Daijiworld Media Network - New Delhi
New Delhi, Aug 6: Only 5.67 per cent of schools in India currently provide uninterrupted education from Class 1 to Class 12 within the same institution, according to data presented by the Ministry of Education in the Rajya Sabha.
As per the Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+) 2025-26 data, only 83,185 of the country's 14,66,682 schools offer education from the primary level up to senior secondary level.
Minister of State for Education Jayant Chaudhary shared the figures in response to a question in the Rajya Sabha regarding the availability of schools providing continuous education and its impact on student movement, retention and dropout rates.
The data indicates that only a small proportion of schools enable students to complete their entire schooling—from Class 1 to Class 12—without changing institutions. However, the Centre stated that student transition and retention rates have shown improvement across various stages of education.
According to the Ministry of Education, the transition rate from the preparatory stage to middle school increased from 92.2 per cent in 2024-25 to 93.8 per cent in 2025-26. The transition rate from middle school to secondary education also improved from 86.6 per cent to 88.3 per cent during the same period.
The retention rate at the secondary level rose from 47.2 per cent in 2024-25 to 51.9 per cent in 2025-26, while the dropout rate at the same level declined from 8.2 per cent to 7.0 per cent.
The government further informed Parliament that 1,617 schools were approved for upgradation from secondary to senior secondary level between 2018-19 and 2026-27.
Rajasthan received approval for the highest number of school upgrades with 606 institutions, followed by Odisha with 331 and Punjab with 241. Uttar Pradesh received approval for 98 schools, while Assam and Karnataka were sanctioned 47 and 43 schools, respectively.
Approvals were also granted to several other states and Union Territories, including Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Tripura, Jammu and Kashmir, Nagaland, Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh.
The Ministry said state governments and Union Territories prepare annual proposals for school upgradation based on local requirements. These proposals are examined and approved in accordance with the programme's norms and funding guidelines.
It also noted that the Samagra Shiksha scheme supports the objectives of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 by improving access to quality education and promoting inclusive classrooms that cater to students from diverse social, linguistic and learning backgrounds.