The Supreme Court banned the publication and re-printing of a Class 8 social science textbook that included a section on “corruption in the judiciary”. The bench also directed the Union government and state education departments to ensure that all copies of the book, printed or digital, are removed from public access.

The Union government apologised to the court and said that the National Council of Educational Research and Training, which published the book, had withdrawn it.

The bench also issued a contempt of court notice to the Department of School Education and NCERT Director Dinesh Prasad Saklan. It told the NCERT director to submit the names of those who were involved in preparing the chapter in question. Read on.

The Gauhati High Court sought the response of Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma to petitions seeking action against him for alleged hate speech against Muslims. A bench observed that the speeches allegedly made by the Bharatiya Janata Party leader and cited by the petitioners reflected a “fissiparous tendency”.

The bench has also issued notice to the Centre and the Assam government, seeking their response in the matter. In the past month, Sarma has made a series of remarks targeting Bengali-origin Muslims in Assam. The BJP leader had said that it was his job to “make them suffer”. Read on.

The Kerala High Court stayed the release of the film The Kerala Story 2 – Goes Beyond. The bench noted that the film, which was slated to be released on Friday, could disturb communal harmony.

On a preliminary reading, the Central Board of Film Certification ignored guidelines for clearing films, said the court, asking it to re-examine the matter. The film allegedly depicts women from various states being lured into relationships with Muslim men and coerced into religious conversion. Read on.

The Student Council of Azim Premji University described the police complaint against those who had planned to hold an event relating to Kashmir as “an asymmetry in outcomes”. This came after the university authorities filed a police complaint against Spark Reading Circle APU, saying that permission was not sought or granted for the event to discuss the February 1991 Kunan Poshpora incident.

While organising an event on the campus without administrative approval may amount to a violation of protocol, such lapses should be handled by internal bodies and not through an FIR, said the council.

The General Student Body of the university stated that the “series of unexpected and unacceptable reactions from the university administration has fostered a sense of fear and mistrust among the students”. Read on.

The Congress criticised Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s speech in the Israeli Parliament, claiming that it “diminished India’s moral standing”. Congress MP Jairam Ramesh described it as an “unabashed defence” of Modi’s host, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Modi on Wednesday told the Israeli Parliament that New Delhi stood with Israel “firmly, with full conviction, in this moment and beyond”.

Ramesh referred to an article written by Eitay Mack, an Israeli lawyer and human rights activist, which said that Modi “acted and spoke like the leader of a minor state visiting a global power, desperate to curry favour”. The lawyer had “exposed the sham of the prime minister’s…address to the Knesset”, said Ramesh. Read on.

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