-The Hindu   In his Independence Day address, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made two important announcements, both relating to education. One affirmed the government's intention to improve the quality of education at various levels and appoint an Education Commission to go into the issues. The other outlined a plan to universalise secondary education as a follow-up to the enactment of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act (RTE), 2009...

This article documents and then examines the various benefits that, it is claimed, will flow from linking the Unique Identity number with the public distribution system and the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. It filters the unfounded claims, which arise from a poor understanding of how the PDS and NREGS function, from the genuine ones. On the latter, there are several demanding conditions that need to be met in order...

Bihar is the first state in India to put information about students, teachers and educational status online as part of an effort to improve education Bihar has become the first state in the country to put details of Classes 1 to 8 of all its 70,000 government schools online. Only recently, a survey of primary education showed that the state, considered one of the most poorly developed in the country, had...

Orissa, which has the second highest tribal population in the country, will start high-tech coaching progammes from next month exclusively for its tribal students to help them compete in tough competitive examinations. The state government plans to enroll about 1,000-1,500 students of Class 10 and 11 from 19 state-run tribal schools located in the interior areas for the programme. Sanjeev K. Chadha, director of the state Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe...

Objective is to make the public “feel the Government and not to see it” Project cost for Coimbatore is about Rs. 2 crore Coimbatore will soon become an “e-district” with select services of four departments going online initially. Tamil Nadu E-governance Agency Director Santhosh Babu told The Hindu that Coimbatore was one of the six districts that would come under e-governance in the State soon. Revenue, Adi Dravida and Tribal Welfare, Backward Classes,...