-Hindustan Times New Delhi: The ongoing strike by municipal workers in Delhi has deprived a majority of over 12 lakh poor students of their daily nutrition in the form of mid-day meals. Officials said since teachers were either not reporting to work or not teaching, the attendance in 1,860 municipal schools had gone down and affected the distribution of mid-day meals. The mid-day meal scheme is a government programme designed to improve the...

-The Hindu Giving up corporate jobs and fat salaries, an increasing number of young men and women are committing their lives to providing education to India’s poorest   “I had career goals, now I set myself happiness goals. Giving and getting happiness in return,” says Pracheta Sharma, and somehow that does not sound one bit corny. Sharma, along with two other friends Mainak Roy and Rahul Bhanot, is working on a project...

-The Hindu Even as the student population has become increasingly diverse, the high incidence of suicide among Dalit students points to continuing discrimination, exclusion and humiliation. There is a need to apply our minds in a calm manner to address the problems that Dalit students face in institutions of higher education and find a more durable solution, now that the University of Hyderabad has revoked the suspension of students in the context...

-The Times of India JAIPUR: Moved by the sight of some students coming to school barefoot in the chilly December weather, Jalore collector Jitendra Kumar Soni, a young IAS officer, started an innovative scheme aimed at providing free shoes to downtrodden and deprived children. Christened as 'Charan Paduka Yojna', the scheme aims at distributing shoes to nearly 25,000 school kids before the Republic Day this year. Soni, who hails from Dhanasar village near...

Representatives of around 20 civil society organizations and NGOs met the Finance Minister Shri Arun Jaitley as part of pre-budget consultation on social sector on 12 January, 2016. Immediately after the pre-budget consultation, a press conference was held by some of these organizations to convey the media persons what demands/ suggestions were made.   Subrat Das, Executive Director of Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability (CBGA, http://www.cbgaindia.org/) informed us that during...