Ayyanna dares government to prove graft charges against Skill Development Corporation
The Hindu
‘YSR Congress Party government is misusing the CID to target those who question its actions’
Senior leader of the Telugu Desam Party(TDP) and former Minister Ch. Ayyanna Patrudu has challenged the CID to conduct a physical verification of assets and prove the charges of corruption allegedly made against the AP Skill Development Corporation during the previous government’s rule or else admit its ‘mistake’.
Addressing a media conference, along with party spokesman K. Pattabhiram, here on Saturday, Mr. Patrudu said that he was ready to come, on behalf of the party, for a probe by the CID at any of the 40 Skill Development Centres (SDCs) in the State. Challenging the CID, he said: “I will give the details of the amounts spent on setting up of the SDCs and acquisition of tools for those centres.”
“Writing, in general, is a very solitary process,” says Yauvanika Chopra, Associate Director at The New India Foundation (NIF), which, earlier this year, announced the 12th edition of its NIF Book Fellowships for research and scholarship about Indian history after Independence. While authors, in general, are built for it, it can still get very lonely, says Chopra, pointing out that the fellowship’s community support is as valuable as the monetary benefits it offers. “There is a solid community of NIF fellows, trustees, language experts, jury members, all of whom are incredibly competent,” she says. “They really help make authors feel supported from manuscript to publication, so you never feel like you’re struggling through isolation.”
Several principals of government and private schools in Delhi on Tuesday said the Directorate of Education (DoE) circular from a day earlier, directing schools to conduct classes in ‘hybrid’ mode, had caused confusion regarding day-to-day operations as they did not know how many students would return to school from Wednesday and how would teachers instruct in two modes — online and in person — at once. The DoE circular on Monday had also stated that the option to “exercise online mode of education, wherever available, shall vest with the students and their guardians”. Several schoolteachers also expressed confusion regarding the DoE order. A government schoolteacher said he was unsure of how to cope with the resumption of physical classes, given that the order directing government offices to ensure that 50% of the employees work from home is still in place. On Monday, the Commission for Air Quality Management in the National Capital Region and Adjoining Areas (CAQM) had, on the orders of the Supreme Court, directed schools in Delhi-NCR to shift classes to the hybrid mode, following which the DoE had issued the circular. The court had urged the Centre’s pollution watchdog to consider restarting physical classes due to many students missing out on the mid-day meals and lacking the necessary means to attend classes online. The CAQM had, on November 20, asked schools in Delhi-NCR to shift to the online mode of teaching.