Government Schools in Crisis: Why India’s Public Education System Is Collapsing
Government schools are often flagged for their structural incompetencies, like single-teacher schools, lack of toilets, multigrade classrooms, and poor learning outcomes for both students and teachers. These persistent shortcomings have fueled a steady drift toward private schools, a shift that carries significant social consequences. If India truly envisions itself as a global leader, it must safeguard its greatest asset—its young minds.
It was rather an ordinary day for students of Classes 6 and 7 at the Piplodi Government School in Rajasthan’s Jhalawar district when, at 7:45 am, in broad daylight, a part of the school building collapsed, leading to the deaths of seven and injuries to several others. This collapse is not a mere infrastructural collapse of an old building but a shameful collapse of national public education, where the future of our nation is getting underneath the rubble while we keep boasting of our national development.
We are nearing eight decades since independence, yet our government schools, which were supposed to be the public institutions for equitable growth, have become neglected and trivialized in recent times. The number of government schools has decreased by 76,883, while the number of unaided private schools has increased significantly by 13,643, with their market share rising from 29.44% to 32.85% between 2017–18 and 2023–24.
“Even in cities like Noida and Gurugram, domestic workers are opting for low-fee private schools charging Rs 500 to Rs 1,000 a month. The education may be poor, but parents still prefer them,” stated Sanjay Gupta, Director of CHETNA, an NGO working for students and marginalized communities.
Over the years, the Gross Enrollment Ratio (GER) of government schools has decreased from 140.5 million in 2021-22 to 124.3 million in 2023-24, indicating a loss of 16.2 million students (-11.56%) in just two years. Primary-level enrolment suffered the most, with 14 million children dropping out—67% of the total decline. Retention in higher grades is no better: barely half the students make it to higher secondary, pulling the retention rate down to 45.6%.
“The personal attention that teachers pay to my daughter and the quality education offered are the reasons I chose a private school over the free government school, where teachers are irregular and don’t teach… I studied in a government school but didn’t learn much. I don’t want my children to suffer a similar fate,” said a housewife from Delhi.
Government schools are often flagged for their structural incompetencies, like single-teacher schools, lack of toilets, multigrade classrooms, and poor learning outcomes for both students and teachers. Statistically, these education gaps are more morbid as UDISE+ reported that of 10.17 lakh government schools, only 3.37 lakh schools have disabled-friendly toilets, which accounts for 33.2% of schools with only 30.6% functional toilets.
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These persistent shortcomings have fueled a steady drift toward private schools, a shift that carries significant social consequences. As more families opt out of public education, marginalized communities—OBCs, SCs, STs, and Muslims—face shrinking opportunities to catch up with a middle class that can afford to opt out of public education. The gap is largely financial. According to IHDS (2011) data, SC/ST households earn only 70–80% of the average household income, while OBCs and Muslims earn up to 90% of the mean annual income of ₹1,13,222. Even a modest hike in private school tuition can effectively exclude these groups, making government schools a crucial safety net.
“Private schooling involves massive out-of-pocket expenditure and comprises over 20% of total household expenditure (on average), making it unaffordable for the poorest children in the country,” stated Oxfam in its Status Report on Government and private schools.
Further, the report points to the deep crisis in education in Government schools, where broken roofs, broken systems, and broken dreams are endangering the future of the nation, touted as one of the youngest in the world. The deterioration of government schools is not just an infrastructural issue but also one of perception. Repeated administrative lapses and poor learning outcomes have contributed to a steady erosion of public confidence. Recent incidents have only reinforced this distrust. One of the viral videos from Chhattisgarh is a classic example where government school staff, including two teachers and the Headmaster, were seen blundering with most elementary spellings, further fueling nationwide skepticism about the quality of education in these schools.
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The learning outcomes reflect this crisis. Nearly one in every four teenagers between 14-18 years old can’t read Class II text fluently in their mother tongue, and over 52% fail a basic three-digit division question. Incidentally, ASER, 2024, in their post-pandemic research on recovery of learning gaps caused due to COVID-19 19 concluded that in reading of class third text government schools increased their literacy rates from 16.3 % to 23.4 % while private schools increased from 33.1 % to 35.5 %. Both above the 2018 levels of literacy, yet private schools maintained their stride.
“In my village, government schools were almost a joke. Teachers didn’t show up. When they did, they made kids stand under the sun for punishment. We learned nothing,” said Sanjay Gupta, a domestic worker from Noida. This sentiment echoes a broader middle-class aspiration for English-medium and technical education—an aspiration, hilariously summed up in a popular film dialogue- “I can walk English, I can talk English” in Amitabh Bachchan’s film-“Namak Halaal”. The “bad but better” logic is rampant among middle-class parents who are willing to spend a hefty amount of their salaries on private schooling, believing it offers at least some advantage over the government system.
Meanwhile, the recent “school merging” policy introduced by the Uttar Pradesh Government has added another layer of complexity to the crisis in public education. Between June and July 2025, the state ordered the pairing of primary schools with fewer than 50 students to resource-rich schools within a one-kilometre radius. The goal was to consolidate infrastructure, introduce smart classrooms, and balance teacher workloads. However, in practice, the mergers have increased the commuting distance for many students, making access to education more difficult. The result has been a paradox: efforts to improve the availability of resources have, in some cases, reduced the accessibility of schools, pushing vulnerable families further away from government education and seeking private schools instead.
Lastly, not to forget, one of the major setbacks to government school education came during the COVID-19 pandemic, the effects of which continue to make recovery of these schools difficult. With schools shut, the majority of children had no means to continue their education, while their families grappled with livelihood crises. For economically vulnerable communities, education took a backseat during these challenging times, leading to mass withdrawals from public schools and, in many cases, the permanent closure of these institutions.
Also, government schools were slower to adapt to the online mode of teaching in comparison to private schools. This digital divide deepened the learning gap. ASER 2021 reported that nearly 33% of Class I–II students in government schools had no access to a smartphone at home, and only 40% of households received weekly learning materials, whether through teachers or online inputs. Consequently, reduced learning time and opportunities during the pandemic further compounded the disadvantages faced by government school students.
To conclude my prognosis, the decline of government school education is a chimera of economic, social, and political reasons that need the urgent attention of multiple stakeholders in society. If India truly envisions itself as a global leader, it must safeguard its greatest asset—its young minds. Let them not be buried under collapsing classrooms or trapped in the lifelong burden of education loans, but empowered to rise as the architects of the nation’s future.
(Edited by Sneha Yadav)
(Anviksha Singh is an intern with TheRise.co.in)
REFERENCES
1. Public vs. Private: Understanding the Shifting Landscape of Indian Education (2024), https://educationforallinindia.com/public-vs-private-understanding-the-shifting-landscape-of-indian-education-2024/
2. Homes Become Schools, Employers Turn Teachers – The Better India, https://thebetterindia.com/14606/homes-become-schools-employers-turn-teachers-chennai-educating-women-domestic-workers
3. UDISE+ 2023-24 Dashboard (Unified District Information System for Education Plus), https://udiseplus.gov.in
4. Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2023 – Pratham Education Foundation, https://www.asercentre.org/aser2023
5. IHDS-II (Indian Human Development Survey 2011–12) Summary Findings – University of Maryland, https://ihds.umd.edu
6. Oxfam India Status Report on Government and Private Schools, https://www.oxfamindia.org/knowledgehub/workingpaper/inequality-report-2022
7. Uttar Pradesh School Merger Policy (2024-25): Government Press Note, https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/lucknow/over-3000-schools-merged-in-up-under-new-policy/articleshow/102337199.cms
8. Digital Divide in Education: ASER 2021 Report (Post-Covid), https://www.asercentre.org/India/ASER-2021