The Punjab School Education Department has started imparting karate training to girl students of upper primary classes to give confidence to them for their self-defence.Disclosing this here today Punjab Education Minister Sikandar Singh Maluka said that under the first phase of this programme 49792 girl students from all over the state were selected for thier training by the expert He said that karate training was carried out in schedule caste concentrated schools and 54718 students had already been provided this unique training. Besides this, bicycles were distributed to 2537 needy girls of 6th clas The Minister said that Exposure visits were undertaken in selected schools of each district covering 66368 student He said that competitive exam was conducted on February this year for girls and scheduled caste children of classes 5th to 8th and first three toppers in every block were awarded with cash awards of R 2000/-, 1500/- and 1000/- respectively. He said that SAD-BJP government was focusing on education of girl child and has taken several measures to check the drop out rate. He said that 1.50 lac class XI and XII and 5480 of class VI girls were given the free bicycle