Experts fear that Schools will begin forcing children with disabilities to stay at home with the “study from home” clause passed under the RTE amendment bill by the Rajya Sabha on Tuesday. This amendment adds children with disability to the definition of “disadvantaged groups” and will now be a part of the 25 per cent reservation for the Economically Weaker Section category, under the Right to Education Act. The bill...

We need a properly defined strategy to integrate poorer children into Schools For millions of children, it is a struggle to get to School, to stay in School and to make sense of what is happening in the classroom. After visiting many homes in rural and urban India, I have realised that learning to read without decent instruction, without enough nutrition, without electricity and water, without a place to keep your...

-The Economic Times The Rajya Sabha on Tuesday passed an amendment to the Right to Education Act. The amendment will widen the beneficiary net for disabled children and provide those with severe disability the option of receiving education at home. It will also give School management committees an advisory role in minority Schools, both aided and unaided, and will put madarsas and vedic Schools and other institutions providing primarily religious instruction outside...

August 9, 2010, Lalgarh Ramkrishna Higher Secondary School: As many as 10,000 people stand in rapt attention. Another 40,000 people are stuck on the roads leading to the venue. The speaker: Mamata Banerjee, railway minister. April 24, 2012, Lalgarh Ramkrishna Higher Secondary School: Between 2,500 and 3,000 people listen to a speech on peace and development. Some start wandering around before the 30-minute speech is wrapped up. The speaker: Mamata Banerjee, chief minister. April...

-The Telegraph The Rajya Sabha today passed amendments that exempt madarsas and Vedic pathshalas, which impart religious teachings, from the Right to Education Act and grant reservation in private Schools to disabled children. Another amendment clarified that School management committees in aided minority Schools would function only in an advisory capacity and would not be required to prepare the School development plan. The amendments will now go to the Lok Sabha. Some aided minority...