Congress flags rising education costs, youth distress

The Congress on Sunday said the recent student protests at Jantar Mantar and other parts of the country are not driven solely by allegations of examination irregularities, but reflect a deeper wave of frustration among young people and their families over the rising cost and limited accessibility of education.

Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said that while the immediate trigger for the protests was an alleged flawed examination system, the growing anger among students and parents stems from broader concerns highlighted by household expenditure trends.

"The Jantar Mantar and other protests in recent weeks have had proximate causes in an unfair and rigged exam system put in place by the deadly duo of Pradhan Mantri and (ex-)Mantri Pradhan. But the agony, anguish, and anger of youth and their parents have more fundamental causes of both accessibility and affordability revealed by the CMIE household expenditure data," Ramesh said.

Citing a recent analysis by the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) based on household expenditure data from 2014-15 to 2025-26, Ramesh said education expenses have grown at a pace far exceeding household income, forcing families to devote an increasingly larger share of their earnings towards securing education.

He highlighted that private tuition has become one of the fastest-rising components of education spending, while school and college fees have continued to climb steadily over the past decade, consistently outpacing income growth.

Ramesh also pointed to the sharp rise in spending on books and learning materials, saying the trend could reflect increasing costs of textbooks, competitive examination preparation and supplementary educational resources.

"Private tuition has emerged as one of the fastest-growing components of household expenditure on education. School and college fees have recorded sustained growth throughout the last decade, consistently outpacing household income growth," he said.

"The youth and their parents are crying out for remedial action NOW," Ramesh added.

His remarks came a day after Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan resigned amid sustained political pressure over the NEET paper leak controversy. The resignation followed weeks of protests led by the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP), which had demanded accountability and sweeping reforms in the examination system.

Announcing his decision, Pradhan said the developments of the previous 10 days had deeply saddened him and clarified that the issue was "not a matter of personal prestige."

The Congress said the latest developments should go beyond addressing immediate exam-related concerns and called for wider reforms to make education more affordable, accessible and equitable for millions of students across the country.

With PTI inputs