Education Spending At 14-Year Low, Reveals Economic Survey 2023-24

The share of education in the combined expenditure by the Centre and the states fell to its lowest in at least 14 years, revealed the Economic Survey 2023-24 tabled in the Parliament on Monday.

The report, which comes ahead of the Union budget 2024-25, showed that education accounted for only 9% of the overall spending by the central and state governments in the fiscal year 2021-22, when the country was recovering from the devastating second Covid wave. This is the lowest relative expenditure on the sector since 2008-09. It comes a year after the share of education spending took an unusually sharp dip from 10.7% to 9.1%.Going by the revised and budget estimates for 2022-23 and 2023-24, the public spending on education is unlikely to see a notable recovery.

Even in terms of the percentage of gross domestic product (GDP), allocation for education is at its nadir. According to the report, the Centre and state cumulatively spent only 2.7% of their GDP in 2021-22 on the sector, which is the lowest since 2008-09; a far cry from the ideal 6% recommended in the National Education Policy (NEP). This figure is expected to increase slightly to 2.9% in 2022-23 (revised estimates) before plunging back to 2.7% (budget estimates).

However, another estimate by the ministry of education, which takes into account the outlay for medical and public health education, agriculture research and educational aid for marginalised groups, among other expenditures, puts the education spending at 4.6% of GDP (budget estimate) for 2020-21. There's no comparable estimate available for the subsequent years.

Data from the past economic surveys showed that there has been a steady increase in the money allocated for education vis-à-vis the yearly rise in overall budgets of the last decade. However, educationists remained unsatisfied with the growth levels. The percentage of education in overall expenditure hovered around 10-11% in this period.

Educationists are concerned by the sudden decline in government support for education. “Almost 50 years ago, the Kothari Commission recommended spending 6% of India's GDP on education. Less allocations for education in the successive Union budgets since then shows that the country's future is not a priority,” said Akshay Tarfe, a city-based education activist. These budget cuts threaten the future of India's youth, especially those from marginalised communities. This was reflected on the ground when only 13% of schools complied with the Right to Education (RTE) Act, a constitutional provision for free and compulsory education for all, he added.

Sadat Husain, a Delhi-based researcher, said, “The social sector is the state's responsibility. However, the inclusion of the Vidyanjali scheme and corporate social responsibility in the economic survey indicates that the government is relying on voluntary donations and services of people for the education sector and using them to shirk responsibilities.”