The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs on Thursday approved a `2,550 crore National AIDS Control Support Project.
The proposed project by the Department of AIDS Control will contribute towards intensifying and consolidating prevention services with a focus on highly vulnerable populations, high risk groups and bridge population and strengthening behaviour change communication and demand generation, besides institutional strengthening and financial management.
This would help in providing the desired impetus required for further consolidation of gains made in containing the spread of HIV infection in the country. With an aim to increase safe behaviour among high risk groups in pursuance of the national goal of accelerated reversal of the HIV epidemic by 2017, its primary focus will be to strengthen and scale up prevention interventions and related BCC strategies for sub- groups of population identified to be most-at-risk by the NACP. The high risk population include Female Sex Workers (FSW), men who have sex with men (MSM), Transgender (TG)/Hijra populations and Injecting Drug Users (IDU).
The NACP has been a remarkable success in its third phase (2007-12) and the country is on track to meet the Millennium Development Goal for HIV prevention and control.
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Malayalam now classical language
AGE CORRESPONDENT
new delhi, May 23
The Union Cabinet on Thursday stamped its approval on the proposal to classify Malayalam as a “classical language” subject to the outcome of a case pending in the Chennai high court in connection with it.
Two major annual international awards for scholars of eminence, a Centre of Excellence for Studies in that language and a request to the University Grants Commission to create with at least in the Central Universities a certain number of Professional chairs for scholars of eminence are the benefits that accrue to a language after it is declared “classical”.
There was huge uproar when Telugu and Kannada were given the honour, earlier, even as Malayalam was not notified.