Parliament Question: Data of Dropout Rates in Schools

GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF EDUCATION DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL EDUCATION & LITERACY LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO-5964 ANSWERED ON 30.03.2026 Data of Dropout Rates in Schools 5964. Smt. Pratima Mondal: Will the Minister of EDUCATION be pleased to state: (a) the data on dropout rates at secondary and higher secondary levels, particularly among girls and marginalised communities, State/UT-wise; (b) whether students in rural and low-income households lack reliable digital access for blended learning models, if so, the details of percentage of such students; (c) whether the Government has any independently verified data to demonstrate measurable improvement in foundational literacy and numeracy across Government schools in the country; and (d) if so, the details thereof and if not, the reasons therefor? ANSWER MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF EDUCATION (SHRI JAYANT CHAUDHARY) (a): The Department of School Education and Literacy (DoSEL), Ministry of Education has developed the Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+) system to record data on indicators of school education provided by all the States and Union Territories. Dropout rate is calculated at primary, Upper Primary and secondary level of education. As per UDISE+ 2024-25, State/UT-wise dropout rate among girls and marginalised groups, such as Schedule Castes (SC) and Schedule Tribes (ST) for secondary level of education is available at https://www.education.gov.in/en/parl_ques. (b) to (d): To bridge the digital divide in education, especially after the pandemic, a comprehensive initiative called e-VIDYA is in place which unifies all efforts related to digital/online/on-air education to enable multi-mode access to education. The key components of this initiative are DIKSHA – the nation’s digital infrastructure, 200 PM e-VIDYA DTH TV Channels to provide supplementary education in various Indian languages for classes 1st to 12th, ePathshala initiative to disseminate Digital Books and eContents, eJaadui Pitara digital app to supplement and complement the physical Jaadui Pitara, a vertical on Virtual Labs created on DIKSHA platform where Virtual Labs for Science and Mathematics for subjects Class 6th to 12th have been made available, Samagra Shiksha also has provision of ICT Labs & Smart Classrooms in Schools of Grade VI and above. There are various AI features available on DIKSHA – Ask DIKSHA (Chat with Books), Video Keyword Search, Read Aloud and AI-bases Transition, useful for Personalize Adaptive Learning (PAL). The PARAKH Rashtriya Sarvekshan 2024, conducted in December 2024 by the National Assessment Centre, PARAKH (NCERT), under the Ministry of Education, assessed baseline competency development in students of Grades 3, 6, and 9 as per the National Education Policy 2020. By meticulously assessing competencies in critical subjects like Language, Mathematics, Science, Social Science and The World Around Us, assessment is to provide comprehensive insights into the educational journey of the learners. Over 21.15 lakh students and 2.70 lakh teachers from more than 74,000 schools across 781 districts participated. National, State, and District-level report cards are available at https://dashboard.parakh.ncert.gov.in/en. Previously, the government of India has conducted National Achievement Survey (NAS) in 2021, with an objective to evaluate students learning outcomes and competencies. The class wise, subject wise and management wise details of performance of students at National, State/UT and District level are available at https://nas.gov.in/report-card/2021. ******