Imtiaz Ahmad & Agencies

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Islamabad : Pakistan’s lower house of parliament on Tuesday approved amendments to the Army Act 1952, Pakistan Air Force Act 1953 and Pakistan Navy Ordinance 1961 which will now give the prime minister the power to extend the tenure of any service chief and the president to give his final nod to the extension or reappointment.

The bills amendments were passed with the support of all major political parties, including the opposition PML-N and PPP.

Some opposition lawmakers, including MPs from the rightist Jamaat-e-Islami walked out in protest over the bills. They had earlier announced they would not be supporting the bill on principle.

After the National Assembly’s approval, the bills will now go to the Senate Standing Committee on Defence for approval before they are passed by the Senate. The bills would become acts of parliament once signed by the president.

In November 2019, the Supreme Court had asked the government to legislate on an extension in the COAS’s services within six months, allowing General Qamar Javed Bajwa to stay in office until then.

CRUCIAL BILL ON TERROR INFO PASSED

Islamabad : Pakistan has narrowly passed a bill that will allow the exchange of information and of criminals with countries, to meet a requirement of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). There was stiff resistance from the Opposition, with its leader Khwaja Asif saying that approving the bill would be “surrendering the country’s sovereignty”.

“Please do not rush the bill to meet someone’s deadline. Let us debate the matter,” he said. PPP’s Abdul Qadir Patel claimed that there was a clause in the bill which allowed the government to hand over individuals to countries even without demand.

In a related development, a the director general of Financial Monitoring Unit (FMU), Mansoor Siddiqui has said Pakistan hopes to win a “largely compliant” rating from the FATF on implementing a 27-point action plan, which could help the government get more time from the watchdog for ensuring full compliance

Bomb kills 2 soldiers in Balochistan

quetta : A powerful roadside bomb exploded near a vehicle carrying Pakistani security forces, killing two soldiers in the southwestern city of Quetta, a police official said Tuesday.

The bombing wounded 12 people, including security forces, said local police chief Abdul Wali. He said some of the wounded were in critical condition at local hospitals. Hizbul Ahrar, an offshoot of the Pakistani Taliban, claimed responsibility for the attack.

air force jet crashes, 2 pilots killed

Multan : Pakistan’s air force said one if its aircraft crashed during training Tuesday in the eastern Punjab province, killing the two pilots. The FT-7 jet trainer went down in an open area, the air force statement said. It said an investigation had been opened to determine the cause of the crash, which took place near the district of Mianwali, 300km from the city of Lahore.

Navneet Sharma

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Chandigarh : The Punjab government will start compulsory National Cadet Corps (NCC) training for students of classes 9 and 11 in government schools of six districts from the academic session 2020-21.

The NCC training, which was first announced by chief minister Capt Amarinder Singh as a pilot project last year, will be launched in Gurdaspur, Amritsar, Tarn Taran, Ferozepur, Sangrur and Patiala districts.

There are 669 high schools and 556 senior secondary schools in these districts with an estimated enrolment of 1.36-lakh students in classes 9 and 11 who will be provided training from the coming academic session as per the roadmap prepared by the school education department, according to two senior officials who did not want to be named.

Of these, around 74,000 students are expected to be from Class 9 and the remaining 62,000 from Class 11.

“These are estimated numbers. The actual enrolment will be known at the start of the academic session. The students of Classes 10 and 12 have not been included because they have to study for board exams,” they said. The annual cost of running the programme in six districts in the first year has been put at ₹24 crore in a proposal submitted to the finance department last month.

The department proposes to engage at least 1,200 ex-servicemen, including retired junior commissioned officers (JCOs), to implement and monitor the programme to begin with. While one ex-serviceman of havildar rank will be hired for each school to impart the NCC training, one JCO will be appointed in a supervisory position for every 10 schools.

The school education department plans to start training from April 1 and is now awaiting release of funds to get going. The department had finalised the roadmap for programme implementation in a meeting chaired by finance minister Manpreet Singh Badal who is being credited with the idea to impart NCC training to schoolchildren. The programme will be gradually extended to other districts as well. At present, 8% students of high and senior secondary classes opt for NCC training in the state-run schools.

Chief minister Capt Amarinder Singh had first announced his government’s plans to make NCC training mandatory in schools and colleges to inculcate a strong sense of discipline among the youth and to make them employable in the armed and paramilitary forces, making Punjab the only state in the country to introduce such a programme.

As per the initial plan, NCC training was to be first launched in Gurdaspur, Tarn Taran and Amritsar districts along the international border with Pakistan, but three more districts, including Patiala and Sangrur, home districts of the chief minister and school education minister Vijay Inder Singla, have been included.

HT Correspondent

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Chandigarh : Lt Gen Prem Nath Hoon, who served the army for four decades before hanging up his boots as chief of the Western Command in 1987, died in Panchkula on Monday evening. He was 90.

His son Ronny Hoon said the General died after suffering brain haemorrhage at 6:30pm. The last rites will be performed at the electric crematorium in Sector 25 at 3:30pm on Tuesday.

Commissioned into the Sikh regiment two years after the Partition, Lt Gen Hoon led the Operation Meghdoot — as the commander of Srinagar-based 15 Corps — to capture the Siachen glacier in 1984. As a frontline soldier, he defended the borders, during the Chinese Aggression and the 1965 war against Pakistan. He also served as the director general of military operations.

Lt Gen KJ Singh (retd), former chief of Western Command, said Hoon was a committed General, who till his unfortunate demise dedicated himself to the service of nation and community.

“He had anchored the Operation Meghdoot, wherein Indian Army pre-empted and prevented Pakistan’s attempts to annex the Siachen. In his loss, we have lost a veteran, who was a role model for the young generation,” he said.

Singh said Lt Gen Hoon was also mentoring NGO activities for national integration and veteran welfare.

Lt Gen JS Dhillon (retd), former commander of 15 Corps, termed Lt Gen Hoon “a good soldier”, who during the Siachen issue successfully led the operation despite shortage of troops, time and equipment. “He handled the things so well that we are still holding onto the Siachen. That has been the biggest achievement of his life,” he said.

Lt Gen Hoon (retd), was born in 1929 in Abbottabad, North West Frontier Province, and joined the Indian Military Academy, Dehradun, in 1947. “I was sure about what I wanted and went ahead to achieve it. I found this grit to be an asset throughout life, even under variable conditions of combat,” the General had told HT in an interview in June last year.

HT Correspondent

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NEW DELHI : Army chief General Manoj Mukund Naravane is expected to visit the Siachen glacier on January 9, a senior officer said on Monday.

This will be Naravane’s first outstation trip after taking over the top job.

Siachen is strategically important as it acts like a wedge between the Shaksgam valley under Chinese control and Baltistan, which is occupied by Pakistan.

As long as the region is in India’s control, the Pakistani army cannot link up with the Chinese to pose a threat to Ladakh.

Over a 1,000 soldiers have died guarding Siachen since the Indian Army took control of the inhospitable glacier in April 1984, almost twice the number of lives lost in the Kargil war.

While around 220 men have been killed in firing from the Pakistani side, the other casualties were caused by extreme weather and terrain.

A ceasefire between India and Pakistan was announced in November 2003.

Defence minister Rajnath Singh announced last October that the Siachen was now open to tourists as part of the government’s efforts to boost tourism in Ladakh and give people a first hand experience of the tough conditions in which army personnel operate.

Naravane took over as the Army chief on December 31. In his 39-year military career, Naravane has commanded a Rashtriya Rifles battalion, raised an infantry brigade, led a strike corps and headed the Army Training Command.

He was also part of the Indian Peace Keeping Force in Sri Lanka and served as India’s defence attache to Myanmar.

HT Correspondent

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NEW DELHI : General Bipin Rawat will attend his first Defence Acquisition Council (DAC) meeting in his new role as the Chief of Defence Staff on January 17, a senior government officer said on Monday.

Rawat took over as India’s first CDS on December 31.

The DAC, headed by the defence minister, is India’s top defence procurement body that evaluates and green lights acquisition proposals made by the armed forces.

Other members of the council are the minister of state for defence, the three service chiefs, the defence secretary, secretary defence research and development, secretary defence production and director general, acquisition. As Chief of Defence Staff, Rawat holds the charge of permanent chairman, chiefs of staff committee — a panel consisting of the three service chiefs.

One of Rawat’s key responsibilities as CDS is to promote the use of indigenous equipment by the services at a time when the armed forces are heavily dependent on imported military hardware.

As CDS, he heads the department of military affairs and is also principal military adviser to the defence minister on all matters related to the tri-services.

He has taken over as Chief of Defence Staff at a time when the three services are facing a worrying fund shortage that could derail some of their modernisation efforts.

HT Correspondents

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New Delhi : Students on Monday staged protests on campuses across the country against the violence in New Delhi’s premier Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) on Sunday night that left at least 30 people injured and provoked outrage. No incident of violence was reported during the protests.

In Uttar Pradesh, hundreds of Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) students took out a Tiranga, or tricolour march, on the university campus in solidarity with JNU . Members of the AMU Teachers Association also joined the march to condemn the violence on the JNU campus, where masked assailants attacked students with sticks and rods.

Former AMU Students’ Union vice-president Hamza Sufiyan blamed the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), the students’ wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), for the attack on JNU students. “They must be booked. The government is booking people for protesting… it must lodge cases against the people who have gone inside a university campus and beaten up students and vandalised the premises,” he said.

The ABVP held counter rallies on several campuses and blamed Leftist students for the violence in JNU. It claimed that the ABVP activists were also targeted.

Protests were also reported from the Banaras Hindu University and the Allahabad University, the two other central universities in Uttar Pradesh.

Lucknow University vice chancellor AK Rai said there was “no law and order problem” on the varsity campus even as he refused to comment on the mob attack on the JNU campus.

Students from West Bengal’s Jadavpur University (JU) and the Presidency University (PU) belonging to the Left-wing organisations and ruling Trinamool Congress took out a torch rally and blocked a road in Kolkata soon after the mob attack on Sunday night. A protest was staged outside the PU on Monday.

“Let the ABVP stoop as low as it can but it would not be able to defeat us. All the ABVP members are goons. They earlier proved it in the JU and now at the JNU. Students will put up a united fight against these fascist hooligans,” said Debraj Debnath, a Students’ Federation of India (SFI) leader from the Jadavpur University.

SFI is the students’ wing of the Communist Party of India (Marxist). Rabindra Bharati University vice-chancellor Sabyasachi Basu Ray Chaudhury called the attack on the JNU campus dreadful. “I know no words to condemn this repugnant act. This is unimaginable in a civilised country. How could masked outsiders enter the girls’ hostel and what were the security staff doing?” Chaudhury asked. The JU and Calcutta University teachers associations issued separate statements condemning the attack.

In Guwahati, students of the Gauhati University, the Cotton University, and other institutes gathered at the city’s Nehru Park for a protest rally. “The police remained mute spectators to the violence. It seems the goons had indirect support from the government. We fear such incidents could get repeated in other universities,” said Moon Talukdar, the general secretary of the Post-graduate Students’ Union of the Gauhati University.

“The attack on JNU students and teachers was perpetrated by those in power in Delhi with the intention of curbing protests there. It could be an attempt to give a different direction to the protests happening elsewhere with regards to the National Register of Citizens and the Citizenship (Amendment) Act,” said Pranjal Kalita, former general secretary of the Cotton University Students Union. In Tripura, the Left-wing student bodies held protests at separate places.

In Kerala, the functioning of many educational institutions was disrupted due to the SFI’s strike call in protest against the mob attack. The SFI has asked students to boycott classes to protest against “saffron goon” attacks on the premier university. In Bihar, the Patna University Students’ Union president Manish Kumar led a sit-in on campus soon after midnight. “The violence against the JNU students and teachers is shameful. The RSS [Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh] is behind it and the organisation needs to be banned,” Kumar said.

Patna University vice-chancellor Rash Bihari Prasad Singh said that the situation was under control. “We are keeping a close watch. So far, there has been no untoward incident reported from anywhere,” he said.

Protests were held in all major educational institutes in Bengaluru, including the Indian Institute of Science and the Bangalore University. Nawaz Mohammed Khan, a student at Bengaluru’s RC College, said they gathered on Sunday night for a protest and some of them were detained briefly. Another RC College student, Elizabeth David, said, “Our protests would continue till action is taken against ABVP.”

Protests were also reported from