Anyone for a haircut?

STRANGE WORLD

IN INDIA, they have hit on an intriguing way of keeping children at school. The regional government in the northern state of Jharkhand is hiring barbers to give pupils free haircuts.

Bandhu Tirkey, the local minister for human resource development, claims many students are too poor to afford hair care, so he is paying 40,000 barbers to provide a free service. Jharkhand is a poor tribal state with a literacy rate of only 54 per cent.

One problem is that most local barbers traditionally belong to India's lower castes and share a common surname – Nai – which declares their hereditary profession. But to ease social frictions and show the spirit of modern India, Mr Tirkey has renamed the barbers "physical trainers".

The programme is costing £500,000 – large by Indian standards. But Mr Tirkey argues it is worth it, saying: "We have to make education attractive for poor students and give them incentives to go to school and reduce the burden for their parents."

The school students and barbers appear to have welcomed the free haircut scheme.

"It will save us money and also make us look good," says Arjun Manjhi, who attends a government school in Khunti, 40km from the state capital, Ranchi.