By Vanya Jain and Pari Ahuja
India’s ambitious plan to use digital technology to transform its educational system has a solid basis thanks to the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, which saw major strategic revisions in 2025. Fundamentally, NEP 2025 aims to create a future in which digital learning is not only complementary but essential—an integrated instrument that supports adaptability, individualized education, and fair access for all throughout India’s heterogeneous socioeconomic landscape.
The Union Budget 2025–26 highlights a strong digital push in education, allocating ₹500 crore for Centers of Excellence in ed-tech, ₹15,000 crore for school digital infrastructure, and ₹5,000 crore for AI integration. The SOAR project, targeting students from Classes 6–12, aims to bridge future skill gaps with foundational training in AI, machine learning, and coding.
These policies appear progressive and even visionary on the surface. They demonstrate a sincere attempt by the government to use technology for development and align with India’s overarching objective of becoming a global knowledge economy.
The gap between desire and accessibility, however, is a crucial fault line that policy cannot resolve on its own. The very students whom these policies are supposed to help are nonetheless excluded by the digital divide, despite the amazing blueprints. For many school-age children in India, especially those from rural, tribal, and economically disadvantaged regions, the promise of digital inclusion has not yet been realized.
Less than 60% of Indian schools have working computers, and nearly half do not have dependable internet connectivity, according to the 2023–2024 UDISE+ report. The lack of a personal smartphone, tablet, or reliable internet connection makes digital content and programs like SOAR all but meaningless for students from low-income families. However, such access is frequently taken for granted by the NEP and associated regulations. This structural oversight—a digital utopia written without taking analog disparities into account—reflects a significant gap between the formulation of policies and the realities on the ground.
Furthermore, devices and bandwidth are not the only factors contributing to the bottleneck. Teachers, mentors, and facilitators make up the human infrastructure, which is still woefully unprepared for the demands of tech-integrated teaching. Many public school instructors are still either undertrained or digitally illiterate despite years of EdTech expansion. No matter how sophisticated the digital learning material is, it is useless if teachers are not equipped, confident, or contextually trained to present it. When teacher training is offered, it is frequently one-time, theoretical, and lacks useful resources for classroom application.
When one takes into account the unequal distribution of public-private partnerships within the EdTech ecosystem, the disparity only gets worse. The top EdTech platforms in India serve mostly fee-paying, metropolitan, English-speaking students, yet there is little integration of these platforms into public education institutions. A framework for accountability or regulation to guarantee that private EdTech companies support larger national objectives is conspicuously lacking. As a result, we see the commercialization of educational innovation, whereby high-quality content is available but restricted by paywalls, forcing students in public schools to rely on inadequately financed, universally applicable government portals.
This inequity is exacerbated by differences at the state level. In terms of implementing smart classrooms, digital training for teachers, and locally relevant content, states like Kerala, Karnataka, and Delhi have achieved impressive strides. States that still struggle with basic electricity, let alone high-speed internet, include Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, and portions of Uttar Pradesh. Such disparate administrative and infrastructure realities cannot be sufficiently addressed by a centralized policy model. The implementation of the NEP is haphazard and frequently superficial as a result of the severely unequal state capacities filtering out its digital promise.
The policy narrative itself, however, raises perhaps the most concerning issues since it seems unduly fixated on advancing technology goals—AI, gamification, individualized learning—while neglecting fundamental disparities in fairness, access, and cultural inclusion. Multilingual content that represents the linguistic and cultural variety of Indian students is not given enough attention. Indigenous pedagogies and community-driven learning methods have limited room. The current state of digital education policy seems to be more in line with the demands of an urban class that aspires to be more successful than with the realities of rural India.
This discrepancy between the intention of the policy and its execution necessitates immediate reflection. Despite their ambition and good intentions, the NEP 2025 and related financial and programmatic efforts lack detailed, context-sensitive execution frameworks. The government needs to understand that democratization is a prerequisite for digitizing education. Technology access ought to be a right rather than a privilege. The idea of inclusive education is only a pipe dream until all students, regardless of caste, class, gender, or location, have the resources to engage in online learning.
Policy needs to shift from idealism to inclusivity in order to reverse this trend. To guarantee that every child in a public school receives a tablet or other learning gadget, the government should think about implementing a National Digital Access Mission, similar to the Mid-Day Meal Scheme.
Second, teacher preparation needs to be formalized as a yearly, experiential, and financially rewarding endeavor. A teacher who can use technology is essential, not a luxury. Additionally, training must be customized to local needs using local examples and digital resources in the vernacular.
Third, cooperation between the public and private sectors needs to be controlled, not voluntary. EdTech businesses that profit from India’s sizable market should be required to support public education through CSR-mandated infrastructure construction, free content licensing, and vernacular translations. The quality, ethics, and inclusivity of digital learning materials should be governed by a regulatory body similar to the Medical Council or the Bar Council.
Decentralization is crucial, fourth. States need to be given the authority and incentives to modify digital learning methods to fit their own socioeconomic circumstances. This entails creating culturally relevant digital content, working with local NGOs, and creating local curricula.
Finally, it is important to remember data privacy and digital wellbeing. Strong protections must be in place to stop data exploitation, surveillance, or algorithmic prejudice as APAAR IDs and AI-based learning analytics become more common. Instead of monitoring, education should empower.
In summary, EdTech has tremendous potential, but its realization depends more on how evenly our tools are dispersed than on how sophisticated they are. India has to decide between two possible futures: one in which digital education serves as a potent equalizer and another in which it represents yet another structural gap. Although NEP 2025 has a commendable goal, its implementation must be inclusive, equitable, and firmly based on the experiences of Indian students. We run the risk of transforming a transformative moment into a missed opportunity if we do not acknowledge this.
The breadth of its reach, not the capacity of its platforms, will define India’s educational destiny.
By Vanya Jain
https://www.instagram.com/vanya0805?igsh=MWlneXIzZnpkYjhwMA=
& Pari Ahuja
https://www.instagram.com/pallaviahuja?igsh=MXB6Y294eHk4d2g5ZQ==
The post EdTech and Inclusive Education: A Promise Unfulfilled or a Path Forward for India? appeared first on Borok Times.
