Today’s papers are all in praise of the Supreme Court’s decision on women in the Army getting permanent commissions, its move on the Shaheen Bagh mediation along with the Jamia videos and a new death warrant for the 16 December rape-murder convicts. ET, Mint and Business Standard have differing reports on the continuing Vodafone and Airtel saga.
The Indian Express focuses on the landmark Supreme Court verdict which paved the way for women army officers on Short Service Commission becoming eligible for Permanent Commission and commanding positions. “In a ‘momentous ruling’ to “change mindset”’ the report says SC termed the arguments against women’s larger role in the army “indefensible and disturbing”. In another ruling, the apex court appointed two interlocutors “to persuade anti-CAA protesters at Shaheen Bagh in Delhi to end their blockade of a public road”.
There’s also an exclusive about former Chief Justice of Allahabad Justice Dilip Bhosale raising concerns over the “pace of work” or indeed the lack of it, in the Lokpal, in letters addressed to chairperson Pinaki Chandra Ghosh. Bhosale, who had been “one of the four Judicial members of the Lokpal”, resigned weeks after he wrote the letters.
A British MP, Debbie Abrahams, “who had criticised India’s decision to revoke the special status of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370”, was denied entry into India and was deported after she landed at Delhi airport. She claimed that this was done despite the fact that she had a valid visa. The report scrupulously points out that the government said her visa had been cancelled “much earlier’’.
Also, more “stringent” measures in Jammu and Kashmir: the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act has been invoked to “register a case against people using social media through proxy servers…’’
The Times of India, on the SC ruling regarding women in the armed forces, begins with stirring words: “Twenty eight years after they first entered the Army, women officers broke an armour plated ceiling.’’ It adds that the decision of the bench to “trash the Army’s ‘weaker sex’ argument was a ‘fitting finale to the 14 year old litigation’”.
The December 16 rape convicts will now be hanged on 3 March as the Delhi court said, “Further delay in the execution of the Nirbhaya case convicts would be ‘sacrilegious’ to the rights of the victim and for justice.”
Shaheen Bagh and Jamia are still in news. In the latter, a “virtual video war” broke out between the university and Delhi Police with “three new CCTV clips…” TOI uses unusually strong language to describe the police action in the videos: the one on Sunday showed the police “barging into the library and raining lathi blows indiscriminately on the students…”
Hindustan Times hails SC’s decision that “shattered the glass ceiling” on women in the armed forces and “created a new equality paradigm in the armed forces..”.
An exclusive flap story on Masood Azhar provides details about the terrorist’s whereabouts after reports suggest that he is missing: he “is living under the highest security in a virtually bomb-proof house behind the terror group’s Bahawalpur headquarters at Markaz-e-Usman-o-Ali, Railway Link Road, in Pakistan.”
The Jamia attack video report is also critical and states the videos further contradicted “the Delhi Police’s claim that they did not enter the library area or beat up students in the premier university.” However, it adds that the plethora of videos now emerging present “contrasting narratives’’— one of police “excesses”, the other of “suspected rioters” taking shelter in the library.
The paper also reports on “Vodafone Idea Ltd and Bharti Airtel Ltd, the worst affected by the top court’s verdict on the adjusted gross revenue (AGR) case” making “part payment”.
The Hindu remains bland with its headlines. However, the SC story opens with a bold paragraph, “The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed the Union government’s submissions that women are physiologically weaker than men as a “sex stereotype” and declared that Short Service Commission (SSC) women officers are eligible for permanent commission and command posts in the Army irrespective of their years of service.”
The Shaheen Bagh story features an interesting quote by Justice Kaul, “Democracy works on different views. We have no quibble on that. You want to protest, no problem…but our limited concern is whether you could protest without blocking roads and entering public areas… With every right there comes a responsibility too.”
The UK MP denied entry in India is given a look in — Hindu quotes diplomat Debbie Abrahams with her account of how she was turned back at the airport.
The Telegraph uses the SC ruling on Shaheen Bagh to take a dig at PM Modi in its headline. The committee appointed by the SC to talk to protesters, “has been given a week to hold discussions and file a status report.”
Read about how Marxist economist and lecturer Prabhat Patnaik’s lecture was put on hold. He was planning to “deliver a lecture on the economy and link it with fascism” at the Visva Bharati University in Santiniketin, West Bengal on 12 March.
The New Indian Express also leads with the Supreme Court judgment. Unlike The Indian Express, it highlights Justices D.Y. Chandrachud and Ajay Rastogi’s statement on how the deeply entrenched stereotype about men being dominant and women being the caretakers needs to be dismissed.
NIE highlights a report about the ship that has been quarantined because of the coronavirus outbreak. This time, two more Indians have been affected bringing the number of infected Indian nationals up to six. There’s also an interesting report about how Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Edappadi Palanaswami has been reaching out to the Muslims as anti-CAA protests rage on in the state.
Read the anchor story about Kaliammal, an octogenarian who won back her property from her son after intervention from the district administration. “If you cannot care for your elderly parents, you have no right to their property,” the report notes.
Mumbai Mirror returns to the Sheena Bora murder case with former commissioner of police Rakesh Maria’s “exclusive and revealing extract…. about the role of his former senior colleagues, and the behind-the-scene jockeying that marked the investigation into one of India’s most sensational murders, and which also led, indirectly, to the arrest of former Union home minister P. Chidambaram.”
Another report covers the arrest of “Amit Prajapati, a 34-year-old software engineer from Ankaleshwar,” who was seized with 37,796 train tickets worth Rs 10.56 crore.
In its reports on the Supreme Court verdict on women in the army,. Tribune notes that SC, in its judgment, noted that “the right to equality is a right to rationality”.
There’s another report on Chief of Defence Staff Bipin Rawat’s statement about the rolling of the first “theatre command” which could potentially “alter the structure of Indian armed forces”.
Also a shocker highlighting how “almost half of the groundwater in Punjab is unsafe and contaminated with hazardous chemicals”.
The Economic Times heads out with Monday’s business story: Vodafone Idea’s plan “to invoke its bank guarantees for recovering adjusted gross revenue (AGR)-related dues” being rejected by the Supreme Court. This is despite the report noting that “the telecom department (DoT) is seeking the law ministry’s opinion on whether the bank guarantees can be encashed before March 17 — the next date of hearing in the SC”. Is it curtains for Vodafone? Well, all this leaves “the beleaguered telcos on the brink of a possible collapse’’.
Meanwhile, an embattled Oyo’s troubles seem to have deepened as it “reported a consolidated loss of $335 million for the year ended March 2019”.
In some “rare good news”, “reserves of lithium, a rare metal critical to build batteries for electric vehicles, have been discovered in Mandya” — 14,100 tonnes of lithium was found in a small patch of land surveyed in Karnataka.
Mint highlights that Vodafone Idea and Bharti Airtel made partial payments of their dues to the government “after the court pulled up the operators for failing to meet the payment deadline set by it”.
There’s also an interesting explainer about the “economics of freebies”, days after the Aam Aadmi Party was re-elected in Delhi. Take note, Arvind Kejriwal, “there is no such thing as a freebie in economics because ultimately somebody has to bear the cost of the supposedly free giveaways”. The paper also highlights Oyo’s widening loss.
Business Standard report on Vodafone Idea’s plan to fall back on bank guarantees emphasises that the Department of Telecommunications has sought legal advice in the matter. “Any move to revoke or encash the bank guarantee would put the operation of highly-stressed Vodafone Idea at risk,” the report notes. The paper’s anchor deals with Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries’ decision to consolidate its media and distribution business into Network 18. “This will pave the way for an Rs 8,000-crore company, second only to Star India,” the report highlights.
There’s also a small, albeit important item about global rating agency Moody’s revising India’s growth forecast to 5.4% from the earlier estimate of 6.6% amid the coronavirus epidemic.