Student Dropout Rate in Rural India
Gargee Deshpande, Parth Mayekar, Priyanshi Jha and Rewa Sharma
Abstract
The student dropout rate in rural India is one of the major challenges of society. It affects the growth and future of the young population and sustainable development of the nation. This research aims to study the socio-economic, cultural, infrastructural challenges. The method of Secondary Data Analysis has been used for the study. It includes the available data from similar studies and reports. The research is significant because of its understanding of challenges of the rural students regarding their education. It also attempts to provide possible solutions for them.
Introduction
Education is most important factor for the development of every person. As per the SDG-4 of United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, quality education should be provided to all. India has a Youthful Demographic Profile. Its young population has impact on the nation’s economy, workforce, and social dynamics. While the urban youth is enjoying the benefits of education, the rural one is getting away from it day-by-day. From the previous studies, it has been seen that a greater number of students from the rural area of India are quitting schools than the urban. Which makes an urgent call for the development in education infrastructure. In this article we are addressing the challenges and solutions for this issue.
Literature Review
The dropout rate in rural India is influenced by various socio-economic factors like poverty, lack of access to quality education, gender disparities, early marriages in girls, financial responsibilities in early age, lack of awareness, etc. (Sukanya Mahalanabis and Shreejita Acharya, 2021) Efforts are being taken from the side of government such as Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT), multilingual education in early-grade education to ease the understanding of students. (NEP 2020) Along with these measures, there is a need to improve teaching quality, infrastructure and awareness and involvement of people is necessary tasks.
Methodology
The study uses the method of Secondary Data Analysis. The data is collected from the similar studies, survey reports of government ministry, governmental institutions and international organization. It is a qualitative secondary research as it is based on the data published and gathered previously by others. The sources have been used are:
Governments Reports: Data collected by the Ministry of Education, Governments websites of Government of India.
International Organizations: Such as UNESCO.
Existing Research Studies: Research work from the International Journal of Policy Science and Law.
In the next step, we analyse the findings and try to build possible solutions that can help reduce the dropout rate and improve the educational opportunities.
Results
The study results in the finding of the challenges faced by the rural students i.e. the factors affecting the students to quit schools. Also, it discusses the possible solutions to be built for the improvement.
CAUSES FOR HIGHER DROPOUT RATES IN RURAL INDIA
Poverty & Financial Constraints
A significant number of dropouts is seen due to financial hardships. According to the census “Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) 2021” highlights that round-about 27.4% of children tend to discontinue education due to financial issues. Although free-schooling is available families struggle with expenses related to uniform, books, transport, etc.
Child Labour & Seasonal Migration
Many children in most rural families are expected to knock off household bills and part-take in household income. The International Labour Organisation, an independent United Nation (UN) body during its survey in India concluded that around 101 lakh children aged, 5-14 are engaged in child labour. *According to the ILO 2020 census. Seasonal migration, when parents are transferred from once branch to another, it disrupts the education of the child, Due to the frequent transfers children have to repeat multiple grades.
Social & Cultural Factors
Gender Disparities
India being a majorly dominated patriarchal society, there has always been slight inclination towards the dominance of the male gender, even when it comes to education girls are usually forced to drop out, due to societal pressure. The UNICEF report on Girl’s Education (2021) stated that 40% of the girls drop out before completing even secondary education. (That is 10th grade.) This Often occurs due to early marriage, household responsibilities & other concerns.
Caste & Social Discrimination
Although India has far progressed into the 21st century, there is still heavy discrimination occurring in the country, children from marginalised communities such as scheduled tribes (ST), scheduled castes (SC) often become victims of discrimination in schools. The National Family Health Survey (NFHS-5, 2019-21) found that only 68.3% of SC & 65.7% of ST children complete Secondary Education. Compared to 79.5% of General, OBC & Open caste students.
Challenges in The Educational System
Inadequate School Facilities
A number of rural schools do not have basic amenities like toilets, drinking water, and suitable classrooms. The Ministry of Education (2021) stated in their survey that 21% of government funded schools in rural regions of India lack toilets, and 16% have unhealthy & unsanitary drinking water facilities.
Lack of Competent Teachers
School dropout and untrained teachers is one of the biggest issues. UNESCO Global Education Monitoring Report (2021) states that India has approximately only 10lakh trained teachers in rural regions, which causes degradation of education standards.
Nutrition and Health Issues
Concerns on Malnutrition and Health
Targets for health and nutrition are very crucial to school attendance. The stunting malnourished children suffer in rural India, affects over 35% children below the age of five, significantly hampering their ability to learn and develop intellectually (Global Nutrition Report, 2021).
Limited Facilities for Hygiene During Menstruation
The lack of facilities for hygiene during menstruation is another factor that results in adolescent girls dropping out of school. As per the Water Aid India Report, 2020 more than 23% of girls stop attending educational institutions because of absence of proper sanitation and menstrual hygiene education.
TRENDS IN STUDENT DROPOUT RATES IN INDIA
According to 2024 data India has seen significant improvement in secondary education completion rate 80 out of 100 girls and 77.2 out of 100 boys completed secondary education in rural India.
Upper primary (6-8 years) with 3 percent and primary (1-5 years) with 1.5 percent, the dropout rate is higher for girls than boys at all levels of education.
Bihar, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Gujrat, Haryana have shown an increase in the dropout rate of students from 2019 to 2024.
In Bihar, it fell down from 51.6 to 40.3 (out of 100) in girls and 51.2 to 38.8 (out of 100) in boys for secondary education. Karnataka shows a decline from 79.3 to 76.5 in girls and for boys, it is 73.6 to 70.7.
Contrary to this, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Uttarakhand have shown quite a improvement.
Kerala, for upper primary schooling, the rate remains 100 in the year 2024 for both girls and boys. For secondary schooling, it has increase to 95.7 for boys and 97.5 for girls.
Tamil Nadu has also shown 100 percent participation of girls and boys in upper primary level. At the same time, it has increased to 89.2 and 95.6 in boys and girls respectively for secondary education.
Maharashtra and Uttarakhand have shown much improvement. Uttarakhand has raised its rate from 83.5 to 92.8 for girls. And Maharashtra has figures rising from 83.5 to 90.5.
SOLUTIONS TO REDUCE DROPOUT RATES IN RURAL INDIA
Financial Support and Incentives
While ASER’s most recent data shows that economic distress is a prominent reason driving school dropouts, it holds even stronger in rural areas (ASER Centre, 2023)1. Potential solutions include:
Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) for scholarships and other learning incentives needs to strengthen as envisaged under NEP 2020 (Ministry of Education, 2020)2.
Increased coverage of PM POSHAN (previously the Mid-Day Meal program), already effective in improving attendance and retention (UDISE+, 2021-22)3.
Targeted financial support for girls’ education modelled on approaches that yogurt-success in states like Kerala and Tamil Nadu (NITI Aayog, 2023)4.
Infrastructure and Accessibility
According to the UDISE+ 2021-22, rural schools still have significant infrastructural deficits. Basic measures should include:
Basic amenities – Only 89.9% of schools have functioning drinking water facilities and 93.9% with working toilets (UDISE+ 2021-22).
Improving transport accessibility, especially in remote areas.
Digital infrastructure – Only 40% of schools in India have computers while 30% of them have internet (UDISE+ 2021-22).
Improving Education Quality
The ASER 2022 findings note huge gaps in learning outcomes in rural areas. The measures include:
Implement multilingual education for NEP 2020 recommendations, especially in early-grade instruction (Ministry of Education, 2020).
Lowering the pupil-teacher ratio to below the current 28:1 at the elementary level (UDISE+ 2021-22).
Boosting teacher training schedules for available pedagogical practices (NEP, 2020).
Social Interventions
The Global Education Monitoring Report published by UNESCO (2021)5 accentuates the importance of generating community engagement. Some measures are:
Strengthening school management committees (SMCs) as envisaged in the RTE Act.
Creating and implementing gender-responsive policies to tackle an increased incidence of dropout among girl learners.
Awareness programs about the significance of education in geographical areas with low literacy rates.
Policy Implementation
According to the National Education Policy 2020, systematic reforms to implement include:
Tracking student attendance and learning outcomes through the UDISE+.
Introducing vocational education at a secondary level.
Ensuring proper implementation of the RTE Act.
The real-world evidence from UDISE+ (2021-22) clearly shows that targeted interventions in these areas have led to improvements in retention rates. The Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) at elementary level stands at 98.96%, while only 79.6% was enrolled at the secondary level, showing impediments to further progress.
Conclusion
Student dropout rate in rural India has been a subject of concern which affects the progress of individual as well as the society. This study identifies the various socio-economic causes of the dropout rates like poverty, lack of awareness, gender disparities, early marriages, inadequate educational infrastructure, etc. Also, it has tries to provide the possible solutions for this issue.
Social awareness can be the most important step to solve the problem of such students. The government give the financial aid through the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) to help the students. Mid-day-meal programmes, support to girls’ education are also being held. Infrastructure are getting better and ensuring basic enmities like water, toilet, transport etc. Policies like National Education Policy 2020 are considered to improve the education quality. With the help of NGOs, societal awareness ahs been spread to importance of education. Such different measures are being taken to reduce the number of students quitting the schools.
States such has Bihar, Karnataka, Rajasthan has shown concerning data as their dropout rates are higher. At the same time, we get to see some positive results from the Maharashtra, Uttarakhand, Tamil Nadu with 100% enrolment. Still there is space for progress overall. The data shows the need of financial, infrastructural, social, educational intervention from government and society to address the issue.
Reduction in students’ dropout rate in rural India is not only important in the educational aspect but also in social and economic aspect. Every citizen of the country deserves a quality life and it can only be achieved with the help of quality education. Such country’s youth is its wealth. They are the future of the country. Every child, regardless of their background should have opportunity to succeed. It is a need of the time to reduce the dropout rates and pave the way for a more educated and prosperous nation.
Work Cited
Socio- Economic Origins of School Dropouts in Rural India (Sukanya Mahalanabis, Shreejita Acharya, 2021)
https://www.pib.gov.in
https://www.ijfmr.com/papers/2024/5/27542.pdf
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/258517687_A_Study_on_School_Drop-outs_in_Rural_Settings
https://www.e-methodology.eu/index.php/rg/article/download/1249/1076/4475
Annual Status of Education Report (ASER). (2023). Annual Status of Education Report (Rural) 2022. ASER Centre. https://www.asercentre.org/p/402.html
Ministry of Education. (2020). National Education Policy 2020. Government of India. https://www.education.gov.in/sites/upload_files/mhrd/files/NEP_Final_English_0.pdf
Department of School Education & Literacy. (2023). UDISE+ Report 2021-22. Ministry of Education, Government of India. https://udiseplus.gov.in/
NITI Aayog. (2023). SDG India Index & Dashboard 2022-23: Partnerships in the Decade of Action. Government of India. https://www.niti.gov.in/
UNESCO. (2021). Global Education Monitoring Report 2021/2: Non-state Actors in Education: Who Chooses? Who Loses? https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000379875
