India is facing a growing education crisis.
Between Financial Year 2022 and Financial Year 2026, up to December 3, 2025, states reported 84.9 lakh children outside the formal school system from pre-school to Class 12. Nearly half of them are girls.
The data shows that dropout is not a temporary problem. It repeats every year and affects the same regions the most.
Large states continue to dominate the list.
Uttar Pradesh recorded 9.9 lakh out-of-school children in FY26 alone and has reported the highest numbers over the five years. Bihar, Jharkhand, and Assam also remain among the worst affected.
The share of girls in these numbers depends on the overall enrolment pattern in each state.
Kerala reports only 33.2 percent of girls among out-of-school children because female enrolment is high. Telangana reports 31.1 percent and Ladakh reports 33.3 percent for the same reason. In contrast, Maharashtra reports 65.7 percent of girls among dropouts. Himachal Pradesh reports 54.8 percent, and Mizoram reports 53.8 percent.
On December 3, during the winter session of Parliament, Congress MP Renuka Chowdhury asked about the scale of the problem. Minister of State Savitri Thakur presented the data and outlined the main reasons behind dropout. States cited migration of families for work, economic hardship, domestic responsibilities on older children, and child labour in both rural and urban areas.
States have tried to bring children back.
In five years, they re-enrolled 26.46 lakh out-of-school children through special training under Samagra Shiksha. They spent Rs 626 crore on these programmes. The training includes residential and non-residential classes, seasonal hostels, and transport services for children from migrant families.
Re-enrolments were highest in 2021 to 2022 at 8.6 lakh. They fell sharply from 2023 to 2024 to only 2.17 lakh. The numbers rose again in 2024 to 2025 with 7.67 lakh children returning to school. Uttar Pradesh led the recovery, followed by Assam and Bihar. Gujarat, Delhi, Jharkhand, Tamil Nadu, and Maharashtra also reported notable gains.
The overall picture remains worrying.
States have managed to re-enroll many children, but the total number of new dropouts keeps rising in the largest states. Officials say this makes it harder to close the gap.
The latest data shows that India needs sustained and targeted action to keep children in classrooms and to prevent girls from falling behind.