Closing India’s foundational literacy gap

This article is authored by Poornima Garg, country director, Room to Read India.

India has largely conquered the textbook challenge. Through decades of infrastructure and enrollment drives, millions of children now have books in their hands. Yet, we have produced a generation that can decode words but cannot necessarily ‘read’. A severely under-recognised cause for stubbornly weak learning outcomes. That distinction is no longer a footnote in policy conversations but sits at the heart of the debate now underway as the NIPUN Bharat Mission charts the path for its next phase, or NIPUN 2.0.

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This pedagogical failure amounts to the denial of a foundational human right to several children, as it takes away their agency. When a child fails to transition from learning to read to reading to learn by Grade 3, their academic future is compromised. As we look at the educational landscape in 2026, the correlation between learning outcomes and reading for meaning, pleasure, and sheer curiosity has never been more critical. The gap remains stark, as echoed by the government's own assessment of the NIPUN Bharat Mission (the PARAKH Rashtriya Sarvekshan (PRS) 2024). While it found Grade 3 children, who benefited from NIPUN Bharat, scoring a nationwide average of 64% in language (the strongest of any grade tested), the underlying data reveal a slump to 60% specifically in reading comprehension. Decoding, evidently, is improving faster than comprehension. This reality is reflected in the latest Economic Survey, reminding us that while universal school access is a victory, it does not automatically create a reading culture. Yet this is not fundamentally a policy problem. India has a strong framework for foundational literacy. The challenge is a translation problem: Ensuring that policies are effectively implemented, and that classroom practice reflects what we know about how children learn to read. That is where the next phase of NIPUN Bharat must focus.

First, the market gap. India’s children’s book market is valued at a mere ₹720 crore, comprising a fraction of the overall publishing industry. Most of this is dominated by academic titles, leaving a massive vacuum for high-quality, age-appropriate leisure literature. Furthermore, there is a severe scarcity of diverse, locally relevant stories in Indian languages. Without books that reflect a child’s own reality and tongue, reading remains a chore rather than a choice.

Second, systemic design. Our education system is currently optimised for completing the portion rather than building deep understanding and meaningful reading habits. While the Union Budget 2026-27 allocates ₹1.39 lakh crore to education, the challenge is not simply one of funding but of misalignment within the implementation structure. The first disjuncture begins at the level of goal setting: Is each strand within the government structure aligned to that goal? When assessments, textbooks, teacher preparation, and classroom support work toward different priorities, reading risks becoming a task for examinations rather than a social practice for life.

This is important because foundational literacy is built through meaningful reading - a goal that Room to Read’s Literacy Portfolio also supports, where all children develop literacy skills and a love of reading, enabling them to pursue lifelong learning and make informed decisions. As children move from learning to read to reading to learn, they develop the ability to understand, question, and engage with ideas. These are the skills that support learning across every subject.

This transition ultimately happens in a classroom, where teachers play a vital role in shaping children's reading experiences. A reading-centric classroom is built not by mandated curricula alone, but by an educator acting as a curator of imagination. By integrating storytelling and read-alouds, teachers shift the dynamic from passive content delivery to active engagement.

We already see this transformation taking place across classrooms in India. In one central Indian primary school, a Grade 3 teacher begins the day with a story where children ask questions to explore meaning rather than recall facts. As the story evolves into discussions and dramatisations, reading ceases to be a confined period and instead becomes a habit. This classroom success is not an exception; it demonstrates what is possible when implementation builds on the native knowledge of teachers and works alongside existing government structures. Sustainable change comes when support reaches the system at every level.

However, this transformation still relies too heavily on individual motivation rather than the institutional support required to make reading a systemic reality. Moving from successful classrooms to wider system change requires turning knowledge into action, ensuring educators have the tools, training, and support they need to help children learn effectively. To scale this vision, we recommend three strategic shifts:

First, policy must mandate protected reading hours - time entirely decoupled from the pressure of testing. Reading should be a sanctuary for curiosity rather than a chore of memorisation, supported by investments in diverse, multilingual titles that address the current gap in children’s literature.

Second, we must reclaim reading spaces during assessment cycles. Libraries and reading corners are often the first casualties during exams, reflecting a belief that reading for pleasure is valuable, but ultimately expendable. If reading is foundational to comprehension, it cannot be suspended when learning is being measured.

Finally, we must treat reading as a social practice. Rather than a solitary task, reading culture flourishes through shared reading circles, storytelling, and conversations around books. For first-generation readers especially, these interactions build the confidence and language skills necessary to transform reading from a classroom task into a lifelong practice.

India has demonstrated that scale in education is possible. The next challenge is depth. Reimagining classrooms from textbook access to reading culture does not require abandoning structure. It requires strengthening the connection between policy, pedagogy, and publishing so that children encounter reading as meaningful, joyful, and sustained.

The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 provides the blueprint, and NIPUN Bharat's next phase is the live vehicle for delivering on it - but only if intent translates into daily practice, and reading comprehension is written into its goals as explicitly as decoding and arithmetic already are. If we continue to prioritize the delivery of content over the cultivation of readers, our learning outcomes will remain fragile. Making reading a national priority is not simply an educational imperative; it is a democratic necessity. A nation that aspires to equity, creativity, and lifelong learning cannot afford to produce children who can navigate a textbook but are lost in a library. We must redesign our classrooms so that reading is routine, protected, and valued.

As India designs NIPUN 2.0, this is the moment to make that shift to official policy and everyday practice. Room to Read’s experience shows that lasting change comes from working with existing government systems, not creating parallel structures. This means building on teachers’ knowledge, supporting implementation at every level, and helping translate policy ambition into classroom reality. Only then will we move from a nation of decoders to a nation of thinkers.

(The views expressed are personal)

This article is authored by Poornima Garg, country director, Room to Read India.