Articles by Kiran Bhatty

The figures for out-of-school children put out by various official sources in India show wide variations. The problems lie not just in the definitions but also in methods of estimation. A glaring lacuna in this process is that sporadic or irregular attendance is not taken into account when estimating the number. This paper unpacks the phenomenon through an intensive micro-study of enrolment and attendance of all children in a single panchayat in India. It shows that irregular attendance accounts for a much larger proportion of out-of-school children, with wide variation in attendance across social groups. It also conducts a regression analysis to analyse school and household-level factors that affect student attendance. It finds that school-level factors play a much larger role in determining student attendance.

The Right to Education Act, 2009, has received mostly negative reactions from various quarters. These reactions have raised fundamental questions about the provision of elementary education as a public good and the role of the State in it. In this article an attempt is made to do a historical review of elementary education policies, placing them in the context of the constitutional objective of "equality of opportunity" and the fundamental right to education now guaranteed through the 86th amendment perationalised in the Act. The policies are reviewed with the lens of inclusion, as that has been, and continues to be, perhaps the most challenging issue in the education sector, even today. To what extent have the government's policies, and their modes of implementation, addressed the concerns and constraints faced by children from marginalised and excluded families in accessing their right to education as equal citizens? What are the implications for the future role of the State in the provision of basic education?

A Survey of Field Investigations Kiran Bhatty In spite of enshrining free and compulsory education in the directive principles of the Indian constitution, the educational backwardness of India even after 50 years of independence is quite glaring. This paper, based on a survey of field level investigations, addresses the issues of economic constraints, schooling quality and parental motivation as a set of possible influences determining the educational decisions within a household and contributing to the overall picture of economic deprivation at the national level.