School students' enrolment dips by 3.7mn in 1 year: Edu ministry

THE SHARPEST DECLINE IN STUDENT ENROLMENT AT THE EDUCATIONAL LEVEL WAS OBSERVED AT THE SECONDARY STAGE (CLASSES 9 TO 12)

- Sanjay Maurya

NEW DELHI: Though India witnessed an increase of over 5,000 schools from 1.466 million in 2022-23 to 1.471 million in 2023-24, the enrolment of school students has declined by over 3.7 million (1.47%) from 251.7 million to 248 million in the same period, according to the UDISE plus data released by the education ministry.

The analysis of UDISE plus reports between 2022-23 and 2023-24, shows that the enrolment declined marginally across gender groups, social categories, and education levels. For instance, enrolment of girl students has dropped by 1.6 million and boy students by about 2.1 million from 2022-23 to 2023-24. The enrolment of other backwards category (OBC) students declined sharply by more than 2.5 million, Scheduled Caste (SC) category students by 1.2 million and Scheduled Tribes (ST) category students by 200,000 between 2022-23 and 2023-24. While the enrolment of Muslim students dropped by over 100,000, the enrolment of students from all minority communities saw a decline of 300,000 in the same period.

However, the drop-out rate—it captures how many children leave school midway—improved across all categories, according to the report.