A recent Delhi high court judgment stops the functioning of private schools that are not recognised by the government. The argument against such schools broadly is that many such schools do not have adequate infrastructure, or follow established education norms. Since they do not have any certification from the relevant government authorities, it is thought they are “not good enough”. The honourable high court therefore decided that only recognised schools can operate.

The key question is not whether such schools meet the norms decided by the government, but whether they meet a supply gap in educational options for the masses. As of today, a very large part of pre-primary and primary education is provided by such schools. They compete with government schools for students. But unlike the government schools, they charge a fee, do not provide free mid-day meals, and typically have fewer freebies. Why then do parents prefer to send their children to such schools? The answer is quite obvious — parents consider such schools more beneficial for their wards than government schools, and they are willing to pay for it.

Education is all about quality. It is difficult to measure the quality of education but certain proxies are typically used by the authorities — these include the kind of infrastructure the school has, how well the teachers are trained, the type of content included in the coursework, teaching methods, etc. If certain norms are met, the relevant government authority is supposed to “recognise” the school.

All this sounds good on paper, but the point is that it is very difficult to measure how well the teacher is teaching (or whether he is teaching at all). Only those buying the education services can be expected to know, through experience, whether their ward is learning something and whether such learning will be beneficial for her. The fact is that, today, a large number of parents consider such schools more beneficial than competing government schools. By eliminating such schools therefore we are constraining the parents’ choice of schooling for their children.

... contd.