-The Hindu school closures also interrupted support mechanisms from which many disadvantaged learners benefit The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated inequalities in education systems across the world. According to a UNESCO report released on Tuesday, about 40% of low- and lower-middle-income countries have not supported learners at risk of exclusion during this crisis, such as the poor, linguistic minorities and learners with disabilities. The 2020 Global Education Monitoring Report noted that efforts to maintain...

-The Hindu The interest of each and the interests of all now coincide, not only within nations but for all humanity How will it all end? Policies to address the worldwide crisis brought about by COVID-19 must satisfy three criteria. First, they must aim to minimise the loss of life directly resulting from the disease, while recognising that there remain deep uncertainties about its true nature. Second, they must restore the elements of...

-TheWire.in Ranabir Samaddar, director of the Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group, speaks about the factors behind the migrants’ desperation to reach home and the dynamics of the visibility and invisibility of migrant labour. With the abrupt imposition of the lockdown aimed at arresting the spread of the novel coronavirus, and prospects of earning a livelihood in cities and urban areas drying up, India stood witness to a mass exodus of migrant workers at...

-Livemint.com * One fallout of the containment measures is that children have to do without the guaranteed school meal * Anganwadi workers have been directed to anganwadi centres only to receive take-home ration NEW DELHI: Unaware of the covid-19 pandemic, four-year-old Jamuni, a malnourished girl in Banda district of Uttar Pradesh, is worried that her primary school has been closed for the last 20 days. Her worry revolves around missing the mid-day meals...

-Counterview.net It was a shocking reply by the Union human resource development minister to a question raised in Parliament on closure of schools in a country where lakhs of children are still out of school. On December 2, the minister, Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’, told Lok Sabha that the NITI Aayog’s education project, Sath-E, has led to 35,996 schools of different levels being merged in Madhya Pradesh, 4,312 in Jharkhand and 1,803...