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India has 26.52 crore students in schools and 4.33 crore in higher education institutions, according to the Economic Survey 2023-24, tabled in Parliament on Monday. 

The document was tabled by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, a day ahead of the Union Budget announcement.

According to the Survey, India also has “more than 11 crore learners in skilling institutions”.

“These sweeping figures put into perspective the enormity of the challenge and the inherent ambition of the New Education Policy 2020 to transform India’s educational ecosystem”, the document showed.

The policy aims at “efforts towards strengthening institutional capacity to embed lifelong learning in the education and skills ecosystem”.

Further, the survey showed that the rise in enrolment in higher education has been driven by underprivileged sections such as SC, ST, and OBC, with a faster growth in female enrolment across sections.

“Female enrolment in higher education increased to 2.07 crore in FY22 from 1.57 crore in FY15, that is., a 31.6 per cent increase since FY15. The growing equity in higher education implies better employment opportunities for the hitherto backward sections,” it added.

As per the Survey, the NEP 2020 is leading “across-the-board transformation” in the education sector “focusing on foundational literacy and numeracy for every child passing the third standard”.

Its “Poshan bhi Padhai bhi programme" for early childhood education aims to develop the world’s largest, universal, high-quality preschool network at Anganwadi Centres”.

The Survey also noted that to sustain an economic growth rate over a quarter century, India “has to educate and skill its youth to stay ahead of the curve”.

This can help them to “work with emerging technologies while overcoming the accumulated education and skill deficits, accentuated by the pandemic".