General U.S. NewsJul 11, 2026·2 min read

West Bengal forms committee to review draft UCC Bill

The Hindu – National

2h ago

West Bengal forms committee to review draft UCC Bill

Summary

Subscribed with another email? Logout and Login with that one. Account subscription benefits alongside Premium Stories, Editorials, Opinions and more. Unlock these with Subscription Updated - July 11, 2026 09:46 pm IST - Kolkata West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari. | Photo Credit: ANI The West Bengal government has constituted a high-level committee headed by former Supreme Court judge Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai to examine a draft Uniform Civil Code (UCC) for the State. A notification issued by the State government said the committee was formed in view of “wide ramifications and voluminous nature of the subject domain of the proposed legislation”. The notification, dated July 10, stated that the State government had already formulated a Draft Bill titled The Uniform Civil Code, West Bengal, 2026, with a view to putting in place a comprehensive legal framework for all citizens who are residents of the State, “irrespective of religion, faith or community, concerning critical aspects of personal civil matters such as marriage, divorce, intestate succession and testamentary succession”. Justice Desai (retd.) will chair the committee. Its members include former Meghalaya Governor and senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Tathagata Roy, Delhi Resident Commissioner Dushyant Nariala, retired IAS officer Shatrughna Singh, Principal Secretary of the Home and Hill Affairs Department Sanghamitra Ghosh, academic Dr Ratna Bhattacharya, former vice-chancellor of Gour Banga University Gopalchandra Misra, advocate Osman Gani Mallick and former executive director of Sambhag Nirmalya Bhattacharyya. The BJP leadership had promised the implementation of UCC in the State during its campaign for the 2026 West Bengal Assembly polls. Congress leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury criticised the move, alleging that the implementation of the UCC could lead to the violation of the rights of minorities in the country. “Why is the government not making it at the Central level?

From the source

A notification issued by the State government says the committee is formed in view of “wide ramifications and voluminous nature of the subject domain of the proposed legislation”

Read the full article

Published by The Hindu – National on thehindu.com

Open on thehindu.com ↗

US lawmaker slams Israeli army after settlers detain him on Palestine trip

A Democratic lawmaker from the United States says he and his tour group were detained by rifle-wielding Israeli settlers during a trip to Palestine. In a post on X on Saturday, Ro Khanna accused the Israeli army of supporting the settlers. “When the [Israeli army] arrived, they sided with the settlers and continued our detention,” Khanna wrote, saying he will release more details about the ordeal soon. The incident has drawn renewed attention to settler violence in the occupied West Bank, which has surged since Israel launched its genocidal war on Gaza nearly three years ago. Rights groups say settlers have been emboldened by the Israeli government, while Amnesty International has accused Israel of carrying out a state-backed campaign of ethnic cleansing in the West Bank. Last month, several Western countries sanctioned networks linked to settler violence. Khanna, who is considering running for US president in 2028, warned that the Israelis had made a “huge mistake”. On Thursday, he told the Reuters news agency that “hoodlums … with machine guns” had detained his group a day earlier. “They block off the road. In an interview with DRM News, Khanna said his experience in the occupied West Bank and Israel was the “first time” he had “really been acutely aware of being brown”. “I saw the arrogance in the eyes of those settlers. Cameron Kasky, an aide to Khanna who was in the group, said they were held for more than an hour and made appeals to the US embassy in Jerusalem for help. Congress is currently reviewing new military spending legislation that, if passed, would deepen the US’s defence ties with Israel.

aljazeera.com

Trump says US would destroy Iran if Tehran assassinates him

US President Donald Trump has said he has left standing orders for the American military to destroy Iran "at levels they've never seen before" if Tehran carries out what he described as long-standing threats to kill him. But under US law, there is no automatic, preauthorised mechanism that would trigger such retaliation the moment a president is assassinated. If Trump were killed, power would pass immediately to Vice President JD Vance under the 25th Amendment and the Presidential Succession Act of 1947, making him commander in chief and giving him the authority to decide any response. The issue has drawn fresh attention after Trump publicly referred to Iranian threats against him and reports emerged of what US officials see as credible plots. Trump wrote on his social media platform on Saturday that Iran had made threats "to assassinate, or attempt to assassinate" him. He said 1,000 "missiles are Locked and Loaded and aimed at the Islamic Republic of Iran, with thousands more to immediately follow, should the Iranian Government act on its threat". The White House did not immediately respond on Saturday to questions about what would happen to those military orders if Trump were killed. Iran's supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, said hours later that Iranians would continue to avenge the killing of his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who died in the initial US and Israeli strikes that started the war in late February and was mourned in funeral events across Iran this week. In remarks aired on state television, he said, "We pledge to take revenge for the pure blood of you and all the martyrs of these two wars from the criminal and disgraceful killers," and added, "This revenge is the will of our nation and must certainly be carried out." During the funeral events, mourners repeatedly held posters and banners calling for Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be killed. The Wall Street Journal reported this week that Israel had alerted US officials to fresh Iranian plots to kill Trump.

West Bengal forms committee to review draft UCC Bill

From the source

More in General U.S. News

US lawmaker slams Israeli army after settlers detain him on Palestine trip

State government will release policy to set up ‘innovation city’, says Aadhav Arjuna

Trump says US would destroy Iran if Tehran assassinates him