THE CONTEXT: April saw a wave of distress across India’s school ecosystem — mass detentions in Class XI in government schools, exclusionary practices in elite private schools, rising fee burdens, and the surveillance of school dropouts by Delhi Police. This backdrop reflects deeper cracks in India’s school education policy landscape, governance apparatus, and constitutional obligations under Article 21A (Right to Education).
THEORETICAL LENSES
| Framework | Relevance to Schooling Crisis |
|---|---|
| Sen’s Capability Approach | Expands focus from enrolment to substantive freedoms – learning, dignity, privacy. |
| Human Capital vs. Human Development | Mere years-of-schooling ≠ productivity; “schooling ain’t learning.” – Lant Pritchett. |
| Social Contract Theory | State’s legitimacy linked to delivering quality public education; failure breeds private escape & regulatory backlash. |
CURRENT SCENARIO – EVIDENCE BASE
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- Enrolment drift: Share of children in government schools down to ≈ 45 % (UDISE+ 2023-24), reversing only in a few states (Kerala, Delhi Pre-COVID).
- Learning crisis: ASER 2023 shows < 50 % rural youth (14-18 yrs) can perform basic Class 3 arithmetic; digital divide persists despite UPI-style “India Stack”.
- Governance fault-lines:
- 4 lakh of 15 lakh schools have < 50 students → multi-grade teaching, vacant posts.
- Performance management reduced to attendance; little linkage to learning outcomes or soft-skills cultivation.
- Regulatory paradox: High “cholesterol” on private schools (fee caps, 25 % RTE quota) without systemic reforms in public schools leads to cost-push inflation & litigation.
- Emerging rights risk: Proposed bi-annual data surveillance of “drop-outs” by police threatens child privacy, exacerbates profiling of Dalit & Muslim youth.
CAUSAL CHAIN – WHY CHILDREN ARE PUSHED OUT OF SCHOOLING:
| Cause | Core Issue | Policy Implication |
|---|---|---|
| Pedagogy–Context Mismatch | Mono-lingualism, rote-focus | Need for localised, multilingual, adaptive pedagogy |
| Socio-economic Drag | Labour, poverty, lack of academic support | Conditional cash transfers, home support programs |
| School Quality Deficit | Infrastructure, teacher shortage, stagnation | Decentralised recruitment, infra investment |
| Policy Disjunctions | NEP vs RTE clash; stress without support | Harmonise NEP-RTE; embed child-centric assessments |
| Urban–Rural Digital Divide | Unequal access to tech and platforms | Offline content parity, community-led ICT models |
COMPARATIVE & GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE
| Indicator (2022-23) | India | UK | Japan | Inference |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| % students in public schools | ~45 % | ~90 % | ~95 % | Public provisioning decisive for equity |
| Student-school ratio | 161 | 401 | 562 | Excess small schools dilute resources |
| PISA reading rank | 72/81 (2018) | 14 | 15 | Quality not quantity drives outcomes |
GOVERNANCE & POLICY CHALLENGES IN INDIAN SCHOOL EDUCATION
1. Erosion of Co-operative Federalism in Education Financing: The reduced central contribution to Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), India’s flagship school education programme, from 60:40 to 40:60 in certain cases, places a disproportionate burden on better-performing States.
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- Several States (Kerala, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal) that resist NEP 2020 conditionalities—like early vocational streaming or centralised assessments—face funding disincentives.
- This contradicts the spirit of “co-operative federalism” enshrined in 7th Schedule and reinforced by the Punchhi Commission (2010) on Centre-State relations.
- NITI Aayog’s School Education Quality Index (SEQI) noted that education outcomes improved when fiscal devolution respected local autonomy.
2. Weak Accountability Architecture in Public School Governance: The School Management Committees (SMCs) mandated by RTE Act, 2009, remain largely ceremonial due to lack of fiscal powers and unclear authority.
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- As per RTE Section 21, SMCs were designed to decentralise school governance and involve parents. Yet, most function as rubber-stamp bodies.
- Opaque teacher transfer policies, often manipulated through political patronage, disrupt continuity and learning outcomes, especially in rural and tribal belts.
- The Justice Verma Commission Report (2012) on teacher education and performance linked systemic teacher absenteeism to lack of local accountability mechanisms.
3. Right to Privacy vs Predictive Surveillance in Education Policy: The Delhi government’s directive to automatically share dropout data with the police raises critical questions under the Right to Privacy judgment (Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India, 2017).
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- Dropouts being tracked for “counselling” or anti-drug vigilance risks profiling poor, Dalit, or Muslim students.
- It violates the four-fold proportionality test laid down in the Supreme Court ruling—legality, necessity, proportionality, and safeguards.
- Under Article 21, the right to privacy is now a fundamental right, requiring any data surveillance to meet the test of necessity and minimal intrusion.
4. Regulatory Overreach & Fee Governance in Private Schooling: The Delhi High Court’s censure of DPS Dwarka for punitive actions against protesting parents exposes the lack of enforceable fee-setting frameworks for private schools.
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- With over 45% of students now in private schools, the absence of a central fee regulation law allows arbitrary hikes, non-transparent development charges, and exclusionary practices.
- The Model Rules under RTE Section 32 offer fee-related grievance redress but remain poorly implemented at State levels.
- The Anil Swarup Committee (2020) on private education regulation recommended a quasi-judicial Fee Regulatory Authority with stakeholder representation.
GOVERNANCE CHALLENGES MATRIX
| Challenge Area | Governance Gaps | Institutional Implications |
|---|---|---|
| Fiscal Federalism | NEP-linked funding conditionalities | Weakens State innovation; top-down model |
| Accountability Architecture | Non-functional SMCs, opaque transfers | Breaks public trust; poor monitoring |
| Right to Privacy | Predictive policing of dropouts without safeguards | Constitutional violations; trust erosion |
| Regulatory Oversight | Arbitrary fee hikes, no central redressal mechanism | Judicial pendency; parental alienation |
THE WAY FORWARD:
1. Learning-Centric Performance Management
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- Deploy AI-enabled formative dashboards (e.g., PARAKH) to track learning progress at the classroom level, aligned to Competency-Based Education (CBE) models.
- Tie increments, recognition, and promotions to value-added metrics — improvement in students’ conceptual mastery over the academic year.
- Link Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) allocations to State-level “Learning Index Audits” validated by independent agencies like ASER or NCERT.
2. School Consolidation with Equity Guardrails
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- Implement hub-and-spoke school clusters (e.g., Himachal Pradesh’s model), merging small schools into resource-rich hubs.
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- Provide free transportation, community kitchens, and counselling outreach to prevent exclusion due to physical distance or safety concerns.
- Use GIS-mapping to ensure access parity and equitable redistribution of teachers.
3. Mission ‘Bhasha-Vidya’: Multilingual & Culturally Inclusive Pedagogy
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- Create a digital repository of graded readers in 22 Schedule VIII languages and tribal scripts using crowdsourcing and AI translation.
- Promote peer-tutoring models honouring local knowledge, enabling learning in bilingual/multilingual formats.
- Align textbooks with NCF 2023 multilingualism mandate and NEP’s three-language formula.
4. Public-Private-Community Compacts (PPCC) for Governance Reform
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- Launch Charter-like PPP pilots (as seen in Andhra Pradesh), where NGOs/edu-startups run low-performing schools under Service Level Agreements (SLAs) ensuring free access, inclusivity, and accountability.
- Create District Education Endowment Funds to pool CSR grants, channelled via social impact bonds tied to learning outcomes and dropout reduction.
- Preserve equity by design — no screening, no exit barriers, and community review mechanisms.
5. Child-Centric Data Governance Charter
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- Enact a Child Data Protection Protocol, aligned with Justice K.S. Puttaswamy judgment (2017), ensuring legality, necessity, and proportionality.
- Appoint an independent Ombudsperson under the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) to vet any proposal involving data sharing with law enforcement.
- Mandate parental consent, opt-out provisions, and local grievance redressal cells.
6. Fiscal Re-architecture + Vocational-Academic Integration 2.0
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- Launch Education Cess 2.0 — earmarked exclusively for teacher CPD, tech integration, and remedial learning platforms in public schools.
- Introduce outcome-linked grants via Finance Commission, where learning gains, retention rates, and transition to higher grades determine State entitlements (10% weight).
- Replace vocational “tracking” with 4-year exploratory modules (Grades 9–12), blending STEM, Humanities, and Skills, aligned with NCrF (National Credit Framework).
THE CONCLUSION:
India’s constitutional promise of “social, economic and political justice” hinges on reinventing its public school system—from mass schooling to mass flourishing. An education architecture that couples “fear of falling” and “hope of rising” for teachers, respects child privacy, and restores community stake-holding will convert demographic potential into democratic dividends by 2047.
UPSC PAST YEAR QUESTION:
Q. The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 remains inadequate in promoting incentive-based system for children’s education without generating awareness about the importance of schooling. Analyse. 2020
MAINS PRACTICE QUESTION:
Q. Discuss how governance failures, policy disjunctions, and digital inequities are pushing children out of public schools. Suggest multi-layered institutional reforms to address this democratic deficit.
SOURCE:
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/derek-obrien-writes-he-was-my-pope-9964413/
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