In PM's home district Mehsana, 20% teens not enrolled, one of the highest in India

Percent working children, age 14-18, India average

The new Annual Status of Education Report (ASER 2017: Beyond Basics), an annual survey carried by the high profile NGO Pratham, has found that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's home district Mehsana has a whopping 20.3% children in the age group 14-18, who are not enrolled in either school or college.
While this is against the average of 14.4% children in this age group who have not been enrolled in a survey carried out in 28 Indian districts, as many as 21 of these districts were found to have a lower percentage of children in the "not enrolled" category.
Significantly, the survey also shows that a major consequence of not getting into formal education is prevalence of child labour in this age group. In Mehsana, as many as 54.5% of children in this age group were found to have "worked for 15 or more days in the last month" of the survey. This is against the all-India figure of 41.6%.
Only two districts out of 28 were found to have a higher percentage of those going to work -- Rajasthan's Udaipur (64.3%) and Maharashtra' Ahmednagar (55.2%).
The report says, across India, "a substantial proportion of youth in the 14-18 age group are working (42%), regardless of whether they are enrolled in formal education or not. Of those who work, 79% work in agriculture – almost all on their own family’s farm. Also, more than three quarters of all youth do household chores daily – 77 % of males and 89% of females."
While till now all ASER surveys, carried out every year since 2005, confined their analysis to age group 6 to 16, in 2017, for the first time, it focused on an older age group, those who have moved beyond the elementary school age.

Status of education: Mehsana, Gujarat

The survey finds that, of the 28 districts surveyed, in 24 states, Kerala's Ernakulam is the best performer, with just about 1.4% children in the "not enrolled" category, followed by Maharashtra's Ahmednagar (4.3%) and Satara (6%), Andhra Pradesh's Srikakulam and Assam's Kamrup (7.2%), Manipur's Bishnupur and Nagaland's Kohima (7.5%), Himachal Pradesh's Kangra (7.8%), Uttarakhand's Dehradun (8.8%), Tamil Nadu's Madurai and Haryana's Sonepat (8.9).
The six districts performing worse than Gujarat's Mehsana are -- Jharkhand's Purbi Singhbhum (21%), Madhya Pradesh's Rewa (28.1%) and Bhopal (31.5%), Meghalaya's Jaintia Hills (22%), Rajasthan's Udaipur (22.7%), and Uttar Pradesh's Bijnor (28.7%).
A further breakup by ASER shows that, in Mehsana, 17.9% boys in the age group 14-18 are not enrolled, as against 22.4% girls. Interesting, in the higher age group, 17-18, 36.7% children of Mehsana are found to be "not enrolled" -- 34.6% boys and 38.7% girls.
ASER notes, the issue of enrolment in the age group 14-18 is particularly important because there is already "near-universal enrolment and automatic promotion through the elementary stage" resulting in "more and more children successfully completing elementary schooling", with official figures suggesting that enrollment in Std VIII almost doubled in the decade between 2004-5 and 2014-15."
"Overall, 86% of youth in the 14-18 age group are within the formal education system, either in school or in college", the report says, adding, "More than half of all youth in this age group are enrolled in Std X or below (54%). Another 25% are either in Std XI or XII, and 6% are enrolled in undergraduate and other degree courses."
Across all the districts, it was found that "the enrollment gap between males and females in the formal education system increases with age", ASER says, adding, "There is hardly any difference between boys’ and girls’ enrollment at age 14; but at age 18, 32% females are not enrolled as compared to 28% males."
"The proportion of youth not enrolled in school or college increases with age. At age 14, the percentage of youth not enrolled is 5%. By age 18, this figure increases to 30%", the report says.

Comments

Disappearing schools: India's education landscape undergoing massive changes

The other day, I received a message from education rights activist Mitra Ranjan, who claims that a whopping one lakh schools across India have been closed down or merged. This seemed unbelievable at first sight. The message from the activist, who is from the advocacy group Right to Education (RTE) Forum, states that this is happening as part of the implementation of the National Education Policy (NEP), 2020, which floated the idea of school integration/consolidation.

RTI framework ‘nuked’? SHANTI Bill triggers alarm, grants centre sweeping secrecy powers

Has the Government of India finally moved to completely change important provisions of the Right to Information (RTI) Act, that too without bringing about any amendment in the top transparency law? It would seem so, if one is to believe well known civil society leaders' keen observations on the nuclear energy Bill passed in the Lok Sabha. Senior RTI activist Amrita Johri has sharply criticised the recently passed Sustainable Harnessing and Advancement of Nuclear Energy for Transforming India (SHANTI) Bill, 2025, saying that it has effectively “nuked” the Right to Information (RTI) Act through the back door.

'Shameful lies': Ambedkar defamed, Godse glorified? Dalit leader vows legal battle

A few days back, I was a little surprised to receive a Hindi article in plain text format from veteran Gujarat Dalit rights leader Valjibhai Patel , known for waging many legal battles under the banner of the Council of Social Justice (CSJ) on behalf of socially oppressed communities.

A Hindu alternative to Valentine's Day? 'Shiv-Parvati was first love marriage in Universe'

The other day, I was searching on Google a quote on Maha Shivratri which I wanted to send to someone, a confirmed Shiv Bhakt, quite close to me -- with an underlying message to act positively instead of being negative. On top of the search, I chanced upon an article in, imagine!, a Nashik Corporation site which offered me something very unusual. I don't know who owns this site, for there is nothing on it in the About Us link. It merely says, the Nashik Corporation site "is an educational and news website of the municipal corporation. Today, education and payment of tax are completely online." It goes on to add, "So we provide some of the latest information about Property Tax, Water Tax, Marriage Certificate, Caste Certificate, etc. So all taxpayer can get all information of their municipal in a single place.some facts about legal and financial issues that different city corporations face, but I was least interested in them." Surely, this didn't interest...

Inside an UnMute conversation: Reflections on media, civil society and my journey

I usually avoid being interviewed. I have always believed that journalists, especially in India, are generalists who may suddenly be assigned a “beat” they know little—sometimes nothing—about. Still, when my friend Gagan Sethi , a well-known human rights activist, phoned a few weeks ago asking if I would join a podcast on civil society and the media, I agreed.

When a telecom giant fails the consumer: My Airtel experience

Initially, I was not considering writing this blog about why I found Airtel —one of India’s premier communication service providers—to have an outrageously poor sales and customer-service experience, at least in Ahmedabad , Gujarat ’s business capital. However, the last SMS I received from Airtel regarding my request for a Wi-Fi connection in my flat in the Vejalpur area left me stunned.

It is? Modi perspires four times a day to ensure face glow? But why he loved ACs?

A former Gujarat government official recently shared a tweet by Subramaniam Swamy where a video shows Prime Minister Narendra Modi telling school children in his hometown Vadnagar that their face would glow if they perspire four times a day. He suggested his face was glowing exactly because of this reason. I have no idea whether facial glow is linked with how many times you perspire in a day, but what I know is, Modi would profusely avoid any perspiration when he was Gujarat chief minister. Thus, in 2006, Modi undertook a fast in support of the Narmada project, which he said the Centre was not supporting. The fast, it was declared, lasted for about 51 hours. I don't recall which month it was, but to avoid perspiration, he got installed air conditions in the open, just next to the spot where he and his colleagues were undertaking fast for the Narmada dam. When some enterprising journalists tried watching the ACs, they were manhandled -- for it would show his fast in poor light. S...

Top Hindu builder ties up with Muslim investor for a huge minority housing society in Ahmedabad

There is a flutter in Ahmedabad's Vejalpur area, derogatorily referred to as the "border" because, on its eastern side, there is a sprawling minority area called Juhapura, where around five lakh Muslims live. The segregation is so stark that virtually no Muslim lives in Vejalpur, populated by around four lakh Hindus, and no Hindu lives in Juhapura.

From Ahmedabad's CG Road to the Supreme Court: My brush with the stray dog menace

It was the mid-2000s when my children wanted me to take them to the municipal market on CG Road — Ahmedabad’s posh upmarket area — where they said Kentucky Fried Chicken had opened a shop. I was reluctant, but eventually had to drive them in my Maruti Frontie car from Gandhinagar , 35 kilometres away, where we lived. After finding a suitable place to park, we went in search of the high-profile restaurant. After roaming here and there, and even asking other shopkeepers in the market area, we still couldn’t find our supposed destination. So, we decided to return to our car and drive to some other place for lunch. Suddenly, a stray dog jumped on me, catching hold of my pant. While I managed to free myself immediately — with people around shooing away the dog — I sustained a few scratches on my leg. I immediately rang up a doctor in Gandhinagar, who advised me to take an initial injection in Ahmedabad right away, which I did. I took three more shots on my return to Gandhinagar. I have ne...

Search This Blog