PRO BONO AND LEGAL AID             
                        CLINIC ON EDUCATION & 
                        LEGAL SERVICES COMMITTEE   
                        
                                                        
                                                   
          
          
         Inclusivity vis-à-vis 
         National Education 
         Policy 2020 
                                                           i 
          
                           PRO BONO AND LEGAL AID                         
                           CLINIC ON EDUCATION & 
                           LEGAL SERVICES COMMITTEE                      
               
               
              LIST OF  
              CONTRIBUTORS  
               
               
              PUBLISHED BY 
              National Law University, Delhi Press 
              Sector 14, Dwarka 
              New Delhi 110078 
               
              Published in January 2021 
              © National Law University, Delhi 2021 
              All rights reserved 
               
              SUPERVISION  
              Professor (Dr) Bharti Kumar, Professor of Law, National Law University Delhi  
               
              ASSISTANCE  
               Aadarsh Singh             Ayushi Pathak            Priya                       
               Abhinav Hansa Raman       Himanshu Mishra          Riya Shah                   
               Akshita Rai               Jeetu Tolani             Shreyasi Tripathi           
               Amit Verma                Kartikey Singh           Shubham Jain  
               Amber Tickoo              Kali Srikari Kancherla   Varsha Sharma               
               Anuna Tiwari              Manas Manu                
               Anugya Chauhan            Pritam Raman Giriya       
                                                                                                  ii 
               
       FOREWORD 
        
          
          The National Education Policy 2020 (“NEP 2020”) is the third educational policy 
          developed after 34 years. The first education policy was announced in 1968 based 
          on the reports and recommendations of the Kothari Commission, and the second 
          education policy was announced in 1986.  
          The  NEP  2020  has  a  transformative  vision  of  education  policy.  It  is  a 
          comprehensive policy that underscores the multi-disciplinary and multi-modal 
          universities,  including  technology-enabled  education.  It  envisages  increased 
          expenditure on education, about 6% of GDP which was suggested in the NEP 1968. 
          Currently,  the  Government  of  India  is  spending  less  than  3%  on  education. 
          Questions  arise  on  its  implementation  and  share  between  central  and  state 
          governments. 
          The  NEP  2020  helps  us  to  understand  the  futuristic  education  policy  in  our 
          country.  It  not  only  discusses  concepts  but  identifies  innovation  in  bringing 
          equality in education. The NEP 2020 seeks to “ensure inclusive and equitable 
          quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all” by 2030. 
          This aspirational goal remains a stark contrast to India’s learning outcomes which 
          remain stubbornly low.  
          It has drawn much attention to the theme of inclusive and equitable education. 
          The UNESCO in its Guidelines for Inclusion viewed inclusion ‘as a process which is 
          concerned  with  the  identification  and  removal  of  barriers’  of  education  and 
          ensures the presence, participation, and achievement of all students and their 
          diversities’.  Even  though  previous  education  policies  have  used  inclusive 
          education to make education accessible to all, there is still a lack of systemic effort 
          to explore the origins, meanings, and applications of inclusive education in India. 
                                            iii 
        
          The NEP 2020 has moved away from the traditional sites of exclusion and has 
          broadened the categories of Socio-Economically Disadvantaged Groups (SEDGs) 
          by  including  individuals  and  crucial  intersectionalities  such  as  migrant 
          communities,  transgender  individuals,  students  of  villages,  and  aspirational 
          districts. The clubbing of categories has potential risks of preferential treatment 
          not being put forward during the implementation more so for refugee children, 
          students of LGBQTI communities, internally displaced communities who did not 
          find recognition in any of the National Educational Policies including NEP 2020. 
          The National Education Policy document is one such policy document whose 
          inclusion affects the future discourse on our education, so the need to assess the 
          NEP 2020 from a different point of view was pressing.    
          With this aim, the Pro-bono and Legal Aid Clinic on Education and the Legal 
          Services Committee at National Law University Delhi successfully organized the 
          Essay Competition on “Inclusivity in the National Education Policy, 2020: A Needle 
          in  a  Haystack?”  which  deepens  our  understanding of the diverse origins and 
          influences of inclusive education in the NEP 2020. The essays in the compendium 
          reflect on diverse aspects of inclusivity such as community engagement, disability, 
          skill-based  education,  income-based  inequality,  masculinity,  sexuality,  rural-
          urban  divide,  language,  and  privatization.  Each  essay  in  the  compendium 
          strengthens the meaning of inclusion in education and thus focuses on changing 
          how the educational system addresses exclusion.  
          I congratulate Prof. Bharti Kumar and all the members of the Pro-bono and Legal 
          Aid  Clinic  on  Education  and  the  Legal  Services  Committee  at  National  Law 
          University  Delhi  for  having  undertaken  this  initiative  in  gathering  students' 
          perspectives across India to critically examine the provisions of NEP 2020 from 
          the lens of inclusivity concerning individuals, institutions as well as communities. 
          I am delighted to learn that more than eighty essays were received for evaluation 
          across India for the competition showing the prominence and concern towards 
          the cause of inclusion in education today. I am sure that this compendium will 
          enhance our understanding of systematizing inclusive education in the Indian and 
          comparative context. This compendium has shown that there is a need to place 
          inclusive education within a common framework which will provide important 
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