-The United Nations From Ethiopia and Yemen to Bolivia and Viet Nam millions of children are today taking part in the sixth annual United Nations-backed Global Handwashing Day, driving home the message that the simple use of soap and water can slash highly preventable diarrhoeal diseases that kill 1,400 children under five every day. "Washing hands before eating and after defecation drastically reduces the spread of diarrhoeal disease and has far reaching...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Over half the kids described by the government as "children with special needs" or CWSN are not in school. In response to an RTI filed by lawyer-activist Khagesh Jha, of the 20,759 CWSN identified across the dozen school districts, 11,463 are out-of-school. Northeast district is the worst-performing in this regard, with 1,820 CWSN out of school, followed by the south district with 1,543 children. But...

-PTI Earlier, HC had ruled that D.Ed would be criterion for recruiting primary school teachers and not B.Ed Mumbai: Bombay High Court has directed Maharashtra government to file an affidavit on a PIL alleging that primary schools in the state were not complying with its earlier full bench order making it mandatory for teachers to have D.Ed qualification. Hearing the PIL, a bench headed by Justice Dhananjay Chandrachud, on October 11, asked the...

-The Hindu The role of education in reducing poverty is widely recognised but our planners are yet to realise how the impoverished struggle with a learning process that is unresponsive to their needs In a society where poverty is far more common than prosperity, one would expect the implications of poverty for education to be widely recognised. What we find, instead, is that poverty is seldom mentioned directly in policy documents on...

-Outlook The faecal matter hits the rotary blades, politically-but we're still staring at a sanitation disaster "Indians defecate everywhere. They defecate mostly besides the railway tracks. But they also defecate on the beaches; they defecate on the hills; they defecate on the river banks; they defecate on the streets; they never look for cover." -V.S. Naipaul An Area of Darkness, 1964 Not...