India has almost solved part of the school enrollment puzzle. The other remains stubbornly unresolved. The latest figures tabled in Parliament reveal that while almost all girls now enter and stay in primary school, a significant number still fail to reach secondary education. The transition from childhood to adolescence remains the point where thousands of educational journeys come to an abrupt halt.According to the Union Education Ministry’s response to the Lok Sabha, 8% of girls enrolled in secondary school dropped out before completing their studies by 2025-26. The figure marks an improvement from 12.6% in 2023-24 and 9.6% in 2024-25, but exposes a deeper concern: Secondary education remains India’s weakest link in retaining girls.The data, from the government’s Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+), was presented by Minister of State for Education Jayant Chaudhary in response to a question raised by MP Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer.
A success story, until adolescence
The numbers tell two very different stories. At the primary level, girls are almost universally retained. The national dropout rate stands at a paltry 0.1 percent. In upper primary, it rises modestly to 3.4 percent.Then comes high school. The dropout rate doubles to more than 8 percent, making it almost 80 times higher than the primary stage figure. The sharp jump suggests that India’s challenge is no longer persuading families to send daughters to school, but ensuring they stay there once they reach adolescence.The pattern is surprisingly consistent across much of the country. Girls mostly stay in school for the first few years. Some begin to leave between grades 6 and 8. But the steepest decline occurs around grades 9 and 10, when many teenagers face a combination of social expectations, economic pressures and limited educational support.It raises a difficult question: If India has succeeded in getting girls into classrooms, why is it still struggling to keep them there?
Poverty alone does not explain the trend
The Centre’s response is based on the findings of the Periodic Labor Force Survey (PLFS) 2023-2024, identifying several reasons why girls stop studying.Some leave to supplement the family income. Others are forced into domestic responsibilities. In many cases, parents no longer consider higher education necessary for their daughters.These explanations point to economic realities, but state figures suggest the issue is more complex than poverty alone.Ladakh recorded the country’s highest high school dropout rate among girls at 15.6%, followed by Assam and Karnataka (13.9% each), Gujarat (13.3%) and Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland (12.4% each).The presence of relatively prosperous states alongside geographically difficult regions indicates that income is only part of the equation. Access to secondary schools, transportation, security concerns, social norms, early marriage, and the burden of unpaid domestic work are likely intersecting factors that influence educational continuity.
Toilets are no longer the biggest obstacle
The parliamentary question that sparked the discussion focused on school sanitation facilities, an issue long associated with girls’ education. In this sense, the government’s data present a much more encouraging picture.According to UDISE+ 2025–26, 95.4% of government schools now have separate functional toilets for girls, covering more than 9.5 lakh schools across the country. Delhi, Goa and Chandigarh reported full coverage, while Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram lagged behind with 67.9 percent and 72.7 percent, respectively.However, the Ministry of Education failed to establish a direct connection between toilet infrastructure and school retention.In its response, the ministry stated that no central study has established a direct causal relationship between the availability of girls’ toilets and women’s dropout rates.Instead, he highlighted the ongoing interventions under Samagra Shiksha, including financial support for sanitary pad vending machines and incinerators in schools. He also referred to a Ministry of Health initiative that reaches 53.9 lakh adolescent girls every month through menstrual hygiene awareness campaigns and sanitary napkin distribution.
Beyond enrollment, the next educational challenge
India’s education system has undeniably progressed over the past decade. Gender gaps in enrollment have narrowed considerably and universal access to primary education is increasingly becoming a reality.But the latest UDISE+ numbers underscore an uncomfortable truth: retention, not enrollment, is becoming the nation’s next education challenge.The transition to adolescence continues to expose structural inequalities that classrooms alone cannot resolve. Economic vulnerability, caregiving responsibilities, gender norms, and concerns about mobility often converge precisely when girls reach secondary school.The decline in dropout rates over the past three years is encouraging and reflects that policy interventions are having an impact. However, a dropout rate of 8% still represents thousands of girls whose education ends before they finish school.As policymakers celebrate improved enrollment and expanded infrastructure, the latest parliamentary data raises a bigger question: Can India really claim success in girls’ education if the journey still ends for one in twelve girls before they finish secondary school?