HRD Ministry asks them to adopt random selection process Guidelines for admission in schools, issued under the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009, prohibit screening of children and interviewing their parents. The guidelines issued by the Union Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry have also asked the schools to adopt a random selection process. “The schools have to adopt an admission procedure which is non-discriminatory, rational and transparent...

After months of debating the issue and seeking the law ministry's opinion, the HRD ministry on Tuesday finally issued guidelines about screening of children at the time of admission under the Right to Education Act. HRD minister Kapil Sibal said, "We have taken the law ministry's clearance to issue the guidelines on screening. The RTE Act will be amended later. Had we gone in for an amendment on screening now admissions...

Frustrated by the government's attitude to disability, an advocacy movement has sprung up in Madhya Pradesh, central India, fighting for the universal right of all children to attend school 'What are friends for? You listen for us and we'll see for you." The black-and-white photograph beneath the words shows a smiling boy with his arm around his partially sighted classmate. It encapsulates the inclusive education ideal – all children of all...

United Nations agencies today launched new international guidelines aimed at helping to protect health workers who provide care to people infected with HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis (TB) from becoming infected themselves in the course of their work. The guidelines, drafted by the International Labour Organization (ILO), the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), are designed to help doctors, nurses and midwives, pharmacists and laboratory technicians, as...

The Global Hunger Index report paints a gloomy picture of South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. WITH the deadline for achieving the Millennium Development Goals just five years away, the 2010 Global Hunger Index report prepared by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) paints a gloomy picture of South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Some 29 countries in these regions, it says, have levels of hunger that are alarming or extremely alarming....