“The 52 primers in Indian languages have paved the way for the beginning of a new civilisational renaissance.”
Dharmendra Pradhan, Union education minister, launching 52 school textbooks in Indian non-scheduled languages (Hindustan Times, March 9)
“The government will probably claim that it was simply following the law; that Kejriwal was not responding to summons. But the […]
Shivani Chaturvedi (Chennai)
John Prabhu: urgency call
Although politically BJP, the ruling party at the Centre, and DMK, the ruling party in Tamil Nadu (pop.77 million), are at daggers drawn, the Tamil Nadu government has signalled an intent to embrace the Prime Minister Schools for Rising India (PM-SHRI) programme, launched in September, 2022.
In an official […]
Aditi Maheshwari (Bhopal)
GKSP children: gruelling trek
The popular urban perception is that rural SC (scheduled caste) and ST (scheduled tribe) children are content with their backwardness and poor-quality schools. This perception was contradicted on February 26 when a delegation of 40 class VII-VIII girl children of the Government Kanya Shiksha Parisar (GKSP), a
Reshma Ravishanker (Bengaluru)
Class VIII students writing board exams
After a month-long flip-flop over conducting class V, VIII and IX ‘summative assessments’ aka board exams for government and private schools affiliated with the Karnataka School Examination and Assessment Board (KSEAB), the last leg of the exams was conducted on March 25-26. This after the Karnataka […]
Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)
Bengal rural government primary school
With dates of general Election 2024 declared, the political mercury in West Bengal (pop.91 million), set for seven-phase polling from April 19 to June 1, has touched unprecedented levels. Leaders of the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) and resurgent BJP are trading vitriolic diatribes, indulging in character assassination […]
Autar Nehru (Delhi)
Newly elected JNUSU president Dhananjay (centre) & supporters
Living up to its reputation of being a bastion of woke Left politics, a students’ coalition of organisations affiliated with mainstream Left parties — AISF (affiliated with CPI), SFI (CPI-M), AISA (Communist Party Marxist Leninist) and DSF (independent Left) backed by BAPSA (a Dalit […]
“It’s a democratic right of the farmers to protest and come and be heard in the national capital. I don’t think the border with China is fortified the way this city is fortified. The government should have learnt a lesson from the previous farmers’ agitation — consult the stakeholders. Last time it took a year-long […]
Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)
Sabuj Sathi beneficiaries
Ahead of the forthcoming lok Sabha polls scheduled for April-May, Chandrima Bhattacharya, minister of state (independent charge) for finance, tabled a Rs.3.66 lakh crore budget on February 8, announcing a slew of social welfare policies including sops for women and children.
While continuing with existing welfare schemes such as the […]
Aditi Maheshwari (Bhopal)
The annual status of education Report (ASER) 2023, published by the independent not-for-profit Pratham Education Foundation (estb.1995), assessed the learning outcomes of 1,514 teenage children aged 14-18 years from 1,193 households in Bhopal and 60 villages in Bhopal district.
ASER 2023 reports 62 percent of teens struggle with basic arithmetic tasks, such as division […]
Nasrin Modak Siddiqi (Mumbai)
Mumbai pre-primary students: sleep deprivation concern
A circular dated february 8 issued by the state government’s education ministry advising change of pre-primary to class IV school timings to 9 a.m onwards, has divided the educators and parents communities statewide. Expressing concern over the issue of children not getting adequate sleep because […]
Reshma Ravishanker (Bengaluru)
Protesting forestry students: “right to feel wronged”
Over 700 students from three state government-run forestry colleges in Karnataka who — were on a month-long protest in their college campuses, congregated in Bengaluru to stage a protest between February 26-29. Their demand is the state government stipulates that only forestry sciences graduates will […]
Shivani Chaturvedi (Chennai)
IIT-M doctoral scholars: workload objection
The top-ranked Indian institute of Technology-Madras (IIT-M) has introduced a controversial mandate (January 15) requiring PhD scholars to publish a paper every semester. This policy change has sparked a backlash from students. Over 300 scholars staged a demonstration on the IIT-M campus on January 17 protesting the […]
Autar Nehru (Delhi)
NAAC headquarters, Bengaluru: new binary accreditation system
Most sentient higher education leaders privately lament the glacial pace at which the mandates of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 are being implemented in collegiate and university education. The Higher Education Commission of India (HECI) — the overarching umbrella organisation mandated to preside over […]
“Deeply regret the passing of Dr. Jagdish Gandhi, founder-chairman of the Lucknow-based City Montessori School, acknowledged by Guinness World Records as the world’s largest single city multi campus school with over 57,000 students. Dr Gandhi was among the first to encourage the novel EducationWorld venture and a committed supporter throughout his life. From modest beginnings […]
Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)
Released on January 17, the latest Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2023 ‘Beyond Basics’ of the highly respected Pratham Education Foundation paints a dismal picture of the pitiable condition of school education in West Bengal (pop.91 million), a state that prides itself on its intellectual prowess. In Bengal, ASER 2023 field tested […]
Nasrin Modak-Siddiqi (Mumbai)
Responding to a query filed under the Right to Information Act, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has disclosed that 218 primary schools, including some highly reputed private primary schools in Mumbai — Anandilal Podar, Santacruz; St. Michaels, Mahim; St. Andrews Primary, Bandra; St. Aloysius, Santacruz; Alexandra Girls, Fort; Rustomjee Troopers (Dahisar), and Gloria […]
Autar Nehru (Delhi)
The Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) published every year by the independent not-for-profit Pratham Education Foundation (estb.1995) usually field tests primary school (classes I-VIII) children in rural India to measure their real learning outcomes. An army of over 1 lakh volunteers — mainly college and university students — test the reading and […]
Reshma Ravishanker (Bengaluru)
Against the backdrop of rising student suicides being reported from Kota, Rajasthan — the tests prep capital of India where 26 secondary students committed suicide last year, the highest ever annually — the Union ministry of education has been under pressure to rein in the unchecked growth of the Rs.58,000 crore coaching classes […]
Nasrin Modak Siddiqi (Mumbai)
Mumbai nursery children. Inset: Dr. Swati Popat Vats
With the national education Policy (NEP) 2020 having restructured the 10+2 school system of over half a century to the 5+3+3+4 system by tagging on three years of formal early childhood education, the BJP/Shiv Sena government has issued a circular to all schools […]
Reshma Ravishanker (Bengaluru)
Girls toilet inauguration: caste shadow
Two back-to-back incidents of children in government schools being forced to clean toilets of their schools have provoked public outrage in the state. The first incident was reported on December 18 when photographs and video clips of some students of the Morarji Desai Residential School in Malur, […]
Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)
The long-standing face-off between the state government and the state governor over the issue of appointment of vice chancellors (VCs) in 31 state government universities has transformed into a full-blown war between the Trinamool Congress (TMC) which rules West Bengal and the governor — an appointee of the ruling BJP government at the […]
Shivani Chaturvedi (Chennai)
Poor student enrolment in the constituent colleges of Chennai’s prestigious Anna University (AU) is causing anxiety within the management of Tamil Nadu’s show-piece state government university, one of India’s top engineering universities ranked in the 501-600 band worldwide by Times Higher Education and among the world’s Top 2,000 by US News & World […]
“We have to bring some changes in the education system of our management institutions for more effective and inclusive development of the country.”
President Droupadi Murmu urging Indian business management institutes to connect their study programmes with Indian corporates, consumers and society (Indian Express, December 7)
“You must be joking about India becoming a developed, rich […]
Autar Nehru (Delhi)
CBSE school-leavers writing final exam: grades inflation hurdle next
With the two national school examination boards — the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE, 28,926 affiliated schools) and Council for the Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE, 2,700 schools) — and 69 state boards scheduled to stage their school-leaving examinations within the next […]
Autar Nehru (Delhi)
The UGC (setting up and Operation of Campuses of Foreign Higher Educational Institutions in India) Regulations, 2023, notified on November 7 by the apex Delhi-based University Grants Commission (UGC), has evoked disappointment and skepticism within academia. Long in the works, the Regulations are unlikely to enthuse foreign universities to establish branch campuses in […]
Nasrin Modak Siddiqi (Mumbai)
Although the latest Israel-Hamas war that began on October 7 when Hamas militia crossed into Israel and took Israeli citizens — mainly women and children — hostage resulting in relentless bombing of the Gaza strip governed by Hamas hasn’t impacted the tenor of life in India, it has had an unexpected fallout […]
Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)
Although the next legislative assembly election in West Bengal is in the distant future (2026), three-term chief minister Mamata Banerjee (who in a classic case of nepotism has groomed her nephew Abhishek to take over after her) has less than six months to make good her promise to bag all 42 Lok Sabha, […]
Shivani Chaturvedi (Chennai)
The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK)-led Tamil Nadu government is determined to scrap the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) — the national exam to determine admission into all 704 medical colleges countrywide, including public and private medical colleges in Tamil Nadu.
For the past seven years since NEET was introduced, a political consensus opposing […]
Reshma Ravishanker (Bengaluru)
With student enrolment in the state’s 49,679 government schools showing consistent decline, Karnataka’s Congress government which was voted to power last May, has announced a plan to upgrade 600 government schools to the status of Karnataka Public Schools (KPS) by March 2024. On October 7, Madhu Bangarappa, minister for school education and literacy, […]
“If we are to truly uplift the socio-economically disadvantaged sections, working on mission mode to improve quality of education at school and college levels should be the foremost priority… Compelling higher rated institutions like IIMs and IITs to admit underprepared students from socio-economically weaker backgrounds into their Ph D programmes will not correct the ills […]
“India’s work productivity is one of the lowest in the world… So therefore, my request is that our youngsters must say, ‘This is my country. I’d like to work 70 hours a week.’ You know, this is exactly what the Germans and Japanese did after the Second World War; they made sure that every German […]
Nasrin Modak Siddiqi (Mumbai)
Suraj Mandhare
A scheme under which corporates, individuals and voluntary organisations (NGOs) have been permitted to ‘adopt’ government schools to improve infrastructure and education quality, has provoked widespread protests from government school teachers statewide.
On September 18, the BJP-Shiv Sena government of the state announced the scheme under which philanthropists, corporates and […]
Shivani Chaturvedi (Chennai)
Ranked #427 among global universities by the highly respected London-based higher ed institution ranking agency Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), the state-government managed Anna University, Chennai, comprising 13 constituent colleges, three regional campuses with an enrolment of 18,000 students, is struggling with only 556 full-time teachers. On October 3, after hearing a batch of petitions […]
Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)
Bengal teachers agitating for appointment letters
A year after the multi-crore teacher recruitment scam for West Bengal’s 92,748 government schools came to light following the arrests of Partha Chatterjee, former education minister, Kalyanmoy Ganguly, former president of West Bengal Board of Secondary Education (WBBSE) and several other government and ruling party bigwigs […]
Autar Nehru (Delhi)
Primary school children: permanent APAAR record for all
When the 65-page national Education Policy (NEP) 2020, distilled from the 484-page report of the K. Kasturirangan Report, was released to an unsuspecting public on July 29, 2020, there was considerable scepticism about its implementation. But bit by bit, several important initiatives – CUET […]
Reshma Ravishanker (Bengaluru)
Madhu Bangarappa: invisible booklets
Somewhat unusually, the Congress government in Karnataka (pop.69 million), which completed 100 days in office on August 27, is on fast-track towards fulfilling its education-related election promises. On August 21, deputy chief minister D.K. Shivakumar announced that as per its manifesto promise, the state government has discontinued implementation […]
Shivani Chaturvedi (Chennai)
A state in which public demand for (allopathy) medical practitioner qualifications is arguably highest countrywide, an August 16 notification of the National Medical Commission has caused widespread dismay.
Under NMC’s Extraordinary Gazette Notification wordily titled ‘Guidelines for Undergraduate Courses under the Establishment of New Medical Institutions, Starting of New Medical Courses, Increase of […]
Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)
Governor Bose & Banerjee (left)
Control of west bengal’s 31 state-run universities by appointing vice chancellors of choice continues to be a bone of contention between the ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) government and the state’s Governor, C.V. Ananda Bose, ex-officio chancellor of all state universities. Since May, 22 interim VCs have been […]
Autar Nehru (Delhi)
DUSU’s newly elected president Tushar Dedha: subsidies priority
Held on september 22 after a hiatus of three years because of Covid disruption, the Delhi University Students Union (DUSU) election was swept by the BJP-affiliated Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) which bagged three out of four office-bearer posts. The Congress-affiliated National Students’ Union […]
“Second chances also pave the way for innovation and creativity. The history of human progress is punctuated by countless stories of visionaries who faced initial setbacks but later triumphed.”
Srinath Sridharan, author & Steve Correa, corporate advisor (Business World, September 23)
“In nearly six decades of general elections after independence, the ratio of women MPs never […]
10 oldest cities in the world Every city in the world has a story to unfold. The ancient cities have all the more tales engulfed with ... 
Decline and fall The conspiracy of silence in the mainstream media over the arrest and incarceration following denial of bail on December 9, of Business ... 
Most qualified politicians of India -Riya Ganguly Politics in India has always generated buzz, controversies ranging from defamatory scandals to questionable qualifications. With over 40% ... 
Hinduism poster allegedly on display at Azim Premji University event goes viral, varsity denies Reshma Ravishanker A derogatory poster on Hinduism, allegedly on display at one of the events at Azim Premji University has ... 
