Education: India gloats, but shrivels under scrutiny

RN Bhaskar

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On April 3, 2025, media headlines talked about how the state government of Maharashtra scrapping the “one state, one uniform” policy. It said that individual School Management Committees (SMCs), and not the government, will decide school uniforms.  Effectively it had scrapped the “one state, one uniform” policy (https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/mumbai/govt-scraps-one-state-one-uniform-policy-smcs-will-decide-on-colour-design-9920893/).

Earlier in December 2024, the state government had revised the “one state, one uniform” policy, following widespread criticism.

Losing legislative time over uniforms

That in turn raises a fundamental question – is it the job of the government to spend legislative time in deciding the uniform that children wear?  Should the government not be concerned with the quality of education instead?

In fact, instead of being concerned with imparting quality education, most state governments have been more concerned about things like language, history, meals and even uniform. They are not concerned with even more critical matters like internet connectivity (only 14% of government schools are internet enabled) , or laboratories (only 48% have science laboratories) – you can find more details at (free subscription) https://bhaskarr.substack.com/p/the-state-of-education-in-india?utm_source=publication-search , and measuring outcomes of school students (barely 50% of 14-18 year olds can read textbooks means for Std II students – (free subscription) https://bhaskarr.substack.com/p/indias-dreams-of-being-a-global-power?utm_source=publication-search). More on this subject can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m74BaqgWD-g

This obsession with things that are not essential to school education (uniforms, language, history etc) have made India’s legislators forget that the country is rapidly slipping into a quagmire. India is producing more unemployable youth than most other countries in the world. Forget Viksit Bharat – it will be surprising if India can even manage to find its own feet within a decade when the number of old people begin to grow alarmingly. India is fast losing its ability to finance the current aspiration of its people.  When burdened by the medical bills of the elderly, India might slip into being a country dependent on doles.

Losing perspective

Consider how the Ministry of education began gloating when nine of its universities ranked  among the top 50 Asian universities on a subject-wise score sheet (https://pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2072018).  This was nothing much to crow about.  The performance of Indian universities has been slipping over the past few decades, and more alarmingly lately.

Carefully examine what the ministry was quite pleased about.  Five of the nine universities had to share their ranking with other countries.  This means that India’s actual ranking was even lower. Second, do bear in mind that these are subject ranking only, not University ranking.  Third, the comparison was only among Asian Universities only, not the entire world.

Even among Asian universities, when entire universities are considered, India’s ranking is much lower. Only two universities ranked among the top 50.  And if the top 100 are considered, only seven Indian Universities make the grade.

National embarrassment

When it comes to Indian universities’’ ranking among global universities, the performance is even more disheartening.  Not one Indian university makes it among the top 100.  The best rank India got was for IIT Delhi which ranked 150.

That is why, when the ministry tried to pat itself on its proverbial back for nine Indian universities ranking among the top 50 when subject-wise scores were considered for Asian universities, it was a pretty sad picture to watch. The government was glowing over a not-so-significant performance.

Running away

The Indian government knows that its school education is in a pathetic state.  But it refuses to admit this.  Yet, this is confirmed by the recent decision of the government to opt out of the PISA evaluation process (https://thewire.in/education/india-opts-out-of-pisa-2025).

It may be recalled that India performed disastrously in the 2009 PISA evaluation.  It stood 72nd out of 73 participating countries.  Since then, it has opted to stay out of the PISA evaluation process.

No wonder, it does not want this type of humiliation again.  Especially after the government has gone around tom-tomming to the world, that it is the Vishwaguru.

India is the rare Asian exception

A chart compiled by The Economist is quite telling about PISA performance (https://www.economist.com/international/2023/12/05/the-pandemics-toll-on-schooling-emerges-in-awful-new-exam-results).  It shows how – generally speaking – Western countries have been performing quite badly on PISA Maths scores.  Asians have been steadily improving their performance.

India must, therefore, be the rate exception in Asia to perform miserably.  It seems to have picked up the worst habits from both the West and the East.

That is why, each time politicians try rabble-rousing people to agitate against or for a language, or for inclusion or exclusion of chapters from a history book, or even seek to impose the type of uniforms that students must wear, it fills academicians will dread.  It points to a further downward spiral.  Instead of focussing on mathematics and science, critical in a world dominated by AI, India has chosen to drive public attention issues that will not make the country’s youth employable.

Unless India takes immediate steps to correct this, there is more despair ahead.

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Do watch my latest podcast on Maharashtra at https://youtu.be/tXjYW_fq2oY

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