Jaya opposes UGC circular, says no to imposing Hindi

Chennai, Mar 3: The Madras High Court has ruled that if a working woman gives birth to a child in the second delivery after twins in the first, she is not entitled to maternity benefits as it should be treated as third child.

"As per existing rules, a woman can avail such benefits only for her first two deliveries. Even otherwise it is debatable as to whether the delivery is not a second delivery but a third one, in as much as ordinarily when twins are born they are delivered one after another, and their age and their inter-se elderly status is also determined by virtue of the gap of time between their arrivals, which amounts to two deliveries and not one simultaneous act," the court said.

The first bench, comprising Chief Justice A P Sahi and Justice Subramonium Prasad stated this while allowing the appeal from Ministry of Home Affairs.

It set aside the order June 18 2019 order of a single Judge, who extended 180 days of maternity leave and other benefits to a woman member of the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) under the rules governing the Tamil Nadu government servants.

The issue pertains to an appeal moved by the ministry, which contended that the leave claim is by a member of CISF to whom the maternity rules of Tamil Nadu would not apply.

She would be covered by the maternity benefits as provided under the Central Civil Services (Leave) Rules, the ministry said.

When the appeal came up for hearing, the bench said it found that a second delivery, which, in the present case, resulted in a third child, cannot be interpreted so as to add to the mathematical precision that is defined in the rules.

The admissibility of benefits would be limited if the claimant has not more than two children, the bench said "This fact therefore changes the entire nature of the relief which is sought for by the woman petitioner, which aspect has been completely overlooked by the single judge", the bench said.

New Delhi, Jul 11: A notice which claims that a COVID-19 Monitoring Committee has been formed is fake, and no such committee has been set up by the Union Home Ministry, as per Spokesperson, Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA).

The "Fake" MHA order stated, "Pursuant to the official orders received dated: Monday, May 18, 2020, of the Honourable Minister of Home Affairs, passed in the approval of Special Status Advisory Committee for COVID-19, a COVID-19 Monitoring Committee has been constituted in the MHA vide order dated: Friday, June 12, 2020."

MHA Spokesperson also cautioned people to beware of fake news and rumours.

India's COVID-19 case count crossed the eight lakh-mark on Saturday with yet another highest single-day spike of 27,114 new cases in the last 24 hours.

New Delhi, Feb 6: Unemployment rate in the country as per a new survey was 6.1 per cent in 2017-18, the government informed Rajya Sabha on Wednesday.

Minister of State for Labour Santosh Gangwar said the government is conducting a new Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) with new parameters and bigger sample size, and its results cannot be compared with previous surveys in this regard.

"As per the new Periodic Labour Force Survey being conducted by the government, the labour force participation is 36.9 per cent and the rate of unemployment for 2017-18 is 6.1 per cent," he said.

Replying to supplementaries during the Question Hour, the minister said the report of this survey is very different than the surveys conducted in previous years.

This survey is not comparable to previous surveys, he said, adding it was an attempt to provide authentic data with the new survey conducted through the Ministry of Statistics.

"We are focusing on infrastructure development and ease of doing business and India's position in the world has improved. India has improved its position to 63rd rank now in 2019 against 196 in previous years," he said.

"Our government is very conscious of creating employment opportunities and is running such programme which generates employment.

"The way our government is functioning, employment opportunities are being created and the youths are getting jobs also," the minister said.

Gangwar said the government has stopped the previous survey as the sample size was low and an attempt is being made to improve the data by adding various parameters and provide more authentic data.

The minister said it will take time for collection of data as households have to be visited on the ground for authentic data collection in rural areas also.