Inclusion and equity in India’s new National Education Policy (NEP): an analysis using the Context Led Model of Education Quality

Abstract

This article reports a qualitative document analysis of India’s NEP with a view to understand how the policy embeds notions of inclusion and equity. It also highlights how the policy sets out to achieve universal access to quality education for all children in India. An analytical framework based on the Context Led Model of Education Quality was developed with a focus on the dimensions of inclusion, relevance and participation to undertake the analysis. This framework offers a novel approach to comprehensively analyse and evaluate educational policies for diverse contexts. The key findings of our analysis suggested that even though the NEP makes progressive statements towards the transformation of the current education system in India, it presents pitfalls undermining social justice concerns of education. Possible ways to address some of the challenges observed in the policy are presented.