NGOs and philanthropic organisations have played a growing role in the education sector in many societies over recent years. This has perhaps been especially apparent in the aid sector, with the activities of outfits such as the Gates Foundation expanding alongside the work of bilateral and multilateral aid organisations.

In this episode, Latika Gupta and Edward Vickers discuss the case of India, where NGOs and private organisations (philanthropical and otherwise) have come to play an especially significant role in influencing education policy. And, as emerges in the course of this conversation, this role has evolved and changed over the past two or three decades, in ways that Latika and others find alarming.

Perhaps the most significant NGO actor in India’s education sector is Pratham. As Latika explains, the regular ‘ASER’ reports that Pratham produces on educational outcomes across India, and the offices that they maintain in states across the country, have come to constitute almost a parallel administrative structure - penetrating educational policymaking processes and effectively performing functions that one might expect government to perform.

This growing prominence of NGOs in the Indian education sector comes in the context of a long-running sense of crisis surrounding public schooling in India. There is a widespread belief among Indian elites that the public sector is irredeemably 'broken' and that it is therefore necessary to look to the private sector for educational 'solutions'. Pervasive elite scepticism of the public sector, and a weak commitment to education as a ‘public good’, are perhaps reinforced by the lack of engagement of wealthier Indians with the public schooling system, with most sending their children to private schools. Latika and Ed discuss some of the reasons for this disengagement. These include ingrained caste prejudice and expanded educational access for poorer Indians since the 1990s, which have incentivised many elites to withdraw their children from the public sector. Meanwhile, economic growth alongside spiralling socio-economic inequality over the same period mean that more privileged Indians now have the wherewithal to pay relatively expensive private school fees.

Crucial to understanding the agenda of educational NGOs such as Pratham is to trace their funding. Much of this comes from prominent entrepreneurs within India itself, many of them involved in the technology sector. But substantial funding also comes from overseas, for example from tech entrepreneurs (including some ethnic Indians) based in the USA. And when it comes to the involvement of tech entrepreneurs in educational ‘philanthropy’, conflicts of interest potentially arise. Pratham has been particularly vociferous in promoting the expanded use of smartphones and education technology in enhancing ‘learning’. Latika explains how the ‘technicist, corporate’ approach has been associated with promotion of an increasingly narrow and instrumentalist conception of ‘learning’, to the neglect of ‘teaching’ and the social or socialising aspect of education.

Another issue that arises in the context of NGO activism in India’s education sector today relates to the political context, which is increasingly dominated by Hindu nationalist forces. As Latika has observed, this has meant that NGO involvement in educational provision, for example in tribal communities in central India, nowadays tends to go hand-in-hand with promotion of Hindutva and nationalist messaging.

Related readings:

• Aparna Kalra. 2024. ‘How Rich Donors Have Caused More Harm than Good to India’s Education’, The Wire. https://thewire.in/education/how-rich-donors-have-caused-more-harm-than-good-to-indias-education. February 28.

• Aparna Kalra. 2007. ‘Education fund eyes pvt schooling for poor’, Mint. https://www.livemint.com/Companies/u2laxlnifd60eoy482hQSJ/Education-fund-eyes-pvt-schooling-for-poor.html, May 17.

• Edward Vickers. 2007. ‘To teach more children well’, Mint. https://www.livemint.com/Opinion/2SzDpJ4RgCLKJZpgSdDipN/To-teach-more-children-well.html, November 20.

• Pratham website: https://www.pratham.org/

• Central Square Foundation. 2019. State of the Sector Report: Private Schools in India. https://www.centralsquarefoundation.org/State-of-the-Sector-Report-on-Private-Schools-in-India.pdf

• Miglani, N., & Burch, P. (2021). ‘Education reform imaginaries: mapping -scapes of philanthropic influence’. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 42(5), 682–698. https://doi-org.libproxy.ucl.ac.uk/10.1080/01596306.2020.1836747