History and the Current State of Elementary Education in India

Abstract

Chapter 1 gives an overview of the history and current status of the education system in India. It identifies parts of the society whom Article 21A is primarily aimed at, and what the most pressing issues to be addressed in the field of primary and lower secondary education are. It is quite clear that those who might profit from having a right to education are those who do not have the means to already afford quality education for themselves by obtaining it from the private market and who are, therefore, dependent on some form of state action. Strangely, it will be shown, even after years of education being a fundamental right, decent-quality education is still not seen as a ‘public good’ that the state ought to provide for free but something that is supposed to be obtained from the market, with the government education system being considered as something ‘meant for (very) poor children’.