Six years after the Union Cabinet approved the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, India’s ambitious rewrite of its education system since 1986 has moved from paper to classrooms in bits and pieces – deeply in some areas, barely at all in others.
Starting from pre-school, the 5+3+3+4 school structure replaced the decades-old 10+2 model, with early childhood education officially transitioning to formal schooling. Graduate students can bank credit and drop out of a degree. Foreign universities have started operating in India and Indian institutions have opened campuses abroad.
But the higher education regulator, which replaced the University Grants Commission (UGC), All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) and the National Council of Teacher Education (NCTE), has been pushed back again. Teacher-education reforms are only half completed, exam reforms are running into leaks and failed rollouts, and every other promised funding target has not been met.
The policy, which replaced the 1986 framework, was approved by the Cabinet on July 29, 2020, with the aim of building a system “rooted in Indianness” while preparing students for the future.
Also read: ‘Not acceptable’: CJP claims Supreme Court order on students’ FIR is contrary to government promises
Change
The most movement has been seen in the curriculum.
The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) released new textbooks for classes 1 to 9, and those for classes 10 to 12 are next in line.
For early education, Jaaju Pitara Kit – a learning program for children aged 3 to 8 years that includes books, posters and toys – has been launched across states. The Ministry of Women and Child Development also launched the National Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) framework to promote sports and competency-driven education in Anganwadi centers and playschools.
Across the country, states and union territories have reduced the minimum age for enrollment in Class 1 to six years, compared to five years earlier.
To ease school education, the central government has also issued guidelines for co-establishing Anganwadi centers with primary schools, although training the workers running them is still a gap.
The National Initiative for Proficiency in Reading with Comprehension and Numeracy (NIPUN) India initiative was launched in 2021 to improve basic literacy levels.
The Education Ministry’s latest nationwide survey, the National Survey 2024, tested 2.1 million students across the country. It found that Class 3 students scored an average of 64% in language skills and 60% in mathematics.
This marked an improvement compared to 2021, when the respective scores were 62% and 57%, but remained below pre-pandemic 2017 levels of 66.7% in language and 63% in math.
The digital record scaled faster than almost any other parameter. Over 20 crore APAAR (Automated Permanent Academic Account Registry) IDs, a unique 12-digit code, were issued to students, although the rollout was criticized over privacy concerns. Case reached the courtsSome parents are arguing against the constitutional validity of the plan and expressing concerns about the security, storage and processing of students’ data. The Supreme Court, while hearing the petitions, said it will direct the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) to provide parents the option to withhold or refuse consent for APAAR.
Manisha Malhotra, director-principal of Satya School, Gurugram, said, “Six years after NEP, its ideas have started taking root in classrooms. Now the focus has shifted towards conceptual learning and curiosity. However, the next phase will be to invest in teacher capacity and assessment that rewards understanding rather than rote learning.”
There has also been a change in higher education. The Academic Bank of Credit and National Credit Framework allow students to transfer credits between institutions and pause and restart degrees.
The Common University Entrance Test (CUET), introduced in 2022, is now the main gateway for undergraduate seats in central universities, although it has been criticized over format issues and loss of autonomy for universities.
Internationalization has moved from the point of interaction to campuses. IIT Madras now runs a campus in Zanzibar (Tanzania), IIT Delhi in Abu Dhabi (UAE) and IIM Ahmedabad in Dubai (UAE); And IIT Bombay has announced one in Japan.
Five foreign universities have received UGC approval to set up in India, with the University of Southampton already operational and others yet to admit students.
“The real impact of NEP will be measured not by compliance, but by how effectively institutions embrace the spirit of innovation,” said Keyur Purani, vice-chancellor of Prestige University in Indore, Madhya Pradesh.
The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE)’s move to introduce on-screen marking (OSM) – one of the major exam-reform pieces of the NEP – has been more troubling. The board this year took up OSM across the country for all Class 12 subjects in place of manual evaluation of around 99 lakh answer sheets. But students and teachers have since reported blurry scans, incorrect marks being entered, uncorrected answers and technical glitches.
HT reported that an internal dry-run in five Delhi schools in January 2026 had identified at least 36 technical, operational and assessment-related problems that were not addressed before the national rollout.
half implemented
Many issues of the NEP have moved beyond the policy document but are still a work in progress.
From the 2026 academic session, CBSE introduced board exams for Class 10 twice a year, reducing the load on the single annual exam. CBSE has declared the results of the second board examination held this year and the students… performance improved.
Adding to this, PARAKH has designed holistic progress cards that assess communication, creativity and collaboration along with academic scores, but most school boards have not yet adopted them.
The pressure to impart education in mother tongue till Class 5 is unequal. The CBSE has asked affiliated schools to move toward home language teaching in the foundation years, and the NCERT is producing textbooks in more Indian languages, but classrooms are often multilingual and language politics complicate such implementation.
was called trilingual formulaSouthern states like Tamil Nadu have been the most vocal critics of the move, arguing that it indirectly imposes the Hindi language on non-Hindi speaking areas. Some others have pointed out that restricting English learning to the foundation years may not benefit children in global job markets, and the Indian education system does not currently have textbooks in diverse local dialects and languages.
In colleges, the four-year undergraduate program (FYUP) is still spreading with multiple entry and exit points. Central universities have adopted it extensively and Kerala has adopted it in its state universities, but many other states like Karnataka and Tamil Nadu are moving slowly, citing faculty shortage and lack of infrastructure.
Teacher education has also been slow. The Integrated Teacher Education Program (ITEP) has been expanded from 2023-24 and will have minimum qualifications for teacher recruitment from 2030, but a national framework to set uniform standards for the profession is still pending.
Praneet Mungali, trustee of Sanskriti Group of Schools, said, “The NEP got the diagnosis right. Where the reforms required structural change, progress is visible. Where they required sustained funding, teacher capacity and political consent, implementation has been very slow.”
and stopped
Some of the most ambitious NEP proposals have seen little movement.
A single higher education regulator to replace the UGC has been repeatedly touted. India’s proposed Higher Education Commission, known as the Vikas Bharat Shiksha Aastha (VBSA), was introduced in Parliament in 2025, but has since been referred to a parliamentary joint committee amid concerns of centralizing power from the states to the central government.
Exam reforms, one of the signature promises of the NEP, is far from the finish line.
The credibility of public examinations has been repeatedly attacked. After several CUET disruptions and NEET-UG 2024 paper leak, the cancellation and re-conduct of NEET-UG 2026 led to widespread protests and the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan last week.
A separate recommendation – breakfast with mid-day meal – has gone nowhere since being turned down by the Finance Ministry in 2021.
Still, some consider funding the biggest unfinished business.
The NEP reiterated the long-standing goal of increasing public expenditure on education to 6% of India’s gross domestic product (GDP). As of now, the combined expenditure of the Center and the states is still around 4.1%, and every other reform runs up to that limit.
“The NEP has shifted the focus from competency to capabilities. Its success will ultimately depend on whether graduates leave universities with adaptability, judgment and the ability to learn,” said Asim Chauhan, Chancellor of Amity University.
The Union Education Ministry did not respond to requests for comment till Tuesday evening.
