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...

Four months after the Right to Education (RTE) Act came into force, guaranteeing every child up to 14 years of age free and compulsory education, the Delhi High Court on Thursday delivered its first landmark ruling by according the relief to 874 children, 350 of them differently abled. Justice Rajiv Sahai Endlaw allowed the petition of advocate Ashok Aggarwal of NGO Social Jurist and directed the Delhi government and its schools...

India’s largest public school chain has accepted that it has failed to improve standards of education in its primary classes two years after it launched a revamp plan, following concerns over learning levels of children. In a letter to all its 981 schools spread across the country, the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan (KVS) has said an internal survey to assess the revamp has found “shortcomings” on all parameters. The revamp plan...

With 35 deaths reported in 2009 at the Asha Kiran home for the mentally challenged, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) submitted a report in the High Court citing deplorable medical attention, poor administration, lack of adequate staff and unhygienic conditions as reasons for the deaths. Placing the report before a Division Bench headed by Chief Justice A P Shah on Wednesday as a PIL on the...

Winner of a national award for Bitter Chocolate, an eye-opener book on child sexual abuse, author-activist Pinki Virani tells Nandita Sengupta the nation has let down its children in the Ruchika Girhotra case. You have said that government response to the Girhotra case is appalling. In the national outrage on Ruchika, government has missed the woods for the trees. I'm appalled that the law minister says we will now strengthen...