New Delhi [India], March 5 (ANI): The Supreme Court on Friday issued notices to the Central government and other parties after hearing a Public Intrest Litigation (PIL) challenging the constitutional validity of Section 12 and 51 of Blood Donor guidelines, 2017, which has imposed a blanket ban on transgender persons from donating blood.
A three-judge bench, headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sharad Arvind Bobde, issued notice to the government after hearing a petition filed by T Santa Singh.
The petitioner had moved the Apex Court challenging the current rules of the 2017 guidelines, which barred transgender persons from donating blood.
“We issue a notice to the respondents, and we will see their replies,” the bench led by CJI Bobde said.
The PIL filed by Santa Singh, before the Supreme Court has challenged the constitutional validity of section 12 and 51 of Blood Donor guidelines 2017, and sought a stay on the rule.
“These are medical matters. We don’t understand these issues,” the CJI Bobde, said, but, however, issued a notice to the Central government and sought its detailed replies in the issue.
The Supreme Court refused to stay the present blood donor guidelines and added that it would not pass orders without understanding the issue. (ANI)

Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala) [India], March 5 (ANI): Ahead of the Kerala Assembly polls, Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in Kerala Assembly Ramesh Chennithala on Friday said that the seat-sharing agreement between the parties in the United Democratic Front (UDF) will be finalised within a day.
“Seat sharing talks are progressing. We are on the last lap. We will finalise the list by today or tomorrow,” he said.
“For candidates’ list, the screening committee will meet and go to Delhi for the Central Election Committee (meet),” he said on seat sharing and candidates’ announcement for the State Assembly polls.
UDF led by Congress comprises of Indian Union Muslim League, Kerala Congress (Joseph), Revolutionary Socialist Party, and a variety of other smaller parties. The front is a part of the United Progressive Alliance at the national level.
On Kerala gold smuggling accused-Swapna Suresh’s purported allegations against Chief Minister of Kerala, Chenithala said, “Whatever the Opposition has said previously has proved to be right. The Chief Minister is the real culprit. His office has taken part in this murky deal with his knowledge”
“The Chief Minister made his Principal Secretary a scapegoat and tried to escape,” he further said.
“Now revelations are before the High Court and also in the public domain which makes me wonder why central agencies are not probing into these angles,” he added.
“They have been sleeping on this investigation for 2 months. I believe the understanding between CPI(M) and BJP may be the reason for this slow pace of the investigation,” he said.
On the recent row concerning a series of resignations of Wayanad Congress leaders, Chennithala said, “Congress is intact in Wayanad. Two lower-level office bearers have left and one of them have come back. One is an INTUC state secretary and the other is a Mahila Congress secretary”.
Ahead of the assembly polls in Kerala, four Congress Party leaders have resigned from the Congress party within the last four days alleging negligence of Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) leadership in the state. (ANI)

New Delhi [India], March 5 (ANI): The Supreme Court on Friday issued notice to former Principal Secretary to Kerala Chief Minister M Sivasankar, on the plea of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) challenging the Kerala High Court’s decision to grant bail to Sivasankar in connection with the gold smuggling case.
A Bench headed by Justice Ashok Bhushan sought a response from Sivasankar and posted the matter for hearing after six weeks.
As the ED sought the stay on the High Court’s order of granting bail to Sivasankar, the Bench said it was not needed as he is already out.
The ED, probing the money laundering angle in the case, has approached the top court against the High Court’s order of granting bail to him saying Sivasankar was influential and his release would hamper the investigation into the case.
Sivasankar was arrested on October 28 last year after the Kerala High Court rejected his anticipatory bail petition.
The case relates to the smuggling of gold through diplomatic channels in Kerala. It had come to light after 30 kg of gold worth Rs 14.82 crore smuggled in a consignment camouflaged as diplomatic baggage was busted by the Customs in Thiruvananthapuram on July 5, 2019.
Apart from the ED, the National Investigation Agency and the Customs Department are investigating the case. (ANI)

New Delhi [India], March 5 (ANI): The medical report of a 14-year-old girl, who wanted to terminate her unwanted 26 week-pregnancy, is ready, the Haryana government told the Supreme Court on Friday.
A Bench headed by Chief Justice of India Sharad Arvind Bobde asked the government to submit the report in a sealed cover and posted the matter for hearing on March 8.
Earlier, the Supreme Court asked the medical board of a government hospital in Haryana to examine if it would be safe for the 14-year-old to terminate her 26 week-pregnancy.
The Bench had called for the medical report from Karnal City Civil Hospital medical board.
The 14-year-old girl, in her plea, has stated that she was allegedly raped by her cousin leading to an unwanted pregnancy. She approached the apex court seeking permission to terminate her 26-week pregnancy.
Under the Medical Termination of Pregnancy Act, 1971, termination of pregnancy exceeding 20 weeks is not permissible without the leave of the court. (ANI)

By Pragya Kaushika
New Delhi [India], March 5 (ANI): Taking a dig at Congress general secretary for Uttar Pradesh Priyanka Gandhi’s visit to the tea gardens in poll-bound Assam and an attempt at plucking the leaves, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Assam chief Ranjit Dass on Friday said women working at tea gardens will vote for BJP government schemes and not for the stunt ahead of elections.
Recently, Gandhi had visited the tea gardens in Assam and got photographed while plucking tea leaves with a basket on her head.
Responding to whether Congress will benefit from such visits in the elections, Dass played down Gandhi by comparing her with the benefits women workers are receiving from the BJP-ruled state and central governments.
“They are putting up foreign land tea gardens. In our tenure, pregnant women workers will get Rs 12,000 in their bank accounts and also they will get maternity leave for six months. So, will they look at Gandhi plucking tea leaves or look at Rs 12,000 while voting?” Dass told ANI here.
Dass also credited the government for opening of bank accounts.
“Will they (women tea garden workers) look at Rs 5,000 that they get in their bank accounts or they look at five leaves plucked by Priyanka Gandhi,” he asked.
The tea garden tribe community comprises 17 per cent of the state’s population. A driving political force for more than 40 seats, all political parties are trying to woo this tribe ahead of polls.
The BJP had been critical of the Congress-ruled alliance that had put photographs from Taiwan instead of Assam in one of the political tweets by the party.
On Congress making a promise of 50 per cent job reservation in Assam, Dass said Congress always makes promises.
“During anti-CAA protests, they (Congress leaders) claimed that 1.50 crore people from outside will come and sell your lands and people will come from Bangladesh. Assamese saw no one came from Bangladesh. In fact, we stood first in the panchayat elections. Lakhs of Bangladeshis have encroached upon ethnic minority’s political rights during Congress regime,” Dass added, claiming that people chose BJP and made it a winner in panchayat elections in support of Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019.
“We won’t lose even a single seat because of CAA in fact we will win more seats,” said the BJP Assam president.
Dass praised his government for the works, which were done in the past five years.
“In the word Assam, first A denotes achievement of the government and another A signifies activities of the party workers. Our online members are 42 lakhs and 1 lakh are offline. Panna pramukh are 60 lakhs and they are working door-to-door. The government has worked to build infrastructure. In five years of government, we had made 11 medical colleges including AIIMS. Border is sealed. Indigenous people have got land documents. So much work has been done. Assam will vote for development again,” added Dass.
The Bharatiya Janata Party will announce the list of its candidates for the first and second phases of the Assam Assembly elections on Friday, said Dass.
He also claimed that BJP and its allies would secure at least 100 seats out of a total of 126 seats in the state Legislative Assembly.
Assam Assembly elections will be held in three phases beginning from March 27 with the final round of voting taking place on April 6. The counting of votes in the state will take place on May 2. (ANI)

New Delhi [India], March 5 (ANI): As many as 468 Arms licenses were issued while 6,263 licenses were renewed by Delhi Police’s Licensing Unit in 2020 despite operational constraints of the COVID-19, according to Delhi Police data.
The Licensing Unit deals with the licensing of – Arms, Explosives, Hotels, Restaurants, Cinema, Press, Auditoriums, Amusement Parks and Performance Licenses among others.
It cancelled 83 arms licenses and issued 388 casual performance licenses last year. In 2020, 19 lodging licenses for guest houses and hotels were issued while 587 licenses under the same category were renewed. 17 lodging licenses for guest houses and hotels were cancelled by the unit.
The Licensing Unit issued 114 register certificates for eating houses, renewed 215 and cancelled 21 certificates.
Suvashis Choudhary, Joint Commissioner of Police, Southern Range said the Licensing Unit has emerged today as one of the important ‘Image Hub’ of Delhi police.
“In the last few years, a major reorientation of the role of Licensing Unit has been brought about within the existing statutes. The important roles and responsibilities of the Licensing Unit have been re-defined by three I’s- issuance of Licenses, Inspection of entities and Interaction with stakeholders,” he said.
The police official highlighted that continuous efforts are being made to ensure “ease of doing business” in compliance to the clarion call given by Prime Minister Narendra Modi with a citizen-centric approach.
The Licensing Unit is a compact unit with a total strength of 196 personnel (as on December 31, 2020) and is divided into sections- Amrns & Explosives, Eating Houses, Loding Houses, Casual Performances, Cinema and Amusement, Press and Private Security Agencies and Electronic Data Processing.
Asserting that licensing process is dynamic and ever-changing, Choudhary, Joint Commissioner of Police, Southern Range said that the unit has lined up several projects in the near future including Application of Robotic Process Automation (RPA), Issuance of Arms License in form of Smart Card, development of a Licensing app, digitization and achieving of physical records, redesigning of licensing unit website and Database Management System (DBMS). (ANI)