-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The government has decided to make it mandatory for over 5,000 scientists, working in different central agencies including the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), to undertake 12 hours of lecture classes in an academic year in public-funded schools and colleges across the country. Announcing the decision, Union science and technology minister Jitendra Singh said it would be "mandatory" for the scientists to formally take...

-Al Jazeera More than 100 workers have died of starvation since West Bengal's tea estates have begun shutting down. Jalpaiguri/Alipurduar, India - The picturesque tea gardens carpeting West Bengal's Dooars region are gradually turning into graveyards, as dozens of workers have fallen victim to starvation in recent months. More than 100 tea-garden workers have died of starvation in the past year amid site closures, activists say - but rather than taking action, the...

-The Indian Express More than four years after the RTE was passed, the state has no handle on the numbers of out-of-School Children. The recently released report of the Global Initiative on Out-of-School Children, based on a situational analysis of India, opens a Pandora's box on data and methodological issues that plague the estimation of out-of-School Children in India. As the report reveals, there is a multiplicity of definitions, sources of data...

-Frontline   The United Nation's MDG report 2014 shows that despite India's significant economic progress, around one-third of the world's extremely poor people reside in the country. IT is raining development goals. As the period for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) draws to a close next year, discussions around these goals and what should replace them have reached fever pitch, with national governments, international organisations and representatives of civil society participating in them. Of...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Teacher's Day was never so big, ever since it was designated as such, back in 1962. That's because of the planned address of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to thousands of School Children. But, what about the teachers who will gather their flock for the big day? Nearly 43% of school teachers in India are now working under privately managed schools. That's about 4.2 million teachers, of...