Private coaching constitutes a significantly large portion of the expense students incur on education, sometimes even bigger than the expenditure on school fees, a study says. In Gujarat, Maharashtra and Karnataka, school students who go for tuitions spend more on private coaching than the average school student does on all items including school fees, transport, books and stationary and uniforms. These are the findings of a in 2007-08 National Sample Survey Organisation...

Action plan should be finalised to end scourge before March 2012 A plan of action should be finalised within a month or so with the target of ending the pernicious practice of manual scavenging within the 11th Plan period that ends in March 2012, sources in the Social Justice Ministry said. This was the key outcome of a two-day consultation meeting which concluded here on Tuesday. Jointly organised by the Ministries of Social...

In the middle of a debate about corruption in high places, the curse struck in a macabre manner from the base of the pyramid on the eve of the celebration of the republic. An additional collector was burnt alive in daylight by a gang that sprinkled kerosene on him after the 44-year-old officer caught their aides pilfering fuel from a tanker in Maharashtra’s Nashik today. The prime suspect, who has a history...

In the midst of all the handwringing over population explosion in the country, the Indian government might miss preparing for a global record-setting event — the birth of the baby that would take the population of planet earth to the seven billion mark. The momentous birth is projected to happen towards the October or November. But what's that got to do with India? Well, we just happen to be the country...

Train traffic on the Delhi-Howrah route was normalised late last night after farmers, agitating over land acquisition for a power house in Karchana area, decided to end their blockade on a railway line in this Uttar pradesh district.After talks between farmers' leaders and the district administration last night, the farmers lifted the 13-hour seige normalising train traffic on a very busy route, Government Railway Police (GRP) sources said here this...