A recent nationwide education survey by the Ministry of Education (MoE) has raised serious concerns about the learning levels of school students in India. The PARAKH Rashtriya Sarvekshan 2024, which assessed over 21 lakh students from Grades 3, 6, and 9, found that only around half of the students could perform basic math tasks.

As per the report, only 55% of Class 3 students could properly arrange numbers up to 99 in ascending or descending order, while 58% were able to add and subtract two-digit numbers.

In Class 6, only 53% of students demonstrated an understanding of fundamental arithmetic operations such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. This includes knowing tables up to 10 and applying these operations to real-life problems.

The survey included a new subject for Class 6 students called “The World Around Us,” which focuses on topics related to the environment and society. Nationally, Math saw the lowest scores at 46%, while Language scored 57%, and The World Around Us averaged 49%.

The survey was conducted on December 4, 2023, across 74,229 schools in 781 districts of 36 states and Union Territories. A total of 21,15,022 students took part, including those from both government and private schools. Along with students, 2.7 lakh teachers and school leaders also filled out detailed questionnaires.

In Class 3 Language, girls scored slightly higher than boys, with an average of 65% compared to 63%. However, both boys and girls scored equally (60%) in Mathematics.

A clear rural-urban divide was also noticed. In Class 3, rural students performed better in both Math and Language. But in Classes 6 and 9, urban students scored higher across all subjects.

In Class 3, central government schools recorded the lowest performance in Mathematics.

For Class 6, students from state government and government-aided schools performed the weakest, particularly in Math.

By Class 9, central government schools led across all subjects, with the highest scores in Language. Private schools ranked next in Science and Social Science, but continued to score lower in Mathematics.

Overall, Language was the highest-scoring subject, while Mathematics remained the weakest across all types of schools.

Ministry officials say that any area where less than half the students answered correctly points to a serious learning gap.

“These learning gaps highlight the need for focused interventions to strengthen students' skills, refine instructional strategies, and provide additional learning support,” an official said.

“Addressing these areas effectively will help improve overall student learning outcomes in the nation.”

School Education Secretary Sanjay Kumar said the government is now moving into the next phase — using these results to drive change in the education system.

“Moving beyond the assessment itself, the next phase of this initiative is focused on enabling systemic action," he said.

"This includes a phased dissemination of data through workshops at the national, regional, state, and district levels. These workshops will focus not only on understanding the survey results but also on preparing district-specific roadmaps, where roles and responsibilities are clearly defined.”

The survey is part of PARAKH (Performance Assessment, Review and Analysis of Knowledge for Holistic Development), which was earlier known as the National Achievement Survey (NAS). It is held every three years to track learning progress across grades. The last survey was in 2021.

While the national average in 2024 is slightly lower than 2017, many states and UTs like Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, and Madhya Pradesh have shown their best-ever performance this year, proving that targeted learning interventions are working.

Notably, only Grade 3 scores can be compared across the 2017, 2021, and 2024 cycles of the survey due to changes in how the assessments are structured.

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