Last Updated: 29 September 2026

Drug prevention taught in Govt schools: Evidence-based anti-drug curriculum
-- Classes 9 to 12 in all 3,658 Govt schools, reaching ~8 lakh students^[1]
-- Launched on 1 August 2025 by CM Bhagwant Mann & Arvind Kejriwal at Fazilka^[1:1]
-- Designed with J-PAL South Asia (co-founded by Nobel laureate Abhijit Banerjee)^[1:2]

PROVEN IMPACT (pilot trial with ~10,000 students)^[2]
-- Students 30% more likely to know heroin carries a high risk of addiction
-- ~50% less likely to wrongly believe willpower alone is enough to beat addiction

¶ The course^[2:1]

• 14-week programme with videos of real recovery stories, worksheets & classroom discussion
• Busts myths about drug risks & addiction recovery
• Lecturers, motivators & doctors visit schools to explain health effects^[1:3]
• Being tested with vocational (ITI) students too; to be extended to private schools & colleges^[1:4][2:2]

¶ Training school heads

• District-level workshops by SCERT & Health Dept train school heads in mental health & drug prevention to make schools drug-free zones, e.g. 136 school heads trained in Ferozepur (Jan 2026)^[3]

Details:

• Punjab's war on drugs

References:

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1. https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/punjab/cm-mann-kejriwal-unveil-anti-drug-curriculum-for-punjab-students-in-fazilka ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎

2. https://cega.berkeley.edu/feature/government-of-punjab-scales-a-novel-drug-prevention-program/ ↩︎ ↩︎ ↩︎

3. https://www.babushahi.com/full-news.php?id=215773 (9 Jan 2026) ↩︎