-Livemint.com The shrinking of middle class population could have a medium-term impact on India’s growth trajectory The coronavirus pandemic may have shrunk India’s middle-class population by 32 million and driven 75 million below the poverty line in 2020, a Pew Research Centre report said, as a severe recession walloped Asia’s third-largest economy. The report, which is based on an analysis of World Bank data, said that in comparison China fared much better, with...

-TheWire.in Under Modi, the state bears the losses of the rich, with tax concessions and state subsidies. But, working classes have to live through complete doing away of fertiliser subsidies, and petrol and diesel subsidies. Last year on May 12, in the peak of COVID -19-induced lockdown, when the poorest of the poor migrant workers were walking thousands of kilometres to their homes, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, with the insight of an...

-The Hindu Students without background will get bridge courses, says AICTE Prospective engineering students will not have to mandatorily study Maths and Physics in Class 12, according to new norms released by the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) for 2021-22. Council Chairperson Anil Sahasrabudhe defended the changes on Friday, saying they are in line with the multi-disciplinary approach of the new National Education Policy. Till now, only those who opted for Physics...

-The Hindu Parliamentary panel pushes for it in all government schools in coming academic year The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Education has recommended that all government schools start providing free breakfast in the coming academic year, as part of an expansion of the mid-day meal scheme envisaged by the National Education Policy. However, Education Ministry officials say a severe funding crunch is likely to delay the initiative. Free breakfasts would involve an additional...

-Scroll.in The report by Varieties of Democracy Institute said India is as autocratic as Pakistan in censorship and worse than Bangladesh and Nepal. India has turned into an “electoral autocracy”, an analytical research project by Sweden-based Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Institute said. The research institute had said last year that the Bharatiya Janata Party now closely resembles a “typical governing party in an autocracy”. A report of the organisation, which conceptualises and measures democracy,...