The Cockroach Janata Party (CJP)’s inspection of elementary and secondary schools over the past few weeks is not unrelated to its initial claims regarding the leak of exam questions: the goal remains to defend the educational interests of Indian youth. But the challenge of mass education is even greater, both in terms of quantity and quality.An educational gap in both quantity and qualityIn its 2025 report, the Indian Ministry of Education reveals that the dropout rate remains very high: while the number of children in elementary school (grades one–five) was 104,381,347, those attending “upper elementary ” (grades six–eight) had fallen to just 63,695,100; those in middle school (grades nine–ten) numbered 37,165,436; and those in “upper secondary school” (grades 11–12) numbered 27,643,717 – meaning that the number of children enrolled in school decreased by nearly threefold across the first three levels. Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty.These absolute figures are even more revealing when compared to the population of the age cohorts corresponding to these four levels. This yields a net enrolment rate of 77%, 67.5%, 47.5%, and 36%, respectively, indicating that nearly 65% of young Indians left the school system after tenth grade and more than 52% after eighth grade. The 2020–2021 National Health and Family Survey corroborated this data by showing that among 15- to 17-year-olds, only 76% of boys in urban areas and 70% of those in rural areas were enrolled in schools.Assessing the quality of education in India is more difficult because New Delhi has refused to participate in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) since 2009. The only independent assessment available therefore comes from NGO Pratham, which has been publishing a report for 20 years examining the reading and math skills of Indian children living in rural areas. In 2024, its report showed limited progress, which did not allow for a return to pre-COVID levels, as schools remained closed for months following the pandemic: 27% of third-grade students were able to read texts taught in second grade, compared to 27.5% in 2018; 49% of fifth-grade students were also able to read such a text taught in fourth grade in 2024, compared to 50.5% in 2018. Beyond these observed variations, these figures remain generally low, as do those for mathematics, which are, however, more encouraging: in 2024, 31% of fifth-grade students could perform a fourth-grade division problem – a three-digit number divided by a one-digit number – compared to 28% in 2018.The shortcomings in both quantity and quality plaguing primary and secondary education partly reflect a significant imbalance in the allocation of government resources. Traditionally, India’s education policy has prioritised higher education – a near-monopoly of the Union government, which has paid little attention to earlier levels of education that fall under the jurisdiction of the states. Higher education thus received more than 30% of the funds allocated to education during the first twenty years of the century. But such a disproportion is not a recent phenomenon. In fact, this elitist bias dates back to the 1950s, a period during which it began to take shape with the creation of centers of excellence such as the Indian Institutes of Technology. These internationally renowned institutions received $1.3 billion in 2026–2027, even though they enroll “only” 135,000 students – a ratio of nearly $10,000 per student. Despite this disparity, the focus has continued to be on higher education since the 2000s, with the growth rate of the higher education budget – 15% in current prices – exceeding that of the overall education budget by one percentage point.Also read: A Month Later, Victims of Police Firing During Siwan Youth Protests Are Still StrugglingAs a result, in 2024, elementary education (preschool and primary) accounted for 48.5% of the national education budget, secondary education for 33%, and higher education for nearly 12%. While the education budget is increasing, its share of total public spending has declined from 13% to 12% of public budgets on average. As a percentage of GDP, the variations are very minimal, with state-level spending accounting for about 3% and Union government spending for 1%, for a combined total of a meager 4%. In fact, investment in mass education has been limited, both in terms of educational facilities and teaching staff.The shortage of resources affecting public schools explains why a growing proportion of children are turning to private schools, as demand for education has made this sector highly lucrative: India now has nearly as many private schools as public ones – 120,618,236 (of which 95,856,710 are unsubsidised) – as it does public schools, 121,589,911. It is worth noting a clear difference between urban and rural areas: while 66% of children in rural areas attend public schools, more than 51% of urban children attend private, non-subsidised schools. These figures demonstrate the appeal of private schools, which, incidentally, increases with age, so that a majority of families enrol their children in private schools once they reach secondary school. The trend is even more pronounced in higher education, where, according to the All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE) Report, 75% of institutions (representing 65% of students) were private in 2020.This situation, which reflects a marked disaffection with the public education system, perpetuates social stratification and prevents the most disadvantaged – who cannot afford private school tuition – from accessing a higher-quality education. The Dravidian modelRelying solely on aggregate data is insufficient, as the average masks vast disparities between the South and the rest of the country. The southern states have high literacy rates, with the exception of Andhra Pradesh (73%). Kerala leads the way with 95.5%, followed by Tamil Nadu (85.5%) and Karnataka (83%). In the north, only Haryana (85%) and Himachal Pradesh (83%) perform as well, with all other states having literacy rates below 80%. These figures reflect dramatic differences in enrolment rates. In 2016–2017, the secondary school enrolment rate in the southern states ranged from 82% to 99% (except for Andhra Pradesh, which lagged behind at 76%), while in the north, it ranged from 68% to 80% (with the exception of Haryana – 86% – and, more surprisingly, Chhattisgarh at 88%). In western India, while Maharashtra performed as well as the south, at 92%, Gujarat is struggling, at 75%. The figures for upper secondary education are even more telling: while enrolment rates remain high in the south (79% in Kerala, 84% in Tamil Nadu), they plummet in the north (29% in Bihar, 37% in Jharkhand, and 59% in Uttar Pradesh) and drops to a very average level in Gujarat: 43%, compared to 71% in Maharashtra. Five years later, according to a government survey, the situation remained highly varied: while in the south (excluding Andhra Pradesh), among those over 15 years of age surveyed (a sample of approximately 319,000), between 48% and 55% of respondents had completed at least secondary school, in the north, excluding Delhi, Haryana, and Himachal Pradesh, this proportion ranged from 32.5% (in Bihar) to 40% (in Uttar Pradesh), with the national average at 41%. The North-South divide here coincides with that of the language of instruction. In 2018, the percentage of schools where English is the language of instruction through 12th grade was 63% in Telangana, 60.7% in Kerala, 59% in Andhra Pradesh, 44% in Tamil Nadu, and 35% in Karnataka, compared to just 6% in Bihar and 14% in Uttar Pradesh. Also read: 8.9 Crore Youngsters in the Age Group 15-29 are ‘Not Studying, Working or Receiving Training’, Says NITI Aayog ReportIn the south, the proportion of schools where English is the language of instruction never falls below 35%, whereas in the Hindi-speaking belt, it never exceeds 15%. It is worth noting that in western India, Maharashtra aligns more closely with the southern approach, with 29% of its schools teaching in English, while Gujarat is closer to the north, with only 13%. These figures are of the utmost importance because proficiency in English has become – or has once again become – a determining factor in social mobility.Beyond primary and secondary education, unequal access to higher education further reinforces the North-South divide. In 2021–2022, the university enrolment rate for young Indians was much higher in the southern states than in the northern ones. Between 36% and 47% of young people aged 18 to 23 were enrolled in some form of higher education in the South, compared to a national average of 28%. Tamil Nadu led the way with a rate of 47%, followed by Kerala at 41.5% and Telangana at 40%. In contrast, Bihar ranked last at 17%, while the rate in Uttar Pradesh was only 24%. In the North, only Delhi, Chandigarh, and Himachal Pradesh outperformed the southern states. Gujarat ranked very low at 24%, and Maharashtra also lagged behind the South at 35.5%.However, these figures must be supplemented with data on the number of college graduates to better understand the composition of the elite in the regions in question. In this regard as well, the South outperforms the North; states such as Tamil Nadu and Kerala had nearly 14% “graduates,” while the proportions observed in Chhattisgarh 7.1% and Bihar 6.8% are about half as high. All these data confirm that there is a “Dravidian model”, as Kalaiyarasan A. and M. Vijaybaskar have shown (see The Dravidian Model. Interpreting the political economy of Tamil Nadu, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2021), a model where education plays a key role, as Vignesh Rajahmani as demonstrated. (See The Dravidian pathway. The Dravida Munntra Kazhagam (DMK) and the politics of transition in South India, Londres, Hurst, 2025).Public policies matter: Tamil Nadu versus GujaratThe disparities we have just observed are primarily the result of very different educational policies. To see this, one needs to only compare the introduction of midday meals by various states, which strongly encourage parents to send their children to school. In 2017–2018, Tamil Nadu – a pioneer in this area – provided a free midday meal in 85.4% of secondary schools, and several southern states performed even better: 86.9% in Andhra Pradesh, 92.8% in Karnataka, and 97.5% in Telangana. In contrast, the northern states ranged between 5.5% and 13.1%, with, in the West, Gujarat at the same level (11%), while Maharashtra remained in the middle with 24.3%.Beyond midday meals, the budgets of Gujarat and Tamil Nadu – which are otherwise similar in terms of per-capita revenue and population – clearly reflect the priorities of these two states in terms of development strategy. In 2023–24, Gujarat – even though it was as wealthy as Tamil Nadu – spent 34% less on education (Rs 34,406 crore versus Rs 46,213 crore), 19% less on health (Rs 13,878 crore versus Rs 16,557 crore), and Rs 159 crore less on social and food assistance (Rs 9,943 crore versus Rs 25,768 crore). Data on social spending as a percentage of GDP further illustrates the contrasting priorities of Gujarat and Tamil Nadu. Gujarat maintained this spending at a relatively low level of 4.46% of GDP in 2021–2022. Tamil Nadu, which emphasises human development, demonstrates a stronger commitment to investment in the social sector, at 5.86% of GDP. These trends confirm that Tamil Nadu prioritises social welfare, like its southern counterparts, while Gujarat’s model remains focused on infrastructure development. Also read: Why India’s Youth Feel Let Down TodayWhile Gujarat lags behind in social spending, it is more willing than any other state to invest in energy and transportation infrastructure (including roads and ports), its two areas of strength. As a result, this state has an electricity generation capacity of 45,913 megawatts, compared to 37,514 for Tamil Nadu. Consequently, per capita electricity supply stands at 2,288.3 kilowatt-hours in Gujarat, compared to 1,588.7 in Tamil Nadu. Similarly, Gujarat invests heavily in road infrastructure. In 2021, its budget for roads and bridges was nearly four times that of Tamil Nadu and comparable to that of Uttar Pradesh, a state with a population of Rs 200 million.In a sense, Narendra Modi has replicated in New Delhi the public policies he had implemented in Gujarat. While the Modi administration has invested heavily in transportation infrastructure and energy, it took a considerable amount of time before turning its attention to education, as its New Education Policy (NEP) was not announced until 2020. Above all, it has reduced – at least in relative terms – the education budget, which, between 2020–21 and 2025–26, has fluctuated between 2 and 2.5% of the Union government’s budget, with the states of the Union being responsible for primary and secondary education.Why should everyone go to school, or the resilience of caste hierarchiesThe low level of investment in mass education has gone hand in hand with a dilution of affirmative action in favour of the lowest castes – as evidenced by the impact of privatisation – and a rehabilitation of the caste system. The speaker of the Lok Sabha, Om Birla – also a member of the BJP – went very far in this regard, as his praise of the Brahmins amounted to a full-fledged defense of the caste system: “The Brahmin community always works to guide all other communities, and the community has always played a guiding role in this nation. It has always played a role in spreading education and values throughout society. And even today, if just one Brahmin family lives in a village or a hut, that Brahmin family always holds a high position due to its dedication and service… hence, Brahmins are held in high regard in society by virtue of their birth.”Until then, the ideologues of the Sangh Parivar – when they addressed the subject – had avoided attributing the Brahmins’ superiority to their birth. Instead, they asserted – using terminology inherited from 19th-century reformers and revivalists, such as Swami Dayananda – that if Brahmins occupied the pinnacle of society, it was because of their qualities (gun). Birla, while acknowledging this point, takes a different stance here that aligns with Myron Weiner’s explanations. In the early 1990s, Myron Weiner, in The Child in India, explained the Indian government’s reluctance to make education compulsory by citing the social conservatism of the elites who controlled it: “Rhetoric notwithstanding, India’s policymakers have not regarded mass education as essential to India’s modernization. (…) The Indian position rests on deeply held beliefs that there is a division between people who work with their minds and rule and people who work with their hands and are ruled, and that education should reinforce rather than break down this division. These beliefs are closely tied to religious notions and to the premises that underlie India’s hierarchical caste system.”In the 1990s and 2000s, Mandal one and Mandal two paved the way for better representation of the lowest castes in the education system. Subsequently, the Manmohan Singh administration sought to remedy the situation described by Myron Weiner by passing the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act in 2009. This law made school attendance mandatory for children aged 6 to 14 and required private schools to reserve 25% of their seats for “disadvantaged groups” – a provision contested by those schools, which succeeded in having boarding schools exempted from the requirement. Whether the movement initiated by the CJP can result in a significant improvement of the Indian schools remains to be seen, but the policies of the southern states and the reform launched under Manmohan Singh have shown the way. These initiatives and the discourse of BJP leaders on caste suggest that educational progress will have to fit in a global world view giving a priority to social welfare and societal change. Christophe Jaffrelot is Senior Research Fellow at CERI-Sciences Po/CNRS, Paris, Professor of Indian Politics and Sociology at King’s College London, Non resident Scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Chair of the British Association for South Asian Studies.