spaces in the mess. Students said this was linked to the notion of vegetarianism being connected to “purity” and was thus casteist. Shortly afterward, the general secretary of the hostel mess wrote to students denouncing the segregation in the mess and reminding students that while Jain food (following the dietary principles of Jainism) was cooked and served at a different counter, no space in the mess could be reserved or seek to exclude anyone. But even as the Dean on Monday circulated the guidelines, which promise “severe punishment” for any violations, students of the Ambedkar Periyar Phule Study Circle pointed to other worries. “The SC/ST Cell does not have a mandate yet, such as the one IIT-Delhi passed earlier this year. There is also no public record of what the grievance redressal procedure for complaints will be like,” a student said. ISIS behind suicide blast at JUI-F political convention that killed 44 in Pakistan: Police Police in Pakistan’s restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province said on July 31 that an initial probe has suggested that the banned terrorist group [ISIS is behind the suicide attack on a political convention of a hardline Islamist party that killed at least 44 people]( and injured more than 100. The attack took place on July 30 when more than 400 members of the conservative Jamiat Ulema Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) party, known for its links to hardline political Islam, had gathered for a meeting under a canopy in the town of Khar, which borders Afghanistan. “We are still investigating and gathering information on the Bajaur blast. The Initial probe shows that banned outfit Daesh (ISIS) was involved,” Geo News quoted police officials as saying. The police said they were gathering details of the suicide bomber, while the bomb disposal squad team was collecting evidence from the site. District Police Officer Nazir Khan said three suspects have been taken into custody. Provincial police chief Akhtar Hayat Khan said 10 kilogrammes of explosives set off by a suicide bomber were used in the blast. He said the bomber was among the attendees seated in the front rows of the convention. Local police said the attacker detonated explosives near the convention’s stage. An emergency has been declared in the hospitals of Bajaur and adjoining areas where most of the injured were taken. The critically injured have been transported from Bajaur to hospitals in the provincial capital Peshawar by military helicopters. Bajaur District Health Officer Dr. Faisal Kamal said more than 150 injured people had been brought to the Bajaur District Headquarters Hospital. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has strongly condemned the blast and vowed that those responsible will be identified and punished and ordered an investigation into the incident and instructed that the critically injured persons be transferred to other hospitals on a helicopter. In Brief: [India’s core sectors’ output surged at a five-month high pace of 8.2% in June]( as per data from the Commerce and Industry Ministry, led by a 21.9% spike in steel output and nearly double-digit rise in coal and cement production. Infrastructure output, which comprises eight sectors, including coal and electricity, accounts for nearly 40% of industrial output. The core sector growth was 13.1 per cent in June 2022, the Commerce Ministry data showed. Evening Wrap will return tomorrow. [Sign up for free]( Today’s Top Picks [[Give us complete break-up of 6,000 FIRs, SC tells Manipur government] Give us complete break-up of 6,000 FIRs, SC tells Manipur government]( [[Domestic medical device manufacturers question Centre’s ‘Make in India’ policy] Domestic medical device manufacturers question Centre’s ‘Make in India’ policy]( [[Fault lines emerge in debate over age of consent and marriage for women] Fault lines emerge in debate over age of consent and marriage for women]( [[Niger junta says France plotting to 'intervene militarily'] Niger junta says France plotting to 'intervene militarily']( Copyright @ 2023, THG PUBLISHING PVT LTD. If you are facing any trouble in viewing this newsletter, please [try here]( Manage your newsletter subscription preferences [here]( If you do not wish to receive such emails [go here](