Education Is Key To Battling India’s Poverty Challenge

Consider the following. First, bef­ore Covid-19, 50 per cent of rural India’s sch­ool-go­i­­ng students in Class V cou­­ld read a Class II textbook. This is data the Ann­­ual Survey of Education Report (Rural) has highligh­ted since 2005. Second, prim­ary schools in some parts of India have been clo­s­ed for over 600 days, even though it is re­cognised that early-­age education is critical to the future lea­­rning trajectory of a chi­ld. My own primary sc­h­ool-going kids in Del­hi last ent­ered their school gate in Mar­ch 2020. India today has earned the unique disti­n­ction of the longest pandemic-in­d­u­ced sch­ool clo­­sures in the world, with Uganda and Bolivia for company. Third, digital inequality is real and onl­i­ne education remains a privilege of the few. The 2021 ASER survey sho­ws that households of only 68 per cent school-going students own sma­rtph­o­nes. Over a quarter of these stude­nts do not have acc­ess to these smart­pho­nes, and therefore had no scho­oling for nearly two years. In Septe­m­ber 2021, a sur­vey of 1,400 school child­ren in und­er­privileged homes across 15 states by eco­no­mists Jean Dreze, Reetika Khe­ra and others, found mer­e­ly 8 per cent rural and 24 per cent urban children, had acc­ess to regular “online” education.  

As a parent, I have witnessed the emo­­tional, psychological and educational cost prolonged school closure has had on my young children. Studying in a Zoom room is no substit­ute for a classroom. We will never make up for what they’ve lost. But at lea­st my kids have the Zoom room. Most of India does not have this privil­ege. An ASER surv­ey in Kar­nataka, done before the second wave—the only comp­a­rative data we have on learning levels before and during the pandemic—highlights the gravity of what we face. In 2018, 19.2 per cent Cla­ss III stu­dents in rur­al Karnataka were at grade level (i.e., they cou­ld read a Class II textb­o­ok). It dropped to 9.8 per cent in 2020. In 2018, 26.3 per cent students could do simple subtraction. In 2020, a mere 17.3 per cent could do the same.

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These losses are not going to be easy to address. In an import­a­nt study, economist and my CPR col­­league Jis­h­­nu Das and others trace the long-term fallout of four months of school closure after the 2005 eart­h­quake in Pak­­istan. They fou­nd just four mon­­ths of school clos­ures resul­ted in persist­ent learning losses thr­ough the stu­­dent’s school life and estimate that if these losses continue into adu­lt life, children cou­ld sta­nd to lose 15 per cent of their life-time earni­ngs. Now consider the effect nearly two yea­rs of school closures could cause.  

Our education system is best described as a sor­­t­ing mechanism, where foc­us is on, as Nobel lau­re­a­tes Abhi­jit Ban­erjee and Est­her Duflo desc­ribe, “teaching to the top of the class”. It works for the “best” students. After all, India produces some of the world’s brightest. The problem has alw­­ays been for the vast majority who are left beh­ind. Eco­­­nomist Lant Pritchett est­imates that four of five children who start the sch­­ool year unable to read, will lik­e­ly make no significant progress on reading thro­ugh the year. Low levels of educatio­nal attainment is one reason for persistent inequ­ality in India. Des­pite overall reduction in poverty, intergeneratio­nal upward mobility in India is low. Those born poor are likely to stay poor, as they are unable to realise their full capability. When inequ­ities are entrenched, growth drags. Consider what two years of school closure will do to wid­en this gap. This is Ind­ia’s ine­quality challenge.  

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All this is surmountable if we as a society come together to make education a national priority. But the muted outrage to two years of sch­­­ool clos­ure, the alacrity with which we have res­umed soc­ial and economic activity while insi­s­ting schools remain closed, and the complete imp­unity of our political class who have been com­­p­li­cit in these decisions, leave me with little hope. Our celebr­a­ted demographic dividend is today a ticking time bomb. And we have only ourselves to blame.

(Views expressed are personal)

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Yamini Aiyar is the president and CEO of Centre for Policy Research, Delhi