Likely to be rolled out gradually, in 3 to 6 months from now  Once fully implemented, the scheme may touch the lives of 20 crore women “Highly subsidised” sanitary napkins will be supplied to women above poverty line To boost female health and hygiene in rural India, the Union government is working on a scheme to provide women living below poverty line (BPL) with free sanitary napkins. The scheme, which will eventually...

Monica Das Gupta is a senior social scientist at the World Bank. Her field research in Punjab, when she was at the National Council of Applied Economic Research, established that sex differentials in child mortality in rural Punjab persisted despite relative wealth, socio-economic development including rapid universalization of female education, fertility decline, and mortality decline. Amartya Sen’s writings drew attention to female foeticide and infanticide in Asia that led to...

After more than six months wait, HRD minister Kapil Sibal on Friday signed the file for the notification of the Right to Education Act, 2009, in the next few days and its implementation from April 1. Delay in working out the finances and funding pattern between the Centre and states were the reasons given by HRD ministry for sitting on the notification. But the funding pattern is yet to be...

Four-year course, including internship, proposed; it would be “institutional” in character  The annual proposed intake for the course is 25 to 50 students Medical Council of India plans to start the course in August The proposed alternative model for under-graduate medical education to create a cadre of rural doctors will be discussed at a two-day workshop beginning here this Thursday. The model, mooted by the Medical Council of India (MCI), is to...

Matriculate Trained Teachers, who make up 87% of school teachers in India, get Rs 775 in UP Rs 892 in Assam and Rs 1,507 per month in Punjab. Even in the most highly rated schools, the average salary is Rs. 7,225 p.m. Nearly 200,000 teachers in Bihar draw a salary less than that of a peon in the government. Teachers with post graduate degrees teaching primary to higher secondary levels, draw...