From Apathy to Action: Reimagining School Education in India
I recently visited a nearby primary school to get my parents' voter ID cards done for the upcoming Haryana elections. Typically, teachers are appointed as Booth Level Officers (BLOs), which led me to the school. A single walk through its corridors revealed the suboptimal condition of the Indian education system.
Half-filled classrooms, children from different grades combined, and teachers reduced to mere supervisors rather than educators — these are glaring realities in most public schools in India. This is not an isolated observation but a widespread issue across the country
The 2021 National Achievement Survey (NAS) revealed that the national average performance of students in Class 3 was 59%, which dropped by 10% to 49% by Class 5.
Further, ASER , a report published by renowned NGO Pratham, highlighted the following for age group of 14–18:
- 25% cannot read a Std II level text fluently in their regional language.
- Only 43.3% of students can confidently solve division (3-digit by 1-digit)problems.
- 57% can read English sentences. Of these, only 74% can tell their meanings
Several states, such as Kerala, Maharashtra, Gujarat, and Manipur, are performing well. However, states with larger populations, like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, and Tamil Nadu, have scored significantly below the national average, according to the 2021 National Achievement Survey (NAS).
There seems to be widespread apathy toward school education, especially among the weaker and marginalized sections. Further, there is a misalignment between inputs and outcomes, primarily due to 3 reasons.
First, education should serve as the engine that propels individuals to become responsible citizens, capable employees, and ideally, job creators.
In 1937, M.K. Gandhi introduced Nai Talim, advocating education through productive work, where knowledge and labour are intertwined to ensure meaningful employment. Today, this separation is a major reason for the growing indifference toward education. India’s current K-12 system fails to make students employable, even after years of schooling.
With a Gross Enrollment Ratio (GER) of just 28% in higher education, most students stop after 12th grade, making it essential for schools to focus on imparting employable skills. The New Education Policy, 2020 agrees to operationalise the concept of Nai Talim, but it is yet to be implemented fully.
Second, Indian school education today fails to generate sensitivity toward contemporary societal issues or instil a sense of civic responsibility in students. Only 6% of classroom time is dedicated to civic education in India, with a lack of high-quality content on topics like taxes, governance, public goods, and civic behaviour. Students have little exposure to practical knowledge such as reading product labels, understanding health and nutrition, basic first aid, sex education, etc leaving them ill-equipped for real-life challenges.
Third, Indian schools fall short of fostering cultural pride. History is often taught through a defeatist lens, focusing more on failures than successes. This erodes students’ connection to their heritage. Cultural pride can ignite patriotism and a sense of responsibility for restoring civilizational glory, which could prevent brain drain and greatly benefit society and the economy. East Asian countries have harnessed this spirit, as highlighted by Minister Piyush Goyal here.
Cultural belief is also essential for value education, a key element missing from our curriculum. It builds a strong internal compass (a great wall), the final safeguard against actions like rape, murder, treason, and forgery. India’s efforts to introduce culture-linked value education have faced setbacks due to the narrow interpretation of secularism adopted by several civil society members.
School education in India needs a critical rethinking. There is dire need to revamp current plans and objectives. A 3-pillar approach is highlighted below.
BEING BHARTIY
The school curriculum must instil pride in Bharatiya culture and heritage. In his book The Golden Road, author William Dalrymple highlights how, before the rise of the Anglosphere (British influence), there was an Indosphere—a vast region of Indian cultural influence stretching from Europe to Southeast Asia, and from Siberia to Sri Lanka. This history is never taught to us.
Focusing on regional cultures and traditions is essential, and the curriculum must reduce its Delhi-centric approach to make education more appealing to children. While we are highly diverse in language, religion and culture, the core values of Bhartiy philosophy — such as accommodation, peaceful coexistence, interdependence, sustainable living, and hard work — are universal and should be emphasized in schools. Ancient Indian knowledge systems can serve as a vital link between traditional learnings and modern theories.
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Value education and ethics should be taught by incorporating teachings from texts such as the Bhagavad Gita, Upanishads, Jain Anga, Buddhist Pitaka, Guru Granth Sahib, and the wisdom of Sufi saints. These sources offer profound insights into ethics, morality, and the principles of right living.
Manu Bhaker, post winning bronze in shooting at Olympics 2024, highlighted how Bhagavad Gita’s idea of ‘Nishkam Karm’ i.e. focusing on actions over worrying about the outcome, helped her maintain calm in her Olympic matches.
Concepts like Anekantwad (discourse ethics) from Jainism, Madhyam Marg (middle path) from Buddhism, and Vand Chhako (sharing) from Sikhism can inspire students to engage in virtuous and meritorious actions. These teachings encourage empathy, thoughtful dialogue, and community service, fostering a more compassionate and responsible society.
CONSCIOUS CITIZENS
Schools should serve as epicentres for discussing social issues and driving social change. In his book Battles Half Won, Ashutosh Varshney argues that Independent India pursued three major goals: national integration, poverty alleviation, and social justice. Schools must act as force multipliers in achieving these objectives.
Civic skills (skills required to participate as a responsible citizen) must be made an integral part of the curriculum. Japanese Schools use role-playing techniques, right from kindergarten to imbibe civic sense. In Japanese schools, the practice of ‘osoji’, or cleaning time, is a daily ritual where students take charge of maintaining their learning environment. it’s an educational philosophy that instils values of respect, teamwork, and pride in one’s surroundings.
The Indian Gurukul education system, which eroded under British rule, also had similar practices of making students responsible for learning space and environment. Today, we do have NCC and NSS Scouts, but these are voluntary programmes often absent in many schools.
An excerpt from an article I read, is highlighted below. This underscores the integration of value systems and civic sense found in Japanese schools, where ethics and community responsibility are key elements of education.
In 2011, when the Tsunami hit Japan and there was a complete power failure, People left the shops, leaving the merchandise on the counters. No one took advantage of the darkness. There was no looting or ransacking of stores.
Civic skills include personal communication skills, knowledge of political systems, and the ability to critically think about civic and political life. In India, it should go a step further to include social consciousness. Affluent schools can take the lead in this initiative. Here is an Idea that can be implemented:
Instead of burdening students with holiday homework that is often completed half-heartedly, schools should connect 9th and 10th graders with local NGOs. Students should be grouped, taught about flagship government schemes, and assigned area-based enrollment targets. Each group would have a guide teacher to aid in field visits and oversee their progress. After the holidays, a discussion should be held to share on-ground experiences, with the legacy of good work passed on to the next batch.
The above exercise would introduce children to social issues, government machinery, digital space, governance ideals, etc. It would create a spirit of collaboration and competition and develop much-needed upward and downward communication skills.
In moulding a conscious citizen, it is also necessary that practical knowledge such as reading product labels, understanding health and nutrition, basic first aid, negotiation, sex education, etc are included. These are highly deployable knowledge, which increases the street smartness of students. Awareness is the first step towards action, and thus promoting the former is key to achieving the latter.
INNOVATE INDIA
When I was in college, I joined the Electrical and Electronics subsystem of a student project, spending the first 1.5 years learning the basics of robotics and electronic design. I later realized that many of our American and European counterparts had already acquired these skills in school. Their selection process is based on the skills relevant to their courses, giving them a 1.5–2-year advantage in deployable, hands-on technical knowledge by the time they enter college.
School education in India largely overlooks marketable, employment-generating skills, aside from English, leaving the task of job-readiness to higher education — which has shown only mediocre results. The curriculum should focus on one key metric: student employability.
Secondary school education should not cater only to those headed for college but to the broader population. Programs like the Atal Innovation Mission are a positive step, but the focus must be more comprehensive. Vocational courses — such as mechanics, electrician work, plumbing, carpentry, tailoring, graphic design, and animation — should be regularly taught, not just once-a-week activities. Governments must move beyond political correctness and fully integrate these skills into the curriculum. Further, advanced courses like robotics, AI, data analytics, etc. should be taught at a higher secondary level.
Innovation can be central to vocational education. regional centres of excellence and ITI institutions can help blend traditional skills with modern advancements. For example, students excelling in mechanics could be trained in operating CNC machines, while those excelling in electrician work could take courses on IoT. The above would alter parent’s attitudes towards schools and ensure students are equipped with both foundational skills and cutting-edge knowledge.
My friend, who runs a hardware business, emphasized how challenging it is to find people with the right skills. India faces acute skill mismatch, and the above could help reduce it. This approach could also foster the creation of entrepreneurs in tier-2, tier-3 cities, and rural India.
In the book MODI@20: Dreams Meet Delivery, Sudha Murthy highlights how early access to a sewing machine helped a poor girl build a successful clothing company that manufactured PPE kits during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The government should further reform the college admission process to focus on skills and qualifying exams rather than just competitive tests. This would motivate students and parents to take skill education more seriously. I have discussed how the National Credit Framework (NCrF) can be utilized here.
The three pillars — Being Bhartiy, Conscious Citizens, and Innovate India can serve as positive first steps toward reforming school education in India. Education is a concurrent subject, allowing several state governments to take the lead in this initiative. Additionally, many of the ideas mentioned above can be implemented by private schools without government intervention, though latter would be beneficial for achieving equitable outcomes.
While I emphasize the outcome philosophy in education, it is essential to recognize Mahatma Gandhi's input philosophy, which focuses on the comprehensive development of the Head, the Heart, and the Hand. This holistic approach is crucial for fostering well-rounded individuals and achieving the desired educational outcomes
Mark Twain referred to India as the cradle of the human race, the birthplace of human speech, the mother of history, the grandmother of legend, and the great-grandmother of traditions. However, he also noted the stark duality present in the country, highlighting the coexistence of wealth and poverty. While inequality may never be completely eradicated, education can facilitate upward social mobility and make Bharat truly Viksit by 2047.
