New Delhi Apr 22 PTI The Krantikari Yuva Sangathan KYS on Friday held a protest demonstration outside Delhi Universitys St Stephens College calling for the immediate scrapping of the interview requirement for admission While the Delhi University has asked St Stephens College to grant admissions for general category students based on the Common Universities Entrance Test scores and hold interviews only for the reserved seats on an 8515 ratio the college has maintained that it will continue to hold interviews for all candidates The college reserves 50 per cent of its seats for Christian students The KYS members also burnt an effigy of the college principal after he allegedly refused to meet them This is an elitist tradition as the only reason to conduct interviews is to select the most elite students for admission into the college The criterion has been persistently used to deny the students from deprived backgrounds from gaining entry into the college and thereby maintain the elitism of granting admission and perpetuating the privilege of select clans and families KYS alleged in a statement This is outrightly pathetic and stands in contrast to the historic struggles such as that of Jyotiba Phule and Savitribai Phule against ending privileges in education it added The student outfit also demanded that an evening batch be started in the college PTI SLB CJ CJ

New Delhi Mar 24 PTI The Union Education Ministry is conducting a Foundational Learning Study in order to assess the learning levels of students up to Grade 3 according to an official statement The study which is being conducted with the objective of undertaking an assessment to establish a baseline for the NIPUN Bharat Mission is being conducted by the National Council of Educational Research and Training NCERT in all the states and union territories over a window of four days from March 23 to 26 Approximately 10000 schools and one lakh students from the sampled schools are expected to participate it said The study is the first-of-its-kind in the world as it aims to set up benchmarks for reading with comprehension in 22 Indian languages the statement said Its objective is to conduct a large-scale assessment of the foundational learning of Grade 3 students to establish a baseline for the NIPUN Bharat Mission The National Initiative for Proficiency in Reading with Understanding and Numeracy NIPUN Bharat was launched by the ministry last year to ensure that by 2026-27 every child in the country necessarily attains foundational literacy and numeracy by the end of Grade 3 The survey aims to establish reading proficiency benchmarks for fluency with comprehension for each of the languages being assessed under the study It will also fulfill the objective of providing the data for Sustainable Development Goal 411 education proficiency levels In the statement the ministry cited the National Education Policy 2020 which highlights that The ability to read and write and perform basic operations with numbers is a necessary foundation and an indispensable prerequisite for all future schooling and lifelong learning PTI SLB CJ CJ

New Delhi Mar 23 PTI A 40-year-old man who had been left debilitated after he developed elephantiasis in his left leg is on his way to overcoming the condition following a series of surgeries at a private facility here according to a statement from the hospital He can now walk freely and has resumed his daily activities it said The patient had met with a road accident around 10 years ago He underwent a surgery on the left groin which resulted in disruption of the lymph nodes lymphatics Following this he began developing Lymphedema or Elephantiasis excessive swelling due to the accumulation of excessive fluids The patient consulted several doctors in the following years but his situation worsened This compromised his ability to walk and undertake daily chores besides giving him psychological trauma the statement from Max Healthcare said He underwent a procedure that involved microsurgical technique at Max Super Speciality Hospital Patparganj After the microsurgery followed by multiple reduction surgeries and non-surgical means to reduce the swelling his left leg which earlier weighed 45 kg has come down to 25 kg it said The leg had swollen to 120 cm when the patient first came to the hospital It has reduced to 65 cm it said A normal leg of an adult male ranges from 35 to 40 cm in circumference According to the team of doctors led by senior director Dr Manoj Johar and his associate principal consultant Dr Pradeep K Singh Deparment of Aesthetic Reconstructive and Plastic Surgery Lympho-Venous Anastomosis LVA is a one-of-its-kind treatment for treating Lymphedema that could be caused due to a trauma It is common in patients of cancer surgeries or filariasis The patient can now walk freely and has resumed his daily activities while also undergoing conservative therapy for improvement Dr Johar said Lymphedema was traditionally treated with debulking ablative treatments in which the excess volume of fat and fluid was immediately excised or eliminated via liposuction These methods on the other hand are far from physiological and are frequently disfiguring or only provide brief relief LVA is relatively new and is now considered one of the gold standard therapies for lymphedema PTI SLB CJ CJ

New Delhi Feb 20 PTI Delhi University is preparing the curriculum of its various undergraduate courses and the process will take another three to four months according to officials The Undergraduate Curriculum Framework UGCF prepared in accordance with the National Education Policy NEP was approved by the executive council of the university on February 11 We are now moving to get the courses done The work has just begun We will put the course content up for public feedback The process will take another three to four months an official said The UGCF includes two features of the NEP the multidisciplinary approach and the multiple entry and exit scheme MEES Under MEES students can exit at the end of an academic year with a degree According to the draft students will stand to earn a total of 176 credits at the end of the fourth year of their undergraduate degree They need to earn a minimum of 50 per cent credits in a discipline to get the degree with a major in that discipline The official said the courses will be drafted accordingly The new batch of students that will be admitted to Delhi University through the Central Universities Common Entrance Test CUCET will be studying the revised courses The university will get a nearly four-year window to work out the modalities of the postgraduate courses The university will start work on framing the postgraduate curriculum after the undergraduate curriculum work is completed It doesnt mean we are deferring it Its just that the first batch of students will become eligible for one year Masters degree after four years so that gives us time to work on the syllabus for postgraduate courses the official said A section of teachers has expressed opposition to the implementation of the NEP by Delhi University saying it may lead to several issues including loss of work hours for teachers and subsequent job losses PTI SLB CJ CJ

New Delhi Feb 19 PTI Delhi Social Welfare Minister Rajendra Pal Gautam celebrated the birth anniversaries of social reformers Guru Ravidas and Gadge Maharaj on Saturday Sant Ravidas had a dream that every person irrespective of caste should have the right to lead a dignified life Both rich and the poor should get equal opportunities Gautam said after he launched the programme by reciting a couplet of the 15th Century mystic poet and reformer Lavishing praise on Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal Gautam said Now the children of both rich and the poor in Delhi are getting an excellent education in government schools Speaking on abolishing caste-based oppression the minister said the onus of creating a society free of discrimination is on every citizen Only then will our country will progress and will be called the golden bird again he said PTI SLB CJ CJ

New Delhi Jan 27 PTI Only 36 per cent of the 89 fatalities recorded in Delhi from January 13-15 in which Covid-19 was the primary cause of death were vaccinated according to official data A little over 21 per cent of the 438 deaths reported in these two weeks were due to Covid-19 while the virus in rest of the cases was incidental it said The daily deaths are analysed The analysis between January 13 and January 25 showed that out of the total of 438 deaths recorded during the period 94 were those where the virus was the primary cause of death In 318 fatalities the finding of the virus was incidental with the patients being those who had comorbidities and were ailing for a long time with kidney ailments cancer and lung diseases among others the data stated They were mostly end-stage patients and a majority of them were aged 60 and above it said When we admit a patient in the hospital they are tested for Covid-19 to see whether protocols are being followed an official said Of the 94 fatalities where coronavirus was the primary reason five were those who were not eligible for vaccination while 57 were unvaccinated and only 32 were partially or fully vaccinated Of the deceased 64 per cent of patients were those who were eligible for inoculation but were not vaccinated he said According to the official sufficient data was not available yet to ascertain whether these patients were infected with Omicron or not We have not received the entire genome sequencing data Of course Omicron would be there but we do not know the numbers he mentioned So far in January 637 Covid-19 fatalities have been reported The deaths where Covid-19 is reported in the patient are treated as coronavirus deaths It is an established principle We have a panel of experts and the analysis was done to see whether there was a pattern to the pneumonia which was typical of Covid-19 but it was found that the fatalities were among those who were end-stage patients the official said Health Minister Satyendar Jain has been stressing that a majority of the patients that succumbed during due to infection this time had comorbidities PTI SLB CJ CJ

New Delhi Jan 26 PTI Fifty four per cent of Delhiites are in favour of lifting the odd-even restrictions in markets but want the weekend curfew to continue till the positivity rate declines to five per cent a survey has claimed Delhi had seen an uptick in COVID-19 infections mainly triggered by the Omicron variant but the cases have seen a decline over the last 10 days LocalCircles a digital community-based platform asked in its survey What should be the criteria to remove current COVID-related restrictions weekend and night curfew market odd-even shops etc imposed in Delhi In response 40 per cent people said market odd-even restrictions should be relaxed but night and weekend curfew should continue until the positivity rate dropped to five per cent Another 18 per cent people were of the opinion that the restrictions should be eased only when the positivity rate dropped to five per cent Fourteen per cent respondents said they wanted the administration to do away with the restrictions only when the positivity rate came down to two per cent while an equal number of people said the government should continue with the existing setup until the positivity rate dipped down to one per cent The remaining 14 per cent of the respondents wanted the government to remove all restrictions immediately the survey claimed On average 54 per cent of Delhi residents supported the removal of odd-even restrictions in markets According to the survey 72 per cent of the participants wanted the administration to the lift the weekend and night curfews only after the test positivity rate hit five per cent The survey received 8661 responses of which 65 per cent of the respondents were men and the rest women Ahead of the crucial meeting of the Delhi Disaster Management Authority DDMA on Thursday which will see discussions on the removal of restrictions the Chamber of Trade and Industry an organisation of traders in Delhi reached the L-G House on Wednesday and submitted a memorandum stating that they suffered about 70 per cent losses in the last 25 days and requested the lieutenant governor to lift all curbs PTI SLB CJ CJ

New Delhi Jan 19 PTI The Delhi University will hold its convocation on February 26 according to an official notification During its 97th convocation last year the university had become the first institution in the country to award digital degrees to its 178719 students The convocation was conducted in a hybrid manner -- a mix of online and physical mode Wednesdays notification however did not mention the arrangement for the convocation this year PTI SLB CJ CJ