The Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR) on Sunday sought an inquiry report within two weeks from the Directorate of Education over the death of a 17-year-old Class 12 student who was found with severe burns at a government school in east Delhi’s Krishna Nagar on Saturday. 

The girl was found behind the school’s guard room after school authorities heard cries from the area. She was taken to Dr. Hedgewar Arogya Sansthan, where she was declared dead on arrival. According to police, a water bottle used to carry petrol was recovered from the spot. 

Taking cognisance of media reports, the commission raised concerns about student safety, questioning how the girl managed to bring an inflammable substance into the school without being noticed. 

“The content of the news report, if true, are disturbing and raise serious concern on the safety of children inside the school premises. The incident as a whole has resulted in violation of child rights on account of negligence of public servants,” the commission stated in its notice. 

The commission issued notices to the Directorate of Education, the school principal and the police, seeking action-taken reports within two weeks. 

DCPCR member Kundan Kanskar said the commission would take action after receiving the reports. “Such incidents hint at a lack of accessible, quality mental health services for students in schools,” he said. 

Police probe 

Police have seized the school’s CCTV digital video recorder and are examining the footage to reconstruct the sequence of events. They are questioning the security guard, teachers and family members to ascertain how the incident went unnoticed. The school’s attendance register has also been examined. 

Officers on Saturday said a three-page purported suicide note recovered from the student’s bag referred to “relationship issues and parental disappointment”. Sources said one page contained an apology to her family, while another requested that a friend not be harassed. 

“We are investigating the matter. The circumstances leading to the incident are being examined,” a senior police officer said. 

Police said they are also examining the family’s allegation that the girl could have been the victim of a conspiracy. 

(With inputs from PTI) 

A 17-year-old girl was found with severe burn injuries behind the guard room of a government school in east Delhi’s Krishna Nagar on Saturday. The Class 12 student was taken to Dr. Hedgewar Arogya Sansthan, where doctors declared her dead on arrival, the police said.

The incident came to light when school authorities heard cries coming from behind the guard room and went to check. Police said they received a PCR call at 11.57 a.m., following which personnel from Krishna Nagar police station and the fire department reached the spot.

A fire officer, Anoop Singh, said a call was received regarding a student allegedly setting herself on fire inside the school.

The girl’s family said they came to know of her death only around 12.40 p.m.

When the student did not return home by the usual time, her sister-in-law went to the school to look for her.

“No one informed me about the incident. I came to the school searching for her,” the sister-in-law said.

The girl’s sister, who had gone to drop her at school in the morning said, “I had gone to drop her at school and she looked fine. I don’t know what happened after that,” she said.

Police inspected the scene and collected samples for examination. Officials claimed they recovered a three-page note from the girl’s bag.

Police are examining CCTV footage from the school and questioning staff members, teachers and students to establish what happened before the incident.

Delhi Education Minister Ashish Sood visited the school on Saturday evening and spoke to police officers, school authorities and nearby residents.

“The tragic death of a 17-year-old student is deeply distressing and a matter of serious concern,” Mr. Sood said, adding that the school management hashanded over all available evidence to the police.

He said the exact circumstances surrounding the girl’s death could be established only after the investigation is complete.

“Our priority is to ensure a fair and thorough investigation so that all facts related to the incident come to light,” the Minister said. “Necessary action will be taken on the basis of the investigation findings.”

(With inputs from PTI)

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The Delhi government stepped up inspections of stores advertising heavy discounts on social media during the festive season and seized over 322 kg of ghee on Friday for further testing for adulteration.

Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta said in a statement that compromising on food quality or people’s health would not be acceptable. She said her government was working to curb irregularities such as adulteration, substandard quality, the sale of expired products and incorrect labelling.

“Consumers should remain vigilant and check the quality and packaging of food products, along with their manufacturing date and expiry date, before making a purchase,” Ms. Gupta said.

During the drive, the Food Safety Department conducted targeted inspections of stores promoting offers such as ‘Buy One, Get One Free’ and discounts of up to 60% through social media reels. The drive aimed to check compliance with food safety standards and prevent the sale of unsafe, substandard, expired or incorrectly labelled food products, Ms. Gupta said.

According to the department, its teams inspected two stores in Vikaspuri, where they collected five enforcement samples of ghee from different brands and five surveillance samples of other food products. A total of 75.53 litres of ghee was seized.

At another store in Hastal village, the team collected three enforcement samples of ghee from three different brands and seized 246 kg of ghee.

The department said shortcomings in compliance with food safety standards were recorded at the establishments. The findings would be reviewed along with the laboratory test reports before further action was taken.

“Further action will be taken in the respective cases in accordance with the law,” the department said.

A total of 1.07 lakh Form 6 applications seeking inclusion in Delhi’s electoral roll have been disposed of, according to an updated weekly disposal report uploaded on the website of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) on Thursday. The latest data replaced the weekly disposal report on the website that was there till Wednesday, with officials saying the data being uploaded earlier was wrong and not reflecting the disposals recorded since August 31, when the claims and objections phase began.

The CEO’s office releases a constituency-wise report every week, recording how many applications under each form – Form 6 for inclusion of new voters, Form 7 for deletions, Form 6A for overseas electors and Form 8 for corrections or address changes – have been disposed of since the claims and objections phase under the ongoing special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls began.

This comes after The Hindu reported that only 0.27%, or 1,238 of the over 4.5 lakh Form 6 applications seeking inclusion in Delhi’s electoral roll had been disposed of between August 31 and October 11.

The revised figures cover each of the seven weeks between August 31 and October 18. Officials said the data displayed publicly earlier was wrong. According to the updated report, 1,07,451 of the 4,59,796 Form 6 applications and 47,105 of the 67,709 Form 7 applications have been disposed of.

“The weekly data being uploaded till now was wrong and it was not reflecting the disposals that happened since August 31, we noticed after the newspaper report,” an official told The Hindu. For instance, the earlier report showed 241 Form 6 applications were disposed of across Delhi’s 70 Assembly constituencies from August 31 to September 6, the first week of the claims and objections period. The updated report now shows 511 for the same week. The second week’s figure has been revised from 34 to 4,543. The sharpest revision is for the week of September 28 to October 4 – from zero to 14,643 disposals.

The updated report also adds the latest week, October 12 to 18, which alone accounts for 43,736 Form 6 disposals – the highest for any week and over 40% of all such disposals so far. According to the updated data, disposals have risen every week, from 511 in the first week to 43,736 in the seventh.

Fifteen constituencies that showed zero Form 6 disposals in all six weeks as per the earlier report, including Burari, Shakur Basti and Kalkaji, now show cases being disposed of.

Tri Nagar is still the only constituency in Delhi with no Form 6 disposals recorded in any of the seven weeks.

Form 7 figures too have been revised sharply upward: from 5,845 to 40,796 for the same six weeks. The first week now shows 10,474 Form 7 disposals against 64 earlier, and the second 17,143 against 274. Over the seven weeks, 47,105 Form 7 applications have been disposed of, along with 1,70,333 Form 8 applications for corrections and address changes.

According to the CEO’s daily bulletin on Thursday, about 4.6 lakh Form 6 applications have been received so far – 2.12 lakh before the draft roll was published on August 31 and 2.47 lakh after. Around 67,709 Form 7 applications have been received, including 16,238 since August 31.

This means about 23% of all Form 6 applications received have been disposed of, compared with about 70% of Form 7 applications. The disposals include applications received before the draft roll was published.

Over 3.5 lakh Form 6 applications are yet to be disposed of. The last date for filing claims and objections is October 30, all applications received are to be disposed of by November 30, and the final electoral roll is to be published on December 4.

The Delhi High Court has quashed an FIR against a Staff Selection Commission (SSC) aspirant booked in connection with a protest at Ramlila Maidan, observing that mere participation in a demonstration does not establish a common intention to disobey police orders or obstruct police personnel. 

Justice Sanjeev Narula held that the petitioner could not be prosecuted without material showing that he knowingly participated in the alleged disobedience or shared a common intention to commit the offence. 

The case arose from a protest held at Ramlila Maidan in August 2025 by SSC aspirants over alleged irregularities in the conduct of the commission’s examination. 

According to the prosecution, some organisers refused to call off the demonstration after the permitted time had expired and instigated protesters to remain at the venue until their demands were met. 

The Delhi police subsequently registered an FIR alleging that some protesters had violated prohibitory orders issued under Section 163 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita by continuing to occupy the ground. The police also alleged that some protesters pushed and scuffled with police personnel. 

The court, however, noted that neither the FIR nor the subsequent status report attributed any specific criminal act to the petitioner. His presence among the protesters, without material indicating a common intention to commit an offence, was insufficient to make out a case under Section 223(a) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, which deals with disobedience of an order lawfully promulgated by a public servant. 

“The petitioner cannot be subjected to criminal proceedings merely on account of his presence amongst the protesters, in the absence of material indicating his knowing participation in the alleged disobedience or any common intention to commit the offence. The continuation of the proceedings against him, in these circumstances, would serve no worthwhile purpose,” the court said in its October 13 order. 

“Mere participation in the same demonstration does not, by itself, establish a common intention to disobey lawful directions or obstruct police personnel. The material on record does not disclose any basis for attributing such common intention to the petitioner,” it held. 

Every round of the Ranji Trophy comprises a wide spectrum of results. There are nail-chewing humdingers. There are one-sided hammerings. Dreary draws, the least appealing of them all, are also part of the First-Class competition’s fabric.

The Elite Group-C face-off between Delhi and Gujarat at the Palam ‘B’ ground belonged to that last category. As is generally the case in these high-scoring affairs that culminate in a draw, the placid pitch seemed to be the most decisive element.

It meant that the host, after winning the toss and amassing 648 for six declared, couldn’t push for an outright win. It had to be content with three points after bundling out Gujarat for 479 to secure a first-innings lead of 169 runs. That, too, took an almighty effort, with Ayush Badoni & Co. spending 174.1 overs on the field.

Delhi still enforced the follow-on in the hope of a few quick breakthroughs, but once Gujarat reached 15 for one in eight overs at the scheduled tea break, both teams decided to exchange handshakes and rest their weary legs and tired minds.

Off-spinner Hrithik Shokeen endured the biggest workload, delivering as many as 53 overs in the first essay and another four in the second. But any possible soreness was supplanted by sheer delight once he claimed his maiden five-wicket haul in First Class cricket. On a deck offering very little assistance for the spinners, Shokeen finished with five for 143 at an economy of 2.7 in the first dig.

When Shokeen dismissed overnight batter Manan Hingrajia to reduce Gujarat to 385 for six inside the opening hour, Delhi would have hoped for the remaining batters to wither away. But skipper Chintan Gaja, who had made 41 on day three, went on to contribute 82 and prolong the innings with the lower-order. It frustrated Delhi, but perhaps not as much as the nature of the surface did.

The scores:

Delhi — 1st innings: 648 for six decl.

Gujarat — 1st innings: Abhishek Desai c Doseja b Shokeen 34, Aarya Desai c Dhull b Shokeen 11, Vedant Trivedi c Rawat b Divij 38, Manan Hingrajia c Mathur b Shokeen 123, Urvil Patel c Badoni b Shokeen 23, Jaymeet Patel c Sanat b Saini 72, Chintan Gaja c & b Mathur 82, Vishal Jayswal c & b Mathur 21, Harshal Patel c Rawat b Shokeen 5, Arzan Nagwaswalla (not out) 10, Siddharth Desai b Grewal 6; Extras (b-34, lb-11, w-6, nb-3): 54; Total (in 174.1 overs): 479.

Fall of wickets: 1-25, 2-79, 3-118, 4-153, 5-277, 6-385, 7-443, 8-444, 9-450.

Delhi bowling: Divij 18-4-45-1, Saini 23-5-50-1, Shokeen 53-11-143-5, Grewal 19.1-3-53-1, Badoni 19-3-57-0, Mathur 25-6-51-2, Priyansh 12-2-23-0, Doseja 5-0-12-0.

Gujarat — 2nd innings: Abhishek Desai (not out) 9, Aarya Desai lbw b Divij 2, Vedant Trivedi (not out) 0; Extras (b-4): 4; Total (for one wkt. in eight overs): 15.

Fall of wicket: 1-6.

Delhi bowling: Shokeen 4-2-6-0, Divij 4-2-5-1.

PoM: Priyansh Arya.

Under the glaring afternoon sun on Saturday, Urvil Patel faced throwdowns for more than 30 minutes in preparation for Gujarat’s Ranji Trophy duel against Delhi. For much of the net session at the Palam ground, the 28-year-old honed his attacking strokes.

He did so whilst donning yellow-coloured batting gloves, a not-so-subtle reminder of his association with Chennai Super Kings since the 2025 Indian Premier League (IPL).

Afterwards, the Gujarat wicketkeeper-batter spoke enthusiastically of the confidence that the CSK stint has infused. In the 2026 IPL, he notably took just 13 balls against Lucknow Super Giants to bring up a half-century, the joint-fastest in the T20 league’s history. M.S. Dhoni’s guidance from close quarters was the icing on the cake for Urvil.

“After playing in the IPL, confidence is high. Just seeing Mahi bhai around gives confidence. I was fortunate to have my seat next to his in the CSK dressing room,” Urvil told the media on Saturday.

With the added exposure, he is aware of the enhancements needed in his game. Despite his blazing 23-ball 65 versus LSG, he compiled just 129 runs in seven games this year.

“I was not satisfied with my overall performance. I reviewed how the season went and I’m working on the things that I have identified,” he admitted.

In the Ranji Trophy too, Urvil isn’t wary of taking the aggressive route. Last week, he hammered a 67-ball 85 against Odisha. “I look to be clear in my mindset. If I decide to attack, I show full conviction. I don’t have self-doubt.”