The Uttar Pradesh government has set up a special investigation team to investigate into 4,000 madrassas, mostly running along the border with Nepal, which are allegedly receiving funds from abroad, officials said on Monday.

An official said the SIT will examine if the money was used on any illegal activities, like terrorism or forcible religious conversion.

The three-member SIT led by Additional Director General of Police (ADG) Mohit Agarwal of the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) was formed on the instructions of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, a senior official said.

Cyber Cell Superintendent of Police Triveni Singh and Minority Welfare Department Director J Reebha are its other members.

Confirming the setting up of the SIT, ADG Aggarwal said there are about 24,000 madrassas in Uttar Pradesh, of which 16,000 are recognised and 8,000 unrecognised.

About 4,000 madrassas could come under the purview of the investigation and the process of serving notices to them will start this week, an official said.

In the last few years, several madrassas have come up in the areas bordering Nepal, according to officials.

Maharajganj, Siddharthnagar, Shravasti, Balrampur, Bahraich, Lakhimpur Kheri and Pilibhit share their borders with Nepal.

An official said a complaint was earlier received that the funds received from abroad were allegedly used in anti-national activities.

A survey last year found that “most madrassas” in the border areas were receiving large sums of money, but were unable to give an accurate account of it, he said.

The SIT will serve notice to such madrasas and seek information about transactions into Exchange Earners’ Foreign Currency (EEFC) Accounts, he said.

The SIT will then investigate the madrasas that get funds from abroad, questioning them on the source of the money and activities on which it was used, the official added.

Chief Justices have been in the minority in 13 significant judgments, Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud has said, standing by his recent ruling in the marriage equality case. He was speaking yesterday at the 3rd Comparative Constitutional Law discussion on ‘Perspectives from the Supreme Courts of India and the United States’, hosted by Georgetown University in Washington, DC

“I do believe it is sometimes a vote of conscience and a vote of the Constitution. And I stand by what I said,” the Chief Justice said on the Supreme Court’s October 17 judgment in which it stopped short of legalising same-sex marriages.

All the judges on the five-member Constitution bench agreed that tweaking laws to bring about marriage equality would amount to encroaching into the legislature’s domain. There was, however, a difference of opinion on the question of the right to civil union and adoption rights. Chief Justice Chandrachud and Justice SK Kaul were in favour of recognising same-sex unions. The majority of the bench took a different view, with Justice S Ravindra Bhat saying he disagreed with the court directing the State to provide for a new legal framework to formalise such relationships.

The Chief Justice also stood by the Supreme Court’s judgment of leaving the decision on marriage equality to Parliament.

“By the unanimous verdict of all the five judges on the bench, we came to the conclusion that while we have progressed a great deal in terms of decriminalising homosexuality and recognising people belonging to the queer community as equal participants in our society, legislating on the right to marry is something that falls within the domain of Parliament,” the Chief Justice said.

In his judgment in the closely-watched case, the Chief Justice had said choosing a life partner is an integral part of choosing one’s course of life. “Some may regard this as the most important decision of their life. This right goes to the root of the right to life and liberty under Article 21,” he said.

“The right to enter into union includes the right to choose one’s partner and the right to recognition of that union. A failure to recognise such associations will result in discrimination against queer couples,” the Chief Justice said, adding, “the right to enter into union cannot be restricted on the basis of sexual orientation”.

Supporting adoption rights for queer couples, he said there is nothing to probe that only heterosexual couples can provide stability to a child. “There is no material on record to prove that only a married heterosexual couple can provide stability to a child,” he said.

The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) on Tuesday said that the Cyclonic Storm ‘Hamoon’ has now intensified into a severe cyclonic storm over the Northwest Bay of Bengal.

As per the information from IMD, the Cyclonic Storm ‘Hamoon’ over Northwest and adjoining Westcentral Bay of Bengal moved northeastwards with a speed of 18 km per hour during the past 6 hours.

The cyclonic storm after moving for six hours, intensified into a severe cyclonic storm and lay centred, at 2:30 am on October 24, over the northwest Bay of Bengal, near latitude 19.3°N and longitude 88.4°E, about 210 km east-southeast of Paradip (Odisha), 270 km south-southeast of Digha (West Bengal) and 350 km south-southwest of Khepupara (Bangladesh).

The cyclonic storm is very likely to move nearly north-northeast wards and cross the Bangladesh coast between Khepupara and Chittagong around noon on October 25 as a Deep Depression.

Earlier, on Monday, the Municipal Administration in Odisha had put all Urban Local Bodies (ULB) on alert in view of the formation of cyclonic storm ‘Hamoon’ in the Bay of Bengal.

Director Municipal Administration Sangramjit Nayak, in an official statement, issued a directive to all ULB Chiefs, sensitising them about the impending danger due to the formation of cyclonic storm ‘Hamoon’ in the Bay of Bengal, which will culminate in huge rainfall, wind, and inclement weather.