The obnoxious practice will continue in one form or the other, as long as the government and society treat certain so-called menial jobs as the preserve of one community. On November 1, a unique journey will come to a ceremonious end in Delhi. Earlier this month, five bus loads of men and women headed out from different corners of the country with one slogan on their lips: honour and liberation for...

The state government has decided to ask private schools to furnish details of their accounts to stop them from indiscriminately hiking fees. Although all private schools will be required to reveal the data, the government’s focus is on English-medium institutions as they have been frequently accused of raising fees arbitrarily. The state education department will soon send a circular to nearly 500 private English-medium schools — both unaided and partially aided (those...

Qualified rural youth now have a chance to get a government job, if only on contract, with 12 lakh technical vacancies opening up in gram panchayats across the country. The panchayati raj ministry headed by C.P. Joshi has decided that each gram panchayat will be allowed to recruit between four and six persons, including engineers, accountants and computer technicians. There are 2.5 lakh panchayats in the country. The state selection commissions will...

HRD Minister Kapil Sibal today said a software has been developed for making the Recruitment process of government school teachers more transparent. "A software for transparent teacher Recruitment has been prepared," he said while addressing the valedictory session of the state School Education Secretaries' conference here. He also asked the secretaries to ensure transparency in the Recruitment process which has often faced criticism from various quarters.Pointing out that the Centre had allocated...

KEY TRENDS   • Maternal Mortality Ratio for India was 370 in 2000, 286 in 2005, 210 in 2010, 158 in 2015 and 145 in 2017. Therefore, the MMRatio for the country decreased by almost 61 percent between 2000 and 2017 *14    • As per the NSS 71st round, among rural females aged 5-29 years, the main reasons for dropping out/ discontinuance were: engagement in domestic activities, not interested in education, financial constraints and marriage. Among rural males aged...