-The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy Menstrual hygiene, an essential building block of a woman’s health, suffers wanton neglect in India’s public discourse. Though public policies are in place, the progress made by India’s government, private, and civil society sectors is not in sync with the nation’s aspiration to be a global economic superpower. R. Sujatha, consultant on gender issues, and R. Gopinath, development economist, critique the steps taken,...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: A pilot study on the midday meal scheme has recommended splitting it into light snacks and a light meal because it found that 70 per cent children in government schools were coming to class on an empty stomach and failing to focus on studies. The study, conducted by the NGO Swami Sivananda Memorial Institute in the Sohawal and Masauda blocks of Faizabad district in Uttar Pradesh, reported that...

-The Times of India MEERUT: Every time Priyanka Singh, a teacher at Upper Primary School, Barabanki, had to explain to her students complex scientific concepts that required colour coding to differentiate between ideas, she would wish for a whiteboard instead of the existing blackboard. She had tried getting donations for her school from locals but in vain. Then someone told her about an online fundraising platform for educators in India. She started...

-The Telegraph Lucknow (Uttar Pradesh): Many a fear has been expressed over the potential misuse of the Aadhaar card, ranging from privacy violation to online looting to suppression of dissent. Now, a headmaster in Uttar Pradesh has been accused of opening an unforeseen flank by showing the door to 17 pupils on the pretext that they hadn't submitted their Aadhaar numbers. Rajesh Kumar, the headmaster of the government-run Laltapur Primary School in Chandauli...

-The Hindu Hundreds of government schools, especially in tribal-dominated districts, have been shut down over the past year. Elizabeth Kuruvilla reports on the closures, the mushrooming of private schools, and the battles waged by tribal villages to keep state-funded local schools open It’s a little past four in the afternoon, the time when schools ring their closing bells in the Hatsesikhal cluster of Odisha’s tribal-dominated Rayagada district. Just before Sekhal Primary School...