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New Indian Express
41 minutes ago
- Politics
- New Indian Express
Home Secretary level talks: India, Nepal agree to boost border, security cooperation
NEW DELHI: India and Nepal have agreed to review and enhance bilateral security cooperation and border management mechanisms, pledging to strengthen them further. The deliberations in these regards took place during the home secretary level talks between India and Nepal, which was held here on July 22, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said in an official statement. The Indian delegation was led by Govind Mohan, the Union Home Secretary, Government of India, and the Nepali delegation was led by Gokarna Mani Duwadee, the Home Secretary of the Government of Nepal. During the talks, both sides reviewed the entire gamut of bilateral security cooperation as well as border management and agreed to strengthen it further, the MHA noted in the statement. The deliberations included issues related to the repair and maintenance of boundary pillars, trans-border criminal activities, working of border district coordination committees, strengthening of border infrastructure, especially the Integrated Check Posts, roads and railway networks, empowerment and capacity building of various security related institutions, and ways to strengthen cooperation in disaster risk reduction and management, the MHA said. The two sides welcomed the finalisation of the text of the agreement on Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters and agreed to work towards early conclusion of the revised Extradition Treaty, it said, adding that the top officials of the two sides agreed that the next home secretary level talks will be held in Nepal at a mutual convenient date.
New Indian Express
a day ago
- Politics
- New Indian Express
Preparation for digital data collection, caste enumeration on: MoS Nityanand Rai
NEW DELHI: The Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Tuesday announced that preparations for Census 2027 have started, with a two-day conference of Directors of Census Operations held earlier this month to discuss the roadmap. The ministry confirmed that the census will be conducted in two phases and will include digital data collection as well as caste enumeration. In a written reply to the Lok Sabha, Minister of State for Home Nityanand Rai informed that a two-day conference was held in the national capital on July 3 and 4. The event was attended by Directors of Census Operations, senior officials from the Directorates of Census Operations, and officers from the Office of the Registrar General and Census Commissioner, India. The Minister added that the conference focused on the roadmap for the upcoming Census and related activities. Key topics discussed included finalisation of the administrative unit framework, data collection through mobile applications, management and monitoring via the Census Management and Monitoring System (CMMS) portal, self-enumeration, training of census personnel, and other related matters. Rai also pointed out that the preparation for Census 2027 started with the publication of gazette notification dated June 16, 2025 expressing the intent of the Government to conduct a Population Census. The Central government earlier last month announced that the Population Census-2027 will be conducted in two phases, and for the first time, it will also include enumeration of castes.
The Hindu
3 days ago
- The Hindu
The Tamil Nadu police to roll out mobile application to collect mandatory audio-visual evidence
A new mobile phone application, called e-Sakshaya, will be rolled out soon for police personnel to collect audio-visual evidence, upload photographs of crime scenes or witnesses, and generate immutable SID packets (secure, geo-tagged, time-stamped evidence with hash verification). This will strengthen the chain of custody and admissibility of evidence, according to a senior police officer. The application was developed by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs to capture audio and video evidence and generate hash reports with time-stamp. It has an inbuilt system for generating certificates in the prescribed format. This is being implemented through the State Crime Records Bureau (SCRB) for the use of investigation officers. Training completed Every investigation officer should record all video evidence, along with audio evidence, wherever necessary, and photo evidence as required under provisions of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, the police officer said. The application is loaded in the mobile phones of all investigation officers, including head constables and inspectors. All of them have been trained in using the application, he added. Block chain technology is being used to ensure data integrity and trustworthiness. The application records videos, photographs, and witness details on the scene of crime, and search and seizure by a police officer. The proceedings of search and search would be recorded and forwarded to courts. Unforeseen situations Whenever eSakshya is unavailable owing to unforeseen situations such as lack of connectivity, the audio-video recording should be carried out through other available means. In such cases, Part-A certificate should be issued manually by the police personnel or the videographers who recorded the video on their device and Part-B certificate should be issued by an expert notified under Section 329 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, according to the Tamil Nadu Criminal Procedure Rules. The investigation officer should link SID packets with the First Information Report number/General Diary (GD) number and the case number register (CNR) number. The evidence, once uploaded, would go to the magistrates concerned and the courts may view the evidence in the case information system application/Sakshya portal on the Inter-Operable Criminal Justice System (ICJS), officials said. The ICJS has been established to make the justice delivery system more effective by integrating main parts of criminal justice: the police (Crime and Criminal Tracking Network & Systems), courts (e-Courts), jails (e-Prisons), forensic labs (e-Forensic), and prosecution (e-Prosecution).
Scroll.in
16-07-2025
- Politics
- Scroll.in
A Jammu family's fight to get their mother back from Pakistan
Two months after her mother was deported from India, Falak Zahoor is disconsolate. 'If she had died, I would be at peace,' said Zahoor, a 32-year-old lawyer and Jammu resident. '[I would think] she has gone to another world and is with the Almighty. We would not be going through this hell.' Zahoor's 62-year-old mother, Rakshanda Rashid, was deported to Pakistan from India's Attari border in Punjab on April 29, barely a week after the Pahalgam terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir killed 26 people. Rashid has since been living alone in Lahore at a paying guest facility. A Pakistani national, Rashid had married a man from the Jammu region in December 1989 and had been living in Jammu and Kashmir since then. She had a long-term visa, one of the categories exempt from the post-Pahalgam wave of deportations, which she had been renewing annually for three decades. At the time of Rashid's expulsion, her visa renewal application had been pending with the Union Ministry of Home Affairs for more than three months. 'What is our fault?' asked Zahoor. 'As per procedure, we had applied for the extension of LTV [long-term visa] before its expiry. The government was sitting on our application for three months without either accepting or rejecting it.' The day after Rashid was deported, her family filed a writ petition before the High court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh. Nearly a month later, on June 6, a single-judge bench of the High Court ruled in Rashid's favour, directing the Ministry of Home Affairs to bring her back within 10 days and reunite her with her family in Jammu. But the Centre on June 29 challenged the repatriation order before a double bench, which issued an interim stay on July 2. In response to the fact that Rashid had applied for extension of her long-term visa on January 4, the ministry said that her application 'was not approved by the competent authority'. Scroll has a copy of the documents. Going by that logic, said Zahoor, her mother had been living in Jammu 'illegally' since January 16. 'Why didn't they deport her earlier then?' The bench asked the Ministry of Home Affairs to submit a response by July 17, the next date of hearing. With Rashid's case now caught in a legal tangle, her family has been worrying about how long she will be able to live alone in Lahore. 'She has already suffered a paralysis attack in the past. Her eyesight is weak and she uses contact lenses,' said Zahoor. 'How can such an individual survive alone?' Deportation and then a court order Ever since she got married, the only family Rashid knew was her husband and her two children. Both her parents in Pakistan died in 1989. When she moved to India after her marriage, Rashid lost touch with her family in Pakistan. According to the Ministry of Home Affairs, a long-term visa is granted to Pakistani and Bangladeshi women who are married to Indian nationals and have arrived in India on valid travel documents with an intent to acquire Indian citizenship. 'My mother's long-term visa had expired on January 16 and like every year, we had applied for its extension nearly two weeks before it did,' said Zahoor. She said it usually takes 40-60 days for the government to issue an extension. But this time, the government had taken more than three months to process the application. When the Pahalgam attack took place, Rashid's application was still under process. Those exempt from expulsion were people with long-term visas and those on medical, diplomatic and official visas. However, on April 28, Rashid received a 'leave India notice' from the local police in Jammu. With nobody ready to listen to their pleas, Rashid's family complied with the government's directions and she was deported on April 29. When the family went to court the next day, the bench took up the plea on the argument that the home ministry's orders had clearly exempted those with long-term visas and diplomatic visas, said Ankur Sharma, the legal counsel for Rashid's family in Jammu. Rashid, according to Sharma, had applied for Indian citizenship in 1996. 'She even has No Objection Certificates from authorities that say they don't have any objections if she becomes an Indian citizen,' he added. Sharma added that it is normal for long-term visa applications to take time to be processed. 'In case there's a delay in processing the extension application on time, it's considered granted unless it's formally rejected by the authorities,' he said. In Rashid's case, Zahoor said that the Foreigners Registration Office, under the Ministry of Home Affairs, said the visa extension process was still underway. 'In fact, I got an email on April 26 from the authorities that the application is under process.' Not only that, on May 9 – more than 10 days after her mother had been deported to Pakistan – Zahoor got an official intimation from the Foreigners Registration Office about her mother's long-term visa application being forwarded to the higher authorities. While ordering the home ministry to repatriate Rashid, the single judge bench of Justice Rahul Bharti had said that Rashid was deported ' without a proper, reasoned order '. 'Human rights are the most sacrosanct component of a human life,' the bench said, ...there are occasions when a constitutional court is supposed to come up with SOS like indulgence notwithstanding the merits and demerits of a case which can be adjudicated only upon in due course of time.' When she was deported, Rashid's family gave her Rs 50,000 –the maximum currency allowed to be taken to the other side of the border. Without an expensive roaming connection, Rashid's phone is not able to make or receive calls. 'We only talk to her when she's able to find a Wi-Fi connection,' said Zahoor. 'She's all alone,' said Zahoor. 'Whatever distant relatives we have there, they live in Rawalpindi and we don't share a good equation with them.' 'No visa', claims MHA The home ministry, in its appeal against the June 6 order, alleged that the High Court failed to appreciate the 'national security considerations' and apprehension posed by Pakistani nationals in India due to the 'war-like situation' between the two countries. The home ministry said that the High Court's order to repatriate Rashid was 'constitutionally impermissible and unsustainable' since it meant extending the judicial writ beyond India to Pakistan. 'There exists no extradition treaty, legal instrument, or international obligation binding Pakistan to return her to India,' the ministry said. 'The Indian government cannot, under existing international law, compel a sovereign nation to surrender a non-citizen.' The ministry also told the court that being married to an Indian national did not grant Rashid to 'claim a right to reside in India'. 'It is well settled law that a foreign national does not acquire Indian nationality or legal residency rights solely by virtue of marriage,' said the ministry's submission. In its appeal, the home ministry has also said that the High Court order could 'establish a dangerous precedent' since it could be used by foreign nationals for 'personal repatriation'. But the home ministry, soon after the Pahalgam terror attack, had on its own exempted the deportation of Pakistani Hindus whose long-term visa applications were 'under process.' Not only that, the exemption was also granted to Pakistani Hindus in India who had not applied for long-term visa status, provided they apply for it immediately. No such exemption, however, was granted to Rashid – a Muslim by faith. 'Isn't that discriminatory?' asked Zahoor. 'If women from Hindu and Sikh community are exempted, why not my mother?'
New Indian Express
14-07-2025
- Politics
- New Indian Express
MHA asks states, UTs to take counter-radicalisation measures in prisons
NEW DELHI: The Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has written to all states and Union Territories (UTs), raising concerns over the growing threat of radicalisation in prisons and urging countermeasures, warning that it could turn into a serious threat to public order and internal security. In its communication, a copy of which is with The New Indian Express, the MHA also outlined a set of guidelines to initiate countermeasures, as they included screening inmates, conducting regular risk assessments, isolating high-risk individuals under enhanced surveillance, and initiating de-radicalisation programmes for such prisoners. 'Prisoners can often become vulnerable to radical narratives owing to feelings of alienation, a tendency towards violent behaviour, or anti-social attitudes, and in some cases, radicalised inmates may engage in acts of violence or orchestrate attacks against prison staff, fellow inmates, or even external targets,' the MHA said, adding that radicalisation in prisons is becoming an increasingly critical challenge in the global context too and is often found to be a precursor to several criminal activities. 'It has, therefore, been felt that there is an urgent need to check and counter radicalisation of vulnerable individuals in prison settings and to undertake an exercise for de-radicalisation of such individuals, as the same is considered crucial for preserving public order and ensuring internal security,' it said.
