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India.com
7 hours ago
- Entertainment
- India.com
As Nandini Gupta Eyes The Miss World Crown, A Look At India's Global Beauty Queens
photoDetails english 2908934 With Nandini Gupta preparing to represent India on the Miss World stage, it's the perfect time to reflect on the remarkable journey of Indian women who've not only won international crowns but also left an indelible mark on the global stage. Updated:May 31, 2025, 04:42 PM IST Miss World 2025 1 / 8 India has a rich legacy of beauty queens who have redefined elegance, intelligence, and global presence. From Bollywood icons to social activists, these women have turned their crowns into platforms for change, making India a powerhouse in global pageantry, take a look: Reita Faria (Miss World 1966) 2 / 8 Reita Faria became the first Indian and Asian woman to win Miss World, breaking stereotypes by choosing a medical career over glamour. Aishwarya Rai (Miss World 1994) 3 / 8 Aishwarya Rai's win catapulted her into international fame, becoming one of India's most recognised global faces in film and fashion. Sushmita Sen (Miss Universe 1994) 4 / 8 As the first Indian to win Miss Universe, Sushmita symbolised strength and individuality, inspiring generations of young women Diana Hayden (Miss World 1997) 5 / 8 Known for her poise and intelligence, Diana added another feather to India's pageant legacy while later becoming a pageant mentor. Yukta Mookhey (Miss World 1999) 6 / 8 Yukta's win further solidified India's dominance in pageants during the 1990s, combining beauty with advocacy. Priyanka Chopra (Miss World 2000) 7 / 8 Priyanka turned her crown into a global empire—becoming an acclaimed actor, producer, and UNICEF ambassador. Manushi Chhillar (Miss World 2017) 8 / 8 After a 17-year gap, Manushi brought the crown back, promoting menstrual hygiene awareness and representing the modern Indian woman.
Egypt Independent
7 hours ago
- Egypt Independent
Egypt, Google, UNICEF to boost tech in education
The Egyptian government, Google, and the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF) discussed on Friday 30/5/2025 means of boosting technology integration in pre-university education system development in Egypt. During a visit to the United Kingdom (UK), Education and Technical Education Minister Mohamed Abdel Latif stressed his commitment to applying the highest international standards to assess the performance of students and teachers. Abdel Latif noted the ministry focuses on introducing the best training programs for teachers for their capacity building, which will in turn enhance their skills. The meeting focused on improving cooperation to implement successful models for integrating technology into education. The discussions focused on reducing the burden on teachers and saving time through the optimal use of artificial intelligence.
Scoop
9 hours ago
- Health
- Scoop
Education Suffers Amid DR Congo Violence, WHO Greenlights RSV Vaccines, More Hurricanes Ahead For Haiti
According to UN Children's Fund, UNICEF, more than 290 schools have been damaged or destroyed in Ituri this year alone, bringing the total number of out-of-school children in the province to over 1.3 million. Protection crisis Between January and April 2025, a surge in violence displaced more than 100,000 people – half of them children. During this period, reported cases of abduction, maiming, sexual violence, and the recruitment and use of children by armed groups rose by 32 per cent compared to the same timeframe last year. John Adbor, UNICEF's representative in the DRC, referred to the situation as a 'protection crisis', stating: 'Violence and conflict are shattering children's right to learn – putting them at far greater risk of being recruited by armed groups, exploited, and abused.' 'The needs are immense, and our resources are not enough,' Mr. Adbor added, referring to UNICEF's emergency response in the region. With more than 1.8 million conflict-affected children now out of school across the DRC, UNICEF is prioritising mental health and psychosocial support through child-friendly spaces, reintegration of children formerly associated with armed groups, and treatment for acute malnutrition. WHO approves two new vaccines to protect infants from RSV Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is the leading cause of severe lung infections in young children globally, resulting in approximately 100,000 deaths each year among children under the age of five. Alarmingly, 97 per cent of these deaths occur in low and middle-income countries. Although RSV can infect people of all ages, 'it is especially harmful to infants, particularly those born prematurely,' said Kate O'Brien from the World Health Organization (WHO). Around half of all RSV-related deaths occur in babies younger than six months. New immunisation products On Friday, WHO issued recommendations for two new immunisation tools: a maternal vaccine, administered to pregnant women in their third trimester to protect their newborns; and a long-acting antibody injection for infants, which begins to protect within a week of administration and lasts for at least five months. Considering the global burden of severe RSV illness in infants, WHO recommends that all countries adopt either the maternal vaccine or the antibody injection as part of their national immunisation strategies. 'These RSV immunisation products can transform the fight against severe RSV disease, dramatically reduce hospitalisations and deaths, and ultimately save many infant lives worldwide,' said Ms O'Brien. Dire hurricane forecasts compound Haiti woes UN humanitarians have raised alarm over Haiti's heightened vulnerability to natural disasters, warning that the country's limited capacity to respond could be severely tested during the 2025 hurricane season – forecast to be significantly more intense than average across Latin America and the Caribbean. Running from June to November, the upcoming season poses a serious threat to the impoverished island nation, where economic crisis, ongoing gang-related violence and rampant insecurity have already displaced over one million people. Displacement sites at risk More than 200,000 people are currently living in displacement sites across the country, many of which are situated in flood-prone areas. Lacking proper shelter, drainage and sanitation, these camps 'leave families acutely vulnerable to storms,' said UN Spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is working with national authorities and humanitarian partners to prepare for the hurricane season. Ongoing efforts include contingency planning, mapping of high-risk areas – particularly displacement sites – and strengthening early warning systems. However, humanitarian access remains limited, and preparedness is severely hindered by the lack of pre-positioned supplies throughout the country. This is a 'direct consequence of underfunding,' said Mr. Dujarric, adding that 'funding remains a major obstacle' to the UN's emergency response in Haiti.
Indian Express
10 hours ago
- General
- Indian Express
‘Welcome step, practical implementation difficult': Pune school principals on CBSE's teaching in mother tongue move
The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE), in a circular dated May 22, has instructed schools across the country to use the mother tongue or state language as the medium of instruction in the pre-primary to Class 5 stages. While this is in line with the Centre's National Education Policy, 2020, as well as UNICEF and UNESCO's advocacy for education in the mother tongue, there are a few challenges to implementing this ambitious move. The Indian Express spoke to principals of English-medium CBSE schools in Pune to get their views on this change and the obstacles they anticipate while enforcing this mandate. What the CBSE circular says Quoting the National Curriculum Framework (NCF) 2023, the circular states that the first language of literacy (R1) in schools should be the student's mother tongue. However, if this is not possible due to classroom diversity, the state language can be used as R1, it adds, directing schools to begin implementing the change from this year onwards. According to the CBSE's SARAS portal, there are 30,859 schools affiliated with the Board in the country. All of these schools are now required to create an NCF implementation committee by the end of May. This panel will be responsible for 'mapping student mother tongue, aligning language resources, and guiding curriculum adjustments'. What schools say Aditi Mukherjee, the principal of Billabong International School, Pune, enthusiastically supported the move by CBSE. 'I think this is a very welcome step because it has been long enough that we have followed English as a medium of instruction in different international schools, and in fact, schools in general,' she said. After mapping students' mother tongues and understanding teacher competency in these languages, Mukherjee said the school will have to make a training calendar to 'capacity build teachers' in the school. 'And if we see that there is some requirement for, you know, external training or even recruitment, we have to do the same,' she added. One of the challenges, Mukherjee said, would be that not all non-educators would agree with shifting the medium of education from English, the language of the elite, to a local language. 'I would also love to call upon our stakeholders, the children and the parents in particular, and have them as the third point of the pyramid. So, teachers, the leadership team and the board committee, as well as the parents, that would be the design,' she explained. The NCERT already has textbooks in 22 languages, and teachers should be able to train themselves to teach in the required language and even create their own teaching resources, opined Mukherjee. However, Nirmal Waddan, principal of The Kalyani School, Pune, envisioned greater challenges in implementing the move. 'I appreciate the CBSE's move on the language policy, but, unfortunately, there are many practical hindrances. In our school at least, we have children coming from diverse backgrounds. They are IT professionals who keep on shifting base, and they do not belong to a single mother tongue like Marathi or Telugu…So, we cannot cater to different mother tongues at the same time,' Waddan said. Even if the medium of education is to be changed to the state language, like Marathi in Maharashtra, Waddan said it will be quite challenging for teachers. 'A teacher who is from North India, how will she know how to teach a child in Telugu or Kannada? Practically, it is not going to be possible to implement this circular to the T…Completely changing the medium is not possible. It will be bilingual in most of the schools,' she said. Even though most of her teachers know Marathi, teaching in the language is a different game altogether, she explained. 'Core subjects like science and maths would be very, very challenging. Because there are certain words which have a proper meaning. I am born and brought up in Maharashtra, but even for me, it is going to be very difficult to explain in Marathi,' Waddan said. She said that even with training workshops for teachers, the shift in medium will still be quite challenging. 'I appreciate the main objective CBSE has behind this language policy circular and the NEP also…to make the children understand and get familiar with the basics…Learning outcomes will be better, I understand that completely. But practical implementation is very difficult,' she added. Indira National School's principal, Arati Garampalli, expressed similar views. 'My personal opinion would not be completely shifting to a vernacular language. I would still prefer that they go on with English and side-by-side give an explanation in Marathi or any other local language…We have diverse people, I do not have only Maharashtrians here. I have Bengalis, North Indians, South Indians. South Indians don't even pick up Hindi easily. So imagine for Marathi, it would be more difficult,' she said. 'We have to look at our stakeholders, which are our students and also my staff. My staff should also be particularly very perfect in that vernacular language. When you are teaching in a language, you have to be perfect in that, you cannot just go on (casually),' she added. However, Milind Naik, principal of Jnana Prabodhini School and a member of the steering committee for NEP implementation in Maharashtra, offered a different perspective and explained how the move might seem challenging, but is achievable. He said that a majority of CBSE school teachers in Pune speak Marathi in their daily lives and are compelled to speak in English in schools. 'A majority of the teachers already know Marathi. So there might be a few, as less as say 10 per cent, who just do not know Marathi. So it is expected that the teachers must communicate in Marathi. That means schools do not require teachers who have mastery over Marathi but are fluent enough to talk, to communicate basic things with the students. So, all those teachers residing in Pune for the last two to three years must be able to do this. It is not so difficult,' he explained. For other languages like Sindhi or Urdu, where teachers might not be easily available, Naik said, 'They (schools) have to try to get those teachers. Otherwise, the students get affected. Many times, the children try to shift from the CBSE English-medium schools to a vernacular school. So if they do not want the students to drop out, then they must try to have multilingual teachers at their school.' A major point of focus in the NEP is to address and improve the school dropout rate in the country. Naik also explained that practical issues would not be unique to English-medium schools but also affect regional language schools. 'Marathi-medium schools from Maharashtra will also face the same problem. If the school is in the Konkan region or near Goa, then they (teachers) must know Konkani also. Or if it is around Amravati or Nagpur, they must know Ahirani, and all those local languages. So, Marathi-medium schools are also going to face the same problem…All schools have to take care of all these things,' he added.
Al Etihad
12 hours ago
- Politics
- Al Etihad
New casualties in Gaza's Khan Younis amid UN warnings of child crisis
31 May 2025 09:14 GAZA (WAM)At least 13 Palestinians, including children and women, were killed on Friday in an Israeli attack on Khan Younis in the southern Gaza reported that Israeli drones targeted a tent sheltering displaced people in the Al-Mawasi area of northern Khan Younis, resulting in the deaths of 13 civilians, including at least three children and several women. Another woman was reportedly shot dead in the to Palestinian medical sources, the ongoing Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip has raised the total death toll to 54,321, with 123,770 injured since October 7, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) revealed that more than 50,000 Palestinian children have been killed or injured since October 2023, averaging one child every 20 a statement, UNICEF said that since the end of the ceasefire on March 18, 1,309 children have been killed and 3,738 organisation renewed its call to end the violence, protect civilians—including children—uphold international humanitarian and human rights law, ensure the immediate delivery of humanitarian aid, and release all the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) warned that Gaza is in urgent need of continuous humanitarian assistance. It confirmed that its warehouses in Amman hold enough supplies to feed more than 200,000 people for a criticised the current US-backed aid distribution system, describing it as deeply flawed and forcing residents to travel long distances, thereby risking what it called a 'second Nakba' due to potential forced displacement. UNRWA Commissioner-General Philippe Lazzarini described the system as 'a waste of resources and a distraction from the atrocities', calling for unrestricted access for humanitarian organisations to operate freely.
