FOLLOW US: @TheStatesmanLtd @thestatesmanltd thestatesman1875 www.thestatesman.com People’s Parliament, Always in Session India’s National Newspaper since 1818 | Pages 12 | ` 5.00 | KOLKATA | NEW DELHI | MUMBAI | BHUBANESWAR | LUCKNOW | SILIGURI | Friday, 21 August 2026 SPORTS PERSPECTIVE Controlled politics in the meme age EDITORIAL WORLD Authority tested Trump threatens Iran with economic pressure as talks stall Page 7 Page 9 Page 6 BRIEFLY Clashes erupt at Jadavpur University: Kolkata: Clashes took place on Wednesday night and into Thursday at Jadavpur University in the city between supporters of rival student organisations, causing police and central forces to deployed on the campus and adjoining areas. Supporters of both the Students Federation of India (SFI) and the Akhil Bharatiya Vidhyarthi Parishad (ABVP) took out rival marches in the afternoon, and were stopped by police. Members of the student organisations staged demonstrations on the road, breaking police barricades and stopping school buses. The confrontation followed violence late on Wednesday night during a general body meeting of the Faculty of Engineering and Technology Students’ Union (FETSU). Several students were injured in the clashes. Page 3 10-day preparation time definitely helped a lot: Manav Suthar after Galle win Page 12 Vande Mataram: Shah asks Five-member panel to probe people to unite against Cong Jantar Mantar clashes VIBHA SHARMA New Delhi, 20 August T he political slugfest over Vande Mataram intensified on Thursday with Union Home Minister Amit Shah leading the BJP’s attack against the Congress over its decision to recite only the first two stanzas of the national song at party events. Quoting the Congress Working Committee’s (CWC) decision, Mr Shah accused the Congress of taking an “anti-national decision” and appealed to people to unite against its “politics of appeasement”. The BJP would take the issue to the streets, he also said. On Wednesday, the Congress’s highest decisionmaking body cited a 1937 CWC resolution to argue that great leaders of the freedom movement, such as Mahatma Gandhi, had backed limiting the public rendition of Vande Mataram to the first two stanzas. With the Congress taking this stance and Mr Shah stepping in, the issue surrounding the national song is all set to become a major flashpoint between the BJP and Congress, say observers. The Congress has sought to frame the BJP’s campaign as the politicisation of national symbols with senior Congress leader K C Venugopal accusing the BJP of turning Vande Mataram and the national anthem into political issues to digress people’s attention from issues bothering the BJP such as the students unrest and the Ram Mandir donation theft. Launching a scathing attack, Mr Shah, meanwhile, warned of the consequences of the Congress’ earlier decision to “divide the national song” and accused the party of insulting not only its writer Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay but also “lakhs of martyrs who laid down their lives, and went to the gallows raising the slogan of Vande Mataram” during the freedom struggle. “In 1937, it was the Congress itself that split Vande Mataram into two parts for the sake of appeasement. That move strengthened the two-nation theory and eventually contributed to the partition of the country,” Mr Shah said. He added that the Modi government had “corrected this historic mistake” on the 150th anniversary of Vande Mataram by giving the complete song legal status, accusing the Congress, under Rahul Gandhi’s leadership, of once again following the path of appeasement for electoral gains. BJP president Nitin Nabin said the Congress had formalised what he called the “insult” to Vande Mataram during its Independence Day celebrations in Delhi into a party resolution. The BJP’s attack escalated following allegations that senior Congress leader Sonia Gandhi had objected to the full rendition of Vande Mataram at the party’s Independence Day event. A video showed Mrs Gandhi gesturing and speaking to a party worker while the song was being played. It was not clear what she was saying, but the BJP alleged that she was attempting to stop the full rendition. • Related report: Page 5 STATESMAN NEWS SERVICE New Delhi, 20 August Former Supreme Court judge Justice R Subhash Reddy will head a five-member High-Powered Enquiry Committee (HPEC) constituted by the top court to investigate allegations of police excesses during the students’ march from Jantar Mantar towards Parliament on 20 July. The other members of the panel include Punjab & Haryana High Court Chief Justice Ravi Shankar Jha, former Delhi High Court judge Justice Shalinder Kaur, former Central Bureau of Investigation Director Rishi Kumar Shukla, and former Meghalaya DGP, Dr L R Bishnoi. The Supreme Court said in its order that the constitution of the HPEC “shall in no way deter or debar the police authorities or other security forces from taking administrative or disciplinary action against such of their officers as may be found to be in contravention of the rules governing their conduct”. The issues identified for investigation by the committee include allegations of excessive force, including pellet guns, electric batons, lathi charges and tear gas, as well as the question whether police responses were proportionate to the constitutional right to peaceful protest. It will also examine whether police/security personnel were properly identifiable through uniforms and nameplates. Issues relating to alleged harassment and molestation of women protesters, the provision for medical assistance and compensation for injured protesters, the use of prohibitory orders under Section 163 BNSS and whether Section 152 BNSS was used in a manner that could suppress peaceful political dissent will also be examined by the panel. In its order delivered on Tuesday, a bench headed by Chief Justice Surya Kant directed the HPEC to look into “the use of excessive force and violence against protestors by police authorities and other agencies, including the deployment of pellet guns, electric batons, lathi charges, and tear gas without adequate warning or proportionality, resulting in severe bodily harm and injuries, some of which are alleged to be of a grievous and lasting nature”. The committee will also look into the necessity of ensuring that police and security personnel wear proper uniforms and visible nameplates at the time of effecting arrests or using force during crowd control operations, so as to secure accountability and enable the identification of individual officers.