As a lot of people gather to applaud the much-awaited changes in the educational policies, here are a few points that everyone needs to consider. This is a critique of only the main points. The New National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 document is very comprehensive. The actual and accurate critique would be a long document in itself. Being a teacher and a parent, I ask all the governments across 73 years of Independence — why is education such a joke in our country? Before declaring policies, I wish experienced and knowledgeable linguists and educationists had been consulted. To make India a vibrant educational hub, one needs to take steps forward and not backwards. We need to compare our education boards with international boards. People lagging need to be brought forward. However, we are doing the opposite. I wish all the fantastic tales that are spun in the educational policies and frameworks would come true and I hope we soon realise that we need proper implementation, teache...

The coronavirus has pushed schools all over the world to go online as new waves of infections keep emerging. In India, a country where the gaps in access to education and the Internet were already vast, poor families are struggling to stay the course. Shirin Riyaz Shah, 15, attends a small private school in Mumbai. There’s one smart-phone between her and her four siblings over which they sit through Zoom lessons and submit homework via WhatsApp. Their schedules don’t blend neatly and there’s a constant tussle over the phone. Data is especially precious because money, always tight, is now in even shorter supply as the pandemic stretches her family’s single income. Her father is a tailor and for now, movement restrictions mean he’s mostly home. When that changes so will the children’s access to his phone. And digital classrooms make the process of learning harder. “In class we can raise our hands over and over again and it isn’t a problem,” said Shah by phone. “We can ask teachers to pau...